Bio

Sali Hughes is a journalist, presenter and broadcaster, specialising in beauty, women’s issues and film. A former magazine editor, she has written extensively for Grazia, The Telegraph, The Observer, Vogue, Elle, Stylist, Marie Claire, Cosmopolitan, Glamour, Shortlist, Woman & Home, Good Housekeeping and Net-a-Porter. She is Contributing Editor on Red magazine and former resident columnist on The Pool and Empire magazine (both of which saw her twice-nominated for Columnist of The Year). She is also Beauty Editor on The Guardian, where she is known for her intelligent, straight-talking advice and honest product recommendations. Sali is a very experienced radio broadcaster, appearing frequently on BBC Radio 4’s Woman’s Hour (for whom she has also presented three in-programme series), Late Night Woman’s Hour, You & Yours, and The Today Programme. She has made many guest television appearances on Sky News, BBC2’s Newsnight, ITV's This Morning, Good Morning Britain and Lorraine. She has written and presented her own factual reports for BBC One Wales, and appeared as beauty expert on a number of consumer shows, including BBC One’s The Truth About Beauty and BBC2’s What to Buy and Why. Her own popular YouTube series of “In The Bathroom With…” interviews has won three major beauty industry awards. Since 2015, Sali has also presented her own show on Soho Radio. Sali has presented a number of TV industry events for the BBC and Channel 4, chaired countless discussion panels for high profile brands, organisations and at all major UK literary festivals. In 2016, she accepted a prestigious invitation to address The Oxford Union, arguing that beauty, feminism and substance are not mutually exclusive. In 2018, she co-founded Beauty Banks, a non-profit collective providing essential toiletries to people living in serious poverty in Britain. For their work on Beauty Banks, she and co-founder Jo Jones have won several major awards, including The Big Issue’s Changemakers 2019 and 2021, You Magazine’s Most Extraordinary Women of 2021, as well as a nomination for the lifetime achievement award at the 2020 Vogue Beauty Awards. In 2022, she was awarded an Honorary Fellowship from Cardiff University, for services to journalism and charity. Sali is author of Pretty Honest and Pretty Iconic. In 2019, she won the J&J Award for Outstanding Contribution to Beauty, and the prestigious CEW Achiever awards, both as voted by industry peers. She has a large social media presence, Tweeting and Instagraming from @salihughes. She lives in Brighton with her two sons and husband, TV comedy writer Daniel Maier.