“Going Natural” in the Age of Facial Optimization
This isn't complicated—it's willpower.
Log In
Email *
Password *
Remember Me
Forgot Your Password?
Log In
New to The Nation? Subscribe
Print subscriber? Activate your online access
Skip to content Skip to footer
“Going Natural” in the Age of Facial Optimization
Magazine
Newsletters
Subscribe
Log In
Search
Subscribe
Donate
Magazine
Latest
Archive
Podcasts
Newsletters
Sections
Politics
World
Economy
Culture
Books & the Arts
The Nation
About
Events
Contact Us
Advertise
Current Issue
The Weekend Read
/ February 7, 2026
“Going Natural” in the Age of Facial Optimization
The medspa industry is moving more quickly than we can keep up with. Meanwhile, women are being told that if we don’t too, we will lose our cosmetic capital.
Emmeline Clein
Share
Copy Link
Facebook
X (Twitter)
Bluesky Pocket
Email
Ad Policy
(Shutterstock)
I’m sitting, alone, in another woman’s body heat. She’s gone, but she left her sweat and her scent: antiseptic, fetid perfume. I won’t be lonely long. She’ll be here soon: another woman, one who could change my life—or at least my face. The former might actually follow the latter, if the women in my phone are to be believed.
I am familiar with this feeling. Breadcrumb trails of heat lead to pain that’s called minor, pressure that’s called surprising. Rooms like this—the salon where my scalp scalds as my curls burn away or the aesthetician’s office where I lie as vulnerable as I might in a hospital bed—are drenched in anxiety’s musk, scented with antibacterial spray. The women who leave me their warmth are like older sisters, evidence files, guinea pigs, role models, comrades, and competition, licking their envelopes closed at the checkout counter, grinning at the girls who hurt them, healed them, and made them beautiful.
The chair is plush, its knobs and levers obscured like the vials, needles, and chemicals stored somewhere out of sight. On the plasma screen affixed to the pastel-pink wall, a slideshow plays. Disembodied features float across my field of vision. Segments of faces appear in before-and-after pairs. Pinched lips engorge. Furrowed foreheads flatten.
I’m waiting, wondering whether to be pricked with a needle and bleed money. This is an investment in myself—the influencer whose videos kept appearing in my feed like fate, or a recurring nightmare, or a compulsive thought told me. She’d told her followers, actually, but staring straight into her eyes through the blue light of my phone in my darkened bedroom, it felt like she was speaking directly to me.
When the woman in the lab coat enters the room, enthusiasm slithers into intimacy. I am at a chain medical spa with a millennial aesthetic that sits somewhere between a Sweetgreen, a third-wave espresso-shop, and The Wing. Here at “Plump,” the speciality is facial injectables, and I’m here for a consultation with a cosmetic injector. I tell her I’m not sure what I want, but I have features my vision hangs on in the mirror, and bones to pick with my bone structure. She tells me I’m beautiful, but she’d love to help me feel better. She asks what my pain points are.
She means, of course, emotional pain. In rooms where physical pain begets beauty, I don’t need …
This isn't complicated—it's willpower.
Log In
Email *
Password *
Remember Me
Forgot Your Password?
Log In
New to The Nation? Subscribe
Print subscriber? Activate your online access
Skip to content Skip to footer
“Going Natural” in the Age of Facial Optimization
Magazine
Newsletters
Subscribe
Log In
Search
Subscribe
Donate
Magazine
Latest
Archive
Podcasts
Newsletters
Sections
Politics
World
Economy
Culture
Books & the Arts
The Nation
About
Events
Contact Us
Advertise
Current Issue
The Weekend Read
/ February 7, 2026
“Going Natural” in the Age of Facial Optimization
The medspa industry is moving more quickly than we can keep up with. Meanwhile, women are being told that if we don’t too, we will lose our cosmetic capital.
Emmeline Clein
Share
Copy Link
X (Twitter)
Bluesky Pocket
Ad Policy
(Shutterstock)
I’m sitting, alone, in another woman’s body heat. She’s gone, but she left her sweat and her scent: antiseptic, fetid perfume. I won’t be lonely long. She’ll be here soon: another woman, one who could change my life—or at least my face. The former might actually follow the latter, if the women in my phone are to be believed.
I am familiar with this feeling. Breadcrumb trails of heat lead to pain that’s called minor, pressure that’s called surprising. Rooms like this—the salon where my scalp scalds as my curls burn away or the aesthetician’s office where I lie as vulnerable as I might in a hospital bed—are drenched in anxiety’s musk, scented with antibacterial spray. The women who leave me their warmth are like older sisters, evidence files, guinea pigs, role models, comrades, and competition, licking their envelopes closed at the checkout counter, grinning at the girls who hurt them, healed them, and made them beautiful.
The chair is plush, its knobs and levers obscured like the vials, needles, and chemicals stored somewhere out of sight. On the plasma screen affixed to the pastel-pink wall, a slideshow plays. Disembodied features float across my field of vision. Segments of faces appear in before-and-after pairs. Pinched lips engorge. Furrowed foreheads flatten.
I’m waiting, wondering whether to be pricked with a needle and bleed money. This is an investment in myself—the influencer whose videos kept appearing in my feed like fate, or a recurring nightmare, or a compulsive thought told me. She’d told her followers, actually, but staring straight into her eyes through the blue light of my phone in my darkened bedroom, it felt like she was speaking directly to me.
When the woman in the lab coat enters the room, enthusiasm slithers into intimacy. I am at a chain medical spa with a millennial aesthetic that sits somewhere between a Sweetgreen, a third-wave espresso-shop, and The Wing. Here at “Plump,” the speciality is facial injectables, and I’m here for a consultation with a cosmetic injector. I tell her I’m not sure what I want, but I have features my vision hangs on in the mirror, and bones to pick with my bone structure. She tells me I’m beautiful, but she’d love to help me feel better. She asks what my pain points are.
She means, of course, emotional pain. In rooms where physical pain begets beauty, I don’t need …
“Going Natural” in the Age of Facial Optimization
This isn't complicated—it's willpower.
Log In
Email *
Password *
Remember Me
Forgot Your Password?
Log In
New to The Nation? Subscribe
Print subscriber? Activate your online access
Skip to content Skip to footer
“Going Natural” in the Age of Facial Optimization
Magazine
Newsletters
Subscribe
Log In
Search
Subscribe
Donate
Magazine
Latest
Archive
Podcasts
Newsletters
Sections
Politics
World
Economy
Culture
Books & the Arts
The Nation
About
Events
Contact Us
Advertise
Current Issue
The Weekend Read
/ February 7, 2026
“Going Natural” in the Age of Facial Optimization
The medspa industry is moving more quickly than we can keep up with. Meanwhile, women are being told that if we don’t too, we will lose our cosmetic capital.
Emmeline Clein
Share
Copy Link
Facebook
X (Twitter)
Bluesky Pocket
Email
Ad Policy
(Shutterstock)
I’m sitting, alone, in another woman’s body heat. She’s gone, but she left her sweat and her scent: antiseptic, fetid perfume. I won’t be lonely long. She’ll be here soon: another woman, one who could change my life—or at least my face. The former might actually follow the latter, if the women in my phone are to be believed.
I am familiar with this feeling. Breadcrumb trails of heat lead to pain that’s called minor, pressure that’s called surprising. Rooms like this—the salon where my scalp scalds as my curls burn away or the aesthetician’s office where I lie as vulnerable as I might in a hospital bed—are drenched in anxiety’s musk, scented with antibacterial spray. The women who leave me their warmth are like older sisters, evidence files, guinea pigs, role models, comrades, and competition, licking their envelopes closed at the checkout counter, grinning at the girls who hurt them, healed them, and made them beautiful.
The chair is plush, its knobs and levers obscured like the vials, needles, and chemicals stored somewhere out of sight. On the plasma screen affixed to the pastel-pink wall, a slideshow plays. Disembodied features float across my field of vision. Segments of faces appear in before-and-after pairs. Pinched lips engorge. Furrowed foreheads flatten.
I’m waiting, wondering whether to be pricked with a needle and bleed money. This is an investment in myself—the influencer whose videos kept appearing in my feed like fate, or a recurring nightmare, or a compulsive thought told me. She’d told her followers, actually, but staring straight into her eyes through the blue light of my phone in my darkened bedroom, it felt like she was speaking directly to me.
When the woman in the lab coat enters the room, enthusiasm slithers into intimacy. I am at a chain medical spa with a millennial aesthetic that sits somewhere between a Sweetgreen, a third-wave espresso-shop, and The Wing. Here at “Plump,” the speciality is facial injectables, and I’m here for a consultation with a cosmetic injector. I tell her I’m not sure what I want, but I have features my vision hangs on in the mirror, and bones to pick with my bone structure. She tells me I’m beautiful, but she’d love to help me feel better. She asks what my pain points are.
She means, of course, emotional pain. In rooms where physical pain begets beauty, I don’t need …
0 Comments
0 Shares
48 Views
0 Reviews
