Makeup

A few things I learned (and in some cases relearned) in 2011:

1. It’s easy to fall back into old habits, one of which for me was comparing myself to others, but it’s a recipe for misery cake and serves no useful purpose.
2. Tim Gunn is my Obi-Wan! Whenever I find myself in a pickle, I close my eyes and ask, “What would Tim Gunn do?” And then (I like to imagine) he materializes — a life coach/style Jedi — to dispense golden nuggets of advice.
3. Red lipstick could be the most powerful force in the Universe (even stronger than gravity). 🙂

So maybe that third one’s a slight exaggeration, but I will say that red lipsticks always make me feel better — especially bright, cheerful reds like NARS Heat Wave ($24).

It makes even mundane tasks, like trips to Trader Joe’s, a million times more fun. I wore it there a few days ago and made a new makeup-loving friend on the staff.

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Lately (in case you haven’t noticed), I’ve had a thing for red lips. I look at them the same way I look at pairs of black shoes, which is to say that one tube (or pair) is never enough.

There are just so many different spins on the red lip motif, just as there are when it comes to black shoes. With the shoes, you’ve got your black high heels, low heels, stacked heels, platforms, and don’t get me started on the sub-shades of black.

It’s the same thing with crimson lip colors. Every one is unique, or at least different in some small but significant way.

Take NARS Velvet Matte Lip Pencil in Damned, for instance. This $24 jewel-toned reddish magenta could moonlight as a crimson crayon in its chubby packaging, and sometimes, when I’m lining and filling in my lips with it, I feel like I’m in art class. 🙂

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Every year around this time, my regular weakness for red lipsticks turns into a serious condition, but even now, it’s usually treatable (with the careful administration of crimson cosmetics), except when I’ve been exposed to a jewel-toned red from NARS.

Then, the only cure is a tube of something like NARS Lipstick in Afghan Red ($24), a rich pinkish garnet. I tooled around town with this particular tube all weekend long, trying to keep the fever at bay…

To be safe, I should probably just keep it in my purse. 🙂

Never mind that my purse is already loaded down with compacts, other lippies, emergency cans of gravy and the occasional acorn, it never hurts to be prepared. Once you’ve been exposed to a shade like Afghan Red, you never know when another red lipstick episode will occur. Trying to predict them is like trying to forecast when terry cloth tracksuits will be back in style (read: impossible to know).

More Jackie than Marilyn, Afghan Red is a refined garnet. It says, “Bonjour, ladies and gentleman,” giving a slight wave of a cupped hand wearing pristine white gloves.

It’s not a color that needs to shout in order to be heard. Dab it on for a whisper light stain, or embrace opaque color by applying a single layer, as I did for these pics.

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