Beauty and the beast - Beauty shopping online

Shopping in Perth and surrounds is a bit of a joke.  The clothes shops are all clones of each other, churning out raggy skanky tacky stuff that I have absolutely no wish to buy and in general make me lose my will to live; certainly my will to go clothes shopping.   There is an exception of course;  the Armani et al sections in the David Jones Perth store, which of course are horrifically out of my reach monetarily speaking.  Siiiiigh.  I think it’s time to visit my dressmaker again …

As for shopping for make up and skin care, well that’s just as bad.  Every department store [of which there are two, yes the same two, in the city or suburban malls] has an identical “beauty floor” with the exact same brands – the big names, Estee Lauder, Clinique, Dior, Chanel, Clarins, blah blah blah. 

The smaller, more interesting brands have zero to minimal representation, maybe one counter at one department store, and only in the city.  As evidence, I give you MAC, my beloved make up line - which isn’t exactly a “small” brand - and my favourite skin care brand Ultraceuticals.  Both are available at just the one counter in just the one department store in the city, and this is sometimes problematic.  I can’t always make it into town, or want to make the trek, especially now I need a walking stick / elbow crutch for any distance. 

For me then, it’s obvious that online is the way to go.  In fact I pretty much do all my skin care and make up shopping online now.  Shopping online can be chancy however, and I’m ultra picky about the quality of service, the security of the site, the speed of delivery, the overall cost and so on.   I have come to trust and love only a chosen few – Adore Beauty; MAC Online; Strawberrynet and Smart Poppy.

Beauty and the beast: Hair today gone tomorrow

 … we wish!  [with abject apologies for really AWFUL pun]

Hair and it’s removal is a topic fraught with implications, decisions, terror, and financial burden.  Obviously I’m not referring to the plain old hair on the top of your head – although cuts and colours and treatments and styles can be equally panic-attack-inducing [which is why we females are always, ALWAYS cringingly nice to our hair-dressers/stylists – only imagine the damage they could do if they had a grudge?].

Nope, it’s all that extraneous and culturally unattractive hair elsewhere – underarms, forearms, legs, pubes … even, for some ladies [and blokes, but I’ll get to that in a bit] backs and bums.  Shade, coarseness and density differs for every single individual but we all, at some point, ask the same questions.  How?  Where?  And for bloody fuck’s sake, WHY?

I won’t get into the whole gender-political debate, and the cultural implications of being hair free vs hairy just now [although feel free to go wild in the comments section].  Let’s assume for the sake of this post that the need for hair removal is on your agenda.  Appearance is the main reason for most folks;  comfort is another. 

Appearance:  Satin-smooth legs and arms are sexy, there’s no doubt about that.  Neanderthal uni-brows and lady-’staches are not.

Beauty and the beast: Hair

Hair / Long beautiful hair / Shining, gleaming, steaming, flaxen, waxen … 

Hair can be the bane of a person’s life.  Too much, too little, too straight, too curly, too thick, too fine, too unmanageable.  An enormous industry is built on thousands of products of must-haves to curl, volumise, texturise, smooth, straighten, condition, tame, tousle, gloss, silken. 

Then there’s all the tools – ionic hair dryers with names that sound like James Cameron movies, ceramic hair straighteners and curling irons, I don’t know what else [no, really, I don’t know, have no idea]. 

Beauty and the beast – Skin care update

Well after all that lovey-dovey stuff, I figured I’d continue in the “girly” vein and write an update on my skin and the products I’m using now [further to my post here way back in July 2006.  Yep, definitely time for a review].

Toward the end of last year my skin was looking truly terrible.  Perhaps not leprosy-level terrible or even terrible by others’ standards, but I’ve always had good skin and this was bloody awful, for me.  I’ve never had acne, only the occasional hormone- or stress-related pimple, it’s normal-to-dry and fairly balanced, and tends to look very fine-textured and smooth.  The only “issue” I have are these red blotchy patches on my forehead, my upper lip and chin.  It’s not exactly rosacea although it shares many similarities;  it’s more a kind of birth-mark.  Or perhaps it’s just the capillaries are more visible because my skin is so soft and translucent [due to the collagen imbalance of the connective tissue disease].

So … toward the end of last year my skin was giving me an awful time.  The bitch.  It was even more blotchy and red than usual, I had raised acne-like lumps under the surface but not breaking out completely, and even though it felt kind of greasy and clogged it was so dry it was flaking in some areas.  Delightful.  All the medication I was on definitely had a lot to do with it [or rather, increased dosages of same], having been even more ill and bed-bound than usual, then add to that a good dose of hormones and depression.  Not the greatest combo.

Beauty and the beast: Wish list

I have a few products on my beauty radar at the moment – actually more than a few and certainly many many more than I can get in one haul, so purchases will be spaced out a little (um, a lot).  Anything else you’d recommend as a top beauty buy or something I “simply can’t live without”?  Do share.

(NB:  Yes I know these girly entries are incredibly trivial and deal with things that aren’t of global importance, and getting upset over an eye shadow is the height of self-indulgent materialism, but one can’t be deeply serious and contemplate profound issues all the time.  Taking yourself too seriously is the quickest way to earning a good slap – or making life even harder on yourself than it already is.  And if one feels pretty, one can behave pretty, too.)

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Beauty and the beast: Raves

It’s no secret I adore MAC in general, and a wide array of products in particular.  It’s a great line, truly with something for everyone, although the sales staff might put some customers off with their edgy trendy over-made up looks.  I find them to be incredibly sweet and helpful though, and they’ve never made me feel like a troll (something that cannot be said for any Clinique counter I’ve visited, which is why I never ever buy Clinique, apart from the fact I think the products are crappy and have a horrible effect on my skin).

Recent MAC purchases have included the Select SPF MoistureBlend Compact Foundation, a gorgeously creamy and soft compact foundation with great buildable coverage that never looks cakey or dry and gives my sometimes-blotchy complexion a nice smooth natural finish.  Yum.  I was especially pleased to find this as my last few forays into compact foundation-land had been utter disasters, and I love compacts for the speed and ease and portability factors.  MAC also has a fantastic range of shades and tones for any skin colour and undertone.

Beauty and the beast: Rants

I have quite a number of “beauty notes” tumbling around in my head – things that are pissing me off, things I love, product reviews, recommendations, all that.  Just nothing substantial enough to make an entire post – so herewith a batch of rants and raves.

I am really pissed off about the MAC Special Collections that are released seasonally or every month or so, because while they are – of course – available all over the US they are not available here, at least not at the same time and sometimes never appear.  Take an example – the Icon/Raquel Welch collection (highly disappointing I might add) was released in Australia at around the same time as in the US; the Balloonacy collection was then released a month or so later in the US but will not be released in Australia until September.  What’s the use of that?  Especially when all the talk on beauty blogs has one jonesing for the “Pandamonium” eye shadow quad (wanna wanna want it NOW).   

Beauty and the beast: MAC holiday sets

Every year MAC comes out with a Holiday Collection; they’re a great way of trying out new colours/combinations in a very pretty palette. Generally, however, I give these a miss as while they are in extra-purty packaging they tend to include few shades/palettes I would use regularly – and the colours I like I have already! The exception was a 2004 palette which held a great combination of purples, which gave me the opportunity to try some great shades and eventually expand my collection with some groovy bold colours.

This year, though, MAC has totally outdone itself. A HUGE group of lip, eye and brush palettes and sets, all totally wish list worthy. All of them have excellent shade combinations, and absolutely fabulous packaging in stylish black metal compacts and clutches with fabric effect/detail (an extra draw if you happen to be a total packaging whore … like me). The mini brush sets are amazingly good value as full size brushes retail from around AUD$40.00 up, and here you get four or five for around AUD$100.00. Great for travel and starting or extending your make up brush collection (yes I know how important this is for the boys out there).

Successful clothes shopping !!!

It is a matter of public record that I have abominable luck in shopping for clothes … and summer clothes in particular. As a result, I haven’t bought any new summer clothes for about five years, have been making do with jeans and miscellaneous T shirts and tanks, and thus was in great danger of pulling a complete “Lady Godiva” look this season. Except without the ankle length tresses; I may be growing my hair but there’s a big difference between wrap-around locks and bouncy shoulder length.

To add to my usual difficulty in finding clothes (size; shape; extremely picky re quality of fabric and manufacture) every garment presented in the shops was raggy, ill made and in vile shades. I had pretty much resigned myself to wearing a Dingo flour sack for the next six months when I gritted my teeth and descended upon Hay St Mall and surrounds a final time; a match to the death.

To my astonishment I met with total success; also much to Tux’s relief who joined me on the excursion. The brave, brave man, risking cerebral haemorrhage and tantrums in the change-room, was an enormous help with suggestions, finding correct sizes, swapping sizes over, and keeping me sweet in between forays with visits to Java Juice (love the Westcoast Watermelon) and Etro Café. You gotta keep the blood sugar up while shopping – especially if you hate shopping for clothes at the best of times. My girly-girl genes extend to make up and skin care goodies but NOT to general clothes shopping; jeans, swimming costumes and much needed items in particular. Gadgets and geekery, on the other hand, oh yes indeed!

I found two boutiques with stuff I could actually wear. Long A-line skirts, swishy and in good quality fabrics; ultra cute lace and cotton tops. SAVED from the burlap sack. Total haul; four skirts in stylish colours and fabrics (one brown linen; two long flow-y numbers in scrunchable cotton, one in faded peacock blue, one in sage green; one multi-layered brown and cream print chiffon), and a few tops. Best of all, the boutiques have a high turnover and intake of new gear so I can keep an eye out for other bits and pieces. AND a size 6-8 fits just fine although if I lose weight I’ll have to get creative with safety pins! (just as well I always wear nice clean underwear.)

Along the way we picked up a few bits and pieces for Tux The Hero, browsed bookstores and CD shops and all in all had a grand day out. Not ‘alf exhausting though, this shopping lark.

(I didn’t want to add to Tux’s burden by checking out the cosmetic and skin care counters, so will descend on those another day; I have a long list of things to try and things to buybuybuy – ahhh the new summer/holiday lines look so much fun; I also need to stock up on body scrubs, moisturisers and sunscreens.)

Beauty and the beast: Skincare

(“The beast” being me, of course!)

Until a few years ago I had a rather lackadaisical approach to my skincare regime; the occasional bit of sunscreen, ditto budget brand of moisturiser, not a cleanser or toner in sight (make-up remover, yes, gotta get those Tammy Faye lashes off somehow). In my defence, I had never had any problems with my skin, no pimples/acne in adolescence, no dryness or oiliness, the epitome of boring normalcy, in fact. However when I hit 35 I figured that although this had worked for me so far, particularly because I have great genes and look about 25 (comes of being baby-faced and small), I’d better make sure things stayed that way. I had also had a couple of “age spots” (Age Spots!!!) frozen off by the dermatologist, and seeing my mother after her trips to the dermatologist was a major wake up call. My skin was also looking very dull and blah due to chronic illness and nasty medication.

So, what to do? I love beauty products, but at the same time I am very very cynical and sceptical when it comes to the cosmeceutical industry, as I call it (my background in science tends to kill wonder), so anything I went for had to be a reputable dermatological designed and approved line, with scientific ingredients and no PR crapola about unspecified miracle age-reversal formulations, patent pending. Some research and queries across the internets led me to NeoStrata, MD Formulations, and recently to Philosophy, and I’ve been pretty ecstatic about the results. And it all takes just a few more extra minutes after tooth-brushing – you don’t have to spend an additional five hours in yer boudoir, being a slave to Higher Beauty.