Always beautiful got boring a long time ago. Instead these days I pick prominent features because it is easier to describe: e.g. taunt features, gleaming teeth, sideburns, lazy eyes.
I guess it is difficult to not make the person at least a little bit cool-looking but that doesn't need to mean beautiful, and I don't give any grief if others want their characters to be beautiful. One of my friends loves to make his description as interesting as possible, picture included. To do so he has deliberately made one of his current characters a real lamo, but it works, his character is one of the core personalities.