Kathleen Hou is the definition of a beauty boss. As The Cut’s Beauty Director, Kathleen travels around the world to review products, try out treatments, and curate brands that are worthy of our bathroom counters. Her stories are as beautiful as they are compelling, and she even won The Cut’s first Fragrance Foundation Award for a piece on Christine Nagel, Hermès’s first female perfumer earlier this year. Wondering how Kathleen spends her mornings and preps her skin for a busy day? Check out her complete morning routine below.
7:30 A.M. My iPhone alarm rings. I wish I could say that I wake up to the soothing sound of a dolphin song or what not, but alas, my alarm is the sound of gentle dogs barking — it’s an iPhone default.
The first thing I read are texts. I try to put my phone down around 10 – 11 P.M., so I usually wake up to a few missed messages and What’s App alerts from friends who live in other countries. Sometimes, I wake up to a group text having blown up while I was sleeping, so I’ll scroll back to find bubbles like, “Where is Kathleen?” “Oh, she’s sleeping.” I’ll blearily try to read my iPhone messages without my glasses and respond back with an emoji to show I read their conversation. I contributed.
7:45 A.M. Still lying on my bed because honestly, after much research, I finally have created the most comfortable bed (start with fluffy Casper pillows) and it is difficult to leave, I read the news, usually the UK sites first. I check my Twitter, Google alerts, WWD, and then email and Slack.
If the news is terrible, I lie there for a few minutes more. If the news is extra terrible, I check Instagram so I can be soothed by the cute bulldog puppy accounts. Also the supermodel Iman has a great Instagram account where she posts affirmations called #Imandaily. (She is always awake before I am). They’re inspirational, without being pithy or trite. Here’s an example of a recent one: “If you’re lucky enough to do well, send the elevator back down.” See what I mean?
8 A.M. I finally get out of bed, brush my teeth, splash water on my face, and then start with my skincare. I pat some Whamisoo toner (a Korean brand) or Tatcha Essence or SK-II Treatment onto my face, I like how cool and refreshing it feels. Then I head to the kitchen to make a cup of green tea (I use tea bags I bought the last time I was in Kyoto) mixed with a spoonful of Korean citroen tea mix — it’s a sweet liquid full of citrus rind that you can add to water. It’s delicious — it’s the same tea they serve at Jin Soon’s spa.
8:15 A.M. If I eat breakfast at home, I compile a breakfast made out of various things in the fridge — usually purple Japanese sweet potatoes that my mom bakes and saves for me, half a sea salted avocado, or sometimes a two-minute soft boiled egg (Martha Stewart taught me.)
I also always need a bite or two of something sweet. There’s always some type of baked good in my apartment, like a cookie or a slice of cake in the fridge, so I might take a bite or two of that. Or sometimes, if I really feel like I’ll need it, I’ll get one of the Hawaiian (swiss cheese, pineapple) scones that they sell at the cafeteria downstairs from our office, if it hasn’t sold out yet. I also do a lot of breakfast meetings so many mornings you’ll find me at Daily Provisions, ABCV, Two Hands, De Maria, or Balthazar catching up with people.
8:30 A.M. I’ll write a quick blog post aggregating some news that came up overnight or this morning. Usually, I’ll have prepped a post ready to go in the morning, so I’ll make sure that it’s all set to go.
This is also around the time, if I’m having a good morning, I’ll try and write three to six pages freehand in a notebook, a la Artist’s Way. She recommends you do it everyday, but I haven’t gotten to that yet. If I do it a few times a week, I feel good about it. It just gets out a lot of the thoughts in the morning, it’s kind of like mental stretching. I both love and hate to write by hand — my hand starts to cramp around page five, but I think it feels good in an old-fashioned way to put something physical to the paper. It’s a combination of a daily diary and mental flexing.
9 A.M. I finish up on skincare. I like to layer my skincare products, so I often do other things as I let them “set.” After toner, I’ll apply an antioxidant serum that smells a lot like pennies — like Drunk Elephant’s C-Firma Day Serum or Skinceutical’s CE Ferulic. I’ll answer a few emails and then, the next layer goes on: Usually, some type of moisturizing serum.
Recently, I’ve been liking Innisfree’s The Green Tea serum, it feels really hydrating and rich, without feeling creamy. I’ll start packing for the day, put together a gym outfit (I like to work out after work). Then I’ll put on a moisturizer. In the summer, I like to use a lighter moisturizer with more of a gel texture like the Tatcha Water Cream. I’ll do an eye cream too, recently, I’ve been using this one from Guerlain that has a metal tip so it also slightly cool and depuffs as I put it on. The last step in my skincare routine is sunscreen. My friends from Glow Recipe introduced me to Prem sunscreen, which feels better than a moisturizer — not oily, doesn’t pill, and doesn’t leave an oily base for my makeup.
9:15 A.M. Then I use about 7 makeup products to get that “no-makeup” look — super easy, I know. Usually, it’s a foundation (recently, I’ve been testing out and liking Estee Lauder’s Doublewear Water Fresh) or a CC Cream (It Cosmetics or Bobbi Brown’s cushion compact.) Then I use the undereye concealer I’ve used for ten years, Cle de Peau’s undereye concealer in Ochre to get rid of my dark eye circles. I lightly bronze my face using a brush and Tom Bronzing Powder, and dot a bit of cream blush on top (the blush portion of Hourglass Cosmetic’s Illume Sheer Color Trio.)
I fill in my brows using Benefit’s Precisely My Brow pencil, and lightly line them with chocolate brown eyeliner (I prefer it over black), with my current favorite being Charlotte Tilbury’s Kohl Eyeliner in Barbarella Brown. My last and favorite step is curling my lashes using the Surratt Beauty eyelash curler. It’s a luxury beauty line started by a former protege of Kevyn Aucoin, who manufactures everything in Japan. It’s so well-designed and I love using it.
I finally, finally leave for the office, grab my headphones, load up Spotify to a playlist of current favorites I have that is inexplicably called “Shower” and go.