Innehållsförteckning för September 2021 från Allure

I’m terrible at goodbyes. I’ve certainly had a fair share in my lifetime. Moving to new schools. Switching jobs. Just this fall, we packed up our house of 16 years and moved to my husband’s childhood hometown. Now, after nearly six years at Allure, I’m closing this chapter and heading to a sunny new coast for a big new role at Netflix. And I’m struggling to find the right words. It’s an exciting moment, but bittersweet because I’ll miss everyone at Allure so much. This has been a dream job, where I thought I’d stay forever. I still pinch myself over the incredible experiences I’ve had during my time here. I’ve interviewed icons (Helen Mirren, Lupita Nyong’o) and trailblazers (Awkwafina, Mj Rodriguez). I sat front row at a fashion show…

1 Dab a lipstick on the center of lips and diffuse it to the edges, says Mehta, for a gorgeous, Popsicle-stained effect. (Try Maybelline New York Color Sensational Ultimate Slim Lipstick in More Magenta.) 2 Magenta blush sounds intimidating, but dusted across temples and cheekbones “it leaves a beautiful, fresh flush of color,” says Mehta. (Try Nars Blush in Coeur Battant.) Top it off with a clear balm for dewy etherealness. 3 A creamy magenta pigment like Danessa Myricks Beauty Colorfix 24-Hour Cream Color in Freedom (top right) is opaque enough to use as a graphic liner. Or, blend a pin drop-size amount onto each cheek for a sheerer wash. Tap whatever is left on your fingertips onto your lids for a monochromatic moment. A BRIEF HISTORY OF MAGENTA Suddenly,…

1. Haus Laboratories PhD Hybrid Lip Oil Stain. Some glosses get sloppy if you so much as side-eye a slice of pizza. But this one—in sheer berry, red, orange, and pink—has the staying power of a stain. (Clockwise from top: Tint, Primary, and Neutral.) 2. Benefit Cosmetics POWmade Brow Pomade and Dual-Ended Angled Eyebrow Brush. Painting on brow pomade used to require more restraint than shopping on Prime Day. But wipe your brush on this pot’s beveled edge and you’re left with the perfect amount of product every time. 3. Eadem Milk Marvel Dark Spot Serum. Skin of color is particularly prone to hyperpigmentation after an injury, like a breakout or bug bite. This lightweight serum targets existing dark spots and helps prevent new ones with vitamin C. 4. Laura…

1. COVERGIRL LIPSLICKS TINTED LIP BALM, “DARING” Makeup artist Molly R. Stern desperately misses this drugstore shade. “You can find it on eBay for over $70,” she laments. “A sheer, perfect, neutral red that was truly gorgeous and universal.” 2. YVES SAINT LAURENT VINYL COUTURE MASCARA, “I’M THE TROUBLE” A few collections ago, YSL briefly offered its slick, lash-clinging mascara in an offbeat palette, including forest green, a shocking pink, and makeup artist Nick Barose’s favorite blue. “It’s so ’80s,” he says. “It reminds me of the kind of makeup I saw on my mom that inspired me to be a makeup artist.” 3. GIORGIO ARMANI ROUGE D’ARMANI SHEER HYDRATING LIPCOLOR, “8” Stern also mourns this hot pink. In the bullet, it looked intense; on lips, it was an allover,…

Neon Eye Makeup + White Liner Shadows that look fluorescent in the pan often fall flat on skin, but if you layer them over a white liner you’ll get electric color payoff that goes on more evenly too. The same trick works for putting more electricity into neon eyeliners. Eye Pencil + a Lighter Revive a dry pencil by running the tip over a flame for a couple of seconds. After it melts slightly—and then, dear Lord, cools to the touch—it’ll glide on like the first day you opened it, says makeup artist Amrita Mehta. She adds, “The difference in color payoff is insane.” (Repeat before each application.) Cake Liner + Lash Glue Makeup artists use water-activated pigments, called cake liners, to create matte looks, but these bold hues can…

@NailsbyMei to her loyal followers, Kawajiri started her career in Kyoto, Japan, painting intricate nail designs for Harajuku girls. When she moved to the U.S. in 2012, she brought her knack for neon colors and three-dimensional designs with her. As for her own acrylic sets, she says, “There isn’t a length I won’t go.” “I always use JinSoon Cuticle Oil [1] for photo shoots. The formula is very rich but really absorbs. It’s similar to my Supernal Cosmic Glow Facial Oil [5]. I have dry skin, but after using this every night, my face feels supersoft and nice.” “Building and filing gel extensions takes so much time. Apres Tips [8] come in so many shapes and lengths and last two to three weeks. My favorite color combos are neons with…

Alex stood in front of a mirror observing himself. “What color?” he inquired of no one in particular. He stared at his reflection a little longer before repeating the question: “What color?” Alex was a gray parrot purchased from a pet shop by psychologist Irene Pepperberg in 1977. To date, Alex is perhaps the only animal to ask a seemingly existential question. (The feathery genius, whose name is short for “avian learning experiment,” learned that the answer was “gray” after being told six times.) Typically, of course, colorcentric ponderings are unique to humans, and the queries are endless: Is the blue you see the same blue that I see? And how do you describe blue to someone who’s never observed it? For most, these debates arise only in Philosophy 101.…

Creating this chart took me back in time. I grew up very poor, but we could afford paper, paint, colored pencils…. So much of my childhood was about crafting and just creating with a box of crayons. That’s really transferred to my life now—color is everything for me. Color is the magic; it’s an energy, a feeling. Regardless of the style of makeup that I’m doing, color always brings the message forward. This particular look was inspired by nature. I have some roses in front of my house, and when I went for my morning walk, I noticed the sun shining down on the satin texture of the petals. I wanted to capture that softness. Blush placement can really change the story of makeup. I love the idea of bringing…

1 MATTIE LUBCHANSKY They/Them CARTOONIST “One of the most well-meaning but unfortunate questions cis people will ask is, ‘Are they going to end up as X?’ or ‘What’s the end point?’ Defining an end point seems counterproductive for me, personally. Because this is who you are.” 2 DENNY AGASSI She/Her WRITER, ACTOR, MUSICIAN “When I get dressed, I ask myself a series of questions: Does this make me feel good because it is comfortable? Followed by, Does it make me feel good because it convinces society of the gender I wish for them to understand? And, finally, Am I undeniable? In other words, do I check off the boxes needed to be a girl in this society?” 3 NAR ANGEL ROKH He/Them DJ AND MUSIC PRODUCER “Everyone’s experience transitioning varies. For me, the…

When I was born, a doctor suggested with professional authority that the fair-skinned little girl my mother had just given birth to would probably never see color. My mother was a young Black filmmaker in pre-liberation South Africa with personal experience being a minority in a disabling sociopolitical context. She politely received the news from the doctor and, with defiance, turned to my father and said privately, “This doctor doesn’t have albinism. I’ll wait for my own child to tell me what she can and cannot see.” I grew older and, as it turned out, I did see color. I couldn’t make out details from a far distance, but when I moved close enough I could see variants of color blending into the portrait of my world. I saw fragments…

April showers bring May flowers. And then summer arrives, its radiant light is diffused through the humid air, and that’s why June is full of rainbows. When a sunbeam crosses paths with a raindrop, it explodes into a brilliant series of varying wavelengths that the eye distinguishes as different colors, from red (the longest wavelength, crest to trough) to yellow to blue to violet (the shortest). The phenomenon happens often enough to warrant almost no media coverage, except for once in 2010, when a video of two parallel rainbows arching over Yosemite National Park went viral. Not because double rainbows are rare—they aren’t—but because the man recording the video was so moved by the experience that he could not help but speak to the sky. In the book of Genesis,…

In 2002, Lancôme released Juicy Tubes, a fruity assortment of flavored lip glosses. By 2003, they were teen classics: Amanda Bynes, Hilary Duff, and Kyla Pratt all listed them among their favorite lip glosses. The concept of flavored lip color was, in human years, beyond adolescent—Dr. Pepper Lip Smacker is from 1975—but these Lancôme glosses were a happy accident: “To keep shiny gloss on lips, you use a sticky polymer that’s a little tacky. Then we stopped thinking about that as a negative. Honey and fruit marmalade are sticky but delicious, so what if we added food-quality fruit flavoring?” Sylvie Guichard told Allure when she was Lancôme’s global research communications director. “If you put it on with your finger, the stickiness is obvious, so we [used] a tube. It wound up…

1. TATA HARPER BLUSH IN NAUGHTY. Tap this sheer, hydrating cream on cheeks, lips, and lids for a soft wash of color. $42. 2. CHLOÉ GEMMA SUNGLASSES. Sunnies so cute you’ll plan the rest of your outfit around them. $495. 3. ABOUT-FACE SHADOWSTICK IN CREATURE. One swipe of this intensely pigmented crayon makes a bold statement. $21. 4. UZ EYE OPENING LINER IN BURGUNDY. Black-eyeliner devotees, hear me out: Rich burgundy makes for an intriguing swap. $16. 5. RARE BEAUTY WITH GRATITUDE DEWY LIP BALM IN COMPLIMENT. Most lip balms barely leave a hint of color, but this one packs a welcome punch. $16. 6. BOTTEGA VENETA LACE-UP MESH PUMPS. After a lifetime of neutral heels, I’m leaning way into a new shoe rule: only showstopping shades. $930. 7. DANESSA…

On visiting the Dior rose fields in Grasse: “It was hundreds of roses. I’m not so eloquent with this right now (laughs). I’m like, the ‘field of rose’ was hundreds of roses. I mean, mainly the thing that’s impressive is the scent, of course, because it’s just kind of carried on the wind. You don’t have to lean over and smell it. You just stand there when it’s blooming and this delicate fragrance surrounds you.” On her favorite non-perfume smell: “Definitely orange blossoms. We have so many in California. When they’re blossoming, it’s just incredible. It’s such a scent of home for me.” If she were to be reincarnated as a beauty product it would be… “Maybe eye cream. I feel like that’s the top thing that helps a tired…

Wearing sunscreen shouldn’t be complicated—or chalky. Sunday Riley gets it right with its new Light Hearted Broad Spectrum SPF 30 Sunscreen, a pink-tinted formula that goes on sheer (on my fair skin and on my colleagues with olive and deep skin tones too). What I love most about the brand’s first sunscreen (aside from its cheery, heart-themed tube) is that, along with physical and chemical UV blockers (zinc oxide, octisalate, and octocrylene), Light Hearted is loaded with anti-inflammatory ingredients, including turmeric and safflower seed oil, to soothe skin as it protects. My sensitive skin loves how the formula helps tame underlying redness, which is even more reason to reapply throughout the day. The September Allure Beauty Box includes Sunday Riley Light Hearted Broad Spectrum SPF 30 Sunscreen along with six…

British makeup artist Leigh Easthope has a type of color blindness that skews the way he perceives red (and colors with red undertones like purple, orange, and pink). But what do you do when you’re color blind and your livelihood depends on color? “Your ideas are not going to be like anyone else’s ideas,” says Easthope. “And you can use that to your advantage.” PHONE A FRIEND Colleagues and friends have helped Easthope navigate new eye shadow palettes. They’ve confirmed, for example, that a purple is purple and Easthope has labeled each color accordingly for future reference. But, for the record, he wishes more makeup brands would use shade names that actually describe a color (“It could be purple, but it’s called Fudge”) or, at the very least, provide descriptions…

In South Korea the concept of “personal colors” is big…but are there really specific shades that can make you look or feel that much better? For as long as I can remember, my mother has recoiled at the mere thought of wearing olive-green. “It does nothing for me,” she’d say. Why? “I’m a winter.” She is a disciple of Carole Jackson, who published Color Me Beautiful about 40 years ago. The quasi-self-help book sorts women into “seasons” based on the tone of their hair, skin, and eyes. Depending on your season, you’re assigned a color palette that promises to “make you look great and feel fabulous.” Early editions of the book included a tear sheet prompting readers to send in $25 to receive a wallet-size bundle of swatches for easy…

In the early 2000s few things were more satisfying than flipping open a Motorola Razr, throwing on a Paris Hilton-inspired slip dress, or swiping on a lip gloss—and the most amazing iteration of each came in splashy magenta. After an arduous year, we’re once again craving the cheery shade, a not quite red, not quite purple-pink. It is the most-searched color on the internet these days, and makeup artists will tell you it’s also one of the most unexpectedly versatile pigments in their kits. “It can be soft without being purely pink, edgy without being dark, and vibrant without being neon,” says makeup artist Amrita Mehta. Magenta can be subtle, as in a layer of tinted lip oil. It can be complementary, as in swaths swirled onto cheeks. Or it…

1. Backdrop Interior Standard Finish Paint in Rose Quartz. “I’ve always fantasized about having my own pink tiled bathroom. This glossy shade of pink has the same soft and sensual vibe. It would go well with round mirrors, checkered towels, and cheeky accessories like Cold Picnic’s Boob Bathmat,” says Sydney Gore, digital design editor at AD. 2. Clare Wall Paint in Vacay. “Growing up, we had a very ’80s seafoam-green bathroom and I still love it—blue skies, blue water, it all makes sense to me! This sophisticated take would be great with a blue striped shower curtain, neutral towels, and wood accents,” says Rachel Fletcher, commerce editor at AD. 3. Farrow & Ball Paint in Pitch Blue. “This moody-blue is a subtle pop of color on its own, or a…

In 2021, Kade Gottlieb, better known by his stage name Gottmik, became the first trans man to compete on RuPaul’s Drag Race—the Olympics for drag queens. (He took home the bronze.) Gottmik, a makeup artist, arrived in the competition’s werkroom wearing clown-white foundation and villainously black lipstick. “Time to crash the cis-tem!” he sang. His talent for transformation borders on the otherworldly, like when he remade himself into Paris Hilton (a client) for a celebrity-impersonation challenge. (Other tricks include: Turning Lil Nas X into a note-perfect Nicki Minaj.) Allure joined the performer at a suburban stop on his victory tour across the United States. By the time you’re reading this, he’ll be packing for the European leg. I went to Catholic school, where you’re not allowed to wear makeup when…

“I probably wear the most color on my lips and nails. Essie Expressie Seize The Minute [1] is a tomato-red that always reminds me of Paris. [It feels] very French.” “Charlotte Tilbury Light Wonder [3] doesn’t feel like I’m wearing makeup. It evens out my pinkish-rosey skin tone and gives a glow. LoveSeen Lashes [7] are easy to apply and add a natural flutter.” “When I’m working from home, I light D.S. & Durga Wild Brooklyn Lavender Candle [8]. It’s so soothing. The NuFace Fix [2] is so easy to use. I leave it beside my computer [and use it while I work]. It’s supposed to activate your muscles to help improve wrinkles.” “After I had my second baby, I lost all the hydration in my skin and my hair…

It’s difficult to say for sure what Eden looked like, but it was probably green. Jan Brueghel the Elder’s “paradise landscapes” from the European Renaissance expressed his vision of Eden in every chlorophyll variant naturally possible, in seas of trees stretching to infinity, in ultramarine surfaces of swan-flecked lagoons, and in some blues and golds. But mostly greens. The Tree of Knowledge is painted in what appears to be hundreds of shades of green, including moss, olivine, and sunlight on broadleaf, each one watching Eve commit the first recorded act of conspicuous consumption. And today? Refined with time and technology, our greens have gotten better, cooler, richer, lusher, and more attention-grabbing than ever. Eve would flip at the gardens of Versailles or Spotify’s Stockholm headquarters. We can’t know how she…

There are tricky, technical words that perfumers use to exchange ideas (try saying “tetramethyl acetyloctahydronaphthalenes” one time, slowly) and easily recognizable (easily pronounceable) ones for notes like rose or vanilla. But there’s no real universal language for complex compositions—one person’s “fresh” is another’s “sweet.” Instead, we often conjure imagery of laundry snapping in the breeze, waves lapping at the shore, or lemons ripening in the sun. But these visual clichés aren’t the only way: “One of the most effective ways to describe scent is with color,” says Frédéric Malle, founder of the perfume house Editions de Parfums Frederic Malle. For Malle, associating fragrance with color is second nature. Born with a sensory-processing trait called synesthesia, he perceives a range of vivid, painterly strokes when he smells perfume—or anything at all.…

As long as there’s been life on Earth, there’s been melanin. Yet scientists are just beginning to scratch the surface of exploring the breadth of its capabilities. Rein V. Ulijn, director of the Nanoscience Initiative at the Advanced Science Research Center at the City University of New York, has helped create a synthetic melanin mimic that he believes could serve as a colorant for cosmetics. And the Mediated Matter group at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology is intrigued by the protective qualities of melanin: Researchers are looking into how coating building facades with melanin could help shield the people inside from environmental damage. The power of our pigment knows no bounds. Routine Maintenance Four dermatologists. Four different ways of treating the dark spots and discoloration—also known as hyperpigmentation—that happen when…