The glow-up gripe: When did makeovers become so complicated

Makeover tropes used to be easy. Curls got smoothed; straight hair got wavy. Brows were tweezed out of their caterpillar stage. The magic wand came out of a mascara tube. Everyone got sent home, delighted, with a structured jacket over a flowy shirt, dark mid-/rise jeans and wedge-heels (“This is the real you, honey!”). For a while, Oprah Winfrey’s show even did make-unders: Sartorially toning down women who had gone too far with hair treatments, make-up, loud prints and jewellery.

It’s so complicated now, they don’t even call it a makeover. They say glow-ups.

On Instagram, @instamyodell has been breaking down the idea of stealth wealth, specifically, the neutral-toned, logo-free looks featured by the bickering billionaires on HBO’s Succession. A Loro Piana shirt, we’re learning, looks and feels luxe even though it carries no branding. Super-rich Swedes wear generic Fjällräven sweatshirts. Poor folks carry “ludicrously capacious” handbags to lug around lunch pails and flats for the subway, even if the bag in question is from Burberry and costs ₹2.6 lakh.

In Viral Reels, @imageconsultantmaidenhead places bib after bib of different colour palettes on to clients’ shoulders before triumphantly sensing the right one. “You have a cool undertone, but you pull a soft autumn,” she coos. A what? It has something to do with looking good in muted warm tones but also rocking bright hues. Maybe it’s the other way around? No one’s sure.

On YouTube, fashion influencers, devouring hauls from Shein and Zara, are convinced that every outfit needs a pop of colour to look complete. Older ladies, schilling classic elegance, preach the opposite: Nothing must pop. Take off the most garish component of the look, and you’re good to go.

Queer Eye isdriving some new dressing rules. Cargo shorts are the devil. “Every man’s closet should have a dark pair of blue jeans, a black jean and a mid-wash jean,” says stylist Tan France. If you can’t half-tuck your top into your bottoms, like he suggests, don’t bother getting out of the house. If you can’t zhuzh your hair (groom and tease it into fashion) every day, the way JVN does, you’re basically a Neanderthal.

Stylists across the world are pulling all sorts of tricks from their pre-loved Hermes Kellys and passing them off as regulation. There’s a three-colour rule (any more is too much) and a rule of thirds (chest, midsection, legs). There’s also pattern-clashing, monochromatic matching, and colour blocking. It’s finally okay to combine gold and silver accessories. But warm and cool-toned whites must resolutely never mix. There are rules about where jeans can be ripped, how high a kurta slit should go, how messy a messy bun can be, how sleeves should be rolled up, and where, precisely, the extra pleat on a silk sari should sit.

Meanwhile when shopping, it’s no longer enough to know if you’re apple-shaped (heavier on the shoulders), a pear (heaviest at the hips), or an hourglass. New body-type classifications include diamond (like a pear, but not exactly), cornet, goblet, skittle , even lollipop. Each calls for different clothes. There are only two ways to get it right. One is out of fashion, the other is out of budget. Both are out of stock.

Scientists have long been telling the world that colour theory is only a theory, that the colour wheel is imprecise. That cornets and lollipops are healthy bodies too. That bright colours and prints (as India knows) do not strain the eye or overwhelm the mind. There really is no science, no fundamental commandments for dressing well. Fashion breaks its own rules all the time. Don’t let it rule your life.