RSSProduct Review : Clinique Repairwear SPF 15 Foundation
June 12, 2009
I wasn’t planning on buying foundation but I got overheated with the excitement of finding this color and formulation. And I’m still on a Winter Self-Discovery kick. And I had an afternoon alone. So what, you might say. Or, you might say, “3 hours?! In a row??” . I myself fit into the latter category.
I went to Sears to buy another tube of Estee Lauder Zero-Smudge mascara because my daughter appropriated mine. And I had a gift card, you see. So I wandered over to Clinique because they make some good, and more affordable, stuff and they had a GWP.
Their gifts are pretty good and free has a certain appeal that I’m certain you can understand, especially if you have teenagers. I wish they’d put some new lip products in those gifts. The ol’ Different Grape (this is a widely wearable color?), Apple Cider ( less wearable than A Different Grape), and Raspberry Glace (kind of boring), they’ve seen their day. I guess that among Clinique lipsticks, I really like the Butter Shine best, but I can see how not everyone would because it’s so creamy. I do like the choice of gifts, the various glosses, and how they’ve done a warm and cool option.
Clinique has a PWP offer right now of Summer Pinks or Summer Bronzes.
I’m always drawn to foundation. It fascinates me for some reason. There’s a sticky spot in my head for all those nuances of beige. My own skin issues are,
-lines under eyes,
- a lot of pigment discolorations on sides of face,
-large pores on nose,
but the skin is pretty smooth in the sense of not-bumpy.
Foundation these days is astounding in the number of finishes available and even the more complete coverage products look and feel pretty good. So I started looking for a foundation with heavier coverage that might still look believable with a face full, and would allow for less coverage in some places and much more in others. Although we all need a darker skin-tone concealer (for imperfections on the skin) along with the lighter one (for shadows), I feel unlikely to begin mixing 2 concealers to arrive at my perfect shades. Even if I did, I don’t have time to dot concealer on a hundred little spots. What if foundation alone could cover well enough to hide those pigment spots?
Decades ago, foundation used to be too pink. Eventually, I think makeup artists convinced cosmetic companies that skin is actually more yellow than it is pink. Now, I wonder if a lot of products are too yellow. The salespeople tell you that they make it that way to diminish redness. Well, ok, but you’re not supposed to see the yellow tones. Your skin becomes a different color than your ears. I see skin as kind of grayish, but maybe that’s because mine is. I freely admit that I have no experience matching foundation to anybody but myself. Does anyone remember Club Monaco makeup? Monica Lewinsky wore it, just to date it for you. Those were neutral foundation colors.
I found Repairwear in Fair Neutral 03 and Neutral 05. Micaela, the very nice Clinique saleswoman who has worked at our counter for years and knows me to be weird, contesting, and hard-to-please but does a great job of pretending I’m a normal client, gave me a sample. I’m thrilled to see they’re taking a page from the MAC book and doing this now; must have all been at the same staff meeting. You should get a sample too. It’s very hard to get a sense of this foundation, or any foundation, at the store. Like mascara, it can only be tested in your own bathroom.
What happened was this. I tried it on, just the smallest bit, as Micaela advised. She said clients who buy it love it and don’t buy another bottle for ages. Your initial impression is “No way, this is too masky”. But once it’s all spread out, after about 10 seconds, dayam, it looks good. It feels a little bit heavy if you get too much on, but your skin seems rather perfect. Maybe a little too perfect, but I can get with the drama easily. This is not the formulation to begin with if you’re leery of the artificiality of foundation.
Pick a Saturday when you have a lot of time. Apply it as you usually do your foundation. Realize immediately the coverage is more dense than you expected and the only way to make it look real is by wiping it off which will make your skin red and uneven. Rinse it all off instead. Wait 10 minutes.
Begin again. Use ¼ your usual amount of foundation. 1 pump of the bottle is about right for your face. Apply it on the side of your hand and from there, put little dots all over your face and start blending them together. You have lots of time to work it around. The sunscreen in it doesn’t sting so it can go on eyelids and at the inside corners of eyes.
Take a little more off your hand and dab it, or stipple with your foundation brush, over pigment irregularities. It covers very well without looking cakey. If you have larger pores, drive the foundation brush into them end-on, with a little more foundation, and they’ll go away. Only the thinnest coverage goes under the eyes, as with any foundation, mostly just to blend away the concealer lines.
It is supposed to dry matte, and it does an ok job of it. You will need powder. I don’t need more touchups during the day than I normally would. I think the product looks a little “tired” at the end of the day, after a couple of powder re-applications. If I were going out at night, I’d wash it off and reapply. Luckily, I have no night life besides chauffering to soccer games so … if it ain’t my problem, … it ain’t a problem!
I start with Clinique’s All About Eyes concealer in Light Neutral, fabulous in its own right, and paint it in the usual places, the darker shadows. I don’t even blend it in, just paint it on with a lipstick brush. Wait 2 minutes and it will dry looking like Indian paint. The foundation brush will blend it for you but don’t smear. Keep your foundation brush strokes feathery, light, and quick. You want the concealer to stay where you put it.
Don’t buy makeup without visiting Paula Begoun’s group at Beautypedia. You’ll get another opinion and a better sense of what’s in this product than I can give you. You’ll learn whether it deserves Clinique’s “anti-aging”, or even better “de-aging”, label.
Unbelievable someone could have so much to say about foundation.
-->Your initial impression is “No way, this is too masky”. But once it’s all spread out, after about 10 seconds, dayam, it looks good. It feels a little bit heavy if you get too much on, but your skin seems rather perfect. Maybe a little too perfect, but I can get with the drama easily. This is not the formulation to begin with if you’re leery of the artificiality of foundation.
Read moreMakeup Model : Deep Winter
May 6, 2009
How do you know if you’re Deep Winter?
Dark eyes and dark hair are common but not a requirement. Your skin can go from Porcelain to Ebony so that’s not helpful.
So, Penelope Cruz is a classic Deep Winter…or at least, she looks like she would be. She can wear black but she has some ability to wear a few warmer colors. Her best spectrum wouldn’t be as cool and sharp as Elizabeth Taylor’s whom you just wouldn’t put in rust.
What about Salma Hayek? If you’re not sure, push the extremes of the 2 possibilities. Deep Winter holds the neutral line with Deep Autumn, where Deep Winter is cooler. You could take a Deep Winter all the way to blue-black hair and red-violet lips and they’d still look pretty good. You could take a Deep Autumn to bronze hair and beyond to orange-brown and it would be wearable. I can see Salma in the black hair and violet lips. I do not see her in orange hair.
Now, this doesn’t work backwards. You can’t assume red hair is automatically Autumn. Not at all. Often they’re Spring or Summer, many times, Winter. Why do books keep showing Autumn with red hair? I don’t know. Maybe because red hair goes well with orange clothing (analogous colors), so the extrapolation says the person must be Autumn. The closer to orange the hair, the more possibility it belongs to an Autumn.
Julia Roberts has dark hair and eyes. Since blue-black hair and purple lips would be ghoulish, but orange-brown hair is good, she’s likely a Deep Autumn.
Keira Knightley? Tricky. Very difficult. I’ve seen people conclude both. I side with Deep Winter but black hair isn’t perfect; neither is orange hair. This auburn here is good, and a Deep Winter can do auburn. It’s creating some odd shadowing around her nose and yellow around her mouth but it may be the makeup or lighting. For me, her eyes are more arresting and her makeup better in pure Winter colors. They might clear the yellow and turn her skin to milk. Maybe she’s neither. This is a woman who probably needs to be draped in person to figure this out.
Jeanne Tripplehoorn? I cannot see her in orange hair.
Jessica Alba? She’s almost surely Deep something but her hair’s been dark and her lips have been cool red lately and I think it looks forced. I see her better in orange, tawnies, copper colors. Likely some sort of Autumn. With the dark neutral brown hair below, her skin looks washed out and the creases from nose to corners of mouth become noticeable.
Sophia Loren? She can have quite lion-colored hair and bronze lips, so she’s Deep, but it’s probably Autumn.
Anne Hathaway? Blacker hair and redder lips work fine. If ever skin had a lack of warmth, that would be it. She is surely Winter, the incarnation of Miss Snow White. Is she Deep Winter, or cooler yet as Clear Winter or Cool Winter? Probably Cool Winter, because I don’t see much compliment from warmed reds, but who knows without drapes.
Katie Holmes? I can see auburn hair or wine hair but not orange hair. She can wear rust and tomato red as well as the cool dark colors, so probably a Deep Winter.
Colors
Lips: NARS Dolce Vita Sheer Lipstick and lipgloss are good cool coral colors; the gloss is gorgeous in texture and durability, as are all NARS glosses.
Now you need a plum-violet color: Mary Kay Berry Kiss is about as blue-pink as you can go, but this is a nice one (bluer, pinker, and brighter than the picture below). If it seems too pink, try Whipped Berries, warmed up just a little but so slightly foggier and darker, for darker women.
Mary Kay Amber Suede appears more orange and it goes on very dark and pigmented. If you blot if well and apply a gloss over top, the color left behind is quite lovely, again for darker women.
L to R, Whipped Berries, Amber Suede, Garnet Frost, Berry Kiss
Are you looking at these thinking “I thought she said she doesn’t like dark lips?”. I am. The thing is, once you find a color of makeup that repeats a color already in your face (a concept we’ll come back to often) or body, it’s amazing how heavily you can apply it. You can literally pack it on and it looks real because you already have the color in you. Maybe I’ve made this point too obviously, but you see, herein lies the strength of color analysis. It will identify the colors that were used to paint YOU.
So what is your “color-within” lip, your neutral, since those above are all pinkish : MAC Slimshine in Scant will be close. It contains some brown, as this season needs since it’s the bridge between Autumn and Winter.
Much as I believe in neutral makeup, I think all 3 women up there look a little flat with lips the same color as their face. I need to come up with a new term. Neutral means neither warm nor cool, a medium tone type of beige or brown or gray. Many would call the lips in those photos neutral. When I say neutral, I extend the definition to include “any color already in your face is your neutral”.
However, I’m realizing that’s confusing and seems contradictory. Nude just means “like you have nothing on”. Maybe the word I need is Natural. That seems to work. I’m thinking as I type so it’s coming out stream-of-consciousness here. I’ll clarify in a separate post because I just thought of it now.OK, shut up, Christine, and get on with it.
If you still think these are dark, mix them with a clear gloss or a lighter lip color like Estee Lauder Elizabeth Pink.
Good ol’ Clinique Black Honey lip gloss that you see in every magazine suits this group nicely.
Body Shop 05 (I believe the color is Strawberry) can work as a bright.
Blush: Your color-within “natural” blush : take a close look at MAC Breath of Plum.
If you want to put a little more on it, Clinique Berry Delight is a good cool coral to go with Dolce Vita lipstick or gloss (don’t buy Dolce Vita blush, it’s too dusty red-brown; NARS Amour is a better contender – Winter is a season of color clarity, not dullness).
And the red-violet blush to go with the lips above : Mary Kay Bold Berry ; Clinique Breathless Berry is cooler than Berry Delight but not as cool as Bold Berry.
Eyeliner: Clarins Waterproof eyeliner in 03 Grey, a sparkly dark grey; Annabelle Kohl Eyeliner in 77 Charcoal, terribly smudgy but great color so powder over it.
Winter is the only group that can wear black eyeliner if the depth of their coloring supports it. If not, the darkest grey or black-coffee brown are darker colors that appear less hard.
Eyeshadow: Clinique Totally Neutral ; MaryKay makes Charcoal eye shadow, a lovely matte midtone dove grey for the cooler women. Paula’s Choice Charcoal is also a beautiful matte grey-brown, more brown than the MaryKay, a fantastic shade for those who are close to Deep Autumn but need the coolness of Winter.
Your natural color : Merle Norman Mink.
Eye hilite : Paula’s Choice Beige. ( Note that Paula’s Choice is selling off her eyeshadows for $4 or less. These are great products, perfectly matte, all available as samples. You will never find a better beauty deal anywhere.)
Within each season, there can be great variety of hair, eye, and skin tone so these color suggestions are generalities. I’m a Deep Winter. Once I get my hair color adjusted, I’ll show you how it looks. Just changing the makeup has made a big difference. Good thing I buy my clothes at Value Village or we’d be living on a raft.
-->How do you know if you’re Deep Winter?
Dark eyes and dark hair are common but not a requirement. Your skin can go from Porcelain to Ebony so that’s not helpful.
So, Penelope Cruz is a classic Deep Winter…or at least, she looks like she would be. She can wear black but she has some ability to wear a few warmer colors. Her best spectrum wouldn’t be as cool and sharp as Elizabeth Taylor’s whom you just wouldn’t put in rust.
Makeup Model : Soft Autumn
March 28, 2009
Autumn colors are deeper than Spring to be sure. But they’re not darkened by adding gray(as Summer is) or black (because that’s Winter).
These are browner colors. They toasty and golden, coppered, and bronzed. The degree depends on which Autumn. If you could distill Autumn down to one color, it would be brown, which would include the variations of gold and orange.
Soft Autumn is not as deep and warm as the other 2 Autumns. They’re quietly warm like in the picture above. Their toned-down richness makes them closer to neutral. This means that they’re easily confused with Soft Summer, who also have a subdued strength in their coloring. Soft Summer is neutral too but is more cool than warm.
This season is so soft, in fact, that it approaches neutral but just lingers on the warm side of the line. Like who? Drew Barrymore. She can be a cool blonde but she looks better warmed up a little more. Lindsay Lohan, on the other hand, cannot be blonde nearly as well as red because her coloring is too committed to Autumn’s warmth.
Can you see how good it can be when you get it right? There’s no contest. Color Analysis works.
Lips: Clinique LongLast Glosswear Sunset ; Almay Ideal Gloss in Bronze Shimmer; Clinique Glow Bronze lipstick.
Blush: MAC Trace Gold. Don’t just fluff this color on. Apply it with feeling (meaning a firm stroke of the brush) to really get the color, not just the shimmer.
All Autumns should know that they can transform their many too-pink blush mistakes to a great burnished shade with Trace Gold. It works best for the Soft Autumns who wear warm pink better than the other Autumns.
Eyeliner: Clinique Chocolate Lustre.
Eyes: Cargo Warm Neutral Palette ; MAC Era.
Cargo Warm Neutral palette.
Eye hilite : MAC Shroom. This is an all-purpose under brow eye color. It would suit all the seasons, certainly all the warm ones. Paula’s Choice Beige is another completely versatile under brow hiliter for all the seasons, at a fraction of the price, and is really perfect because it has no shine.
The disclaimer : Don’t buy it if you don’t try it. These are color guidelines to give you a sense of what you should be looking at.
The colors are getting warmer now, but there’s some heat on the way and things are going to get a whole lot hotter.
-->Soft Autumn is not as deep and warm as the other 2 Autumns. They’re quietly warm. Their toned-down richness makes them closer to neutral. This means that they’re easily confused with Soft Summer, who also have a subdued strength in their coloring. Soft Summer is neutral too but is more cool than warm.
Read moreProduct Review : LipSense Liquid Lip Color
March 22, 2009
I’m always a little nervous when asked to do a review on a product I’m given rather than one I bought myself. What if it’s awful? I don’t like writing really negative things unless I can balance it with something positive. Does your integrity require that you write the opinion even if it’s bad, since the person requested it?
No need for anxiety here. This is the most interesting and weirdest product I’ve put on my lips and also one of the best performers. I had given up on long-wearing lipstick, figuring it was just a beauty industry inside joke. ‘Lip Plumping’ , now that really is a joke.
Kelly Robertson of Celebrity Lipstick e-mailed to ask if she could send me a lip product sample from her SeneGene line. She looked at the pictures I’ve posted of myself along the way and chose a color in keeping with my neutral-makeup-loving, conservative, Canadian self. The color Kelly sent was Apple Cider, on me a warm peach-rose color of medium depth.
The product comes with a Moisturizing gloss in a second tube, and an instruction sheet. It’s makeup – do I need instructions? Actually, yes, they’re helpful.
I started by doing what we all do with lipstick, I smeared it on my hand. Within 30 seconds, I couldn’t get it off. Promising indeed.
When you apply it to your lips, the first thing you notice is that it stings. That’s about all you’re noticing for 10 seconds as something evaporates. Not tingle. Sting. The color goes on sheer with 1 application but builds nicely with further applications, and it stings with each. Kelly tells me that the sting comes from SD40 alcohol, a type well above standard cosmetics grade. If your lips are chapped or cracked, you’ll feel it even more.
It’s also thin and can sneak past your lipliner easily if you move too fast. There is a plus side here for mixing 2 colors. It would be extraordinary for me to apply a color of anything from the container without mixing it with something, so mixability is a big concern of mine. If you owned 2 or 3 of these, you could customize an endless number of colors.
It’s tacky within 1 minute and you apply the moisturizing gloss. The stinging stops. The gloss is shiny but not obnoxious, quite pleasant actually. Kelly tells me that the stinging sensation is relative to how dry your lips are but that the shea-based gloss is very healing and the sting on application goes away after a couple of days of wearing the product.
Now we get to the good part. It does not come off. It does not require the gloss to be applied every 15 minutes (every 1-2 hours is plenty and doesn’t need a mirror because the color doesn’t budge) because the color is not drying and the gloss has some lasting power.
The product doesn’t crack, roll, crumble, fade in the center, dry, no matter how often you roll your lips. Other than being a little sticky, it’s very flexible and you don’t really know you have it on. It leaves no trace on cups. I drank tea and it didn’t move. I applied my MAC lipstick over it once instead of the gloss it came with and the color looked interesting but didn’t move.What you give up in comfort in the first minute, you get back in a huge durability and comfort payoff.
Are you familiar with the business lunch? 6 men and you. You took a little more care with your makeup. You’ve met, you’ve eaten the soup. By now, you know your lipstick is long gone. Buy why put on more lipstick, there’s still the wrap or the salad? By the time they’re done, you can’t even hope for lipliner to be getting you through. You hope that the emphasis you placed on your eye makeup is drawing attention away from your naked lips.
Yes, you could excuse yourself to go touch up your makeup, but how womanish and wimpy is that at a work meeting, and then you return looking all glossy? This is better. The guys are hanging around drinking coffee and guess what? So are you! Looking the same as when you walked in. Now here’s a woman who has it together and whose look is working for her in every sense of the word.
After a salad with dressing, the product is gone from only the center of the mouth but still quite presentable. Pull out a lip balm (if the guys wouldn’t pull out a lip gloss, then you shouldn’t either; Labello or Blistex, or anything one of them would use, is forgiven; you can fix the look back at the office or alone in your car), slap some on, and you look good. Don’t eat oily food at the business lunch.
For evening, for parties, for meetings, for a day outdoors, anytime you don’t want to fuss with reapplying lip color, this product is most definitely worth a try. It’s uncommon for a product to surprise me but this one did. It was still looking great 8 hours after I applied it.
The color selection is quite remarkable. I appreciate that one of the biggest challenges of online makeup sales is showing colors that are representative across different browsers and monitors. Though the swatches have been improved since I first looked at them, they might still need a little work. Apple Cider looks like a light-medium peach-pink on the site but it actually goes on deeper than that on me, and I have medium coloring. On a fair woman, it would certainly be more intense unless she only used a single sheer layer. I also wish the swatches were about twice the size they are.
If you lick it, it will taste very slightly chemical. You won’t taste it when you eat or drink and it has no odor once it’s dry. LipSense is not tested on animals. If you have any questions or need guidance with colors, you will find Kelly incredibly helpful and receptive to questions.
-->This is the most interesting and weirdest product I’ve put on my lips and also one of the best performers. I had given up on long-wearing lipstick, figuring it was just a beauty industry inside joke.
LipSense really keeps its promise. It does not come off. The product doesn’t crack, roll, crumble, fade in the center, dry, no matter how often you roll your lips.
Makeup Model : Warm Autumn
March 4, 2009
This is me. How much time do you have?
Can a Season share makeup?
My good friend and sister-in-law, Holly is a Warm Autumn, just as I am. Over the years, I’ve noticed that we can wear exactly the same makeup colors even though her hair and eyes are not the same color as mine.
I started looking at women and have decided this holds true for all women within the same season in the 12 Season scheme. (What is a 12 Season scheme? Read more in Sites To Know : Pretty Your World). The overall color palette and degree of contrast are similar enough to produce makeup palettes customized to your coloring.
If you’re a Light Spring, the makeup that suits you will suit all Light Springs. There may be some that are deeper or lighter than you, so the makeup may look a little different but overall, you will look great in the same shades.
Can you have intensity and light lips?
I don’t like dark lips on anybody. Just a personal thing. They make us look older no matter how perfectly shaped the lips are.
But Warm Autumn needs intensity in makeup to balance strong golden undertones in the skin and the rich clothing colors that suit us so well. I continue to make the mistake of wearing lip colors that are too coral, trying to get a light lip but with color.
Brown alone can look flat and dead… but Autumn does better with brown than anybody. Shimmer is the only way I know to get some intensity and add life to brown, without adding darkness or orange-ness. Brown and toasty/metallic work naturally to become gold and copper and bronze and everything in between. This is what Autumn is all about.
I make the mistake of too much orange in blush too. Candy colors don’t work on this season’s makeup. They have to be natural (meaning warmth added to brown). The strength of this coloring (actually the large amount of warmth in the skin) can cope with metallics in small doses better than the more delicately colored seasons.
Think about Julianne Moore. Her skin isn’t dark but there is enough golden-beige in it that the whole color picture is fairly intense. Dressing her in watered down colors wouldn’t have nearly the kick that deeper warmer colors would have.
You’d put a shimmery copper on her and have it disappear into the face long before it would on Gwyneth Paltrow. Why? Because that is already one of the colors nature put in her overall color design. The sign of a great color for you is that it just gets absorbed into the coloring your face already has. With that kind of color, you can load it on and look real. You can color a little outside your natural lip line and look believable instead of dorky.
Here’s your makeup
Lips: MAC Honey Flower (too brown, dark, and orange alone on me) mixed with MAC Ramblin Rose (more warm coral) or MAC Jubilee (more neutral). MAC Plastique is a fabulous peachy brown metallic, too light on its own though (light and frosty is the formula for ash-colored lips, so it has to be mixed). With those 4 MAC lipsticks, you can create many many good shades. If you like more red color, start mixing in MAC Mocha.
From L, all MAC, Plastique, Jubilee, HoneyFlower, Ramblin Rose.
All this mixing, what a pain, ay? No, no, no ! This is how you learn to customize your colors and how a mixture of 2 colors always always always looks better than a single color alone. Just load a Quo Retractable Lip Brush with your color(s) of the day when you’re doing your AM makeup and you’re set. You can get enough on the brush for 3-4 touchups. Lipstick applied with a brush looks better and lasts way longer, no doubt about it.
Blush: Dior Sunkissed Cinnamon. The price of this stuff is deadly but I like the sheerness and softness of the color. It might look a little pink on you, depending on your skin, more true to its brown-pink name. My skin turns pink to peach, brown to peach, and peach to orange.
Since the color is soft, you can’t see the edges of the blush. What does that mean? Go see the movie Confessions of a Shopaholic and see if you can pick out where Isla Fisher’s blush begins and ends. Also, as a soft color, it looks fresher and younger than a darker or browner color.
The photo is linked to the product at StrawberryNET, which holy cow, if you don’t know it, is worth a look around for the freebies, discounts, sales, selection, and that’s before we talk about Free Shipping Worldwide.
If you like more noticeable color, look at Dior SugarNSpice.
Eyeliner: Dark Brown; there’s thousands of them.
Eyes: MAC Brule, Cork, Soba.
This is a palette of those same colors on a white background. They look dark on the white. I just threw in the gloss for fun. It’s a Chanel Glossimer, color name long worn off.
Fight with Photoshop though I do, every single day, this is the closest I could digitally match the lip colors (Honey Flower is not here). They’re close but not exact.
Look at what happens to those exact same colors on the golden beige skin of a Warm Autumn. Only the background layer’s color has been changed. Suddenly, they’re much closer to what they look like when a Warm Autumn puts them on her face.
Try this out next time you’re shopping and let me know. Convince me I’m wrong.
-->My good friend and sister-in-law, Holly is a Warm Autumn, just as I am. Over the years, I’ve noticed that we can wear exactly the same makeup colors even though her hair and eyes are not the same color as mine.
I started looking at women and have decided this holds true for all women within the same season in the 12 Season scheme.
If you’re a Light Spring, the makeup that suits you will suit all Light Springs. There may be some that are deeper or lighter than you, so the makeup may look a little different but overall, you will look great in the same shades.
4 Ways To Lighten Your Makeup As You Get Older 3
January 23, 2009
The third of 3 parts on applying makeup that’s beautiful on an older face.
1. A little bit of bronzer every day. Just go around the outsides of your face, under your jaw, under your cheekbone, at your temples. I have a wide nose so I put it down the sides of my nose.
The bronzer and the contour are the same product. Choose the lightest color you could wear, more gold than peach or bronze, with no shimmer at all. Don’t spend a lot of time looking for this item. It’s near impossible to find in a shade that’s believable in winter, especially if your complexion is light.
Instead, make your life easier by choosing a pressed powder in a color 2 shades darker than your own color. There’s so much to choose from in this arena and it works really well.
I use AboutFace powder in Tawny that you read about 2 Beautiful Bronzers For Early Summer.
If I were shopping, I’d look at Estee Lauder’s AeroMatte because it’s:
- pressed ; loose powder will not be controlled enough
- sheer, which is more believable in winter and means a lighter color deposit
- matte, because sparkly bronzer or contour just looks idiotic, especially in winter or at the office
Follow with blush in a rosy or peachy color. Choose something light and fresh in your color family. Dark blush makes skin look dull and lifeless. Nobody has brown cheeks. For some women of intense coloring, a deeper rosy-plum is fresh and believable. For others, spicy peaches and terracottas are very real colors. Stick with your color family and don’t go too dark. Bought your Color Swatches yet? Choosing makeup colors is a snap, a done deal, a cakewalk once you have your swatches.
Put the blush high on the cheek, under the outside of the iris, right above the contour, a little higher than the nostril. Think of putting it on the highest part of the round part when you smile.
Blend your blush better than you ever have. Two spots of bright or dark blush are too stereotypically old-lady. Use products that blend with absolutely no hard edges.
2. Avoid foundation with heavy coverage. Look for sheerer products. Try a foundation that is more transparent or if you love the one you wear, mix it with a little or your day cream ( the one with SPF, you know?) . It looks so much more like real skin. It is fast to apply, gives you some sun protection, is easy to blend into the neck, and can do wonders for how smooth your skin looks. Some powder on the shiny areas, the sides of the nose and center of the face, and that might be all you need to make a huge difference.
Some choose to go heavier with pigments and coverage as they age, but the skin is less forgiving and can’t carry this off attractively. In Christopher Hopkins’ great book, Staging Your Comeback, A Complete Beauty Revival For Women Over 45, he explains his preference for more opaque coverage in foundation in a matte finish. He feels it hides uneven coloration better, which he believes that people notice more than wrinkles. I don’t know about that – it may be true from a distance, maybe even a social distance of 2ft. or so. I think people do notice wrinkles.
(The BUY link only works on Christopher’s site but the book picture is linked to it.)
Here are some of the After photos for you to make up your own mind. He has incredible vision and beautiful, classy taste but I’d feel too made-up, and I already wear the stuff every day. Could be I’m not putting it on right.
Sheer coverage can do a shocking amount to even skin tone, even if a few discolorations come through. With Christopher’s suggestions of an opaque foundation and the powder under the eyes (which can be brushed away later), your face would have very little pliability, the coverage would look like a shield, and the wrinkles would almost blink.
I will concede that once we’re over 40, we have to be careful with dewy and glowy, just as he says. Unless you have 30 yr old skin, and perfect at that, take care with shine. You can always add it back in in a controlled way with a shimmer cream (see 6 Makeup Shimmer Do’s). Do we know this instinctively? The older we get, the less shine will work. That’s good. It keeps us in the realm of that watercolor diffusion which is the best makeup anyhow.
You’re brilliant, Christopher. I’d even let you at my hair. I don’t doubt I’d look much better than I do but I’m not with you on the foundation for an everyday look busy women can fit into their lives. You said “I know you can see [foundation] but others can’t.” I think they can. More about Christopher’s book in another post.
3. Eyeshadow that lifts. Women don’t require or desire a 4-eyeshadow blueprint. You put your light concealer under the eyebrow and that’s that done. You put a light neutral color on your eyelid. Where you put it on your eyes is what a makeup artist will tell you, but usually you’d go from the lash line to halfway between crease and eyebrow.
Our foreheads/eyebrows/eyelids are falling down with gravity and time. Instead of putting the darker neutral eyeshadow in the crease, apply it above the crease on the skin that falls down over the crease. If you raise your eyebrows, you won’t see where that is so relax your face and see what part of the lid is lying on top of the crease. See how the push pins are pointing to a fold of skin that falls down over the crease in the eyelid? Make it recede with darker shadow. Thanks to Jenepher Reynolds for this eye-opener.
4. Eyeliner. There is no way around it. You will look asleep without it. Our eyes, like our lips, lose definition with time. Our coloring softens and makes everything blend together more. Draw a line around something and it’s more noticeable. Our eyes are the part of our face that should be most noticed because they’re our expression and our vitality.
The color depends on your coloring, remembering that neutral makeup will always look more real. It will be some shade of gray, brown, or black. These colors are not hard to find. They range from soft grey to charcoal. You’ll find soft brown, milk chocolate, black coffee, grey-browns, lots of choice. Clinique’s Quickliner is but one of many good choices for application, staying ability, and color selection.
Buy from a company where you can test the colors. The sealed ones vary too much from the color on the packaging.
-->Today’s 4 suggestions for improved makeup on mature faces consider bronzer, foundation, eyeshadow, and eyeliner.
Read moreNever Buy Lipliner Again
November 15, 2008
On October 17th, I told you about my purchases from Paula’s Choice 50% Sale page (Friday’s Gift Better Be Good). It seems the company is shifting its position more closely to its original mission of producing the finest skin care products at the fairest price. I think it’s a good plan. The beauty business must be tough enough, let alone doing it over the internet.
I didn’t buy many of the makeup items because I’ve been scared off by so many unhappy purchases from Avon, where you can’t handle the real product before you buy. Samples are helpful but add another step to the purchase process, and by then you’ve found the product elsewhere. Returns from Canada are always a pain.
Anyhow, I did buy the Toffee lipliner. It is GREAT! A light flesh-tone a la Kevyn Aucoin that goes on with good opacity, and disappears into lips. Do you know the wonder of Aucoin’s work? You can read more about him in the article Kevyn Aucoin : Anything is Possible. Words cannot describe the fine man and makeup artist that he was.
Have you ever looked at Aucoin’s makeup and colors in a store? They look a little strange in the display but freakishly couture on the skin. It shows a masterful undertstanding of makeup and skin coloration which I completely aspire to. I’d be lying if I said I come close to grasping it, but W-O-W.
Other colors look spineless by comparison, but I understand why that is. The consumer is the mass market, not a population of makeup artists, so colors and textures have to be blander or women like me wouldn’t know how to use the product. Have you ever seen Kevyn’s Sensual Skin Enhancer? I am dying to buy some but cannot figure out which color to buy. It looks a bit like glistening putty.
Kevyn Aucoin Sensual Skin Enhancer
To assist us, we have the cosmetician. Her makeup has a Tammy Faye resemblance, like a thick yellow layer on her face that seems to magnify every pore. It makes it hard to concentrate on anything else. If you scraped your thumbnail along her cheek, you’d have a big gob of rainbow gunk to wipe off. There are 2 smears of blush right across the cheekbones upon which rest the mandatory magenta rectangular glasses with jewels embedded in the bars. The lipliner, which is probably scented, is present in abundance. There is lots of gold, most notably in the form of a chain you could use to drag a tree stump out of a ditch. You know the obligatory Chanel bag is stashed back there somewhere.
Oh my. This individual is not coming from my imagination. In her defense, she quickly and correctly identified me as being from another planet, wished me fun, and left me to play. I left without the SSE.
My apologies, I always seem to digress…
The Toffee lipliner (not scented) stays put for 2-3 hours, even with gloss over top, a cup of green tea, and a morning of non-stop appointments. The color is quite shockingly neutral, not at all pink or orange. I may reapply the gloss or lipstick, but the liner is still doing its job. Among lipliner’s duties, one of the most important is to not draw attention to itself and this product does that admirably. Check out this fantastic color.
L to R, Clarins 03 Naturel-Just Nude, L'Oreal The Sexy Beiges, Paula's Choice Toffee
Same colors, L to R, as picture above.
You can sample this, but even if you don’t, you’re only out $3.98 (and remember there’s a colorless option (not on sale)).
I ordered 8 of them. Shut up, did I really? Oh, yes I did. And everything’s 10% off in November. I’ve decided I need more moisture, so I bought the Skin Recovery and Moisture Boost Toners, as well as the jumbo bottles of Skin Recovery and Skin Balancing Normal/Dry Cleansers. Every winter, my skin feels drier. This year, I’m doing something about it.
-->On October 17th, I told you about my purchases from Paula’s Choice 50% Sale page (Friday’s Gift Better Be Good). I did buy the Toffee lipliner. It is GREAT! A light flesh-tone a la Kevyn Aucoin that goes on with good opacity, and disappears into lips. The color is quite shockingly neutral, not at all pink. I may reapply the gloss but the liner is still doing its job. Check out this fantastic color.
Read moreThis Month In Elle Canada November 2008 : Read Every Article
October 16, 2008
Thursday! Do you feel like this?
or this?
No need to write in. I can guess.
I bought a subscription to Elle Canada because it cost $6/year with a coupon in a Clinique bonus. It targets a much younger audience and I usually don’t relate. I was off to a better than usual start with this one, with the Editor’s letter. The rest of the issue was just as good.
But before that, on page 21, what DID they do to Nicole Kidman’s lips in the Omega ad?? I hope they’ve been Shopped, not shot up. That girl can look stunning or sick. If she could just leave her hair red and wavy, she’d go a long way.
Editor-in-chief, Rita Silvan, who has very good hair that I especially covet if the curl is her own, writes about fashion’s ridiculously high heels. She describes Julianne Moore, reduced to a teetering tottering woman who could barely make it to the stage to present an award. At that moment, even Julianne Moore made herself ridiculous. Did anyone hear a word she said once she finally conquered the stairs?
Heels that give little lift without losing solid grounding are great. Beyond that, when your walk is shaky, when your knees are oddly bent, when your concentration is on staying upright and alive, when you’re better off sitting politely than getting up and going somewhere, then fashion has made a woman its victim.
So Rita and I agree. When women allow themselves to be diminished by an industry’s fabrication and propaganda about how we should look, just so that industry can continue making money, I get prickly. And when we allow ourselves to be in pain (because stilettos hurt like..) , then we’re even bigger victims.
Natural Resources, on page 40, shows a selection of absolutely beautiful neutral makeup for a tone-on-tone look. The lipsticks are especially appealing. Laura Mercier Aurora will be worth a look; on the Mercier site, I noticed Caramel which I liked even better.
On page 176, Rose is the Beauty News Trend Of The Month. It counterbalances the neutral-to-warm-tones page above with some equally wonderful makeup for pink undertones. Here’s the face ; click the arrows to see the makeup.
Beautiful coats, jackets, boots, very clean lines – a lot of shopping done for you here. The entire issue outdoes itself in coats, bags, and price ranges.
Anne Hathaway, made up to look more interesting than I’ve ever seen her, makes a point about not deciding what you want others to like about you. I’d never really thought about it in that way before. Do we decide “I am funny” or “I am nurturing” or “I am clever” and then work it till it overshadows our other traits? More I think of it, more she might have a point.
The Beckhams have a new his/hers scent. What do these two discuss at the supper table, do you think? The media would have us believe that they do nothing but get photographed and have enviably successful sex by any standard.
I read every horoscope except my own, to prove that they’re interchangeable. You know, my own (Libra) really was the best match, almost the only match.
25 Beauty Steals… I’m always a sucker for those. There were some things I’ll look at (though less than I’d hoped).
I am all about using food as medicine. Until you’ve got that figured out, you can take all the pills you like. They’ll never work as well as when the diet is there to support them. A full page for each topic is devoted to Foods to Fight Stress, Colds, and Fatigue, as well as Antioxidant and Detox best choices.
Much more I haven’t mentioned. There was a lot of diversion packed into this $4 magazine.
On the final page, designer Michelle Lowe-Holder is interviewed. Her opinion of celebrity is most apt, particularly from someone in her line of work. You simply must visit Michelle’s favorite fashion blog at www.stylebubble.typepad.com. For this woman who looks out her windows and sees corn fields, it was time travel.
-->I bought a subscription to Elle Canada because it cost $6/year with a coupon in a Clinique bonus. It targets a much younger audience and I usually don’t relate. I was off to a better than usual start with this one, with the Editor’s letter. The rest of the issue was just as good.
Read moreThis Month In Allure July 2008 : Sex Again!
July 15, 2008
If it had been on the cover of any other magazine, I would not have bought it. Last month, I didn’t buy Vogue because the cover said “Let’s Talk About Sex” in reference to the movie, Sex In The City. I don’t care or believe what media tells me about sexiness. Actually, I disagree with most of it.
But it was Allure! It’s my gift to myself each month. I had to buy it and I’m glad I did.
The Best Gloss To Soften Your Bright Lipsticks
July 11, 2008
I have accumulated way too much lipstick over the years. Much of this is due to my ongoing search for the perfect neutral. A color that looked good at the store somehow always looks too strong at 9AM, or when I see myself in pictures. The basic color might be quite good, but I wish it were softer and more sheer.
Read more-
A Greener Tea
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