What is beauty in the era of 100- year life? Kaoru Saito and Kirin/FANCL's vision for the future of beauty Kaoru Saito / Beauty Journalist
Saeko Doi / General Manager, Cosmetics Product Planning Department, Cosmetics Business Division, FANCL CORPORATION
Sakurako Yoshino / Health Science Business Department, Kirin Holdings Company, Limited

How has the definition of beauty changed in these changing times? And how will it change in the future?

FANCL, which has long been committed to helping people achieve healthy beauty, and Kirin, which has been involved in promoting physical and mental health through beverages and foods, held a discussion with Kaoru Saito, a beauty journalist. She is famous as the author of the book, "If You Read a Page a Day, Your Way of Life Will Change: That’s Why ‘People with Discipline’ Are Beautiful," Shueisha Bunko and has observed the changes in the beauty industry and history of consumers’ perceptions of beauty. The theme of the tripartite talk was "What is the beauty of the future?"

Each of the three will discuss the beauty of the present and future from their respective perspectives.

Changing times and deepening values in the sense of beauty

From your point of view, as a person who has been dealing with the values of beauty for many years, are there any changes confronting beauty in recent years that are particularly impressive to you?

Saito: Yes, I feel that we have indeed reached a major turning point in the past few years. Until now, in the beauty world, proposals for people over 50 have been very limited, and a full-fledged approach for post-menopausal women was still in its infancy. But now that the beauty industry has finally opened its doors to people in their 50s, it will expand further into their 60s, 70s, and 80s in the future. As the phrase "Era of 100-year life" is being coined, I feel that the values of beauty are also undergoing a major change.

Yoshino: I myself strongly agree with what Saito-san said about "the door to one's 50s." This is because when I entered my 40s, I sincerely thought to myself, "Thank you, seniors." Thanks to my seniors who paved the way for me, the breadth of options in beauty is totally different between the 40s I imagined when I was 20 and the actual 40s now. I realize that this is something that has been built up with the times.

How does FANCL feel about the changes confronting beauty?

Doi: At the time FANCL was founded, cosmetics contained additives and were not highly purified, and cosmetics intended to make people beautiful often caused skin problems. The company was founded with the aim of eliminating such defects. Recently, however, the quality of cosmetics itself has improved greatly.

At the same time, customer concerns are becoming more and more diverse. There used to be a certain number of people who said, "I have sensitive skin," but now there are more and more who say, "I don't have sensitive skin, but I feel some kind of discomfort every day." This may mean that changes in our lifestyle and environment are affecting our skin in new ways. As a cosmetics manufacturer, we are always thinking about how to deal with this issue.

Yoshino: I feel that various stressors are increasing as lifestyles diversify, work and household responsibilities are balanced, and the use of digital devices increases. In this context, I feel that there is a need for support to review not only the condition of the skin, but also the entire lifestyle.

What are your thoughts on the growing number of options, such as medical cosmetic treatment?

Doi: As a cosmetics manufacturer, we welcome the expansion of our customers' choices. However, we also feel that we have an increased responsibility to provide correct information. Especially for the younger generation, we need to first communicate the importance of daily care.

Yoshino: That is really true. Medical cosmetic treatment is one option, but there are many things that can be further improved by reviewing one's entire lifestyle, including diet and exercise habits.

Saito: I feel that we are in a bit of a perilous time in this regard.　Medical cosmetic treatment has become so popular that there is now a shortage of surgeons. I am concerned about what will happen in the future.

I write irregularly on the theme of "a life without medical cosmetic treatment," and I think we need to find various ways, including inner care, to find out what we can do instead of medical cosmetic treatment.

A Form of Beauty that goes beyond products and accompanies people in their daily lives

What do you think are the keywords of beauty that symbolize the current era?

Saito: I believe that transparency and cleanliness are important. In fact, transparency is a condition that many people cite when they fall in love at first sight. Whenever I ask someone, "Have you ever experienced love at first sight? What was the reason?" they often answer, "It was someone with a sense of transparency."

However, transparency is very difficult to achieve. It is not easy to feel it when you look at yourself in the mirror. It is the essence of beauty that oozes from deep within the skin.

Cleanliness, on the other hand, can be created with care. It is undeniable that cleanliness, whether in the voice or in the hair, inevitably diminishes with age, but it can be built up if we consciously make up for it. I say, "Let's start by regaining a sense of cleanliness," especially as we age. As you do so, a sense of transparency will emerge.

Doi: Transparency certainly gives the impression of revealing a little of a person's inner self, doesn't it? If you feel this, it means that the person's heart must also be beautiful. I think it is a word that evokes a sense of beauty at a deep level.

Beauty is not only about skincare and makeup; it is also about conditioning from the inside out, isn't it?

Saito: Since I went through menopause, I have drastically changed the axis of my beauty routine. I started to put not only applying but also drinking, in other words, inner care, at the center of my beauty routine. I have a fun story about supplements. For example, I always carry around something like FANCL's Calolimit with me, and when I dine with my friends, I hand them out to everyone so that we can all eat them without worrying. Then everyone is really overjoyed and says, "Let's eat, let's eat."

In this sense, inner care products play an important role as a daily source of pleasure. I feel that it is very important to give myself a daily sense of pleasure, as such a sense of pleasure can lead to a better awakening the next day.

From what you said about inner care, I felt that beauty affects our relationships with others as well as for ourselves. What are your thoughts on the connection between beauty and relationships and society?

Saito: I often think, "the face is both personal and social." Beauty is not something that is unique to oneself, but is also created in relation to others. That is why social wellbeing, in other words, being a comfortable presence for those around you, is also part of beauty. I believe that there is true beauty in connecting better with society while taking care of oneself.

We also believe it is important to view beauty in terms of personal appearance. Be energetic, have fun, and look for beauty that is unique to you. I believe this is the first step to cultivating beauty from the inside out.

Yoshino: At Kirin, we also believe that beauty and health are not only for ourselves, but also helpful to enrich our relationships with others. By being beautiful, we feel confident about ourselves, which in turn leads to smiles when interacting with others. Such a perspective on wellbeing that links the mind and body, as well as the individual and society, may be important.

Yoshino: Kirin is engaged in a variety of initiatives to realize health value for its customers. For example, in order to help customers lead healthy lives, we focus on various health concerns, such as visceral fat and muscle strength, along with immunity, and develop and market supplements with multiple functions. In addition, immunity is an aspect that is difficult to take care of just for its own sake because it is invisible to the eye. That is why we make it available in various forms, such as in various beverages and yogurt.

We value the concept of wellbeing - the perspective that mental health and physical health are connected. If it is only about physical health, you can get nutrients from a tasteless meal. But good food makes people happy, doesn't it? That is why we want to provide tasty and healthy food. It is the same with beauty. We not only want to achieve healthy skin, but we also want to value mental health, such as the fact that being beautiful makes you like yourself and makes it easier to smile when you interact with others.

Doi: To improve the foundation, both nutrition from the outside and from the inside are necessary. To give you a recent concrete example, FANCL has launched a skincare product for the around 30 generation called "toiro." This is a product that caters to the lifestyle of the busy around 30 generation. For this generation, whose skin tends to deteriorate due to irregular lifestyles and lack of sleep, we propose, "Let's accept their lifestyle without denying it, and with that in consideration we will support them in toning their skin with our cosmetics." We believe that offering realistic solutions that are tailored to the person's lifestyle is a form of support from inside out.

Creating the future, dealing with essential beauty

As I listened to what you have said so far, I was reminded that beauty is not just about appearance, but is also deeply connected to the mind and health. What kind of beauty do you think will be sought after in the future?

Saito: To tell you the truth, what I am really interested in now is anti-aging in a larger sense, beyond beauty. In recent years, longevity research has advanced, and some are even thinking about living to 135 years old.

I am very excited about the possibility of anti-aging on a more mankind level, on a global scale. In that sense, I would like to broaden my perspective from a single piece of skin to total youthfulness.

Yoshino: Kirin and FANCL have been conducting research in the fields of health and well-being and beauty respectively. We feel that there is potential to create new beauty values through the collaboration of these two companies.

As I discussed with both of you today, I also believe that the beauty of the mind and body are connected, and I think it is important to have motivation and confidence because of our age, not because of pressure to be beautiful at any age. We hope to help people build that kind of health in their daily lives.

Doi: At FANCL, we also place great importance on being close to the lives of each and every one of our customers. In addition to cosmetics, we are committed to providing correct information and developing safe and reliable products, especially now that there are more and more beauty care options available.

Saito: Kirin and FANCL have different entrances but the goal is the same. These two companies make me feel that way, so I have high expectations for their collaboration. In the future, anti-aging in a larger sense is inevitable in terms of healthy life expectancy. It is not enough to simply live longer. The most important thing is to be healthy, and for that purpose, health and beauty will be truly irreplaceable.

When I think about what is it that increases with age, it can be wisdom or knowledge. By expanding our intellectual curiosity, we can take care of aging, and we will never look back and think that being young was the best thing that ever happened to us. You don't lose everything when you get older. Rather, we can live our lives while discovering within ourselves the things that increase and evolve as we age. I think this is the era we are living in.