Beauty

43 posts

I Am Not My Hair

Welcome to the first post of the new weekly series:  Slores on Beauty. My lovely co-host, the fabulous Miss Cunning Linguist, and I will alternate bringing you advice on a range of beauty products from hair care to make-up to skincare. We are also seeking advice from you, as well as taking any questions. Continue reading →

QOTD: Do You Use Scent?

The word ‘scent’ is very useful, it gets around the whole ‘perfume’ vs ‘parfum’ vs ‘extrait de parfum’ vs ‘eau de parfum’ vs ‘eau parfumee’ vs ‘cologne’ vs ‘eau de toilette’ vs ‘eau de cologne’ business. (These terms have to do with, more or less, a scent’s concentration.)

I’ve used scent since forever. As a teenager I was given a bottle of Chanel No.5 without having any real idea what a big deal it was.

When that ran out I couldn’t afford to replace it, and so moved on to Zen, by Shiseido. I don’t think it’s made anymore, and if it is, I seem to remember reading that it wasn’t the same formula.
Continue reading →

Should Men Shave (More Than Our Faces)?

Warning: This post is possibly NSFW.

I was recently out with friends having frozen dranks (no, not in a hott tubb, unfortunately) when the talk somehow turned to manscaping. One of my friends, a straight (and not particularly metrosexual) dude, mentioned that he trims the hair down below. “It’s one of the little things I do that I know women appreciate,” he said. And the women we were with (all in their late 20s or early 30s) all gave the thumbs up.  Continue reading →

Contrary to the Internet, NASA is Not Working on Wrinkle “Cure”

Earlier today, the Discovery Channel’s Discovery News tumblr re-blogged a post by The Week Magazine that caught my eye:

A drink formulated by NASA scientists to protect astronauts from the sun’s radiation could become a hot-selling, age-defying beauty product. New research suggests that AS10, or “space drink,” can noticeably reduce facial wrinkles and obvious signs of aging in as little as four months.

Continue reading →

Beauty Tutorial: Fake It ‘Til You Make It

A number of us ladies (and Dogs) were discussing beauty tricks last evening and venting our frustrations with the problems cosmetics cause us. We had questions: Is the smokey eye a myth? (Answer: Yes). Why are Spanx crotchless and is that ever not funny? (Answers: Let’s not think about that too hard and no). We realized that we all have different strengths and that combined, we could probably construct the perfect beauty look.

Personally, I am useless when it comes to eye makeup and intricate hairstyles? Forget it. The one thing I am really good at is creating a nice, natural-looking base layer. Continue reading →

The Marilyn Monroe Memes Need to Stop

In the decades following her death, Marilyn Monroe has been exalted as the human embodiment of bygone Hollywood glamour and unmatched sex appeal but recently, she has been given another accolade: the counterweight to our culture’s ever-thinner beauty ideal. The oft-invoked argument centers around the declaration that Monroe was a size 8/10/12/14 and if she were alive today, she would be considered overweight and probably, never would have been a star. (These claims are inherently problematic because women’s apparel sizing has varied considerably over the years, rendering numbers utterly useless as indications of proportion and because such conjectures are speculative and sensational in nature.) Continue reading →

Refinery 29’s Illustrated History of Nail Art

I’d like to direct your attention to Refinery 29. Currently, they have a slide show with illustrations giving a few key milestones in the history of nail art, from ancient Egyptians dying their fingertips with henna to 15th century Incas painting eagles on their fingernails.

Modern nail polish as we know it would not be possible without the automobile, as nail polish is modeled after car paint. Continue reading →