In 18th c. Europe, how did the use of cosmetics differ for upper-class men and women?

by caffarelli

Or did it not differ at all? I have in my mind that men never lined their eyes with kohl or anything like that, but that could just be Hollywood imposing its aesthetic on my history! Did men and women seek to highlight or minimize different facial features when they used cosmetics in the 18th century?

chocolatepot

This was surprisingly difficult to find much information on - modern writers frequently note in passing that women and men both wore heavier makeup than we would consider normal today, but primary sources are mostly men complaining about women's "deceitful" cosmetics. Neutral mentions of cosmetics (recipes, advertisements) usually say "for women", but it's hard to judge if this means men were not generally using lotions and so on or if it was simply a polite fiction that "of course only frivolous women use these, men are too manly and truthful, wink wink".

Selling Beauty: Cosmetics, Commerce, and French Society, 1750-1830 (2009) emphasizes the similarities more than differences - both whitened and then rouged - although fewer men wore patches than women, and men used depilatory creams on the forehead to conceal the natural hairline under the wig. Portraits show the same general whitening and all-over-the-cheek rouge distribution on men as on women. While I can't definitely say how the actual cosmetics looked on actual people, continuing to go by portraits it was fairly naturalistic and done with a light hand for both men and women.

Lining the eyes wasn't really done for either gender - the focus was on the white and red tints, hair pomade and powder, patches, and scents. So that's a modernism!