Ducks a fortune: More younger Australian women now lining up for lip filler and other surgery
IT was once for the older generation only. But no longer — cosmetic enhancement is now the must-have beauty treatment for increasingly younger women.
Confidential
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A DECADE ago cosmetic procedures were the realm of women looking to prolong their youthful looks through Botox injections, spoken of only in hushed tones.
Today it has a very different image, with a market of young women in their prime embracing the new trend of less-than-subtle enhancements.
Take it from our reality TV stars and Instagram influencers: cosmetically enhanced lips are leading the way and Aussie women are falling into line.
According to the Cosmetic Physicians College of Australasia, lip filler has become one of the most popular procedures in recent years. One doctor even likens it to being as “common” among women as picking up a new handbag or a pair of shoes.
Married At First Sight star Davina Rankin, 26, has no qualms admitting she’s a long-time user of lip-filler injections to plump up her lips. Rankin has been getting them done every six months since she was 18.
“A little bit of filler really goes a long way,” says Rankin, who had her first treatment as a young glamour model after she got dental veneers and felt her lips were out of proportion.
“I get lip filler and a tiny bit of Botox in my forehead. My mum’s from Papua New Guinea so I actually naturally have decent-sized lips anyway,” she says.
Filler is a solution, most commonly hyaluronic acid, which is injected into the lips to fill the soft tissue under the skin and create contours and volume. It is also commonly
used to create high cheekbones or to lift sagging brows.
There is no record of how many Australian women indulge in the treatment, due to an unregulated industry (until recent calls for a crackdown, anyone from untrained hairdressers and beauty therapists could offer the medical procedure). However, injectables are conservatively estimated to be a billion-dollar business.
The most recent research in the area, conducted by So What? Research in January, found that in a survey of 3000 Australian women almost half the respondents (46 per cent) said they had a cosmetic treatment to address thin lips or would consider it.
In addition, 84 per cent said they were “actively considering” or “may consider” using dermal fillers in the future.
For reality TV viewers, the news should come as no surprise. In recent months, Australians have met lip-filler convert Rankin and her co-star Tracey Jewel, 35, who confessed to having a $9000 faceful of filler.
“I got filler in my cheeks, lips and under my eyes,” Jewel told a gossip magazine.
“But TV wasn’t so kind. I’d look at some of the angles I was shot in and think, ‘S ..., is that what I look like?’
“Then the online abuse started.”
After watching herself on Married At First Sight, Jewel reversed the lot. And if Married At First Sight isn’t your style, you only needed to flick the channel to find two more big-pouted princesses on Seven’s My Kitchen Rules.
Jessica Alvial, 31, and Emma Byron, 38, from Sydney’s eastern suburbs, were dubbed the “Botox Sisters” for what viewers perceived to be an excessive indulgence
in cosmetic work.
In fact, the women received so much online abuse as a result, when contacted for this article they felt too traumatised to speak.
And in recent weeks, Ten’s Bachelor In Paradise has delivered a new spate of injectable faces with Keira Maguire, 31, and Laurina Fleure, 34, both previously admitting to having a gamut of plastic surgery and cosmetic enhancements.
Maguire said she found the pressures of fame so intense, she underwent a $35,000 makeover as a result.
Once the pastime of the wealthy and ageing elite, cosmetic work has been adopted and repurposed by a new generation of women in their teens, 20s and 30s.
Popularity has soared in the past five years, with advances in cosmetic medicine meaning getting fillers now has little down time and is far cheaper than surgery.
(Costs start as low as $350, though repeat treatments are usually required every six months to a year.)
“What we’re noticing is that younger and younger kids are having fillers,” says Professor Mark Ashton, president of the Australian Society of Plastic Surgeons.
“And that’s not to correct the effects of ageing, that’s to structurally and fundamentally change the way they look.”
In recent years, Prof Ashton has noticed women are requesting a new kind of Eurasian look, which he believes stems from social media and the internet giving us more access to images from different racial groups.
It features a blend of qualities traditionally considered beautiful in different societies across the world. “She’s got high cheekbones, really full lips,” he describes.
“The West is moving towards the East and vice versa.”
Sydney friends Kelly Douglas, 33, Kate Galliano, 22, and Katherine Johnston, 26, have all regularly had their lips injected with filler.
“Most of my friends get it,” Johnston says.
“All of my friends,” corrects Galliano.
Galliano was just 15 when she got her first taste of lip-filler during a holiday to Russia, while Douglas was 18 when she had her first injections of filler and anti-wrinkle drug botulinum toxin (commonly known as Botox).
Johnston was practically elderly in comparison, getting her first taste at 21.
When Douglas first got filler in her hometown of Hobart in 2003, the procedure was rarely talked about and she hardly knew anyone else getting it.
But it was suggested to her during a microdermabrasion treatment and she maxed out her credit card with the $1000 cost.
“I tried it and I just became addicted to it from then,” she says.
Douglas didn’t notice it as a trend until she moved to Sydney several years later and seizing the opportunity began running “Botox parties” for women to get together, socialise and receive injections of Botox or fillers.
In 2018, getting a quick jab may seem as standard as visiting a hairdresser, but doctors warn the risks mean that choosing a trained and skilled physician is essential.
Worldwide 50 people have gone blind permanently after having filler injected, some of whom had it inserted into their lips.
When Galliano got her first treatment, her upper lip swelled up to touch her nose, covered in what looked like giant weeping cold sores for several weeks.
For Johnston, her initial treatment resulted in hard lumps forming permanently in her lips.
Then there’s the less serious but unwanted consequence of addiction, in which patients get a distorted view of themselves and repeatedly get filler treatments resulting in a disproportionate “duck face” aesthetic.
Real Housewives Of Sydney star Matty Samaei says she often has to refuse clients who have lost perspective at her Double Bay clinic, while Brisbane-based Dr Mary Dingley, confirms a good proportion of her work comes from clients asking her to “fix it”.
Thankfully, the benefit of hyaluronic acid is that it can be dissolved.
As for Davina Rankin, she’s never had a bad experience and proudly acts as a “walking advertisement” for her doctors.
“I think, do whatever makes you feel comfortable,” she says.
“If you feel like getting a more plumpy lip, do it. Everyone should be able to do what they want to do without being criticised.
“It can make all the difference to someone’s confidence.”