The Fascinating History Behind MAC's Most Iconic Products

Everyone remembers their first MAC product. From the sleek black packaging to its shimmery formulas and finishes, the beauty brand has secured itself in the heart of not only makeup professionals, but several generations of beauty lovers.

Founded in 1984 as MakeUp Art Cosmetics, the Canadian company was the brainchild of Frank Angelo, a renowned salon owner, and Frank Toskan, a popular makeup artist. With an emphasis on unisex makeup products that delivered bold, high-quality colors and skin-like finishes, MAC quickly grew a celebrity fanbase that included drag queens, supermodels, and global megastars like Madonna and Michael Jackson.

“MAC debuted as an iconoclast,” says former celebrity makeup artist and beauty historian Rachel Weingarten. “[At the time], women expected gold packaging and girly colors or formulations — MAC gave them stark black packaging and a cornucopia of products to play with. Way before beauty influencer culture, MAC was encouraging women (and men and anyone who loved makeup) to simply try everything and not only the looks that appeared in glossy magazines.”

MAC’s subversive approach beauty changed the industry, which at the time, still looked mostly homogenous. “MAC is the cool best friend you secretly never thought you deserved, who gave you makeovers and made you look cool,” says Weingarten. “They never ever judge you. While beauty lines have certainly evolved over the years, MAC sprang forth all-inclusive.”

Over the past 40 years since its inception, MAC has continued doing what it does best — breaking boundaries and cementing itself in makeup history. This year alone they’ve dropped a slew of new products (including the new velvety-smooth MACximal Silky lipsticks), announced Kim Petras and Danna Paola as the new faces of VIVA Glam, and reissued their iconic Disney collab for a limited time only.

To celebrate the 40th anniversary of one of the most iconic makeup brands of all time, Bustle decided to get the inside scoop on the most memorable MAC launches in the past four decades. Below, MAC’s director of makeup artistry, Romero Jennings, the brand’s executive director of trend, Cat Quinn, and Weingarten spill the fascinating backstory behind each of the brand’s beloved collabs.

1991: Lip Pencil

Spice. Chestnut. Stone. Cork. These are just a few of the most iconic lip pencils in MAC’s collection. According to Jennings, MAC’s lip pencils that helped put the brand on the map (and not just because Linda Evangelista was a fan).

“It just spread like wildfire,” Quinn says of the product. “People would come into the MAC store asking for Spice lip pencil without even knowing what it was. They just had heard that it was the supermodel pencil. And then you had Pamela [Anderson] and Mary J. Blige wearing in. People just had to try it. Supermodels were the original influencers.”

Going beyond celebrities, Jennings notes that many women of color would buy these pencils because they had colors that would suit their skin tone. During a time when many beauty brands saw makeup as one-size-fits-all, MAC expanded its hyper pigmented color range to include shades that could be used by everyone. Before this line, Jennings said many of these women would use eyeliner to get their desired lip look.

“That just means that there weren't any or any or enough options back then to create this contoured lip look,” Jennings says. “But now there was an option that wasn’t as harsh and, because no one was blending the line back then, you could wear this pencil and have it look more approachable.”

“What MAC does best is also embrace variations that go beyond pale, brown or black,” says Weingarten. “There is a shade for everyone.”

1993: MAC Studio Fix Powder Plus Foundation

As a makeup artist, Jennings says Studio Fix Powder Plus Foundation was a game-changer. A kit essential, this product made it easy to apply foundation and still get a super-matte look without needing to use a ton of different products.

“Back then, matte was like being rich,” says Jennings. If you weren’t sweaty or glowy or strobed, you were wealthy. I remember so many newscasters coming in to buy this product, including the guys.”

This product was one of the first ever to offer shade rangers for multiple skin tones. Jennings adds that this product, which reads well on camera, can be used as a finishing powder on top of your regular makeup to flatten and smooth everything out.

1994: Viva Glam

Toskan and Angelo announced the launch of VIVA Glam to celebrate the 10-year anniversary of their company, but also to give back to their community. Complete with a bright-blue lipstick graphic that announced 100% of proceeds would be donated to HIV/AIDS research, MAC launched the first of many Viva Glam lipsticks — a brownish blue-red called Viva A Heart (formerly Viva Glam I) — with drag icon RuPaul as the face of the campaign.

“Thirty years of Viva Glam, thirty years of giving back,” says Jennings. “It’s really incredible that this brand stood up for their friends, their colleagues, and their customers.”

Since its inception, MAC has raised over $520 million and recently added a Pride Palette to its lineup of charitable products. From couture color collections that hit the runway to famous Viva Glam ambassadors like Lady Gaga and Rihanna, the campaigns themselves have become as famous as the lipsticks. “We actually have all of the past campaigns hanging in our office, so when you walk in every day you see them,” Quinn adds.

“I'll add the analogy of applying Viva Glam to being what Wonder Woman feels like when she puts on her cuffs,” says Weingarten. “She's bulletproof. That's how the first few years of Viva Glam felt.”

1996: CB 96 Lipstick

Created specifically for Christian Blanken’s 1996 collection, Jennings says CB 96 was the first collaboration the makeup brand ever did with a fashion designer. “No one was doing this back then — no one,” he says. “When you think about creating products and how long the lead time is to create this, it’s outrageous. The designer had to give us the fabric and the main part of the collection.”

Jennings recalls the fabric as being a beautiful burnt orange with a subtle metallic flair. Using that as the main inspiration, the CB 96 lipstick was born. He explains that they paired the sunset-inspired shade with the Spice lip pencil on people with lighter complexions and the Chestnut lip pencil on people with darker complexions. The result? A universal lipstick with a “beautiful frosty, sunkissed, sun-glazed looking color that was really comfortable to wear,” Jennings says.

Quinn notes that almost thirty years later, this color is still making waves on and off the runway. Case in point: the coral lippie is spotted on Julien Calloway in the the Gossip Girl reboot.

1997: Clear Lipglass

“You won’t find a film or TV makeup artist that doesn’t have Lipglass Clear in their kit,” Quinn says. “In fact, the makeup artists for Stranger Things used so much clear lip gloss that we actually had to send her a huge jar of it. They were using it for the good because it’s so viscous and it doesn’t move. So, if you want someone to look wet on screen and you don’t want to have to keep hosing them down with water for continuity, this keeps them looking wet.”

Quinn adds that this product was also used on Top Gun Maverick for the sweat while the pilots were filming in the sky. “You can’t have a makeup artist in the cockpit reapplying sweat,” Quinn laughs. “I’ve heard of shows where it’s been used to fake snot and fake blood to make a wound look gorier. It’s an all-in-one product that also looks really beautiful on lips.”

Jennings said no one has managed to match the formula since its inception. “It makes the lips look fuller and plumper and it really catches the light,” he says. “It photographs really well and it really is a performance product that people had to get used to; they were so used to glosses being sheer and having to reapply so often, but with this product, you didn’t need to. That heavy stickiness also gave us this beautiful, 3-D lip.”

While the product was specifically made to enhance your lips, Jennings says he often uses it over eye shadows and he notes that it’s especially great for people with mature eyes. “In many cases you would think to stay away from glass, but because this doesn’t move, it continues to make the eye open and close without seeing the wrinkle,” he says. “It’s kind of magical.”

1999: MAC Ruby Woo

For many people, Ruby Woo was their first entrance into the world of MAC and for many, it has been deemed a lucky color. Quinn herself says she wore the famed color on her own interview with MAC years ago. But what most people might not know is that Ruby Woo’s creation was a happy accident.

“They were reformulating Russian Red, which was Madonna’s signature color through her Blonde Ambition tour in the ‘90s, and they stumbled upon this slightly-less matte version,” Quinn explains. “They saw that color that’s a little bit bright, a little bit more dynamic, and that’s how Ruby Woo was born. She found us.” While the initial reformulation of Russian Red was reverted back to the original formula due to fan backlash, the experiment did lead to the creation of one of the best-selling lipsticks of all time.

“I’ve been with MAC for 32 years and was selling this lipstick back in the ‘90s,” Jennings adds. He says he used to apply the lipstick shade, pull out the mirror, and let the customer see just how beautiful Ruby Woo looked on their lips. “The blue of the red that’s in this lipstick would actually make teeth look whiter,” he says. “It was amazing that you could wear something that would enhance your smile.”

2000: MAC Strobe Cream

“No one ever said that word before this product,” Jennings says of the strobing trend, which was inspired by MAC’s famous Strobe Cream. “It was the beginning of social media and this was the first time that anything went viral. Before then, it was by word of mouth or Page Six.”

Used by many professional makeup artists, Strobe Cream was invented as a universal product that can be used on any skin tone. Sheer and transparent, the product adds a subtle glow to the skin without looking like you’re wearing makeup or glitter.

“We were doing Alexander McQueen’s shows in the early 2000s and they really wanted the skin to have this futuristic, alien kind of look, so they’d put all these pigments, glitters, creams, and oils together to create this otherworldly skin — and that’s how Strobe Cream was born,” Quinn explains.

For the everyday customer, Strobe Cream became the embodiment of a MAC lifestyle, Weingarten adds. “I think women were skittish to wear more evening-y makeup looks during the day,” she says. “Disco was dead and makeup had its place — Strobe Cream changed that.”

2002: MAC Fix+ Primer and Setting Spray

Created to be used before, during, and after your makeup application, Jennings calls the Fix+ Primer and Setting Spray the all-in-one product that everyone should have. According to Quinn, tons of makeup artists use the setting spray backstage to instantly transform products backstage; Jennings says he recently did a video where he used the spray to transform an eye shadow into a slick liner.

“This product, as with many products here at MAC, was born backstage at Fashion Week,” Jennings says. “Makeup artists are always de-potting and putting everything in one container and [in the ’90s], our artist backstage, Netta Szekely, did that.”

He says Szekely used the brand’s Softening Cream and added various other products, including essential oils, to make a product that would keep makeup on for hours at a time. Back then, it was packaged in a high-tech, space-age white bottle with black text. “Everyone else was doing really pretty packaging that was more feminine and this was very non-gender, so that’s why [even] men were using it,” he says.

2007: MAC Barbie Collection

Before there was Greta Gerwig’s award-winning Barbie film, there was the famed Barbie Loves MAC collaboration that included a collector’s edition doll. Complete with a jagged bleach-blonde cut, all-black outfit, and a shimmer-forward beat, this limited edition Barbie showed young women that they could be a badass makeup artist. It was the first time the iconic doll was seen having a makeup-focused profession and allowed an entire generation to dream of their future backstage at Fashion Week.

“The doll looked like our leader at the time,” Jennings recalls. “She was a working woman, so it was something people loved because it was a modern take on Barbie.”

Going beyond pastel pink and vibrant fuschia, MAC took the Barbie collection one-step further by launching a 30-piece makeup set with pressed powders in perfectly Y2K shades, glittery glosses, and vibrant lipsticks and matching liners — all with Barbie’s signature silhouette on the packaging.

“Even though it’s Barbie and we have pink, we also had a deeper blush that looks like a take on Raisin, which is one of our top sellers for deep skin. We really innovated the Barbie line back then,” Jennings adds. “I remember [working in the] store and having women come in with their daughters and the daughter pointing to [the collab]. It was the first time a brand collaborated with this kind of young, iconic, toy. No one did this before on this scale. This was groundbreaking.”

2016: Selena Quintanilla Collection

The best-selling MAC collection of all time, 2016’s Selena Quintanilla collaboration sold out in minutes and was so popular, the brand would release a secondary set just a few years later to satisfy the demand.

“What makes MAC collaborations so special is that once we get to the point of doing a collaboration with someone, that is not the first time we are meeting them or talking to their family,” Quinn explains. Fostering years-long relationships with stars and their entourage, this Selena collection was particularly special because Selena herself was a fan of the brand.

“Selena is someone who organically wore MAC,” Quinn explains. Her signature red lip was Russian Red and she was always rocking the Mahogany and Cherry lip pencils. MAC embraced the singer’s signature look by working closely with her family to make sure everything felt incredibly true to her and her fan base. “You saw it in the shade range. You saw it in the shade names. We even launched in her hometown of Corpus Christi,” Quinn adds. “With MAC, it’s never just slapping someone’s name on a collection. It’s so carefully thought out and there’s true intention behind every step of the process.”