I spent the turn of the century in college, and I’m now in the wildly entertaining position of seeing the outfits I wore on the steps of the Delta Zeta sorority house being recycled by women who are now college-age themselves. Indeed, the air has been thick with Y2K nostalgia lately. But as we celebrate the zig-zag headband-bridge between generations, let us not forget that the late ’90s and early 2000s were a time bedeviled by mainstream media that giddily criticized size-six celebrities for getting “bigger than ever.” It was an appalling practice that, thankfully, has become de-normalized.
It was in this era that we met Adriana Lima, who became a Victoria’s Secret Angel in 2000. The Brazilian model’s gorgeousness helped sell countless bras, her beauty not only meeting the highest of prevailing standards but arguably moving the goalpost in an even harder-to-reach direction. And, inconceivably, it seems, she has since aged and done human life-living things like the rest of us who exist within the same space-time realm. She had babies, maybe a cosmetic procedure or two—and she had the audacity to continue existing in public not looking exactly like she did prior to those typical life events.
In 2023, major media outlets largely left the fault-finding in Lima’s somewhat different appearance to individuals on social media, who were unfortunately more than happy to jeer at what they deemed a tragically overweight fallen angel with a “new face” (derogatory), all the while ignoring that she was still easily embodying conventional beauty standards. While there was some coverage of how the internet was reacting to her appearance, there was very little chastisement coming from publications themselves; instead, these publications patiently waited to praise her eventual return to a more familiar Lima look, as if pouncing out from behind a couch at a surprise party, shouting, “Glow-up!”
“Anyone Who Thinks Your 40s Are Too Late for a Fresh Start Hasn’t Seen Adriana Lima’s Glow-Up,” reads the headline of a women.com article. “At 45, Adriana Lima’s Stunning Makeover Marks a New Era for the Supermodel,” said Vogue Arabia.
This celebratory tone feels way friendlier than how the media used to talk about celebrity weight, but it’s just as problematic. [Editor’s note: While Allure never called indisputably thin celebrities fat, we can own up to having promoted skinniness and diet culture back in the day.] By framing Lima’s perceived return to top-tier beauty as something to be exalted, it automatically suggests that the way she looked for a little while was deserving of censure. And the idea that this is somehow a glow-up or a stunning makeover ignores the fact that, even when puffier and allegedly pulled, she was still Adriana-fucking-Lima. When the glow-up “before” is still a real-world 10, we have lost our filter-rotted minds.
Perhaps I’m more annoyed with this than most because, while I in no way reside in the beauty C-suite with Lima, I’ve been told by a number of well-meaning people that I’ve also had a glow-up in my 40s. In my case, I lost weight via a GLP-1 and simply continued my twice-yearly Dysport regimen, while getting a modest filler zhuzh every couple of years. I was never what society would deem ugly prior to these medical interventions, just occasionally chubby, with a slightly less defined jawline. Still, weight loss and some subtle injectable treatments have been interpreted as something to be joyously celebrated with you-go-girl enthusiasm.
Guys, I was cute before, too. Calm down.
Sure, I’ve invested in my appearance in ways that may change or maintain it. But just as judgment over these choices (an entirely separate ball of wax) is uncalled for, so is glorifying the results as if someone took a microwaved Squishmallow and transformed it into a limited-edition Barbie. I simply happen to be at the slender end of my own historical weight fluctuations right now, and I haven’t aged dramatically. That’s a glow-up?
That distinction matters with Lima, too. She’s gone from being supermodel gorgeous to still being supermodel gorgeous, just a little heavier than we were accustomed to seeing her. To call whatever weight she’s lost a glow-up is to suggest there was something to fix, as if we would ever be upset to wake up looking like Lima’s “before” pic at any point in her career.
Ironically, the Victoria’s Secret show itself has changed considerably since Lima first walked it, inviting models with slightly bigger bodies to walk the runway, reflecting the brand’s attempt to move beyond some of the self-imposed limitations of its old image. Yet here we are, still insinuating—albeit in deceivingly positive language—that one of its most famous models needed a software update before she truly qualified to continue walking in the show.
Adriana Lima has been beautiful beyond aspiration for as long as we’ve been aware of her. It’s completely fine to think she looks more familiar now than she did a few years ago—no thought policing here. And it may no longer be ordinary to hurl Y2K-esque insults at her for not looking like she did back then, but that doesn’t mean that era’s absurd beauty criteria aren’t still baked into the way we talk about celebrity appearances, even—and especially—when that talk sounds congratulatory.
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