I was a teen in the late 90′s, which means I first started experimenting with makeup as Backstreet Boys blared from my CD stereo (yes, stereo) and we all tuned into Dawson’s Creek on Wednesday nights to watch illicit teen drama. Here are 5 of the beauty trends none of us could live without in my middle and high school days, for better or for worse.
Hard Candy nail polish. (above) The Hard Candy nail polishes launched a frenzy for Easter-egg colored nails. I remember my mom taking us to the department store and letting us pick from the dazzling array of bottles, each of which came with a squishy ring. I could have the same pale blue nails as Drew Barrymore! But this millennium, Hard Candy has gotten so stale that you can only buy it at…Walmart.
Body glitter. We used to scoop this gelatinous stuff up by the gallon at Claire’s, and no square inch of skin was spared. I didn’t stop until my entire abdomen was covered in iridescent glitter sparkles that smelled like cheap vanilla. Looking back, our teachers probably thought we were crazy for sparkling ourselves silly just to go to algebra class.
Dark lipstick. I can spot 90′s celebrity photos instantly by looking at one thing: their lipstick. These days, a dark, smoky eye and nude lips have reigned for years, but in the 90′s, it was more about a light eye and dark lips. Whether you wore a gloopy, frosted brown or a Gothic deep purple, the big deal for lips was dark.
Butterfly hairclips. Oh, I think every one of my prom hairdos in high school featured an updo with a million things clipped in it. Whether it was those ubiquitous butterfly clips, the “twist-in” metal jewels, or tiny barrettes, we all bedazzled our hair to capacity and thought we looked cool.
Straight center-parted hair. I remember my mom telling me my hair in the 90′s was flat and needed more body, but I was determined to let my bangs-free, straight hair hang long and heavy around my face. With the 80′s revival of the 2000′s, we’ve seen a lot more volume and waves come back into play.
CK One. Whether you were a guy or girl, this was the scent you wanted to leave in your wake as you sauntered down the hall to your locker, because it was UNISEX. How edgy.
Which beauty trends did you rock in the 90′s, Lovelies?
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Strippers still wear body glitter…
magnolia / 1054 posts
omg…. butterfly hairclips. i remember buying them for 25 cents at the drugstore….
sunflower / 389 posts
I miss all of these! I rocked everything on this list expect for the CK. There was the comeback of flared jeans, then there was metallic jeans, tie dye jeans, high heeled jelly sandals . . . and of course insanely colored lipsticks like blue and green
Gimme a break, I was 10 or younger during the 90′s lol.
(I still like metallic jeans and jellies though).
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Butterfly hairclips!
sunflower / 304 posts
HAHAHA. oh my gosh… i totally rocked out the butterfly clips and loads of body glitter. ^_^
i also wore hideous eyeshadow “crayon” colours.. like lime green and teal blue.. not to mention blue and purple eyeliner.. LOL.
@vixen_with_a_cause@xanga - OMG, high heeled jelly sandals..i had a blue pair..i loved them!!
sunflower / 389 posts
@StillNotaPrettyGirl@xanga - OMG!!!! I wanted blue ones and never got em’! I could swear I have a pair in a size 3 somewhere in storage that I might be able to squeeze into . . . I never find any trend outdated. It’s just a matter of updating the rest of an outfit accordingly
Nice eyeliner choices, by the way!
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wow. that dark lipstick look really wasn’t for everyone.
@vixen_with_a_cause@xanga - high heeled jellies, I do miss. The shoes were the coolest in the 90s.
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You can still use butterfly clips modestly and look nice.
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holy cow, I remember going to Claire’s for their “10 for $5″ sale and half of it was hair bedazzling nonsense like the butterfly clips, twist-in things, and spray in glitter. And tons of body glitter. I thought I looked awesome with a little on my eyelids or cheeks. hahaha oh high school . . .
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great post! i’m a little older, but boy this takes me back. man, i loved dark lipstick.
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haha. thats totally the 90s.
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BUTTERFLY CLIPS!!!!!!
hydrangea / 59 posts
You can totally still rock the nail polish, no one needs to know it’s hard candy. Plus center parts make a comeback like every other season, and dark lipstick was down for last fall!
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Jelly sandals! They were the epitome of all things preteen girly in the 90s and they ALWAYS gave me horrible, nasty blisters!
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LOL @ the body glitter. Man, did I love that stuff. But the goopiness of it was God-awful and it smelled gross (wow, I can quite literally remember the exact feel and scent of that crap)! You’d think someone would have converted us all over to sparkly lotion a lot sooner.
And freaking butterfly clips… I must have had a billion of them! I remember searching far and wide to find butterfly clips that no one else had, so mine would be admired by all the girls in my Sunday school class. Yeah… I was so cool. lol
sunflower / 453 posts
i remember a short-lived trend of tassled belts… like they were leatherish belts that were cut into strips at the end to make long tassles you tied… I had one of those.
Maybe that was more like really early 2000′s though.
hm…
i wasn’t a very trendy kid :p lisa frank stuff, I guess. that was more what you had for school supplies though
sunflower / 254 posts
i hope the 90′s comes back full throttle. that was the best.
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@PerkyPunk8064@xanga - LOL yessss! 10 for $5 sales were the best thing in my little elementary school life back then. I could buy a million ridiculous accessories from Claires and not break the bank… hey, $5 seemed like a lot back then.
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i was still a little girl in the 90′s, but i definately remember the butterfly clips, even i had those. the plastic ones & then there were the metal ones that had the bouncy wings, i was hardcore in love with them.
orchid / 123 posts
Omg! I was a little girl in the 90s but I never noticed how fashionable my mom was! She would buy me’ like designer butterfly clips! Hahaha I thought they were annoying and nsync made me’ vomit lulz I’m going to have to thank her and ask where she packed them away (:
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Omg I loved body glitter back in the day. The dark lipstick I didn’t start doing until the early 2000′s but then again I was finally going into my pre-teen years by then. And only within the last year or two did I decide to do a side part. Other then that my hair is usually very straight, long and has a part in the middle.
ranunculus / 3285 posts
Glitter is a bitch to get off.
orchid / 178 posts
aw, butterfly hairclips! i just found some of mine hiding in the back of my closet and couldn’t believe i ever actually wore them in public.
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haha i totally remember the glitter- i did dance and for every performance we’d coat ourselves in the bath and body works roll-on “art stuff” glitter =]
and i HATE center parts. they’re like blunt bangs; if you’re over ten, they look awful.
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hahaha body glitterrr! how i loved that. lol butterfly clips
all the kids who lived in the 90′s = the bestttt
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I STILL LOVE BODY GLITTER OMGGGGGGGGGggggggg
dahlia / 2103 posts
Oh. My. God. I remember all of these!! And I loved them!! I still have deep burgundy lipstick, I don’t really care if it went out of style. But oh, the butterfly clips….I am glad those went bye-bye.
And actually I am quite excited that I can now buy Hard Candy at my local Wal-Mart…it’s really the only place I can find jungle green, cobalt blue, and hot pink mascara!
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Does anybody remember the butterfly clips where the wings actually moved around? I found one in my room like a week ago and can’t imagine how I ever thought those were cool haha
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lol to the body glitter, butterfly clips and CKone
if i saw one more butterfly clip i would have snapped
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Aww, good times.
orchid / 241 posts
Haha, awesome. I remember how devastated I was when my crush bought some girl in our class a bottle of CK1… Not only did she get Jon, she got the CK1, too. Bitch.
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Oh man, this brings back memories.
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Hahahaha
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I still miss hair scrunchies. If my hair were long enough I’d totally still wear them.
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LOL ohhhh boy… butterfly clips, body glitter, and center part? WOW just brought back soo many frickin memories.
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Ah my gosh, I had like a million of those butterfly hair clips. I think I managed to hold onto a few of them over the years
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i was crazy for butterfly clips… i liked the big ones where the wings were attached by springs and could actually move hahah
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oh butterfly clips!
orchid / 176 posts
The only one I got into in the actual 90′s was body glitter. I mean, I was still pretty wee at the turn of the millennium. (Pretty sure I was on local TV with bedazzled eyelids and a plastic horn in 1999… “And how do you feel about the new year, little girl?” “Bzzz! Bzzz!” Anyway…)
I now wear LOTS of butterfly clips. The plastic ones, actually–they’re sold in the baby isle, for fuck’s sake. And I’ve been meaning to put my Hard Candy polish (purchased in… I don’t know… 2004?) back to use.
daisy / 571 posts
BUTTERFLY HAIRCLIPS & BODY GLITTER , FTW!
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Whaaat!? I remember Hard Candy nail polish being lined up at the duty free shops at the airport. Although I’ve never bought any of HC’s products before, knowing they were sold along with the products from high-end brands, it’ hard to believe they’re Walmart bound now!
And butterfly clips! Haha, totally forgot about them! Great entry!
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Butterfly hairclips!!!!
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Haha. Butterfly clips were the shiznit.
Awesome list.
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I was a toddler in the 90′s, and I vaguely remember putting glitter on my arms and wearing butterfly barrettes.
daisy / 505 posts
I was not quite a teen at this time but I lapped up these trends. AHA the butterfly clips. I think I managed 15 of them in my hair at one time once. And I had a kit to make my own body glitter and I thought it was just THE coolest thing ever. Also, I thought Claire’s and Icing were heaven on earth.
daisy / 505 posts
@xxFADEt0BLACKxx@xanga - HAHA did they have springs in them? I remember only the cool kids at school has the live action, springy butterfly clips.
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my hair is still parted down the middle.
daisy / 502 posts
This post made me so nostalgic.
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i dont miss any of these
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I’m the only person that I know that still wears the straight down the middle. Well besides my mom. I still see the butterfly clips. The rest of it, eh.
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I remember using tons of glitter hair spray for my 8th grade formal… and GUILTY- I still love the twist in jewels when used tastefully (if such a thing exists) but those are restricted to the privacy of my bedroom for return-to-childhood silly dress up sessions.
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CK One was the shit. My mom bought me so many CK One T-shirts, it was such over kill…
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@hollowhopes@xanga - Yes! They had the springy wings that would always flop around like CRAZY even if you turned your head real slow . They were so incredibly annoying but I wore them all the time. Now it’s kind of like wtf was I thinking?
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BUTTERFLY CLIPS! <3333 i had these really cool fancy ones, and i’d wear them to summer camp, then i’d swim, and they’d get tangled in my hair. all the time. good times. <3
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I loved those butterfly clips when I was little!
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I don’t miss any of these things. The only good thing about the 90s was Reservoir Dogs.
hydrangea / 99 posts
hahaha oh body glitter. it’s always been such a disgusting thing.. what were we thinking. butterfly clips! I def always had to have them in my hair for school.
sunflower / 499 posts
shooott i got my body glitter!
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I was a hard candy addict… I know its been a while but I still have the plastic rings on the nail polish and I loved their eyeshadows… yeii the 90s
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hard candy! i still have a box of it from the 90′s..the type that has many bottles in it and stickers on the bottom of the box. i used to use it as my pencil case (:
sunflower / 434 posts
I wore body glitter and butterfly clips in elementary school. For an eight-year-old in the 90′s, body glitter = instant popularity.
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I was only a kid in the 90′s…but I LOVED Hard Candy, Body Glitter, and butterfly clips!!! I still have a sparkly blue Hard Candy color..it was my favorite
And I miss my butterfly clips. Sometimes I wish I could still pull them off now..
What about those tattoo chokers? Does anyone else remember those?!
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Ah, I remember/had/sort of miss the body glitter and butterfly clips.
Ummm, I still wear my hair with a center part. Sometimes straight, sometimes naturally curly.I don’t think it’s ever been parted any other way.
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I still leave my hair in it’s natural middle part =) I’m too lazy to train it, and you know what? I don’t think it looks all that bad. It’s actually somewhat annoying to me that practically every girl in the nation has a side part now.
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ahhhh the glitter and the butterfly hairclips =)
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@mynameis_pocahontas@xanga - I wish I could have a side part:/ but I have a callic in the front so straight down the middle for me too
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i always bought bought body glitter but never knew what to do with it… i always put it by my eyes hahaha i was such a stylish child…
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i remember they also made thick glittery nail polishes, and those ridiculous jeans with the bleached bell bottoms at the end. haha. christina ricci and neve campbell were my idols then.
i rocked all of that except for CK.
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I miss the 90′s. I loved butterfly clips but now it just looks ridiculously annoying.
I also miss chunky platform runners and shoes.
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I had big butterfly hairclips ^^ lol
and tons of roll on body glitter!
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wow. are you telling me i was trendy in the 90s? damn. i was pretty cool then. lol.
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OMG butterfly clips. I used to loooove those. Oh how I miss them.
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Aw I miss being 12!
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slap-on bracelets!!
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butterfly clips n body glitter lol…im now into bow tie clips lol
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God, I feel so old
I kind of hated the glitter…it was always so sticky and goopy so it made me feel like I was rubbed with honey.
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@kinamorata@xanga - Yes it was! I remember trying to get it off for a visit to my grandma’s house… That was not fun and it got everywhere.
daisy / 630 posts
Dark lipstick is hot