April 2015 ran on the same calendar every US beauty year had been running on for several years — Coachella in the second and third weekends, Easter in between, the spring color collections finally getting their proper retail moment. The 2015 version, though, felt meaningfully different from the 2014 one. The festival makeup conversation had matured beyond the “louder is better” pivot of 2014; the spring color collections at the prestige tier had landed earlier; the Met Gala on May 4 was already casting forward through April’s editorial coverage. By the first Tuesday of the month we already had three new things on the bathroom counter and a clearer sense of where the year was heading. Below, what we kept reaching for.
Coachella 2015 dialed back the loudness of 2014
The Coachella photo cycle that came out of the desert in April 2015 was more restrained than the 2014 version had been. The 2014 festival makeup had pivoted hard toward maximalism — bright lipstick, strong liner, elaborate braids — and 2015 quietly reverted to a polished version of the 2013 minimalism. The signature look was a luminous skin (the Becca Shimmering Skin Perfector still kept its position), an eye kept clean except for a soft champagne shimmer at the inner corner, a sheer-finish nude lip. The styling was slightly less feathered and braided than 2014; the messy-undone-bun was the new dominant hair moment.
The product that defined the 2015 desert look was Charlotte Tilbury’s K.I.S.S.I.N.G. Lipstick in Penelope Pink — a softer warm pink than Pillow Talk, with slightly more pigment — that became the editorial reference for festival lip-color across the entire weekend coverage.
Spring color landed across both prestige and drugstore
The spring color story we documented in March extended through April, and the prestige-versus-drugstore conversation tightened meaningfully. NARS’s Velvet Matte Lip Pencil in Sex Machine — a saturated bright coral — had become the prestige reference for the warm-coral camp. Maybelline’s Color Sensational Vivids in Vibrant Mandarin was the editor-recommended drugstore copy, at one-third the price.
What was new in April 2015 specifically was the fingertip-application advice. The makeup-artist tip that bounced through every spring how-to was to apply matte coral with a fingertip rather than directly from the bullet, building the color in two thin layers — the result read closer to a stain than a full opaque lipstick, and the technique made the coral wearable in a way it had not been for several years.
Drunk Elephant continued its prestige momentum
Drunk Elephant’s Sephora momentum continued to build through April 2015. The C-Firma Day Serum was getting genuine cult-status reviews from editors who had now committed to it for two months; the Beste No. 9 Jelly Cleanser had emerged as the brand’s sleeper hit. The brand’s anti-clean-beauty positioning had genuinely shifted the conversation in the category, and several other brands were openly responding to the framework in their own April marketing.
YSL Cushion confirmed for fall
The cushion-compact category news of April 2015 was the official confirmation that Yves Saint Laurent’s Cushion would launch at US prestige in fall 2015. The format was rumored to lean dewy like the Lancôme version rather than matte like the Dior, and the shade range was promised to be the widest in the category to date. By the end of April the cushion-compact map for 2015 was clear: Lancôme dewy (already at retail), Dior matte (at retail since February), YSL dewy (coming fall), and Sulwhasoo prestige Korean (already imported).
Hair conversation pivoted to balayage
The hair-color conversation we had not paid much attention to in 2014 became impossible to ignore in April 2015. The shift was specifically toward balayage — hand-painted lightening that worked outward from the mid-shaft of the hair rather than the all-over highlights of earlier years — and every salon we walked past in early April had a balayage menu on the door. The technique was lower-maintenance, easier to grow out, and produced a sun-warmed effect that read more natural than traditional highlights.
The product side of the conversation followed quickly. Olaplex, the bond-repair treatment that had launched in late 2014, became the salon-standard add-on for any balayage service through 2015. The at-home version landed later in the year.
What we’re watching for May
May 2015 brings the Met Gala on May 4 (theme: “China: Through the Looking Glass”), wedding season at full tilt, and Mother’s Day on May 10. We were watching the Glossier Cloud Paint launch rumored for late spring. We will see you on the first Tuesday of May.