Wherein Style Spy Identifies Yet Another Trend She Will Ignore

I saw this on Style.com's website and it nearly made me snort coffee out of my nose.



Typically, the smoldering is a hint to turn down the heat on one's flatiron. I'm just sayin'...



However, the makeup is really pretty and -- according to makeup artist Pat McGrath -- was all done with products available at your local drugstore or supermarket. Which is an interesting choice, given that Bottega is one of the single most expensive labels out there. Just goes to show -- the artist is more important than the tools.


More cutting-edge makeup:

Yes. A two-tone lip. The top is orange and the bottom fuchsia. A few months ago when the whole "Slumdog Millionaire" thing was cresting, I told a friend to get ready for a lot of bright color in fashion -- I particularly predicted that the bright orange/hot pink combo would be big. I did not expect it to show up on someone's mouth.

This look comes from the Fall 09 Ungaro show. Because apparently this

was not enough color to satisfy Ungaro designer Esteban Cortazar. Golly. Makes you wonder what the inside of his home looks like, huh?

Actually, this collection was kind of great, I recommend giving it a look. It's classic Ungaro, definitely, but as we know, I love color, and I appreciate the exuberance. It is really, really tough to modernize a look as closely associated with wretched 80's excess as Emanuel Ungaro, but Cortazar is on the right track. There are the requisite poofy skirts and riotous color/pattern mixes, but it's not all over the top, there are some good modern pieces that would brighten up a gal's closet, and I would KILL to get my hands on this jacket/vest/whatever it is:

Fairly sure this isn't going to become one of my go-to labels, but definitely worth keeping an eye on. I'm drawing the line at the two-tone lips, though. One lippie at a time is plenty for me.




Photos: Style.com, GraziaDaily.co.uk

Mascara Update

So I told you last week that I'd give you an update on my mascara switchover: I couldn't find my favorite Max Factor Lash Perfection

at my grocery store, so I'd opted for the Rimmel Eye Magnifier. The verdict on the Rimmel is... Meh. It's a lot goopier than the Max Factor -- I found I was spending almost as long cleaning up the mascara with a moistened Q-Tip as I was actually applying it. PITA. Also -- the particles. By the end of the day I have little black flecks all around my eyes, and even resting on the inner lower lid. Besides looking sloppy, that's not good for a gal wearing contact lenses. I was at the grocery store today and the Max Factor dealer had evidently delivered a new stash, so I scored some and I'm changing back. Hey, if it ain't broke, don't fix it, right?

The Moment Has Not Yet Passed

I think my Purple Moment is now officially a Purple Hour. Still on my all-things-violet-and-plum kick, which most lately extends to this:

Yves Saint Laurent GOLDEN GLOSS Shimmering Lip Gloss in 14 -- Golden Purple

I was at the YSL counter buying some Touche Eclat when this jumped out at me. SUCH a gorgeous color in the tube, and amazingly, it was absolutely gorgeous on me. Again & again I find myself wondering why I haven't been wearing more purple my whole life -- purple lurrrrrves a blue-eyed redhead.

Now, let me just say that I'm not a huge makeup person. I mean, I wear makeup, of course, but it's not my big thing. Most of what I put on my face, cosmetics-wise, can be found in the grocery store. Can usually be found in the grocery store, I should say -- right now they are & have been for a while out of my very favorite mascara

(Max Factor Lash Perfection, which I raved about here -- click photo for link)

One of the reasons I love this stuff, besides the formula being excellent, is that is has a great wand with little plastic bristles instead of a spoolie. Since they're out of it, I went with this

(Rimmel Eye Magnifier -- again, click for link)

which has a similar kind of wand. So far I've only used it once, but I'm feeling pretty good about it. I'll keep you posted. While I was at the YSL counter I got to chatting with the very nice SA about mascaras and she gave me a sample of the Diorshow Black Out which she swears by. I've heard lots of women swear by this one, actually, it always tops Best Of lists; but I have to say -- I didn't love it. This particular iteration of the DiorShow, the Blackout, evidently has actual kohl in it, which is cool in a Cleopatra sort of way, but may be what led it to flake in little tiny particles. I hate the little tiny particles. A lot of mascaras that bill themselves as "lash extending" have stuff in them -- like tiny fibers -- that eventually drops off my lashes and either gets under a contact lens or just looks sloppy. And forget those ones with the basecoat that you put on before color. Oh, waaaaay too much trouble, and all that "lash building" stuff just becomes a storm of tiny flakes settling on the skin under my eyes. Bleah.

So, yeah, while I'm not opposed to drugstore makeup, I do really swear by the Touche Eclat, which is a brilliant highlighter/cover up that does great things for my undereye circles. I have a very thin face and fair skin and this time of year when the allergies have kicked in I can look like I lost a tough boxing match a few days ago, but the Touche Eclat does a great job of mitigating that. Also, I'm semi-obsessed with the YSL Golden Glosses. (And also with their Touche Brilliance Glosses -- equally wonderful.) I freely admit to being a complete ho for lip gloss and lipstick, I regularly have to go through the makeup drawer and purge because lip colors are a fun, easy, often inexpensive way to indulge my consumer instinct. The YSL glosses are not, of course, what one would call a bargain, but they are really, really good, so I don't mind spending the money. They have gorgeous color, an excellent, not-too-goopy texture with some actual grip, and the sparkly bits are A) golden, as promised, and not silvery and B) teeny-tiny and not in the least gritty, which I absolutely loathe in a gloss. (I've tried the Chanel Glossimers, another big favorite of the Glosserati, and it made me do that compulsive lip-licking thing that Shine does when she's tasted something she doesn't like -- I couldn't get it off my mouth fast enough. Grit is bad.)

The color on my nails in the photo above is also a result of my New Purple Thing. It's OPI and the name is "We'll Always Have Paris," so you can see that it felt like Nail Polish Destiny when I encountered it. It's a great color for winter, but only when nails are short. Otherwise it gets a bit Dragon Lady. I think my next Violet Adventure is going to be eyeliner. That sounds like fun, doesn't it? Anyone who has any suggestions is welcome to give them!

My Left Foot

It's Sunday morning and this is the state of my left foot.

(Toenail color: O.P.I. Kennebunkport. A really great true red.)

It's not easy to tell because the flash washes it out, but the top half of my foot is covered in a bruise, and the area just south of my toes is quite swollen. I think I'm looking at my second day in a row of not being able to run, because while the foot doesn't hurt to walk on, it hurts to have something pressing on it. I don't believe it's broken or anything, just badly bruised and quite sore. I actually took a dance workshop yesterday and was on it for three hours with not too much problem, I just made sure to wear shoes that didn't press on that part of my foot.

What, you may be asking, did you do to yourself?

I didn't. I was done to.

Friday afternoon I had an appointment at the Shu Uemura counter in Neiman Marcus to get some false eyelashes from CC, my favorite Austin cosmetics SA. (I was attending an event Friday night, I wasn't just randomly over-maquillaging myself.) I got up there a little early and... I'll admit it, I was doing some shopping, despite my No Buy. I had my outfit for the evening picked out, but I... Oh, it was panic shopping. We've all done it. And I was kind of half-hearted about it, but still... I was shopping. I was in a store called Martin + Osa, which is not actually a place where I usually spend much time because they seem to sell only really simple, casual clothes (endless variations on the t-shirt, jeans, etc.) in muted, dusty colors, but they had a couple of blouses in the window that were nice bright colors and I thought the red one might work with the skirt I was planning to wear that evening, in place of the plain black top (::yawn::) that was in the lineup. I tried on this blouse, which was cute and would probably actually be quite useful, but "cute" wasn't what I was looking for, so I decided against. I was replacing the blouses on the hanging display where I'd found them at the front of the store (I know, I can leave them in the dressing room for the SAs, but I grew up in a home where one of my mother's most frequently uttered phrases was, "Put it away when you're done with it!" and I was going to walk right past the display on my way out of the store.) As I was replacing the blouses, a little SA came scurrying over, intent on finding a pair of shorts for another customer he was working with. The shorts were located on a shelf immediately below the hanging section where I was replacing the blouses. Could he wait the ten seconds it would take for me to hang the blouses? He could not. He crouched off to my right and reached awkwardly around in front of me to rifle through the pile of shorts and since he couldn't see what he was doing, he was clumsy about it. Next thing I knew, a stainless steel bracket for holding up some signage weighing about five pounds was plummeting off the shelf and landing on my foot, which was very skimpily shod due to having had a recent pedicure.

It nearly brought me to my knees. The thing was L-shaped, about an inch and a half wide by a half-inch thick, and sharp-edged. The cut edge was what hit my foot, and a drop of blood instantly started to well up on my skin.

Mr. Thing was fluttering around me like a butterfly in a wind tunnel, slightly panicked as he no doubt saw his retail career flashing before his eyes. The poor customer he was waiting on discreetly took herself off to some other part of the store, not anxious to watch the public flogging she probably thought was about to take place. "Are you okay? Are you okay?" he kept yammering. No, I told him, I was most certainly NOT okay. It hurt like hell and it was already starting to bleed. "Tell me what I can do! Tell me what I can do!" he begged. I looked at him and I truly loathed him in that moment. I mean, I had a serious impulse to punch him in the mouth, and he was an itty-bitty wifty thing -- I coulda taken him easy. Not only was he the cause of what was currently some pretty intense pain, but he was useless. "Let me get you some ice/a band-aid," would have been nice. "Here, come sit down over here for a moment," would have been another good one. Instead he was just a bag of quivering panic and he would not shut up.

"Just don't drop anything else on my foot," I told him, and limped away to nurse my wound in private.

No, I didn't ask to speak to a manager. I couldn't see what good it would do. The guy was an idiot, but it wasn't like he injured me on purpose. It was an accident, and I don't see the point of getting some college kid who works for 8 bucks an hour reprimanded or worse for an accident. My foot is sore but I don't think there's any long-term damage here and goodness knows I've caused worse injuries to myself on a few occasions. I went to my event Friday in high heels -- the inaugural appearance of my Blahnik Dianamuses (Dianami?), and they performed admirably. I hate not being able to run, but a couple of days off isn't going to kill me.

Besides, I can't help the sneaking suspicion that I brought it on myself by breaking my No Buy. Was this just the Universe reminding me to stay focused on the goal? Maybe. I did in fact panic-buy a top at Neiman's, something completely different to wear with a back-up outfit that I put together in my head as I hobbled along in case I couldn't wear the shoes I was planning to wear. But it's still on the hanger -- still in the car, actually -- and I'm going to return it next week. And the jolt of the pain cleared the fashion fog in my head and I realized that I didn't have to wear a plain black top -- I had an emerald green blouse that would work with the skirt. Voila:

(Photo taken post-party, I did not leave the house with those lap creases.)

And it was just fine. And my eyelashes were also great, although by the time I got home one of them had come unattached on either end and was hilariously waving around on my eyelid like a crazed centipede. (Note to self -- carry tube of eyelash adhesive in evening bag.)

On the topic of eyelashes -- I went with a pretty low-key set that were fairly realistic-looking, but manohman does Shu Uemura have some faboo falsies. I am dying -- DYING -- for an opportunity to wear these bad boys:

Long, sweeping feathery things -- completely over-the-top and gorgeous. Or these:

Absolute fantasy. What enormous fun.

I do have a wedding to attend next weekend... I haven't been able to find any earrings that I want to wear with the dress, maybe I'll go with matching lashes as an accessory instead.

So that's my tale of woe. Forgive me for whining, I just needed to get it off my... instep. Hope everyone else had a wonderful, fashionable, injury-free weekend, and that all mothers are having a wonderful Mothers' Day!

Photos: Style Spy, shuuemura-usa.com

More Fluttering, Now In Technocolor

So. What do we think about this stuff?

It's a new mascara from Max Factor that comes with two different colors, one a darker basecoat and one a bright highlight color.



This one's called Blushing Blue -- blue base, magenta tips. Hmmmm...



This one seems a little more... practical, for lack of a better word. Moonlit Black, with silver.


I'm torn.

The devil-may-care fashionista part of me who supports all things fabulous and experimental thinks, "Nifty! What a fun way to play with makeup!" The real-life part of me thinks, "Well, that's just ridiculous."

For starters, who knows what it actually looks like, despite the very lovely publicity photos of Carmen Electra (a woman whose name I still cannot say with a straight face -- references to Bizet and Sophocles are just not what one expects from a Baywatch actress who was once married to a Red Hot Chili Pepper). As big a fan as I am of Max Factor mascaras (and I am -- I really do wear them), no actual living person has ever gotten their eyelashes that long with merely the aid of a wand full of goop. And those photos of the actual eyes are pretty obviously photoshopped (it's the same photo of the same eye, with the colors changed), so what's a bi-color-curious gal to believe?

The color combo I'd be most interested in would be this one:




24 Karat Brown, which is a nice brown topped with gold. I think redheaded me would be best in these colors. I am also intrigued by this one:



Blazing Black. Although typically I think it best to avoid anything in the red family around the eyes to avoid the bunny-eyes effect, this is so wonderfully dramatic. And you know I love the drama.

On the other hand, I also keep flashing back to this nightmare

from Erin Fetherston's last runway show, and that? Is not exactly what I'm after. Oh-so-creepy.

If I run across this product during my weekend perambulations I may pick some up. What do you folks think? Has anyone tried this stuff yet?

On a completely different note, Style Spy is hitting the Bridal Trail again this weekend with her Newly Engaged Friend Ms. A. Any & all Austin-area readers (and I'm including San Antonio & Dallas in that category) are most welcome to write with their advice on shopping for fabulous-but-not-bank-breaking wedding attire. We will be especially interested in information on folks who provide service in the customizing and alterations arena, so if you have recommendations on who to use and who to avoid I'd love to hear them!

Have a great weekend, everyone!

Photos: MaxFactor.com, Style.com

LOOT!

Well, I didn't have the best day yesterday, but it was considerably brightened by a FedEx box that was waiting at my front door and contained this:


Excellent schwag from Max Factor! This teaches us that A) the power of the Interweb (that magical series of tubes) is pretty darned awesome and B) Karma extends to cosmetics!

The day after my (wholly unsolicited, I promise) rave review of Max Factor Lash Perfection mascara I received a nice e-mail from a young woman at the firm who handles their public relations thanking me for my kind words and offering to send me some other new products to try. Well, I'm no fool -- I said sure. So this post is less unsolicited, but don't worry, I'm not in the pocket of Big Mascara quite yet.

There's all kinds of fun stuff in here and a few things I'm really looking forward to trying, including two tubes of their Lash Perfection Volume Couture Mascara.




I'm not exactly sure yet how this differs from the straight-up Lash Perfection that I already have, but I'm looking forward to finding out. It has the same kind of brush that the original has, which is a big part of the appeal for me. Thing is, I just bought a brand new tube of the other stuff this weekend, and I don't want to open the new one just yet (mascara starts to degrade the moment you expose it to air). So I'm going to make the extra tube available here. Just leave me a comment (with your name -- ahem!!) saying you want to be eligible and I'll do a drawing Saturday morning. If I pick your name, I'll send you the mascara, but you have to promise to write & let me know what you think of it. (The color, by the way, is Soft Black.) I'm also thrilled to find out they have this in Auburn, which is a wonderful everyday color for redheads like myself.)

The thing I am trying out presently is the MAXWear Lipcolor. It's one of those double-ended tubey glosses with a sponge app -- one end is a long-wearing color and the other is a gloss. I'd given up on the long-wearing lip colors quite a while ago, because they made my mouth feel as though I'd painted it with the same latex-based stuff that's on my bathroom cabinets, but this actually feels okay. I'm testing it in a color called Cinnamon & Sugar, which is a lovely light brownie-pink (sort of a my-lips-but-better color) that has a sparkly clear gloss. So far, I'm through my second cup of coffee and the color is still there, although the gloss is long gone. Bonus -- the gloss tastes like marshmallows! The real test will be if it survives my lunch of leftover palak paneer. Stay tuned!


And now -- my next unsolicited (I swear) rave, for this stuff:


Bliss Sleeping Peel Serum. Oy, vey, I love this goo. A friend got a bottle in some schwag and handed it over to me to try and baby, I am hooked on the junk. I really wish it didn't cost 60 damn dollars an ounce, but I'm here to to tell you that I am going to pony up. It's one of those antioxidant exfoliator thingies and it really did make a difference in my skin. No one is mistaking me for a young Catherine Deneuve or anything, but to me it was noticeable.

(Unnecessarily beautiful. Unreasonably so, even.)

So is this a not-very-opaque attempt to get the folks at Bliss to send me more juice? Hell, yes! After squirting this stuff on me every day for a few weeks I'll happily put pretty much anything they squish into a bottle, tub, or tube on myself. So there! My crass commercialism knows no bounds, because unfortunately my bank account does.

Oooooh, so much to do before I leave on Monday. Posting may get spotty for a bit, friends, as I race around trying to line up my travel ducks. Bear with me.


Photos: Style Spy, MaxFactor.com, Blissworld.com, Geocities

Flutter, Flutter

Small good thing:




Max Factor Lash Perfection Mascara. This stuff is Da Bomb. (Are we still saying "Da Bomb"? Someone ask a teenager for me.) It's got one of those newfangled plastic bristle brushes instead of a spoolie, which makes for really nice definition, it doesn't clump. (Although it feels a little weird to apply at first -- slightly prickly.) Plus, it's hearty -- I'm a woman who never leaves the house without at least two or three creams of various sorts on her skin (moisturizer, foundation, sunscreen) and by then end of the day this still isn't smudgy. (I don't wear waterproof mascara because I wear contact lenses.) Look:

(Actual unretouched photo. It's not a great photo, but I'll have you know that getting this was no easy task and I'm very, very sorry you weren't all here to witness the comedy. Note: when attempting to take close-up photo of own eye, disable flash first. Blinkblinkblink.)

Best of all, the stuff isn't pricey. Under 8 bucks for great mascara. I have a tester of a Chanel mascara that goes for about three times that and I don't like it any better than this stuff. Now, I'm funny about what I'll spend money on. I think we'll all agree that I'm capable of spending what some would consider obscene amounts of money on a pair of shoes without batting a (well-mascara'd) eye. In the makeup arena, I'll splash out for foundation, because I think if your skin doesn't look good, nothing does. I'm also a hopeless lip gloss ho - a complete sucker currently for the YSL glosses which are, I'll freely admit, stupidly expensive. (They're just so pretty!!!) But when it comes to stuff like mascara, reason (or just plain stinginess) kicks in. I want to buy it at the drugstore. And this one -- I can! No trip to the mall just to buy mascara; I can pick it up along with my orange juice and toilet paper.

Try it & tell me what you think!

Photos: InStyle.com, Style Spy