Why Aquatic Blue Is Poised To Be Beauty’s Buzziest Color For 2024

While most folks on BeautyTok spent 2023 trying to master the art of the #cleangirlaesthetic, celebs were quietly entering their blue period. In the last few months, Hailey Bieber complemented her glazed-donut skin with “ocean eyes,” Selena Gomez decorated her lids with icy blue pigments, and Zendaya rocked blueberry milk nails. Always the trendsetters, these three stars were ahead of the game: In 2024, the color blue is slated to take over the beauty world, and there’s a psychological reason why.

According to Pinterest’s trend predictions, searches for “blue eyeshadow aesthetic” (up 65%), “fun blue nails” (up 260%), and “aqua makeup looks” (up 100%) have seen major traction recently. Translation? You can expect to see all things azure taking over your TikTok feed in the year ahead.

As Constance Hart, a color therapy expert and the founder of Conscious Colors + Color Aroma, explains, blue is typically a soothing and calming color. And its mood-enhancing effects can differ depending on the exact shade you’re looking at. “Pale blue is the most peaceful and calming of the visible color spectrum, while turquoise is cooling and more stimulating,” she tells Bustle.

According to Pantone, classic blue “is imprinted in our psyches as a restful color [and] brings a sense of peace and tranquility to the human spirit” — and the shade is making its way into your beauty routine by way of two calm- and creativity-enhancing hues.

Baby Blue’s Main Character Moment

After the past few years the world has collectively had, it makes sense that beauty lovers are working peaceful, pale blue tones into their makeup bags. “Life is getting more fast-paced and requiring, and also stimulating more anxiety and anxiousness,” says Hart. “As a result, peace and calm are becoming even more important.” But pastel blue can offer some relief for the mind.

While “peach fuzz” — Pantone’s official color of the year for 2024 — offers some of the same soothing benefits (according to the brand, it “conjures up an air of calm” and can help you “find peace from within” to “impact your well-being”), blue tones are better suited for creativity and self-expression. At a time when #GRWM videos abound, these shades are understandably becoming increasingly common fixtures.

“As a whole, people are placing more concern and attention on their emotional wellness,” says Hart. “As your emotional needs change, you’re attracted to turquoise and pale blue more and wear them more often.” Her take? These particular colors offer some inspiration and hope.

Turquoise Takes Center Stage

While pale blue beauty can help evoke a sense of internal serenity, adding an aqua shade to your routine is a way to live that zen out loud.

“Turquoise can be a phenomenal color energy ally for inspiring yourself to speak your heart’s wants, needs, and desires,” says Hart.

The hue has become particularly prevalent among Gen Zers, who happen to be the ones driving these blue-tinted beauty trends forward. “As a whole, I see this generation being bolder about inspiring others through their communication and not holding back their ideas,” says Hart. “Inspiration and inspiring others seem to be a Gen Z theme, and the color turquoise can spark this energy further.”

Feeling, well, inspired? Keep scrolling for three ways to add these chill-enhancing tones to your beauty routine.

Makeup

For an easy way to experiment with blue, Jeanine Lobell, celebrity makeup and founder of Neen, recommends decorating the inner corners of your lids with an icy blue shadow. “Using a small brush or your pinky finger, lightly dab a C-shape on top and bottom, outlining the inner corner of your eye,” she says. “Let it blend and feather, or make it sharper for a more graphic look.”

If you’d prefer a more subtle glam, use a blue liner inside the eye or for your cat eye, she says. “If you’re not makeup shy, a blue wash on the lid or a statement in the inner corner is pretty.”

Whether you’re looking to paint your lids blue or experiment with a swatch of aquamarine shimmer, this creamy powder allows you to do both. It’s easy to layer so that you have full control over just how bold you want your look to be, but with the right amount of product, the color payoff can be major — especially if you apply with your fingers instead of a brush.

Blue liner is known for making brown eyes look brighter. “As a general rule of thumb, using the color wheel and engaging with complementary colors is the best way to overstate your eye color with understated color choices,” M.A.C. Cosmetics senior national artist Keri Blair previously told Bustle.

That said, a pale blue like Glossier’s Patina can make any eye shade really pop. Use it to decorate your inner corners, create the lined cat eye Lobell mentioned, or copy Selena Gomez’s “floating eyeliner” look.

If you want to get fancy with your aquatic beauty look, this palette comes with 15 shades of green and blue with both matte and shimmery finishes. Pair your pale base shades with some of the deeper shimmers to create a truly dimensional beat.

Nails

Painting your nails a pale blue or turquoise shade will give you a quick hit of the colors’ calming benefits every time you peek down at your hands. Even better? Just as working in a blue room can help improve focus (studies say so), looking down at blue fingers tapping away on a keyboard may have the same effects.

For just under $20, you can snag a set of four light blue and turquoise shades that will deliver endless DIY manicure options for the entirety of 2024. Wear each polish on its own, or try all of them together for a gorgeous ombré set.

Press-ons are having a major moment. Embrace turquoise’s calming effects with the Zen set from a brand that literally has the word “chill” in its name. This $16 kit (which features some seriously adorable, balance-inducing yin-yang shapes) comes with 24 nails (so you can find your perfect fit), a dual-sided buffer and file, a cuticle stick, and nontoxic, nondamaging nail glue.

These icy nail stickers are perfect for creating a winter-inspired baby-blue mani. Each sheet comes with 32 strips (20 in the blue base shade, 12 sparkly accents), which stick seamlessly onto nails to create a pro-grade look within minutes.

Hair

Even if you aren’t looking to go for a full Kylie Jenner-circa-2015-inspired baby blue dye job, there are still plenty of (commitment-free) ways to work these trending shades into your hairstyle. Paint on some temporary streaks, add some accessories, or opt for a wash-out treatment. You’ve got options to play with.

This easy-to-apply shade stick is gone after a single wash, which means you can amp up your party ponytail with blue streaks and feel confident that they’ll be gone before your morning meeting.

Try out two 2024 trends in one with a pale blue bow. It adds an element of chic elegance to any look, and feels far less expected than the standard ballerina pink.

According to one Bustle writer, “everyone should try blue hair at least once in their life,” and this wash-out hair paint is your chance to do just that. Unlike traditional hair dyes, this one has a slight shimmer to it, and applying it is as easy as pumping some product into your hand and streaking it through your strands (which, as an added bonus, allows you to determine just how blue you want your hair to look). The water-based formula delivers bold color but comes out in one wash — which is Hocus Pocus level magic indeed.