Beauty Series #8: Beauty Trends

Folder highlights
Podcast episode details for "Beauty Trends" feature Dr. Lawrence Bass advising against chasing surgical trends for timeless, natural results.

Summer Hardy (00:01):
Welcome to Park Avenue Plastic Surgery Class, the podcast where we explore controversies and breaking issues in plastic surgery. I'm your co-host, Summer Hardy, a clinical assistant at Bass Plastic Surgery in New York City. I'm excited to be here with Dr. Lawrence Bass Park Avenue plastic surgeon, educator and technology innovator. The title of today's episode is Beauty Trends. Okay. Dr. Bass, another episode in our beauty series. What are we talking about today?

Dr. Lawrence Bass (00:29):
I've mentioned beauty trends before in passing, but wanted to provide a more in-depth discussion of some of the concerns around beauty trends.

Summer Hardy (00:39):
This is definitely a prime topic for discussion that would benefit from a little expert input. How did he get started on the idea of a whole episode on this topic?

Dr. Lawrence Bass (00:48):
Well, I saw a comment somewhere in beauty media, I don't want to name names that said the latest new beauty trend was for facelifts to have a demure, natural look, and I had a good laugh about that. But when I stopped chuckling, I got serious and decided to discuss this topic in more depth and do a whole podcast episode around it. I was laughing because in my patient population and my part of the country, a natural undetectable look, as well as the people that trained me who are among the most highly regarded aesthetic plastic surgeons in the world, that natural undetectable look has always been the prime objective after safety. So to me, this is nothing new or trendy, it's just part of basic principles, the fundamental approach I've been taking with facelift and other forms of aesthetic surgery over the past 30 plus years. But I recognize that demure where it is a trending word on social media in the last year. So I'm guessing the writer at the magazine probably decided this was a trend based on that word trending on social media or some commentary from Southern California celebrities who picked up that word and decided to moderate some of the more overblown things that they've done in aesthetic treatments.

Summer Hardy (02:20):
Okay, that makes sense. So where do these beauty trends come from?

Dr. Lawrence Bass (02:24):
Well, on some level everyone's talking about beauty, but the main places where these trends get created is in media, magazines, TV, social media and influencers. So beyond just people showing things and plastic surgeons and dermatologists talking about beauty, medical treatments, influencers formally add to the trending aspect.

Summer Hardy (02:54):
And what are all these parties doing to create these trends?

Dr. Lawrence Bass (02:58):
Well, their job is to produce content to entertain us and bring us new things, and they have an issue or a broadcast that they have to fill again and again forever. So there has to be this constant stream of new things. This means they need to create fads and trends or at least report on the local emergence of them in order to fulfill their mission. They've got a job to do, and we're all familiar with this fashion cycle. We see it in clothes, wide lapels are in then narrow lapels are in wide ties or skinny ties. Shoulder pads are in women's jackets. Then there's no shoulder pads. Pants have straight legs or bell bottoms. Jackets get shorter, they get longer, then they get shorter again. So that's all good. Your clothes wear out and you have to replace them. You need new ones. So it's okay to change it up a little bit and that works.

Summer Hardy (03:57):
Okay. I've seen these fashion trends come and go, but when it comes to beauty, how should we respond to these trends? Are they to be avoided altogether or do they play some role in fashioning our look?

Dr. Lawrence Bass (04:09):
Well, there's definitely a role. Beauty trends are like fashion trends, and we do that with makeup and hairstyles, and these are safe temporary things to experiment with to help create the image we'd like to project to the outside world. Still, beauty is not a hundred percent subject to trends. There's something timeless about beauty, and it springs from various biological stimuli and responses. Youth is very closely tied to beauty in all cultures, and every culture in every individual has a somewhat different image of beauty or perhaps multiple images of what's beautiful to them. But understand the trends help you to fit in and look like many others rather than to stand out with your individuality. And as Americans, we often like to express ourselves individually rather than go with the herd.

Summer Hardy (05:05):
That's a good point, Dr. Bass. Now, when it comes to plastic surgery itself, where do beauty trends fit in?

Dr. Lawrence Bass (05:11):
Well, I personally think that it's a very different story with beauty trends in surgery. It's really not a good idea to cycle your looks surgically. And some examples, I've spent a lot of time in the 1990 suctioning fat out of ladies' buttock areas to give them a slimmer smaller buttock. And right now there's a trend to have a high shelf like bottom, that's the Kim Kardashian look. And other people don't want that unnatural high and over wide look, but they do want a full curvy bottom that looks female. So those are all trends, but you wouldn't want to seesaw back and forth with those. I've seen patients who use permanent fillers, which are always a bad idea to create a Kewpie doll face or be stung lips, and that may not look appropriate or ideal at a different age. Remember, permanent fillers are not approved in the US overall with one exception and not a good idea in general because you're fixing a look that's trending but may not make sense to you at some time in the future.

Summer Hardy (06:26):
You mentioned that beauty standards vary somewhat by location. Can you expand on that?

Dr. Lawrence Bass (06:31):
There are regional differences and saying that, of course, everyone in a certain location who's pursuing plastic surgery doesn't have the same outlook on this. There are reasonable gradations over a very wide range. So I don't want to paint every individual with the trend happening in their area of the country. But there are patterns to how outlook on plastic surgery differs in different locations. We're heavily influenced by our environment, by others around us, and what a good breast size looks like to somebody in one part of the country or what in an attractive body shape is, may not look as natural or as desirable to people in another part of the country. Some of this comes from culture and upbringing, but we continue to modulate our beauty standards based on those around us and what we're shown in movies, magazines, TV and social media, basically celebrities.

(07:29):
And if we think back to the old days corsets that were waist cinchers, bustles and Victorian dresses, these were fashion garments designed to create a certain what was viewed as beautiful, desirable female body shape. And it's the question of the chicken and the egg. Did the creation of these corsets create a desire for cinched, narrow waists, or was it a response to a desire to show those because that was perceived as beautiful and what we consider normal or desirable or average in breast implant size varies greatly in different parts of the country in different social groups. Other countries in the world have a very different outlook on it than what most Americans do. So there's no one standard. But if all the ladies at the pool at the beach are augmented, look very large, and you are not as large, you feel that and that puts some pressure on you to move in their direction.

(08:34):
You may not have any surgery, you may have an augmentation surgery and go much more modest, but it exerts a pressure on you in terms of what looks normal, desirable, attractive, and average, because that's all around you in your environment. I often think of another example. So many of the models who were in beauty magazines had a lip shape where they were pumped up in the corners of the upper lip, which is not a natural shape, but so many models had it. And it was in so many fashion magazine and beauty magazine pictures that patients would come in and ask me for those lips, even though they were demonstrably unnatural because they had seen it so many times, it became desirable. The upper lip is supposed to taper as it goes towards the corner, not be fullest at the corner. That's an unnatural shape.

Summer Hardy (09:31):
That makes sense. So can you share some takeaways about beauty trends with our listeners, Dr. Bass?

Dr. Lawrence Bass (09:37):
The first thing to do is think about if a trend is just a turn of the wheel in the cycle of fashion, or is it a true advance in the capabilities or outlook of the field? So think of that facelift example. I mean, we've always wanted natural facelifts. We incrementally get better and better at making facelifts perfectly natural, but that's really not a change. It's just being put out as a trend. Is it a step forward in meeting timeless goals of beauty for youth and a beautiful appearance? Or again, is it just a variation in outlook without any real technical or production capability associated with it? The distinction between changing your appearance, improving it versus restoring a youthful appearance is something always to keep in mind. So both are okay. Both are things we spend a lot of time doing in plastic surgery, but you have to have the goal clearly in mind.

(10:40):
Are you trying to improve your appearance, harmonize it, become more beautiful, or are you trying to restore your appearance, undo some aging changes and look more like yourself the way you looked a few years back? Overall, small changes that aren't dramatic are usually best and dramatic changes are more likely to pass out of fashion and need to be reworked. And again, this is a really bad idea with surgery. Now I'll admit this is a philosophical statement and some people like to create a great deal of drama with their appearance, and we as a society believe they should have that freedom. But overall, you're less likely to have buyer's remorse if you follow the philosophy I'm advancing and create a natural look that fits your personal definition of beauty and not some trend that would make you fit in with a common look rather than stand out for your individual, beautiful look.

Summer Hardy (11:40):
Thank you as always for bringing us intriguing and relevant commentary on current events in the beauty world. Thank you for listening to the Park Avenue Plastic Surgery Class podcast. Follow us on Apple Podcasts, write a review and share the show with your friends. Be sure to join us next time to avoid missing all the great content that is coming your way. If you want to contact us with comments or questions, we'd love to hear from you, send us an email at podcast@drbass.net or DM us on Instagram at @drbassnyc.