The best fashion and beauty trends that empowered women in 2018

Every woman is beautiful in her own way, no matter the height, weight and skin color, but the beauty and fashion industries don’t always manage to celebrate this diversity. Most trends that women are told about in blogs and magazines tell them to hide one body trait or another and work very hard to comply with that year’s idea of “perfect woman”. While 2018 still had a number of beauty and fashion fads, it definitely did a great job at embracing and celebrating diversity a bit more and introduced trends that women all over the world had been waiting for. These are the best fashion and beauty trends that empowered women in 2018, inspired them to accept their natural beauty or gave them the freedom to experiment in fun new ways.

The bold brow

After years of overplucking, the bold and feathery brow is here to stay and women are happy for it. Inspired by celebrities like Cara Delevingne, Zendaya and Lily Collins, beauty brands are launching product after product that helps achieve the bushy brow look – a look that, for many years, women have had to hide by tweezing their brows diligently every couple of weeks. For women who already had naturally bushy brows, it definitely felt liberating not having to go to the salon and modify their most expressive facial feature. It seems that fashion was quite late in acknowledging the role of eyebrows: a 2002 study showed that eyebrows have a huge role in facial recognition and participants were unable to recognize iconic celebrities once their brows had been digitally removed.

Freckle fever

For many years, women with freckles were judged, sometimes even bullied for these marks, but 2018 brought a surprising new trend: freckle tattoos. These tattoos are made in a color that’s similar to your skin tone and once they heal they mimic the look of natural freckles almost perfectly because they are quite subtle. Tattoo artists all over the world said that they got hundreds of requests from women who love the fresh and youthful look of freckles. But even those who didn’t like the commitment of tattoos experimented with the freckle trend by trying out freckle makeup to draw attention from dark circles and brow wrinkles. This is definitely a step up from the heavy makeup trend that had women cover their natural imperfections with layers and layers of full coverage foundation and powder.

The androgynous look

2018 took an interesting turn from the hourglass figure into androgynous territory and fashion houses came up with bold and edgy androgynous collections. Women were encouraged to love their bodies the way they are and resort less to breast implants or clothing tricks to look more voluptuous. In fact, there has even been an increase in the number of breast reduction procedures because women either regretted extreme breast augmentation surgeries they’ve had or because they wanted to rock the boyish look. Plus, breast reduction has many great benefits for your health and wellbeing, including:

• Get rid of bad posture and back aches
• Feel more comfortable during the day, avoiding skin irritation and injury from bra straps
• Participate in any sports without being limited by large breasts

Until recent years, women rarely resorted to breast reduction; plastic surgeons were mostly contacted for breast lifts and breast augmentation procedures, but lately the demand for breast reduction has grown considerably, including among teens, who opt for the procedure for medical reasons.

Short hairstyles

In 2018, the long, sleek Cher-like locks co-exited with short hairstyles like the blunt lob and buzz cut. In the past, the buzz cut had the same reputation as piercings and tattoos: rebellion, angst, non-conformism. Today, women can wear a buzz cut to express confidence and femininity at the same time. There are several explanations for why the buzz cut is trending. Some say that they are inspired by the strong women who rocked it and made it iconic in TV shows and movies: Charlize Theron as Furiosa in Mad Max: Fury Road, Millie Bobbie Brown as Eleven in Stranger Things. Also, celebrities like Cara Delevingne and Kate Hudson gave it a go and turned the buzz cut into the hottest hairstyle trend of fall/winter 2018.

Mermaid hair

Have you ever wanted to dye your hair in every color of the rainbow and not be judged for it? Well, now you can, because thanks to the fabulous mermaid hair trend, it’s acceptable to have your hair colored blue, purple, pink, green, even all at once. We’re not sure when exactly this trend started, but now having fun is easier than ever before, not to mention that so many hair dye brands are coming out with semi-permanent dyes that wash out after a few washes. This a great way to experiment with all sorts of unicorn colors, without worrying that your hair will get damaged or that you’ll have to wear a color that doesn’t match you for months.