Today is the Teint Miracle/Michelle Phan event at the five-story event space across from The Opposite House, our hotel. The first sesson is for “e-fluencers,” as the top beauty bloggers and vloggers here are called. America’s clearly not the only place with a thriving beauty blogosphere. The second session is for the beauty editors. The e-fluencers are an enthusiastic bunch. They jump around, photographing and videotaping everything: the space, Michelle, themselves, each other. Their style is quirkier too. The beauty editors are more laid back demeanor and fashion wise. I meet the beauty directors from Vogue, Harper’s Bazaar (a guy!), Good Housekeeping and several magazines unique to China, such as Trends Health. Michelle, no surprise, feels more at home with the e-fluencers.
Michelle does a Q&A in front of the audience with Michelle Kwok, a former colleague of mine from New York who is now the assistant general manager of Lancome China. Michelle P. then recreates the “China girl” looks from the video she shot earlier in the week. The whole group moves downstairs for the Teint Miracle unveiling and Michelle demos the product on a model. Afterwards, there are group interviews and one-on-one time with different TV stations and the Chinese versions of YouTube—Tudou and Youku. Funnily enough, both online channels feature bootleg versions of Michelle’s videos. Tudou somehow has more than 700 Michelle videos available, one grainier than the next, even though Michelle’s only made 100 or so videos total. (YouTube is blocked by the Chinese government, as are Facebook, Twitter and YouTube.)
Everyone here is very young. It’s not like New York or Paris where you have career beauty editors and executives well into their second and third decades of work. The fashion/beauty/media industries only exploded here in the past decade, so it’s not surprising everyone is younger. Still, I can’t help feeling like I’m in an Asian version of that science fiction story Logan’s Run, where no one is over the age of 30. But at the same time, it’s exciting. I feel like I’m really witnessing something while it’s happening. Sandy Linter, the amazing makeup artist, and I trade emails. She’s been following the trip via the blog entries and she pegs it: “The Youthquake all over again.”
The Youthquake she’s referring to took place in the 1960s in New York and London and led to so many changes, both political and cultural. It will be interesting to see where China’s Youthquake leads.
It’s a long, long day. We take a 20-minute break then meet in the lobby for the drive to dinner. We have a fun meal with the Lancome China team in a private room at a traditional Chinese restaurant near the Forbidden City. Keeping my vow to try everything, I have the braised jellyfish, a sake-like red wine sweetened with dried plums, and warm, sweet walnut milk. Then it’s back to the hotel, where once again I fall asleep the second my head hits the pillow.
Photos: Michelle and the Lancome team, the e-fluencers, the event space, watching the Teint Miracle demo, Julia & Michelle, gothy attendees, Jerome and the beauty director of Vogue China, me and the beauty director of Harper's Bazaar China, outside the event space at night.
