Pretty and Fresh: The Clean Girl Makeup Trend
Here at SHEGLAM, we believe makeup is an art form, and a well-beat face is like its own art project — but sometimes you don’t have time to go full glam. Or maybe you just want to highlight your natural glow instead.
Enter clean girl makeup — the fresh-faced makeup trend taking the internet by storm. When it comes to clean girl makeup, less is more, and your natural features take center stage. However, just because minimalism is the operating principle here doesn’t mean that there isn’t any work involved.
Keep reading, and we’ll walk you through everything you need to know to nail the clean girl makeup look.
1. Glowing Skin
If beauty is skin deep, skin is a pretty important part of your makeup routine! Especially for the clean girl look, which calls for a foundation of glowy, hydrated skin. Everyone’s skin is slightly different, so experiment with different skincare routines and pay attention to how your skin reacts to figure out what works best for you.
There are a few skincare staples that are non-negotiables, though, and number one is a high-quality makeup remover. Sleeping in your makeup is the quickest way to dehydrate your skin, so always remove makeup with a double-cleanse before going to bed or applying the rest of your skincare ingredients.
We particularly love this nourishing face cleansing balm, packed with vegetable extracts, vitamin C, and the soothing scent of the neroli flower. It starts as a balm but transforms into an oil as you rub it into your skin.
Just a few pats are enough to remove your makeup, and those extra hydrating ingredients will protect your moisture barrier the next day. Finally, choosing a good moisturizer is also key to unlocking that natural, dewy skin.
Cover Up Those Blemishes
The clean girl look is all about effortless beauty. You want to look like you just stepped out of the shower with a fresh, clean face and spent no more than a minute in front of the mirror. In other words? Leave the contouring for another day. Concealer, though, is totally okay.
Use a shade that closely matches your natural skin tone to conceal your blemishes as much as possible. Use a tapping technique to get the most out of a small amount of product. We recommend first dotting the concealer onto the back of your hand or wrist, then using a finger to transfer the concealer from your hand to the blemish with light tapping.
Not only does this warm up the concealer formula, making it easier to blend, but it will also use a much smaller amount of product, which is essential for a fresh-faced, makeup-less look. Our Like Magic 12HR concealer is perfect for this — the liquid formula is super buildable, and the coverage lasts all day.
Highlighter
Once you’ve taken steps to let your skin shine from the inside out, all you need is the lightest touch of makeup to nail the glowy skin of the clean girl look. Take a liquid highlighter and dab it onto your wrist to warm up the formula.
We recommend our Glow Bloom liquid highlighter in shade Vanilla Frost for this — it’s super light and dewy, but layers well for a buildable, natural shine.
Using a finger, dot highlighter onto the highest parts of your face: The tops of your cheekbones, the tip of your nose, your cupid’s bow, and even the inner corners of your eyes (just be careful not to get any makeup into your actual eyes).
You can use your finger to blend the highlighter into your skin for an even, subtle look, or lightly dot it with a fluffy brush.
Remember, the goal here is to look like you just rolled out of bed with an even, fresh-faced glow. The more blended your highlighter is, the better it will fit the clean girl aesthetic.
2. Fluffy Brows
Perhaps the most iconic part of the clean girl makeup look is the fluffy brows (also known as “soap brows” on TikTok). To achieve this high-volume, viral look, start by combing out completely bare brows with a spoolie brush, then going over them once more with clear brow gel.
Be sure to use a light touch — you want your brows to look naturally voluminous, not frozen in gel. Once you apply the gel, use a flat surface to lightly comb over the tops of your brows to provide just a bit more shape. Then, leave your brows alone for at least three minutes to let the gel dry and set.
We recommend using our Set Me Up Brow Hold kit for this task. It comes with a spoolie brush and clear gel specifically formulated for maximum hold with minimum pore clog-age. The spoolie brush is double-sided with a flat end, so you can use that side to comb over the tops of your brows.
Once your brows have been shaped to perfection, use an eyebrow pencil to lightly fill in any obvious gaps. No need to fully fill them in or go crazy, just enough coverage to make them look naturally bushy and full.
(When in doubt, start with a super-light touch and slowly layer on more until you’ve reached the perfect level of coverage.) Voila — you’ve nailed the fluffy brow look!
3. Other Light Touches
While a glowing complexion and full, fluffy brows are the cornerstones of the clean girl look, there are a few other essential finishing touches to nail this look.
One of our favorite tricks to looking more bright-eyed and pretty with minimal makeup is applying clear mascara. Start off by curling your eyelashes with a sturdy eyelash curler, then apply just a few strokes of clear mascara. This will help hold the curl in place and create the illusion of natural volume without the potential for mess that regular mascara holds.
Of course, no fresh-faced glow would be complete without hydrated, baby-soft lips! Just like the rest of your skin, your lips can benefit from plenty of moisturizing and care. We recommend using a lip care kit, such as our Pillow Lips Lip Care Cream, before you go to bed each night.
This cream is infused with nourishing ingredients like jojoba seed oil, avocado oil, and vitamin E (an antioxidant) to repair dry or cracked skin and let you roll out of bed with lips good enough to kiss. The best part? All the ingredients are vegan, meaning no animals had to suffer for your pretty pout.
Apply the Pillow Lips cream before you go to bed each night and swipe on just a touch of lip oil in the morning to finish out your clean girl look. We like Jelly Wow Hydrating Lip Oil in shade “Loco for Coco” for a non-sticky, subtle shine.
Easy Breezy Beauty
Whether you’re new to learning about clean girl makeup or have been seeing it all over your TikTok For You Page for months, one thing is obvious: It takes a lot of work to look this effortlessly gorgeous!
Perfecting your skincare routine, figuring out how to perfectly shape your brows, and finding your ideal amount of highlighter all take time. But with these clean girl makeup tips in your back pocket, you can’t go wrong.
While we love a high-effort, artistic makeup look, the best part about the clean girl trend is that it creates a clean canvas for your own natural beauty to shine. There’s no contouring away features or letting your perfect smokey eye take center stage here — instead, all eyes are on you and your natural beauty.
So the next time you’re running late and need a quick makeup fix, or want to steal the show with a pretty and unassuming glow, try the clean girl look. We’re pretty sure you’ll be turning heads for the rest of the night.