October 29, 2009
Posted by marta
We’ve had Lancome’s vibrating mascara and now we are being treated to Lancome’s Oscillation Foundation ($48), a foundation that, yes you guessed it, vibrates. It is supposed to give you a “pixel-precise” complexion for up to 14 hours.
I don’t really know what pixel precise means. I decided to Google it and fetched up a high definition TV by Philips that “features pixel precise HD and invisible sound”. What on earth is invisible sound? Realizing that I was in danger of getting off track, I went back to Lancome’s Oscillation Foundation. The spongy applicator micro-vibrates 7000 times per minute to break down the powder. Couldn’t that have been done in manufacturing? Oscillation Foundation was beginning to look like a desperate gimmick. Read more...
October 8, 2009
Posted by marta
This week’s improbable product combo: a lip gloss that comes with a date rape drug testing kit. I am embarrassed to admit that this nutty idea comes from the UK and a company called 2LoveMyLips.
The idea is that you’d be sitting in a bar and as you bend down to adjust the strap on your stiletto, some fiendish cad spikes your Cosmopolitan. But you are ever on the alert and whilst feigning to adjust your lip gloss you cunningly dip a pink taper into your drink that can detect GHB and Ketamine.
Naturally, I take all this to be a gimmick to sell lip gloss. Still, I thought I should check if drink-spiking had reached epidemic proportions whilst I wasn’t looking. Robert Hansson, principal chemist at the Forensic Science Laboratory in Australia, conducted a study and concluded it was an “urban myth”. Studies in the US turn up a miniscule number of drug spiked drinks (eg: less than half percent). Read more...
June 19, 2008
Posted by marta
TurboLash All Effects Motion Mascara will be launched in Saks on July 17th. I've been trying to work out why a battery operated, vibrating mascara applicator would be a necessary addition to one's life. Perhaps someone who's lashes are so long as a result of using Jan Marini's eyelash enhancer might benefit. But how? Does it speed up a task that takes all of 30 seconds? Why would you need 125 micropulses per second?
Estee Lauder's head of global marketing, Elana Drell-Szyfer, has clearly agonized over this as well. "There is a relationship between vibration, length, volume, separation and curl." Its worth reading that again to appreciate how spectacularly meaningless it it. Still, Elana's is not an easy job.
Lancome is also getting into the burgeoning vibrating mascara market and is going to launch Oscillation later in the year. This will vibrate 7,000 times per minute and will deposit a specially made ultra-fine mascara. Read more...
May 8, 2008
Posted by marta
A friend generously returns from her frequent trips to Tokyo with tubes of Japanese charcoal cleanser. Last time she added in a face mask that does a pretty good job of lightening the skin. Although she’ll take requests, I don’t think I’ll be asking her to pick up Kyobeni Rouge on her next trip.
Kyobeni Rouge is probably the world’s most expensive lipstick. It costs between $675 and $2,850 for a pot that holds up to 50 applications. Isehan-Honten, the company that has just launched Kyobeni Rouge, says that this is justified because its green (crushed safflower petals), rare (said petals must be harvested from one particular mountain in July and before dawn), and has staying power (ever seen a Geisha touching up her lippy in the bathroom?).
April 14, 2008
Posted by marta
Karin Herzog was inspired by the ancient Egyptians, who used a sheer powder to protect themselves from the sun, to make Isis. Herzog’s identical formulation has, as its main ingredient, talc. Doubtless ancient Egyptian medical science hadn’t equipped them with the knowledge that talc is linked to skin cancer. Here in the 21st Century we know better. The Egyptians certainly knew about mica, another ingredient in Egyptian Earth Isis. Whether they used as a sunscreen is, as far as I can tell, undocumented. The other ingredient is kaolin. I hope Herzog isn’t sourcing her kaolin from Egypt as the only one mined there is of inferior quality.
By the way, there is a Mr Herzog. Born nearly a century ago, he invented the artificial respiration system but abandoned such medical mundanity to work at Karin’s side producing oxygen-based face cream.
