So what is it exactly about French Girls and their love of Red Lipstick?
Well to begin with they feel absolutely no hesitation to use it, due to a long line of women before them being perfect examples to the profound allure of the red lip.
As little girls, they have grown up seeing grandmothers, and mothers and aunts applying the perfect red to their lips. They have learnt the minimal art of a little rouge, some mascara and the all important red lipstick, a spray of dry hair shampoo so as to pull off the just got out of bed look and . . . voila!
I have spoken to women in London who tell me that it is far too daring to wear red lipstick in London . . . and yet London is and always has been the place to take the most daring of chances re fashion, as London designers have proved through the ages with the hot pants and the mini skirt . . . never mind the punk and gothic looks.
And even me with my trademark very short haircut . . . I am now applying the red lipstick on a daily basis, because with short hair French men not used to seeing urchin haircuts, they at first glance always think I am a man! But not when they see my red lips!!!
Now my own everlasting search for the perfect red has lasted since I first visited Paris as a teenager. I have come close once or twice to the ‘perfect red’ with lots of mistakes along the way, that remain hardly used. And yet I walked into the Sephora shop in Avignon a couple of years ago, as always on the hunt for the perfect elusive red. We had gone to the cinema Utopia, and after the film we always have a walk around the lanes.
Well in Sephora a tiny slip of a salesgirl approached me and asked if she could help me. Without even thinking, I blurted out my enduring search for ‘the perfect’ red lipstick. She took a good look at me and led me over to the the Dior counter and pulled out the Hollywood Red [857] tester and tried some on my lips . . . perfect first time! Then she took that off my lips and put on again Dior Rouge [458] . . . again perfect! She called them my perfect red nude and pink nude lipstick colours. The 458 is more what I would call ‘nude’ however the red 857 is not ‘nude’ as you may know it, yet nude in the sense that it is perfect for the colour of my skin, looking so much more natural than any other red has looked on my lips so far in all my life.
What a total little treasure she is . . . and I am so sad I didn’t take her name for she is the one to advise you to go to . . . with the most perfectly natural gift to determine what suits and does not suit, especially under the usually unnatural glare of shop lights. A little one in a million makeup advisor/influencer.
