A Makeup & Beauty Blog – Lipglossiping

That is all.

…if you had any to begin with.

So, Proctor & Gamble endured a wrist slap recently with their Olay Definity Eye Illuminator advert catching the attention of the Advertising Standards Agency in the UK.

The advert features the iconic Twiggy, now in her 60s…

It contained a testimonial from Twiggy stating: “Olay is my secret to brighter-looking eyes”.

Proctor & Gamble had already withdrawn the ad before it came under scrutiny, stating that they’d reviewed the post-production techniques that had been used in the creation of the ad and had found the “minor retouching” around the model’s eyes to be inconsistent with their policies which led them to replace the original ad.

I do hope the digital artist got bitch slapped by P&G, I mean seriously… that’s not even good retouching.  If you’re gonna exagerrate the effectiveness of your product, fine… but at least stay within some realms of reality.

Olay Definity’s latest Anti-Aging Night Cream Ad…

Wait!  There’s too much character in that face, back to the graphics tablet retoucher man and erase those wrinkles, pores… infact, remove all skin texture completely while you’re at it! *whip crack*

On the whole, I don’t have a problem with digital retouching. I feel that I’m enlightened enough to appreciate that a retouched image represents a distorted reality and I don’t mind looking at idealised photographs appreciating society’s desire for aesthetics.  I mean, let’s face it… Twiggy (as beautiful as she is) in her natural state is gonna sell as many eye-brightening products as I am diet pills – she’s 60 years old for chrissakes.  I don’t feel conned by a little airbrushing… but where’s the god-damn subtlety gone?

Just because we’re all used to seeing these altered images, ain’t no reason for you to get all complacent about it Mr. Digital Artist…

Use it to make models/celebrities look their best, not to transform them into freakish parodies of the media’s eternal quest for unattainable cartoonish perfection.

Ahhh… the lovely Demi, looking younger than Leila.

Hahhhahahaa!  Dude, Digital Retouching for Dummies… a book with your name on it.

As an advertising tool, I dig it… but 2009 saw it getting kinda out of control and almost self-referential in it’s absurdness.

What are your thoughts on airbrushing? Against it? A necessary evil?

So, I was asking on Twitter last night… Why is it, when department stores advertise things like 25% off sales, the beauty department only ever offers 10% off at the most.

All department stores are the same, you receive the email with the promise of big savings only to open it and sigh at the small print.

So, it was rather apt this morning when I read this article on the Daily Mail website.

If you haven’t got time to read it, here’s the headline:

Battle of the beauty brands as Debenhams slashes prices by 15% in Christmas price war

God I hate the Daily Mail.

“Slashes” and “15%”, an oxymoron if ever I heard one.  Excuse me if I don’t pee my pants with excitement and rush down to my nearest overpriced cosmetics counter to take advantage of that generous 15%, I wouldn’t want to start a stampede in the middle of this dramatic pricing war.

So yeah, no real point to this post… just venting a little.  Sorry about that.

Part 1 & Part 2 of the saga… and don’t read further if you’re offended by swearing.

…So, my original order was made back in May and included lipsticks, loose pearl eyeshadows and nail polishes.

I received 2/3 of my order 2 weeks later with the rest being marked as Out of Stock on the invoice.  I didn’t think anymore of it and assumed that I’d be refunded for whatever was unavailable.

Fast forward a couple of months and the rest of my order still hadn’t arrived.  Neither had my refund.  I was busy being a new mum, so was preoccupied with other things and not overly concerned about this.

I emailed them in July to query what was going on as I hadn’t heard a dickie bird from them and they replied promptly to let me know that my items were going to be shipped that week.  They weren’t infact shipped until the end of the month and I wasn’t notified of this until I had chased them up a couple more times.

We’re now heading towards the end of August, and I emailed to tell them that I still hadn’t received my order and I wanted a refund for the items not received.

I had a one line reply telling me to go check with my customs office.

That totally got my back up.  No apologies, nothing… just a ‘we sent it’?  Fuck off, I’ve waited since May for you to pull your fingers out of  your bums and send me my order and now that it’s lost somewhere over the Atlantic you tell ME to chase it up?

I’m gonna do a long story short thing here, because quite frankly… I’m boring myself thinking about the whole thing now.  It wasn’t a huge amount of money – but it’s the insincere “have a nice day (we don’t actually give a shit)” attitude they displayed towards the whole sorry saga which turned me into a dog with a bone on this one.

After some more emails which mainly involved them telling me what great communicators they felt they were whilst I tried not to piss myself with laughter over the irony, I got an email this morning…

…We will not continue back and forth email, as it is clear we view this situation very differently.

We have issued you a refund.

in other words: “You don’t half go on, we thought you’d have buggered off by now – so take this and piss off”.

I can do that! ‘Cos your stock buying abilities suck, your communication skills are non-existent and most of all… the name of your shop is rubbish.

I hope this isn’t too deep for a Sunday evening/Monday morning, but it’s something that’s been playing on my mind for a few days.

I’ve noticed that disclosing my love for all things cosmetic to a colleague, friend or even family member often has a profound affect on the way I’m perceived by this person.  I’m not completely discounting the possibility that I may be a little hyper-sensitive to this, but generally, I notice a shift in attitude.  This usually involves them expressing a flicker of surprise followed by puzzlement and if they particularly care about me, there’s a genuine sense of disappointment that I don’t choose to invest my energies into something more worthwhile.

I wonder if it’s because I don’t conform to how people prejudiciously imagine fashionistas and their beauty equivalents should look, think and behave?

~ I’m above the age of 22
~ I don’t ‘air kiss’
~ I’m someone’s mother and wife
~ I don’t say ‘awwww bless’ lots
~ I run my own business
~ I can hold a relatively intelligent conversation on a variety of subjects (go me!)
~ I don’t have the *ahem* ideal body shape for displaying fashion
~ I don’t have a complete meltdown if I break a nail (just a mini one)

Don’t get me wrong… there are definitely some women that seem to revel in the stereotype.  My Space-Cadet-O-Meter usually registers the vacuumed in cheekbones/overly ambitious pouting action displayed in some profile pictures.  In general though, since discovering beauty blogs I’ve realised just how diverse the beauty blogging community is, and most bloggers don’t appear to conform to the stereotypes.

I feel sad that our hobby is often regarded with such disdain.  It’s thought of as frivolous, trivial and altogether rather pointless.  Your appearance, rightly or wrongly (that’s a WHOLE other debate!) has a huge impact on your daily life and surely it makes us sensible rather than senseless to invest time and gain pleasure from making the best of what we started life with?

Even my husband (who is completely tolerant) will roll his eyes and gently tease me about going to ‘play’ with my makeup.  I asked him curiously if he could think of another word to replace ‘play’ that didn’t make me sound like an 11 year old about to raid my mother’s vanity case.  He couldn’t, and neither could I.  I don’t mind the expression, I use it myself – but I do think it’s indicative of the attitude that prevails when it comes to beauty.

Either way, I can live with it up until the moment that people I hold in high regard look at me as if I should know better.

Do you have anyone in your life that understands YOU, but just can’t seem to grasp your love for this ‘superficial’ hobby of ours?  And perhaps more importantly, do you notice it having any impact on your perceived credibility?

This is a tiny haul, it was larger but MsCuppyCakes was out of stock on a few items of my order.  How much do I hate it when e-tailers send half an order without giving me the option to adjust/add to my original order in lieu of the out of stock stuff.  I mean, I’m already paying the international shipping, so gimme the god damn option to choose alternative products or simply re-order from fresh if their online merchant service doesn’t allow exchanges.  *and breathe…*

Other than that, I was pleased with the service.  I received my items fairly quickly (within 14 days) and everything arrive in one piece and well packaged.  The value of my order was stated correctly on the customs form and not overinsured (important to avoid unecessary import duty).  I would order again, although I would definitely double check stock levels with a quick email and go to NonPareilBoutique instead if they were unsatisfactory.

Overall, 3/5… definite room for improvement with regards to stock updates and communication.

Anyway, here’s some of the infamous round lipsticks I selected:

From L -> R: Darling, Chaos, Ceto and Rea

and the swatches…

Darling and Ceto are a little too simillar for it to be worth owning them both.  Out of the 2, I prefer the slightly less sheer Darling.  Rea is a nice medium matte nude which isn’t at all drying on the lips like some mattes.

Chaos… beautiful in the tube, I’m really not sure whether I can pull this colour off or not… what do you think?  Yay or Nay?  Be honest now, or I’ll come round your house and pee in your cornflake box.

I also bought some of the NYX Loose Pearl Eyeshadows and Nail Polishes, although none of the polishes turned up *sigh*.  First impressions of the Loose Pearl Eyeshadows are positive (for the price).  Can’t stand the little pots they come in so I’ve ordered some pigment pots from eBay to decant them into.  I shall do some swatches of them soon.