The Science of Beauty

Anyone who follows my tweets will know that I was quite angry last week following my visit to the Science Museum's "Lates" event. Science Museum Lates are free, adult-only evening events held once a month. As well as giving visitors an opportunity to experience the Science Museum without children and with booze (a joy I must admit), the events are themed. Last week's theme was "The Science of Beauty", and it was sponsored by L'Oreal UK and Ireland. Yeah I know, warning bells are ringing already.

The flyer for the event can be found here. The programme included:

• What Makes a Beauty Product: an exhibition on beauty research and development from L'Oreal and the chance to learn what your skin says about you
• Table-top experiments: discover how to make your own beauty potion
• Why Does Beauty Matter: debate with a panel

There were lots of other talks going on that evening but the above are the only ones I had time for, so my comments are restricted to the above.

I headed straight up to the "What makes a beauty product" exhibition as soon as I got in. Finally, I thought, a chance to talk to someone about the science behind beauty products or maybe learn something new and perhaps reassuring. But I was disappointed. The focal point of the exhibition was a computer-based exhibit that told people about their skin type, no doubt coupled with advice on what L'Oreal product would work best to complement it. It wasn't worth my time queueing for and I didn't care to find out more. The part that was actually about beauty R&D was... wait for it.... a pop up stand! Here's what it looked like:

There were two more stands showing the history of L'Oreal. Pretty pathetic eh? Struggling to prevent my face from scowling, I headed towards the table top experiments. Those at least had some element of science, but nothing particularly new to anyone who's done GCSE chemistry and I've got a bloody degree in it. Ooh dry ice. Ooh mixing acid and alkali to make something pop. No real relevance to the science of beauty, just an opportunity to make slightly tipsy people gasp.

With a sinking feeling that I was wasting my time I headed finally to the panel debate for "Why does beauty matter?" The panel members were Béatrice Dautresme, Executive Vice-President Corporate Communications and External Affairs for L’Oréal; psychotherapist Lucy Beresford; Carla Bevan, Editor of Marie Claire online; Sarahjane Robertson, Executive Director of the charity Look Good... Feel Better, UK; science broadcaster and author Vivienne Parry; and Professor David Perrett of the University of St Andrews. The panel members spoke in turns and then there was a Q&A. The whole thing was chaired by journalist Alice Hart-Davis.

Béatrice Dautresme from L'Oreal talked about a project they were doing cataloguing the history of beautification. We were treated to a promotional video. She pointed out that people have been doing this beauty thing forever, before companies came along. I got the feeling she was trying to subtly say "don't blame the beauty industry for making a big deal out of this, people have always wanted to look better". While it's true that people have always engaged in trying to make themselves look better, beauty companies have, I believe, changed it into more of an obsession than it should be. Lucy Beresford spoke about how beauty is tied up with self esteem. She quoted a survey that found 60% of women in London believed that wearing make-up gave them an edge at work. There was no discussion about why women believed this. I can't even remember what Carla Bevan from Marie Claire said. Sarahjane Robertson runs a charity called "Look Good... Feel Better" which gives support to women with breast cancer, namely with combating the visible effects of cancer treatment. A very worthy cause. Vivienne Parry basically took the opportunity to plug her new book on hormones and told us all about why we smell attractive to the opposite sex because of hormones. She's a pretty distinguished science communicator so I was surprised at how bubblegum her talk was. David Perrett showed some slides of faces and asked us to rate them on attractiveness. The point was that symmetrical faces are more appealing. Yawn.

Onto the Q&A. Someone asked the panel what they thought about the use of skin-lightening creams in India. Beatrice batted that one away telling us that light skin has always been seen as desirable because it meant you weren't working in the fields. I'm not kidding. No mention of L'Oreal's own racist policy of excluding non-white women from promoting its products. A man in the audience asked SarahJane Robertson if her charity provided services to men. It does. Other questions were not particularly memorable.

I left the debate feeling hugely disappointed and angry. Nobody talked about the science apart from giving the word itself a bit of lipservice. Nobody talked about whether our society is too obsessed with beauty or why beauty matters to much for women particularly.

In fact the whole evening was laughable. The most popular event of the evening seemed to be one where you could get a Cleopatra-style make-over. It all just felt like a promotional exercise for L'Oreal. Everywhere I went there were freebies. Being a cheapskate I took some. I now have samples of "UltraLift Pro-X re-plumping anti-wrinkle day cream", "Pureology" shampoos and conditioners and "Derma-Genesis Cellular Nurturing" day and night creams. I only took one sample of the anti-wrinkle cream (for research purposes!) and the woman doling them out told me to take as many as I wanted. When I said "it's OK, I'm only 27" she looked confused.

Sigh. I really did expect more from the Science Museum. I didn't expect PhD level science, but I hoped for something a bit more substantial. What I got wouldn't have intellectually stimulated a 5-year old. Even more disturbing was that the Science Museum completely sold out to L'Oreal, forsaking any exploration of the science (or lack of it) for a beautiful yet ultimately shallow promotional event. I know the Science Museum receives funding from companies but I don't expect it to compromise its integrity to do so.

Did I learn anything new? No. But I suppose I should stop thinking and just be grateful that I can re-plump my face with Pro-Xylane. Thanks Science Museum and L'Oreal.