What Will We Look Like In 20 Years?

0:28This is The Run Through. I'm Chloe Mel. at what they called it, the future of appearance. It is a snapshot predicting what we all might look like in two decades. And it breaks down what features on our faces and bodies we will be enhancing and the beauty treatments that will be in hot demand in the years to come. And for their reporting, they spoke to plastic surgeons, CEOs in the beauty industry. They looked at the ways AI will show up in the future. So there really was a lot that went into this. And I loved hearing the conversation. I thought it was really interesting. Yeah, the AI renderings of the faces of the future really spooked me.

1:07But, you know, we're already sort of like halfway there. Honestly, when I scroll through my Instagram, I think filters have taken us halfway there. We're just kind of catching up IRL with how our faces are going to look. Anyway, can't wait to listen for that. Choma, we are coming off Easter weekend. Did you do anything to celebrate? No, I just went for a hike. But, you know, I'm kind of curious to know what you did because as a kid, I used to love Easter. And I know you have two little ones who are adorable. It's really tailor-made for kids, I have to say. It's like Easter Bunny is a completely confusing entity.

1:46But he really, he makes it fun. Yeah. There's chocolate. More fun than Santa, a bit more nimble. Yes, hide and seek. There was a whole thing this year that because the price of eggs is so expensive, people were dying potatoes. Oh, God. Really? They did not turn out well. They looked like planets with eyes. Oh, dear. And even Arthur was like, these are weird. But we also did dye some eggs, and then we've been eating them all week, which is fun. No, it goes to waste. Yeah. Choma, how's your trip to New York been? It's been great. It's been really fun. I mean, kicked it off with the Ralph Lauren show, which was actually such a fun New York moment.

2:27Usually Ralph shows in the evening, but he showed in this sort of like Lightfield gallery, the Jack Shaman gallery, and had been recently renovated. And so that's this incredible ceiling. I am curious, Choma. I always enjoy that Ralph Lauren shows off calendar because it just makes it feel like more of a special event. But I'm curious if you can explain to us why they choose to do that. That's a good question. I think certain brands understand that they can get their community together for these moments. I think Ralph obviously has a very starry circle of friends and fans of the brand and usually shows close to the Met Gala because that's when a lot of the Ralph fans are in town.

3:15And it was exceptionally starry. I mean, to see Anne Hathaway and I mean, who else was there? Naomi Watts, Michelle Williams. Also, Julia Louis-Dreyfus, who was a big excitement for me. Yeah. No, they had a really a very major front row. What would you say was the fashion takeaway from the show? It felt very true. I mean, Ralph always like has, speaks to the things like his loves, his obsessions. I think in a nutshell, it was kind of like tender and tough, like this kind of tension between sort of romantic, like Victorian style blouses with these sort of tough leather jackets. Tender and tough is so good.

3:59Yeah. And I think, you know, you think of those great 80s and 90s Ralph campaigns and it sort of spoke, it had a little bit of that nostalgia to it, but it felt super, super good for now. um yeah and i think there's been kind of a romantic mood in the air think about the chloe collection um you know what shaman has been doing at chloe and it had a i think it was ralph kind of claiming that some of that history but in his own way with that sort of those red Leather staples that we all love. And the evening wear was really fab, too. It was very wearable. It's a long, embroidered shirt dress. You can just imagine someone, like, sweeping onto the red carpet and looking kind of effortless in.

4:50Yeah. Actually very Anne Hathaway. Mm-hmm. Yeah. She was shopping. Yeah, she was definitely shopping. Choma, what is your resort schedule? And what shows are you excited about? Usually resort season tends to be destination shows. Chanel is showing their cruise collection in Lake Como next Tuesday. Fuiton is showing in Avignon. Dior, I believe, is also in Italy. I know that Dolce is showing in Rome this year. Resort shows are happening in Italy. Resort shows are happening in Italy. So it's going to be a busy summer. Well, speaking of Italy, big, big Italy week with the beloved Pope dying on Easter.

5:30I know. I know. I love him. I know. And I was sort of moved by how moved the whole world was by this. Like, it really felt like it sort of rocked everyone in a way I wasn't totally anticipating. Same. And I think a lot of people are sort of learning about his life, his legacy, what sort of humble approach he had to the papacy. Wanting to be buried in a very simple, you know, coffin, living in very simple quarters. His sort of plea to J.D. Vance to remember and be kind of have some sympathy and empathy for immigrants. I think it resonates at this moment in history when everybody is like when the world feels quite out of control and someone who was kind of doing doing such amazing work and not making, I don't know, just the humanity of him.

6:23Yeah. The funeral will be this weekend in Rome. And I know sort of all heads of state will be going. I think it'll be a big moment. We have Chiara Barzini, who's a great Roman writer. I love Chiara. She's doing a sort of postcard from Rome for us. She spoke to a gentleman who's a Vatican insider for some inside scoop. And also, I'm so excited, Anna Cofola is doing a really fun piece on Filippo Sorcinelli, who is the Pope's tailor. He's this very handsome gay man who Butt Magazine just did a big spread on. But we will be getting something exclusive, too. And then there's also the famous, more traditional Pope's tailor, Gamma Relli, which is where you can get the iconic red socks.

7:11That's sort of an if-you-know-you-know-Rome. Well, didn't Andre Liantali buy his socks there? Yes. Everyone buys their socks at Gamma Relli. You heard it here last, people. But so we're speaking to Gamma Relli and Filippo about making the future Pope's vestments. And Gamorelli told Anna that they are already preparing vestments in small, medium and large, depending on who it is. I love that. Which I love. But yes, I also think that because of Conclave, the film, there's increased interest. But Emma Spector did do a great fact versus fiction, the movie versus real life. And fun fact, Emma's mom, Alessandra Stanley, was a Vatican reporter for many years in her youth.

7:53Yes. So, yeah, that's been a big moment. and last night, we're recording this Wednesday afternoon, but last night there was a surprise concert in Washington Square Park by Lorde. How cool. Sort of prepping for a new album. We had an inside tip, so Irene Kim and Sam Sussman went as our intrepid boots on the ground, but she was supposed to come on at 7 p.m. and came on at 9.30 p.m., but apparently it was a real New York moment of sort of screaming teenagers and college students all sort of huddled together in Washington Square Park waiting for that. Oh, I love that. I'm actually, tonight, I'm going to see a sort of performance on the roof of Soho House of 50 Cent, which is quite a different crowd.

8:41But I'm quite excited. Same but different. Same but different.

8:48Choma, tell us what you can about how your Met look is coming. I want to know accessories too. I want to know glam plans. Okay. Yeah. The glam, the accessories are all coming together. I've got some really cool Tory Birch shoes. I'm going with Tory Birch to the Met. And they have these really amazing metal detail that sort of hooks up with the belt that I'm wearing. It's this huge metallic kind of Western inspired belt by Martine Rose. And actually was just getting some updates about my look. My suit is ready. But the shirt and the tie are still in the works, which makes me slightly nervous because obviously these things have to be shipped from the UK from Martine's studio.

9:36And then sort of figuring out some jewels. I think I'm going to wear some Cartier jewels, maybe a brooch, maybe some earrings. We're hearing a lot of brooch, big brooch energy. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I think it's a brooch moment. It is a brooch moment. I'm going to be in the war room for the evening, but I'm still going to wear something fabulous because I would like to go to an after party or two. GQ is hosting an after party with Ander 3000, which sounds fab. Yeah, I'm excited for that. And there's a really pretty duro olowu dress that I love that I'm looking at. And then there's also a really pretty erdom tailored sort of long coat embroidered and embellished suit jacket that I thought was good for the theme.

10:23And then for the pre-met party, which is at Ginny's Supper Club, the jazz club in the basement of Red Rooster, Marcus Samuelson's restaurant in Harlem. The theme or the dress code is Blue Notes because it's a sort of a jazz age reference. And so I think people should wear blue. I loved the Christopher John Rogers by J.Crew collaboration. And there's a really pretty blue sequin dress from that that I'm excited about. Yeah, I didn't pack enough blue. But I think I've got like this kind of navy blue striped Vivian Westwood jacket. And this red kind of flapperish. Perfect. Bodhi thing that I can wear over some denim, some blue jeans.

11:07That's what I'm going to. Oh, there you go. There's your blue note. Yeah, exactly. Exactly. Oh, we didn't talk about Sinners. I'm going to see Sinners. People are obsessed with Sinners. I know. It was impossible to get tickets. Really? I love that. Yeah. Back to the movies. Yeah, because we want to go see it in IMAX. Oh, my God. So fun. I know Thespi was seeing it in 70mm, which I thought was a very chic video person thing. Yeah, Sinners. Unfortunately, the only movie I've seen in theaters recently is Minecraft with Arthur Albert. but you do you. It's a sleeper here. I've heard it's made so much money at the box office.

11:45It's no comment. But you know what? They're there to support my children.

11:54The Run-Through will be back with Nicole Phelps.

12:10You come to the New Yorker Radio Hour for conversations that go deeper with people you really want to hear from, whether it's Bruce Springsteen or Questlove or Olivia Rodrigo, Liz Cheney, or the godfather of artificial intelligence, Jeffrey Hinton, or some of my extraordinarily well-informed colleagues at the New Yorker. So join us every week on the New Yorker Radio Hour, wherever you listen to podcasts.

12:44It is so good to have you both here. And I'm going to start with you, Natisha. We have talked about Botox and fillers for as long as I have been in fashion publishing, over two decades. But we are here today to talk about the future, the next two decades, 20 years from now. Can you give us some broad strokes based on these articles about where the beauty industry and all of us are heading next? Of course. I think what's really interesting is looking at the past 20 years and what the real shift is and what's taking place. We've gone from coming out of the 90s into a very strong beauty YouTube influencer industry with heavy glam.

13:25So we've gone from the likes of highlighting, contouring, baking to a real shift where consumers are now really into this internal understanding. So that's where we've seen with the skincare and makeup hybrid trends. But then we're really understanding now that it's not just about surface levels. So beauty and wellness are converging. And we've had the support of aesthetics and medicine to where we're seeing the external and internal links. So moving forward, those trends will continue to unfold and unravel. And that's essentially what we unpack in the Future of Appearance package. And we're essentially seeing regenerative medicine.

14:07We're seeing exosomes. We're seeing polynucleotides. So this essence of understanding that how we look internally in terms of cell performance will essentially eradicate on the outside as well. Right. Yeah. And I would add that it feels like the big theme is everyone will be doing more while trying to look like they're doing less. It just feels like there are more products, more treatments, more procedures that you can get. But at the same time, the very obvious, oh, I know that, you know, she got work done. The ultimate goal is to have that not happen. So it's the undetectable but very orchestrated face.

14:43There's a very strong focus throughout these pieces about non-aging and the idea of all of us living a lot longer. Do you agree that that's one of the big takeaways of the piece? And what are the other themes? A hundred percent. This is actually something that we thought was so important to understand when we did our consumer beauty standard survey. It's not just about reducing wrinkles anymore. It's how can we extend our cell life? How can we feel better for longer? How can we biohack to essentially perform at our best? So we found that aging is now tied into longevity and this essence of living longer.

15:22So I think that was a really poignant theme that came out of the survey. another two that really stood out for me was cosmetic treatments which surprisingly less than a third of responders had actually invested in in the last five to ten years well that's completely going to flip the script going forward in the next 10 15 20 years where on the back of the undetectable trend and the aesthetics that we've seen with subtlety it's all about that enhancement versus transformation and because we've seen such a strong conversation on social media more consumers are wanting to invest in cosmetics as part of their kind of beauty routine alongside the products that they're buying on shelves.

16:01And then I think for me, the other one was GLPs. And we know that's been such a hot conversation culturally around the Zempick and Wegovi and just weight loss advancements that have taken place from the red carpet to consumers in the past 12 to 18 months. So what we're now seeing is that many consumers, more than half, are expecting that to reshape beauty standards going forward. So that's something that was quite a divisive takeaway. And I think the final one was AI, which I know we'll go into a bit later, but it was surprising to see that many consumers were actually open to investing in AI in the future.

16:38But they did have their reasons for that. And that being it's to help them predict future appearances, such as what will they look like with aging and wrinkles, et cetera, and kind of forecasting what they could look like, but also personalized products. So they made sure they want to incorporate AI into their routines to know exactly what's going to work for their skin. What about you, Hilary? Do you have anything to add? Yeah, I was really struck across all of the articles in the package of just how scientific it really is and using words like regenerative and stem cell therapy and is it exosomes that appeared in your one story?

17:13And I was like, I have no idea what this even is, but it's, you know, your cellular DNA and makeup. So it feels like that is the difference between this conversation around longevity just being a new marketing term for anti-aging. You know, we don't say anti-aging anymore. We say living longer and where there would actually be a difference in what we're doing and what we look like is that science. So are we there right now? It doesn't feel like it, but, you know, it seemed like the unanimous consensus from all of the experts we talk to from dermatologists to the dentists is that's where all of the work is heading right now.

17:49And so, you know, that could be the difference between are you dyeing your hair? Are you making sure that your hair doesn't turn gray for, you know, additional time? I definitely want to learn how to make that happen. So before we dig in, can we talk about how the surveys worked? How did you collect all of this data? So essentially what we did was we worked with our Condé Nast Global custom insights team. And what we did was we essentially was like, okay, this is the brief. We want to understand how consumers are interpreting, reinterpreting standards today. And that's everything they're seeing on social media to what they're consuming from in the headlines.

18:25And then we wanted to work out how is that going to change in the future? Because essentially that's what brands want to know. They want to know how they can market and tap into the consumer and also the growing and changing sentiment. All right. So we should start at the top, our faces. Yes. What are we going to look like in 20 years? How are we going to look different than we look today? It's subtle, right? It's not very different. I think that right now, if you have had work done, it might be obvious. The goal of the future is to make it so it's very much not the case. It's going to be less reliant on products like cosmetics and blush and contour and, you know, more reliant on what's underneath.

19:05So that skincare and treatment conversation that is really combining the two. So I would say it's not so much like a strive for perfection. I think we're also seeing a circle back to our more natural features, but improved. But yeah, I would say across all of the articles, you know, Natisha, I'd love to hear your thoughts on this. It was almost striking like it's not a massive difference. It's just more like you, but better. Exactly. And I think one of the biggest takeaways on my side, just kind of pushing on what Hilary was just saying, is it's the healthier version of you. So it's skin will be healthier, tighter, lifted, brighter in a nutshell.

19:44And texture and quality was one of the main takeaways I got from speaking to the different dermatologists and surgeons to essentially say that the structure of the skin is where all the changes are happening. And as a result, we'll see these subtle changes. And that will be spread from advancements in surgery to cosmetic works, as we mentioned, even to skincare products becoming so hyper-personalized and tailored to what your skin needs. As a result, we've got youthfulness, we've got vibrancy, and just skin just looks healthier. So this whole obsession with skin texture, I think I am not immune to this.

20:20It's because we're sitting on Zooms all day, do you think? Or are there other reasons why we have sort of moved on to texture and consistency as such a particular driver for us? I think the Zoom face phenomenon is responsible for so much of where this is all headed. Because not only we're looking at ourselves more than ever, you're noticing how your face moves when you react to something. You're just picking on qualities or perceived flaws on your face that you might not otherwise really dwell on. I'm not immune to it either. I think it's very much the driver for not only we're headed in terms of skin texture, but also just the knowledge that people have around what's available, what's out there.

21:03It feels like it's converged all at the same time. We're always on our phones. We understand more about the industry than ever before, what's available, what products are in the market, what new treatments are available. I think it feels like there's always something new that we can select as here's the big thing to fix right now. I think on social media, it's hooded eyelids. So there is always going to be a new treatment to fix something. And it does kind of feel like the industry is picking on the fact that we're always looking at ourselves. And whether we're on Zoom or posting pictures on social media or live streaming on TikTok, those types of things, it's just so much is centered around your face.

21:39I remember early days in the pandemic, Tom Ford gave us at Vogue a lesson in how to look good on Zoom. So no overhead lights. The camera needs to be at eye level or above. And oftentimes when I'm at my desk, the camera is looking up, you know, under my chin. And I'm like, why haven't I fixed my camera? Did he recommend the beauty filter? Because I use that. I use that. Absolutely. Neither of you need it. We're moving on to the body. There's already a palpable change that you've both mentioned in our culture with the increased use of weight loss drugs like Ozempic. Natesha, in what ways will you see this continuing in our future and how might it go further?

22:18It's an interesting one because there are two kind of stories to unpick. I think from an Azenpik and weight loss and advancements journey, we're seeing metabolic reprogramming, which was actually something that we took away from speaking to the experts in our products of the future piece, where weight loss and advancements will settle. And what we'll have instead is consumers will be so in tune with essentially what's speeding up their metabolism, what's slowing down their metabolism, and then building a kind of healthy lifestyle around being able to biohack our metabolism. And then what we're also seeing is this kind of tap out and consumers essentially might not want to be involved in the advancements with weight loss changes.

23:02But also then we'll still see an appreciation of body diversity. I think that was one really big takeaway is that whilst the Zempic and weight loss advancement seems to be trending and promoting a singular body type, there will be consumers that also want nothing to do with it. And they're happy to embrace their figure as it is. And I think the two stories will run along as two parallel stories going forward. Well, I think there's an interesting question where if this type of drug and weight loss is so available to everyone and accessible, does it swing back in the other direction? I don't know.

23:36Natisha, what do you think? Because to me, that is, it's almost weird to think about it in that sense. But it just feels like we are headed back towards this thin as in standard. But if it no longer becomes this thing that you achieve, it becomes the standard. Do people sort of want to shift away from that norm again? That was definitely a takeaway from speaking to a few surgeons is that we'll see this Zempic and single trending body type settle just within the consumer industry. And we might see a swing back. But what we will understand is that there will be more than one story or more than one body type to tell.

24:17Even though right now we are definitely seeing the thinner silhouette taking steam. That's definitely true on the runways of Vogue Business. our colleagues do the size inclusivity report. And this season, there was a real rollback of advancements, right? Yeah, it feels like we've kind of abandoned the body diversity on the runway story. And I think the Ozempic era is much to blame for that. Oh, 100%. Yeah. So, readers will remember from a previous episode that I'm newly obsessed with protein because of the effects of aging on muscle loss. I understand from some of the reporting that you've done that that there might be a new way to retain muscle by injecting fat, which is really fascinating to me.

24:58Natisha, can you tell us about that? Of course. So muscle essentially is going to be the next frontier. And I think what we're seeing is fat being used in a way that hasn't been used before. So we'll be able to inject that into muscles based on a healthy diet. So the expert I was able to speak to, Dr. Roy Kim, who is a plastic surgeon in San Francisco and Beverly Hills. He was saying that what we're moving on from post-Zempic and the weight loss conversation is the muscle deterioration. And what we'll then start to see is advancements where we'll be able to inject fat into the muscle. And as long as consumers are able to work out and eat healthy, that fat can turn into muscle.

25:37And as a result, we'll have a more slimmer, toned, ultra-defined silhouette. And those are the AI images that we unpick within the features. 20, 30 years from now, you're able to see an ultra-defined body type based on turning fat into muscle. Well, we have to talk about teeth because teeth have become a real talking point in the culture right now, thanks to Amy Leuwood, the star of The White Lotus and SNL. They sort of poked fun at her and she clapped back, which got a lot of attention. So where should we start? Yeah, well, we dedicated a whole story to just teeth of the future, because I think to your point, it's such a focal point.