As a man, subjecting oneself to the blinding lights of the perfume and cosmetics section of Selfridges is considerably easier, it turns out, when one is being accompanied by a multi-award winning beauty editor. That blinding labyrinth of light and intimidation that surely formed the inspiration for Rachel Whiteread’s towering white Turbine Hall installation, the Unilever Series, at the Tate Modern late last year is an area most men generally shuffle through awkwardly, if not avoid altogether. Rather, head held high, I recently made my way to the Clinique counter to come to grips, first hand, with the burgeoning industry of male cosmetics.

Propped daintily upon a gleaming white high chair, with a mascara twirler (or whatever) run delicately through my eyelashes I felt totally secure, which is surely further evidence of my colleague’s enormous power over the entire universe of beauty. “I should start a column called Pimp My Colleague,” she declared as the photographer snapped my picture.

In 2004 Market analysts Mintel valued the UK male grooming market at £685 million. By 2009 they have predicted that this figure will rise to £821 million. In April this year Selfridges devoted its front window displays exclusively to male clothes. Clinique, who launched their men's cosmetics range 20 years ago, have now been joined by Lancôme, Clarins, Jean Paul Gaultier and others. While none of these events individually spell the birth of some new age of man, cumulatively they made me feel I needed to investigate the world of male cosmetics. And so a few weeks back when I was told I’d been booked in for a make-over with Clinique and OPI, I felt powerless to say no.

Back on my high chair, Lauren Smith, the capable Assistant Business Manager for Clinique at Selfridges, sat me down next to a device Clinique have invented to assess skin type. The device, which has all the apparent scientific veracity of a Scientology personality test-o-meter (or whatever) asks its operator to quiz their subject on their skin type. I know absolutely nothing about my skin at all so pushed the machine to the outer limits of its already dubious credibility. But, my faith in Lauren and her knowledge of the body’s largest organ was and is unwavering. She assessed me as a skin type “combination oily”, or pasty, grease smeared, vampiric, indoorsy-type skin, She then showed me a glimpse of my future as she brought out the twelve thousand products I would need if I wanted to stay 28 forever, which in abject defiance of my birthday next week, I do.

All too many articles written by men on their journey into the feminine world at some point have a paragraph on the intimidating, if not emasculating sensation of entering the boudoir. Well mine is no different. When, the next day I went back to Selfridges to pick up my products and have my nails done at OPI, I suddenly felt terrifyingly alone. My beauty editor pal had been called away on other business (to Milan, or gay Paris I suppose), and so for all my previous swagger I now felt decidedly meek. Lauren handed me my products and I headed to OPI to have my nails done.

OPI do the nails of greater Hollywood, having begun as a brand catering to the stars eventually their products and services were in such high demand that they released lines for the common woman, and ultimately man. I had a manicure in which my nails were buffed and clipped, my cuticles sorted out, my nails painted and my elbows (curiously) lubricated. Where most men opt for transparent nail polish, if anything, I went for Linkin Park After Dark, a deep purple / black colour that I fancied would transform me into a goth kraut rock god. “Do a lot of men have this done?” I asked the Head Nail Technician, Charmaigne Williams, who was tending to me. “No,” she replied “none do.”

I was at my most self-conscious on the tube ride back to work, having been instructed not to touch anything for an hour to give my nails time to dry. In attempting to adhere to this I was forced to mince, little fingers cocked. I found myself overcompensating for the mascara and nail varnish by scowling, which gave me the outward appearance of an irritated poodle.

There can be no question that, in spite of the recent movement towards beauty products being marketed to males, fastidious attention to appearance is still associated with gay men. It is not by chance that the term to describe the preening modern man, metrosexuality, suggests some kind of deviation from the hetero.

The writer and sexuality commentator, Nancy Friday, author of among other things, Men in Love, Men’s Sexual Fantasies, wrote in the late nineties: “we are a different culture where... beauty is linked to male homosexuality; as the power of beauty has shifted increasingly into men's lives, the star of homosexuality rises.” Simultaneously, interestingly, no such association exists between female beauty and lesbianism.

In her recent article about male models, Lisa Armstrong wrote that “the frenzy of appreciation (11 million internet hits and counting, many of them from overexcited females) that has greeted [male model, David Gandy’s] Dolce appearance suggests that this is not only a gay phenomenon.” Were this an article about a female model, with all gender references reversed, it would seem absurd.

To counter the sense that beautiful men are gay men, male grooming products have traditionally been given overtly masculine packaging and imagery. Advertisers of men's fashion and cosmetics, who control some of the chief images relating to the masculine ideal are these days decreasingly reluctant to talk about beauty. Where previously they packaged their products around concepts of “health” and “grooming” now they are more comfortable using the words “beauty” and “makeup.”

I stuck to my full beauty regimen for just over a week, which some of my male colleagues declared to be “very brave.” While no strangers directly commented on my new look, I did feel the perpetual glimmer of idle curiosity or slight antipathy wherever I went. Perhaps the antipathy was imagined rather than real, and reactions from people who knew me were generally quite positive about my new look, nevertheless, when I washed it all off I did feel quite some relief.

Having now abandoned my black nails, mascara and bronzer, I do keep up with some of my skin care plan and have once brushed over a blemish with foundation. And I would wear black nails again, but for party purposes rather than meetings with my boss.

Is this the beginning of a transitional moment that will see all men in mudpacks, hair rollers and home pedicure kits before the century is out? The jury is out.

OPI products, including Linkin Park After Dark, are available from www.lenawhite.co.uk or 01923 240 010

Clinique Skin Supplies for Men are available from www.cliniqueformen.co.uk or 0870 0342566