Personally I’ve always found most men look more attractive with beards (I’m a straight dude) so I grew one as soon as I could.
After having it for a while I decided to shave as I hadn’t seen my actual face in a few years. After I shaved I realized that I have very chubby cheeks that make me look like a literal child.
In the US they were definitely out of fashion in the '80s and '90s. They were fashion statement that said "I'm a gross hippie" or worse, a BeeGee.
I was a teen at the time and the consensus among teen girls was that a beard was the ultimate dealbreaker of a physical attribute. Makes sense, really, because most guys our age couldn't grow a nice one if they wanted to. (And also - hippies are gross). I always respectfully disagreed, and would point to our classmate, Murad. He had pretty well grown facial hair by junior year and he looked fiiiinne.
The exception that proved the rule? Luckily (for Murad) my classmates generally agreed, but refused to back down from their opinion in general.
That attitude persisted, with the occasional appearance of a goatee or soul patch in the late '90s, both of which proved to be a gateway drug that led to the appearance of proper beards. I think a lot of guys would have liked to have beards, but realized that they were driving away potential partners. But they were pretty normal by 2010.
I'll drop this line from wikipedia, which should illustrate just how boringly mainstream beards have become in the US.
Since 2015 a growing number of male political figures have worn beards in office, including Speaker of the House Paul Ryan, and Senators Ted Cruz and Tom Cotton.
My wife and I both grew up in the eighties/nineties and this was exactly her attitude for years. It was only when I went ahead and grew one anyway - despite her reservations - and she decided she actually likes the way I look with it and now won’t let me shave it off!
That’s the tism side of my brain. The ADHD side of my brain thinks shaving is the most boring chore ever. I fold and put away my laundry with greater frequency.
Unfortunately, more recent information is googlebombed with people’s lightly supported fluff pieces, so a cursory look didn’t turn anything like this up for the 80’s, 90’s, 00’s, and 10’s.
Now that I think about it, you can just extrapolate that curve forwards and it matches anecdotal data about the 80’s and 90’s, reaching a similar smooth face extreme around 1990 to peak beard in the 1890. By that logic, it’s a 2-century cycle, and we’ll be back to all beards late this century.
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