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In the early aughts, the beauty aisle doubled as a dessert menu. Bath & Body Works was churning out frosting-inspired mists, Lanc\u00f4me\u2019s Marshmallow Juicy Tube lip glosses lined the purses of teens and adults alike, and Jessica Simpson launched an entire line of edible body products that promised to taste as good as they smelled (I can personally attest that they didn\u2019t).<\/p>\n
While the era\u2019s self-care routines were sugar-filled, its diet fads were decidedly sugar-free. Pro-anorexia forums thrived on LiveJournal, ads for workout programs and weight loss pills dominated TV, and tabloids treated celebrity weight speculation like breaking news.<\/p>\n
Fast forward twenty years, and we\u2019ve somehow landed back in a strikingly similar cultural moment. After a fleeting moment in the 2010s when the body positivity movement gave us a glimmer of hope that beauty standards were finally broadening, the cultural celebration of thinness has returned with a vengeance. The resurgence started as a whisper with the rise of GLP-1 weight-loss medications like Ozempic and Wegovy and has since risen to a shout, reigniting the ultra-skinny ideal in a way we haven\u2019t seen since the early aughts. Hashtags like #Y2KSkinny and #2000sSkinny climbed TikTok\u2019s algorithm before the app started blocking searches for #SkinnyTok due to its glamorization of disordered eating (which, if you ask the experts, won\u2019t help curb content that glorifies thinness or disordered eating).<\/p>\n
All the while, I can\u2019t help but notice that beauty, once again, is going all in on dessert. Scents of comfort\u2014like vanilla, caramel, and tonka bean\u2014have come back in full force just as diet culture has retightened its grip, a phenomenon I like to call \u201ctreat beauty.\u201d<\/p>\n
Food-scented beauty products have always existed, but they haven\u2019t always occupied this much cultural and commercial real estate. Throughout much of the 2010s, fragrance trends skewed more seductive<\/em> than edible<\/em>: spicy florals, musks, ambers, and earthy notes dominated perfume launches, with sweetness often playing a supporting role rather than the main event. Vanilla and other gourmand notes never wavered entirely, but in 2025, they moved decisively to center stage.<\/p>\n Right now, launches of dessert-themed fragrances are up 24 percent year over year, according to Mintel. In turn, gourmand notes like pistachio, milk, and honey have spilled over from perfume counters into body care, candles, and even makeup. \u201cThe trend now touches nearly every price point\u2014from personal fragrances to candles that evoke favorite foods and the memories attached to them,\u201d says Linda G. Levy, president of the Fragrance Foundation.<\/p>\n For example: In the back half of 2025 alone, Rhode Beauty celebrated Hailey Bieber\u2019s birthday with limited-edition lip tints that smell\u2014and taste\u2014like tiramisu, vanilla soft serve, and cr\u00e8me br\u00fbl\u00e9e (that\u2019s on top of the numerous other glazed-donut-themed products she sells); Bath & Body Works\u2019 Milk Bar collaboration turned the bakery\u2019s best-selling confections into soaps and lotions; and Beekman 1802\u2019s partnerships with Hershey\u2019s and Libby\u2019s promised “Foodified” skincare inspired by chocolate bars and pumpkin pie.<\/p>\n