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· August 18, 2005 1:24 PM by
Colleen Shirazi
· August 27, 2005 11:47 AM by
Dain
· August 27, 2005 2:48 PM by
Colleen Shirazi
· October 3, 2005 1:00 AM by
Scott Frankum
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Beauty Notes: Urk... /// Classist tendencies of makeup...
Beauty Notes: Urk... /// Classist tendencies of makeup...
Posted by Dain, Monday, August 15, 2005 8:42 PM (Eastern)
My family has moved, to the lesser known town of Billerica, albeit only temporarily until the new house is made handicap friendly. I haven't had regular internet access for a week, which is tantamount to barbarism, as far as I'm concerned. In two weeks, the same phenomenon should occur, as I'll be returning to school (in all likelihood I shan't be able to post as regularly). Just a heads up on the schedule of the blog.
A mere hop, skip, and a jump away is Lowell (yes, the Lowell of the mills and Cambodian ethnic ghetto). There is a Wal-Mart. No such institution is allowed anywhere near the hallowed picket-fence universe of Lexington, and my brother, whose working memory only extends so far, was, in a word, put out. Lexington is the sort of town that erects such bourgeois soul-leeching boutiques as Jasmine Sola (a very cheap version of Kitson, basically), but never a Wal-Mart. My brother was irritated by the ostensibly "poor people" workings of the place. I probably should have slapped him, I suppose, because a place that is dead cheap is just simply brilliant, no matter the story (and we are still in suburban Boston). But I was too busy perusing the makeup. Of course.
Makeup, like many other things that can be bought, is classist. I looked at an eyeshadow trio by NYC Cosmetics, something very benign and pretty like a lilac, dark taupe, and vanilla (I think). I realized that naught but the very finest in pressed eye powders and the softest blue squirrel have touched my skin in... years. Which may not seem very long, but it is, when you consider just how rapid the turnover of the years is in the fashion industry—and consequently, the beauty industry. Is the difference really so great, between $3 eyeshadow and $30 eyeshadow? In a word, yes. You pay for superior colors, richer pigment, silkier textures, and long-lasting shadows. The distinction is vivid enough for me, but does it matter to other women?
It should, I suppose. But the difference between a MAC eyeshadow and a Dior eyeshadow is not vast, even from my point of view. And yet, I will say that I do not generally buy MAC eyeshadows, unless it is for a truly unique color. I have been frustrated too many times by chalky and rough MAC shadows—yes, it does happen. "Satin Taupe", would be one such example. A huge mistake, that one. Dior, at the pinnacle of shadowage, never disappoints, insofar as quality is concerned. Even my favored brand, NARS, can deliver inconsistently. This is just a matter of different pigments, of different sizes and material, acting differently.
But why...?
There was a lovely quartet by Cover Girl, the aptly named Crystal Waters. I haven't tried Cover Girl eyeshadows in years, not since I was 14 or so. The quality was not half bad, as I recall. It varied. The colors in Crystal Waters are gorgeous, and I could only think it a pity that I would never actually buy them, though I would in a heartbeat if NARS made them. Such is the way of things. It is not a label thing, the way that much of my highjinks with skincare are; eyeshadows have a sort of fixed objective quality, unlike the prevarications of skincare. I would be delighted if Cover Girl were at the same quality level of Dior, but low-quality eyeshadows I simply cannot abide. [shrugs] That is the way things are... I have been buying NARS duos for years, and I will continue to do so (Dior has superb, and absolutely unfailingly consistent, quality, but quints are hard to buy—large investment, and you're in for a lot of colors). Perhaps it has become something of an obsession, particularly since it takes a good many years to use up an eyeshadow (the higher the quality, the longer it takes), but I don't consider it a sensible matter. I've yelled at myself, but I can feel the pricks of acquisitiveness rise with every new collection. I'm resigned to the fact that I have become a collector of these eyeshadows.
On the upside, I experimented with L'Oréal Endless lipsticks. They're lovely. I want to own all of them. Rich pigment (I am so SICK of sheers and glosses these days), and in a rose-scented (classic L'Oréal) lightweight texture, not like the gloppy cream lipsticks of five years ago. Not to mention, they are in very presentable frosted gold tubes. I just want them all. Crimson Joy (a bright red, perhaps a little too bright for me), Fired Up (a deep browned sort of red worthy of Josie), Real Raisin (a creamy mauve, a balance 'tween the powers of rose and plum), Plum Perfect (an amazing color, like silver sparkle laced raspberry), Fearless Fuschia (rich magenta)... etc., etc. I also took a gander at Rimmel Bordeaux, a deep-seated garnet shimmer over a dark red—it's a coolish blue-toned red, in that it's got something purplish going on, but no tendency to fuschia, which is near unbelievable, amongst reds, particularly blue-toned reds.
For a moment, as I looked at Rimmel and NYC and Maybelline and Revlon and Cover Girl and L'Oéal, I thought, "What would it be like to be content with only this? To have six lipsticks, ill-chosen, a bottle of liquid foundation applied like a mask, black eyeliner, a box of brown shadows, some dusty rose blush?" It would be so simple, like some purer vision of minimalism, a state of innocence in the "buying o' crap". Quite a different vision from the obsessive, overanalyzed, preciousness of how I approach cosmetics. And I stood there, apologizing to the carts of any number of Middle Americans (I know no other way to describe them), in my subdued accent that can be indentified only as quasi-Anglo Ivy-League WASP, as a tantalizing picture of a pre-Lapsidarian paradise swam before my eyes. Those lipsticks would probably be dirty, caked with powder from a burst compact in the dark interiors of some handbag. A little smushed, warm in the August heat, without reverence. They would be stupendously boring colors. Chosen without precision, refinement, subtlety, but a few minutes of surreptitious peering in CVS. They would probably smell a little rancid. The vision vanished. The lipstick in my bag is no "noble savage" (shades of Jean Jacques Rousseau), it is the fabulous, extravagant, and ostentatious YSL Rouge Pure Shine No. 3, with its glossy, peach-scented berry hue, assidously polished to remove smears from its gilt cage of logo-emblazoned glory. I yearned for the purity of the "noble savage", but I knew then it was only the condescension of humility, I am the jaded, seen-it-all courtier who faces a little guilt when disparity stares her full in the face, and the sophistication of her world is exposed as all too Baroque and affected. The fact remained, I would never trade in my NARS duos for Cover Girl—never, no way—I can't even imagine owning less than three of them (at a modest $90: lesser stashes could be built around $90). It is a... err... good thing, I suppose, that I have the discretion to recognize quality when I see it, and the ascetism of the "noble savage" is merely an affectation, entirely meaningless, and probably not advisable, as far as taste goes. For a moment, I was seduced by the sway of a different persona (for, like the makeup you wear on your face, the stash you own is reflective of the type of person you are), but I know that I am of a certain type: a connoisseur of the most beautiful things in the world (i.e. highly elitist cultured tastes). It sets my teeth on edge to say so, but 'twere useless to pretend otherwise. We are all who we are, right?
As a side note: One lady was staring at the backsides of two Neutrogena cleansers with peculiar intensity. As I have been in such a situation many a time (several times a week), I felt compelled to tell her, "That one, if you want acne-proofing. That one, if you merely want a strong SLS-lather that strips like a demon," but I felt shy approaching a stranger thus, and said nothing, even if the decision seemed as automatic and clear as the turning on of a lightbulb.
Labels: beauty notes, philosophy
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August 18, 2005 1:24 PM,
Well...it's a phase.
Once you start making your own money, there is a tendency to spend it all on all that stuff you spent the first part of your life coveting without being able to buy.
After a while though...it gets to be...boring.
Anything that's purely material has a limit in importance in your life. You can ask the rich guy who's having a heart attack. You think he wouldn't give every cent he had, to have a healthy heart again?
You are spending your formative years inside our headlong rush to return to raw capitalism. Since I grew up within the heart of the Cold War, I have no real interest in it. If communism was an unequivocal failure as an economic system, so was the unadulterated capitalism that created it in the first place.
So...do not assume that people who choose not to spend their money on luxury items, have no choice. Some of them do. It can be a conscious decision.
August 27, 2005 11:47 AM,
It's not really necessarily a function of cheap makeup, I suppose. You can do that with Estée Lauder and Lancôme. I suppose I mean more the complete lack of the obsessive tendency that, say, you or I or anyone visiting this site will possess. We notice things such as color and texture, but what if you didn't? What if you didn't care at all? I'm not talking about limitations or choice; not how much money, but sheer lack of interest (indeed, having money of my own makes me more paranoid about spending it, but since it's spending money, not saving money, I suppose I'm just being obsessive). I dunno. It's somehow appealing to imagine a world in which I just thought of cosmetics as stuff I own, not... err... a unhealthily large portion of my waking life. How I feel towards cars, say.
I dunno. It'd be a certain type of utopia, that's for sure. But then it wouldn't be half so interesting.
August 27, 2005 2:48 PM,
Yeah...I think we suit each other well. Your taste is really very good, and interesting. I think you will always be able to pick out what's good, in whatever milieu.
Me, well, I'm cheap. It wouldn't matter how much money I had to spend, I would still be cheap. I would still be haggling over buying shampoo.
I think it is something you will get used to. I went a little nutty when I finally had some extra cash to spend. :)
October 3, 2005 1:00 AM,
Make Up Tips: The Economics of Lipstick
I had Saturday lunch with a friend who works for a prestigious Italian formulator and packager of color cosmetics. Their major client is Estee Lauder and Lauder owned brands like MAC, Bobby Brown and Francois Nars. (Lauder brands control over 45% of the U. S. department store cosmetics market).
I asked about the basic economics / cost structure of color cosmetics. My friend provided some fun-to-know facts about the manufacturer’s wholesale price to Lauder:
$.50 Filling and Formulation
$1.25 Packaging
100,000 Minimum Order Per Color
10 Typical Number of Colors Offered, (so 1,000,000 minimum tubes to launch a collection).
$22.50 Retail Price
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