material concern

The Rimmel Ten girls are giving their London guide to their home towns: so here’s my take on all things British in Los Angeles….

I made a google map of my Brit picks here.

my guide to glam…basically can be summed up as: look great, but never perfect

got my new Rimmel 10 girls package and challenge! key words: glam glam glam….more to come!

so, as you know, I’m a Rimmel 10 Girl, and yesterday I got a bunch of fun stuff to play around with….

yesterday, I tried the ice coffee lipstick and found myself pleasantly surprised by the subtleties of the look: I usually go big one place (strong eye, or strong lip) and go nowhere with the rest (as in naked rest of face).

Today, to emulate all the famous makeup artists who do those great little drawings with the whole look, I did one showing my old go-out look with the two experiments I tried with the Rimmel goodies:

what do you think, old look or new look?

i got a fun surprise package from Rimmel today.

I spread the goodies on my bed like a teenager and giggled.

Then I headed off to the studio to work on Popomomo’s Fall 10 with my awesome intern Jessica. We’re gearing up for fashion week in NY and have to handprint samples and have a photoshoot this sunday.

We both tried on ICED COFFEE lipstick and I followed up with mascara and eyeliner.

The color looked great on Jess,

but for me it did something I’m not really used to: a subtle look….

which, i guess is an interesting way to experiment: this whole less is more thing I’ve heard about from time to time:)

as you know: I’m a Rimmel girl, and so i’ve signed on for creative challenges. We all got our first challenge: and the first step is to not wear makeup.

here’s a theme song for the first step:

unfortunately (fortunately) this is not hard for me. I like makeup, but I’ve come late to it, and its only in the past couple years that i’ve thought about wearing it: and then, take into consideration how many days I forget to put it on and you can start to understand that most days are days without makeup.

HOWEVER

i recently had a model casting: beautiful girls, all of them: and some were completely devoid of makeup. and even though they are gorgeous: some of them almost disappeared.

So i decided that if models needed a little color, ummm maybe I could make an effort and swipe some mascara or eyeliner and maybe remember to use all the crazy lipsticks i buy.

since that point, I’ve done a pretty good job of remembering to wear makeup. On days I forget: I have probably forgotten all day.

step 1 of this challenge made me realize that lately I’ve thought of a little makeup as a little armor, or a little guarantee about the night.

so: here is me without makeup:

me and booker also without makeup

I’ve always hated those tabloids “stars! without makeup!” but seriously: we should all be so lucky:

so…a while ago I got an email from Rimmel, the UK makeup company, about this new thing that were doing: which was basically finding 10 cool girls around the US that exemplify the London look in America, and then have us, in creative ways, explore and experiment with Rimmel products and projects.

I think most of us young savvy’s out there are aware of how large company’s are looking for new ways of marketing. In most cases, the people writing the marketing plans are alot like us: young, smart, interesting: so a lot of the new marketing, when done right, is that way as well. Sometimes its done awkwardly: and we can all smell it a mile away.

I was into the Rimmel challenge for a couple reasons:

1. I use Rimmel

Its totally affordable, and comes in cool colors: as someone new to makeup who’s primary purchases started to flesh out photoshoots: I’m a big fan of color and a price that means I can try a bunch of shades.

2. Rimmel doesn’t test on animals

No companies should: many do. Rimmel doesn’t: I like Rimmel.

3. Creative challenges are fun for everyone and I like fun. I also spend a little too much time on occassion on my own DIY projects and stalking others DIY projects online, so doing some with an excuse to be online is pretty good with me too.

4. Getting the London look: I love London, and London style and it’s tradition of eccentricity.

Isabella Blow, Vivienne Westwood, Zandra Rhodes, Elizabeth, and that lovely british eccentricity kind of, in my mind, results in a high-low (think new balmain with topshop shoes) and old-new (grandmother’s fancy velvet dressing jacket chopped off with some leather leggings) and perfection/abstraction (a perfect eye and lip with bed-head) and a general confidence+amivalence that I find totally charming. Sloppy sexy: but in the most perfect way.

Its that always looking great and never looking perfect thing that I love.
Rimmel Girl Kate Moss, Alexa Chung, the Geldofs, all rock this look perfectly.

And, this is kinda a weird thing to say. But I LOVE that I occasionally see pics of some of UK ladies trashed coming out of clubs or dinner or whatever. I know that might be somewhat of a sensitive issue, but, from an american standpoint, that “I don’t give a F(*%$*(&%$” is pretty awesome. Especially as they are almost always wearing very high heels:).

so: yeah, I’m a Rimmel girl.

Adventures to follow.