Innehållsförteckning för December/January 2021 från Allure

As someone who considers herself relatively skin-care obsessed, I’ve been a devoted daily user of sunscreen for many years. But I’ll admit, I haven’t always been diligent about reapplying throughout the day, unless I was at the beach in full sun. Until now. Over the past two months, executive beauty director Jenny Bailly and I have been diving into some fascinating topics for Allure’s new podcast, The Science of Beauty. Unsurprisingly, nearly every skin-care conversation—dark spots, melasma, pores, wrinkles—comes back to sun protection. It’s why we decided to make our pilot episode all about, you guessed it, sunscreen. While recording our first six episodes, I learned so much about other topics too. Here are some of the tidbits that have really stuck with me: • Botulinum toxin (a.k.a. Botox) owes…

Tucked among the paradoxical extremes of Austin’s East Side, where modular yuppie condos share street corners with gritty hipster bars, stands one rainbow-painted house plucked straight from the cover of your favorite Lisa Frank binder from fifth grade. Meet the Cute Nail Studio. Tucked among the paradoxical extremes of Austin’s East Side, where modular yuppie condos share street corners with gritty hipster bars, stands one rainbow-painted house plucked straight from the cover of your favorite Lisa Frank binder from fifth grade. Meet the Cute Nail Studio. “[We wanted a place] where you can come in, be yourself, ask for whatever. And we’ll celebrate whatever your idea of beauty is and just go hard in that direction,” says Jason Darling. He and Maria Darling are the marriedpreneurs behind this dreamy, self-proclaimed…

llie Goldstein always wanted to be famous. It’s one of the first things she tells me when we sit down for a Zoom interview in early October. (She’s tuning in from her home in Ilford, Essex, about a 45-minute drive from the heart of London.) And at just 18 years old, she’s well on her way to that goal, propelled by a nowviral image in which she appeared for Gucci Beauty in partnership with Vogue Italia. Goldstein, who has Down syndrome, is spreading positivity—and a message to the industry about the importance of inclusivity—throughout the world. I started dancing when I was five and I’ve loved it ever since. And drama as well. I was in school plays, like Jack and the Beanstalk. When I was doing the play, it…

It’s always an honor to be the first anything. I was thrilled that I was the one. I have to tell you, the week before my season aired, Bravo was running the marathon of old Beverly Hills episodes and I had a panic attack—like, “Aaaah! Everybody is going to see everything!” I was freaking out. I had to call a girlfriend to talk me off the ledge. She’s like, “Girl, it’s too late to walk back now!” The drama is the biggest challenge, really. Oh, you never know when the drama is coming. You’ve always got to be prepared, honey. Waterproof mascara is a must. Make sure your wig is on tight, because you never know. First of all, the show is very competitive. No one is going to tell…

“My cousin just started working nights and loves to ski on the weekends, so it’s fair to say this Slip Après Ski Eye Mask ($50) was made for her—and I hope it helps her adjust to her new sleep schedule.”—KATHLEEN SUICO, ASSISTANT BEAUTY EDITOR…

Not so long ago, Pharrell Williams found it necessary to confirm in an interview, picked up by CNN, that he is not a vampire. The suggestion didn’t relate to his supernatural creative output in songwriting, performing, and fashion design. This was about how Williams, 47, on the cusp of entering his sixth decade, looks like a guy who is younger by half. His angular cheekbones are heirlooms from his grandmother. His father gave him almond-shaped eyes. Admiration for his talent as a musician and performer has always been accompanied by a preoccupation with his good looks and skin-care routine. And his sensitive, philosophical bent applies to every category of his pursuits. “Sometimes you need to cleanse your spirit,” he says. “Sometimes you need to cleanse your mind. Sometimes you’ve just…

On the second day of June, Instagram was swarmed with black squares in the name of solidarity, which, oddly enough, made a spectacle of a movement, but not in the best light (or filter, rather). Pitch-black boxes—intended to express solidarity with the Black Lives Matter campaign in response to the killings of Breonna Taylor, George Floyd, and Ahmaud Arbery—flooded the platform, effectively drowning out the voices of organizers and protesters. The BlackLivesMatter hashtag, and indeed parts of the movement, fell victim to a mass gesture of performative activism, which gave nothing to the minority forced to social distance during one of the most significant political times in their lives. What we have known about social media became heartbreakingly clear: People were interested in change, but they were more interested in…

Nigella Miller, FOUNDER OF AFRA “When I was a child, my cousins and I would fall into these moments of doing each other’s hair while spending time together—we didn’t realize it was so precious. Hair plays a huge part in Black culture and my family’s hair routines were a big part of my everyday life. That family time and those Black hair moments still inspire me today. I wanted to re-create iconic Black hair culture staples, like beads I wore, and steer away from mass-produced plastic. I wanted to launch a Black-owned collection of regal hair accessories that tie my Guyanese culture to my African-American culture. Afra, [a line of gold hair jewelry], is a merge of all my worlds. It’s fashion-meets-beauty-meets-lifestyle-meets-art-meets-Black-hair-meets-Afro-Guyanese-meets-Black-culture, which sounds insane, but I did do it.…

When you think of cork, if you do, you probably think of wine stoppers, or maybe dartboards. But cork jars and compacts? Those are new. They don’t exactly glisten in a shelfie, but some sustainability experts are banking on cork to help shrink the beauty industry’s carbon footprint—a Herculean task considering that, in 2018, almost 7.9 billion units of rigid plastic were created for beauty and personalcare products in the U.S. Cork offers a renewable way forward: It is natural and biodegradable (it gets broken down by insects over several years). Cork is harvested from the cork oak tree (quercus suber) found in the western Mediterranean and along the Atlantic coast, in seven countries (including Morocco, Portugal, Spain, and France). And cork can be cut from a layer of bark…

It happens every day and usually more than once: When a person wishes to signify greetings, gratitude, admiration, or otherwise good or chill vibes, they peel back their lips and reveal two rows of about 32 mineral-coated nerve fibers, embedded in pink tissue, coated with threads of saliva. Made up mostly of hydroxyapatite, a relatively weak gemstone, teeth begin to rise from gummy ridges inside the mouth when a baby is around six months old. Those teeth hang on until about the first grade, when they start getting replaced by larger, forever teeth. In various cultures, baby teeth are alternately buried, thrown, or exchanged by spirits for money, and the incoming teeth herald a child’s arrival at perhaps the weirdest time in young life. Things just get more challenging from…

What came first: The Real Housewives or our ever-growing obsession with perfection? Did the smoky eyes and bandage dresses on Bravo’s juggernaut Housewives franchise influence the beauty choices of millions of women or have my fellow Housewives simply conformed to society’s ever-changing beauty standards? To answer that, we need to travel back to 2006. Facebook was in its infancy, Jack Dorsey gave birth to Twitter, and Bravo announced a new show: The Real Housewives of Orange County. The franchise grew up alongside these newfangled social apps, and so did the Housewives themselves. We are pop culture, and we are informed by pop culture. We have incredible reach, but we too are merely followers on the yellow brick road that led to the rise of social media, beauty bloggers, and the…

“As a reality star, I give my life to the world,” says Cynthia Bailey, a model and cast member on The Real Housewives of Atlanta. “It’s important to have [a space] that’s just mine.” Bailey is sitting on the first of three stories in her Sandy Springs, Georgia, home. Behind her, a wall of glass is painted with the surrounding forest and lake. Lake Bailey, she calls it, but that is an unofficial title. “I’m a Pisces. Water makes me happy,” she says. “And lots of light. This is basically a glass house.” She laughs. “Please do not throw stones.” The show’s next season will offer a more literal depiction of Atlanta’s Housewives, as an ongoing pandemic prohibits the indoor brunches and elaborate group trips that have plotted out seasons…

ERIKA GIRARDI, THE REAL HOUSEWIVES OF BEVERLY HILLS “Erika is my main muse. Period,” says Mikey Minden, Girardi’s creative director (yes, she has a creative director). “[What you see on TV] is how Erika lives her everyday life. Nothing is exaggerated. We keep a PowerPoint deck of every single look we have ever done on the show. One of my favorite looks was our Berlin latex look—it was very S&M. You must use baby powder to slither into [latex], and shine the outside up with lube (this particular job, I have become very familiar with). The beekeeper face net is the best thing to have in your kit. You can do full hair and makeup, zip the face net up, and get dressed seamlessly without messing up your glam. When…

“I don’t love choosing one scent for someone else, but I do love this Ellis Brooklyn Library Discovery Set ($27). With eight perfectly constructed fragrances, my best friend gets to find a new signature perfume.”—PAIGE STABLES, BEAUTY EDITOR…

To be alive is to experience stress. Or, to be more dramatic: Life is suffering. But none of us could have prepared for the stress—abject, encompassing—that 2020 would bring. In January, America began the year with the baseline anxiety that the killing of an Iranian general by a U.S. drone strike might plunge us into World War III. Things generally went south from there. Now, as COVID-19 works its way through the country, so does another ailment. Risk factors include sudden changes in routine, social isolation, fear of getting sick or making others sick, and financial insecurity. Symptoms range from nausea to hives. To get a better picture of how the pandemic has shifted the American psyche, I spoke with therapists across the country—and every provider I asked said mental…

It’s 4:45 p.m. on a Wednesday. Specifically, it’s 4:45 p.m. on the 29th Wednesday I’ve spent working from home. My gaze floats to the bar cart in my living room-slash-office. I wonder if I’m still technically on the clock, but then remember there no longer is a clock. Some days I wake up at the crack of dawn and crash by sundown; other days I struggle to be up and dressed for a Zoom call at 9 a.m., but then work well into the evening. So if time is merely a construct, does that mean happy hour is now… any hour? According to data from Drizly, an online platform through which you can order all manner of alcohol straight to your door, the answer is yes. During 2019, 63 percent…

Humans are not Earth’s best tenants. We probably don’t again. even crack the top 10. But in a general effort to clean up the place, we began to use information that environmentalists and climate scientists had been sharing with us for years. Then a pandemic happened. In some ways, the planet is one of the few entities that has seen a major upside: As flights were canceled and cars remained in park, air pollution fell to unprecedented levels around the world. “I’ve lived in New Delhi my whole life and there’s never been a blue sky,” said Indian beauty editor Vasudha Rai when Allure checked in with her in the spring. “Now I sit in my garden, look at that blue sky, inhale and exhale.” As the world has eased restrictions,…

BEST BEAUTY TIP? Sleep. FIRST SKIN-CARE BRAND YOU EVER USED? Glytone. WHAT’S THE FIRST THING YOU DO WHEN YOU WAKE UP IN THE MORNING? Thank God. WHAT’S THE LAST THING YOU DO BEFORE YOU GO TO BED? Read. Or watch Netflix. WHAT ARE YOU WATCHING RIGHT NOW? The Social Dilemma. LAST THING YOU BOUGHT? A gift for my mom—a charcuterie board. HAVE YOU PICKED UP ANY GROOMING HABITS FROM MOM OR DAD? Probably from my mom. My dad doesn’t really take those things into consideration. Different era. WHAT’S YOUR FAVORITE SMELL IN THE WORLD? I like baby smells. [And] the smells associated with babies. When I was a kid, my parents used baby powder on me. DO YOU WEAR FRAGRANCE? I do not. I used to wear it, back in…

As dermatologists across the country began reopening their offices this summer, many reported a surge in patients with sudden and dramatic hair thinning. “I didn’t go an hour without seeing a hair loss patient,” says Papri Sarkar, a dermatologist in Brookline, Massachusetts. Many of these patients are experiencing a form of hair loss called telogen effluvium, a temporary condition in which excessive hair shedding is caused by “a shock to the system,” says Nazanin Saedi, an associate professor of dermatology at Thomas Jefferson University in Philadelphia. It may be triggered by unexpected furloughs, knockdown fevers, or abrupt upendings of daily routines. And it can translate into hundreds of hairs falling out every day; for some, it can be upwards of double, even triple, the amount of hairs they’d normally lose,…

PRODUCT REVIEW POWER PLAYER The emphasis is on “Max” in Olay Regenerist Retinol24 Max Night Serum: It’s made with 20 percent more of the brand’s retinol complex than the rest of the Regenerist line. Three Allure editors put it to the test. “I am, admittedly, just starting to incorporate retinol into my routine. I like how this one isn’t yellow-y or tacky (I’ve been surprised by how many others are), and it’s hydrating, so I don’t have to ‘sandwich’ it (that’s derm speak for layering retinol between basic moisturizer to head off irritation).” —SARAH HAN, SENIOR COMMERCE WRITER “The dropper grabs the perfect amount of product—a good control measure for someone with sensitive skin like me, who might otherwise get a little retinol-happy and wind up with redness or flakes.…

5 Clipper lengths required for a smooth fade. Some barbers use upwards of 10 settings, plus a straight razor, for perfect lineups. 2¼ Length in inches that hair on males may not exceed under current United States Air Force regulations. Per a memorandum released in September, hair must have a “tapered appearance on both sides and the back of the head.” 195,300 Approximate likes on a tweet featuring a photo of a so-called quarantine fade (as in, an endearing but not-so-successful attempt at a DIY haircut under social-distancing orders). 21 The jersey number for former New York Knicks guard Iman Shumpert, who, in 2013, has the Adidas logo carved into the bottom half of his hi-top fade cut. Due to an NBA rule that states players may wear logos on…

I was an ’80s chick, modeling and hanging out at Limelight. I was 5′6″ and a half, but my card said I was 5′8.″ When I first got to Europe, I was sitting on the bench at Elite, not getting work. So then I went more commercial, doing advertising. My first job was in Milan, for Diesel jeans. I was making $150,000 as a kid, smoking cigarettes, drinking prosecco. I learned from people in Europe how to look good, eat well, take your time at a meal, enjoy life. I make almost all of my food at home. Even when I was married, my husband and I would eat at home most nights. As a model they also gave me a nutritionist, so I’ve always taken vitamins. I’m into these…

“I plan to fully embrace being a wacky-aunt figure by gifting all the tweens in my life these Maison Francis Kurkdjian Scented Bubbles in A Rose Is a Rose ($20) that emit a delicate whisper of rose when they burst.”—DIANNA MAZZONE, SENIOR BEAUTY EDITOR…

beauty box spoiler alert We may not be visiting fragrance counters anytime soon, but there are creative ways to find your new favorite scent—or gift a set to loved ones. Allure Beauty Box’s Limited-Edition Fragrance Box houses $215 worth of fragrances (from Viktor&Rolf, Rebecca Minkoff, Floral Street, and more); $30 for Allure Beauty Box members and $50 for everyone else (allure.com/fragrance). “I don’t want to give Chanel Le Vernis in Chaîne D’Or ($28) to anyone. I’d prefer to display it on a small table as a festive show of class. But I’m sure my mom would find it and turn her fingernails into 10 gold coins, and it would probably look better that way.”—BRENNAN KILBANE, SENIOR WRITER…

In a June interview, Stanford University economist Nicholas Bloom estimated that the COVID-19 pandemic had caused the layoffs of 3 in 10 Americans, asked 2 out of 10 to risk their lives for “essential” business, and pushed the grateful others to the gauzy line between work-life balance. As organizations in our society—corporations, universities, government agencies—whittle down budgets, American workers feel pressure to make themselves as indispensable as possible. For those who previously worked office jobs (even as that adjective becomes less and less useful) that pressure is more than likely bearing down on them at their kitchen table or bedroom desk. A study published this past summer that observed 3.1 million employees found that workdays under lockdown had become almost an hour longer on average—and that was just a couple…

Global events have always influenced the way humans groom, usually in unpredictable ways. During WWII, beauty was a propaganda tool: Women were urged to wear makeup as a sign of patriotism, a way to maintain their femininity while working jobs that were traditionally filled by men, and as a means to lift the spirits of husbands and brothers and male strangers fighting overseas. Global hardships always impact the beauty industry and, in return, how we take care of ourselves. For the first time in decades, the beauty industry is poised to shrink 15 percent overall, undoing years of growth in a fraction of that time. In March we were instructed on what was essential to live; beauty was not on the list. Malls, department stores, and stand-alone beauty retailers turned…

AT THE TIME OF THIS WRITING, no one has been charged or arrested for the killing of Breonna Taylor. One of the most widely seen photos of her is at her EMT training graduation ceremony. The “B. Taylor” patch sits proudly above the chest pocket of her straight-out-of-the-box blue uniform shirt. She’s cradling a dozen signature roses in the crook of her elbow, certificate in hand, fingernails subtly did. A broad smile animates her fresh face, pushing her plump, luminous cheeks right up to her sparkling, squinting, age 20-something eyes. Set back, away from her flawless forehead, long black and burgundy Marley twists are carefully woven and wrapped around her head like a turban made of yarn. She’s serving warrior Queen Amina of Zaria vibes. On this most joyous and distinguished…