What's going on in beauty this week, from head to toe and everything in between. From Head... Seeing red: Do redheads have such a difficult time finding products that they need their own product line? Side question: What's up with taunting redheads for being "ginger"? Why is this a thing, ever? I've heard otherwise thoughtful people say some really stupid things about people with red hair, and I don't understand it! ...To Toe... Holy grail: I'm not quite narcissistic enough to actually consider this news, but in case your shoe checklist is the same as mine I feel the moral responsibility to share: I have found the perfect heeled sandal. It's comfortable even after hours of New York strolling, it's durable, it's low-vamp with no ankle strap (hate!) but feels secure anyway because of the construction, it's dressy enough for most occasions but not so dressy that you… Read More...

What's going on in beauty this week, from head to toe and everything in between.   Eureka! From Head... Radio lab: Radioactive beauty products, for real, back in the day. Isn't it fantastic that we now have laws and stringent federal regulations against putting poisonous crap in our cosmetics? ...To Toe... Made for walking: Virginia Postrel on our collective fascination with shoes (including a follow-up from the poll from a couple of weeks ago about how many pairs of shoes you own): "[The] distinction between media manipulation and personal meaning hints at the bigger issues at stake in all this talk about shoes: How do we understand life in a commercial, consumer-oriented society?" ...And Everything In Between: Rock on: Procter & Gamble is partnering with the United Negro College Fund and Black Girls Rock! (you know they really rock because of the exclamation point) to "document the current state of black… Read More...

Mirror Me, Annika Connor   Those of you who have been reading this blog for a while may remember last year’s month without mirrors, a project that brought on a monthlong wash of serenity. So serene was I during that time, in fact, that I decided I’d make it an annual event for myself—going a month each year sans mirror, a yearly retreat from self-surveillance. I hadn’t intended on writing here about revisiting the mirror fast, since I thought it would basically be rerun of what happened last time. I couldn’t have been more wrong. To be painfully honest, the past few months have been difficult for me. I’ve had some health problems, enough to interfere with my work both on this blog and elsewhere. I lost someone I loved, my maternal grandfather. I’ve been under general work stress, and have been showered with a… Read More...

What's going on in beauty this week, from head to toe and everything in between. From Head... The great unwashed: Golda Poretzsky (longtime readers will remember her from this interview) gives a thorough two-part guide to no-shampoo hair care at Persephone Magazine. She's a stronger woman than I—I went nine months without washing, but after I was "stealth shampooed" (the same thing happened to Golda, at the same spa! It's not just me!) I decided to go back to shampoo and am glad I did. I now wash my hair about once a week and it doesn't get nearly as greasy as it did before I did the extended no-shampoo bit. So even though I'm happily washing again, I recommend giving the unfortunately named "no-'poo" bit a try. ...To Toe... This little piggy had none: Illinois woman suing a nail salon after she received a pedicure there—and, allegedly, an… Read More...

Am I the only one who's just ever so slightly creeped out by this song? I've been putting off writing about male-to-female compliments because, quite honestly, it’s touchy. I crave hearing compliments within my relationships, but I also know that when I’ve gotten them, I still feel dissatisfied. In fact, the compliments given to me by men I’m not dating tend to be the ones that stick. This is somewhat in line with research indicating that women are likelier to respond with a “thank you” to compliments from men than they are to those given by other women. The author of that study speculated that it was because compliments can indicate social status, and since generally speaking men are seen as having more status, women may treat compliments from them as coming from a social superior? Or something. Honestly, I think it’s more… Read More...

What's going on in beauty this week, from head to toe and everything in between. From Head... "And what did you do with the hair?" "I hid it under the radiator": NPR reporter Jeff Cohen interviews his daughters, ages 5 and 3, totally poker-faced, after the elder decided to give her sister a haircut. Investigative reporting at its adorable finest. ...To Toe... Godfather: Mumbai gangster arrested for conspiring with the owner of a fish pedicure salon chain to threaten a pedicure franchisee who had filed a complaint against the chain's owner. ...And Everything In Between: Mr. Universe contestants; note that I have no idea if these particular musclemen "feel that many times women flirt with men just to tease them or hurt them." Juicebox: Men obsessed with building muscle are more likely to have sexist attitudes (agreeing with such statements as "I feel that many times women flirt with men just… Read More...

  I’d planned on writing about male-to-female compliments, but honestly, the more I read of these compliment studies the more fascinated I become. I’ll get to male-female compliments soon, but for now, a few findings of compliment scholarship: 1) Compliments reveal our values. A successful compliment must be about something that’s recognized by both the complimenter and the complimentee as having value. (That’s not to say that both parties have to personally value the thing being complimented—I’ve been complimented on haircuts I hated—rather that both parties have to recognize that it has value. Otherwise, the compliment isn’t complete.) The consequence here is that compliments can tell us a good deal about what we as a culture actually value. Studies have repeatedly found that the number-one topic of compliments given to American women (from both sexes) is appearance, so—surprise!—it seems we value… Read More...

What's going on in beauty this week, from head to toe and everything in between. From Head... If I only had a heart: Reallllllly hoping the Fifty Shades of Grey makeup line is going to be uber-literal. ...To Toe... Size me up: People can accurately judge age, gender, income, and attachment anxiety based on shoes alone. And here I thought I had everyone fooled with my sensible beige sandals with contour support and comfort soles, but it turns out they reveal me to be a 36-year-old middle-class lady who falls exactly in the middle of the attachment anxiety spectrum. (Thanks to This Charming Candy for the link. And word up, readers: Such a thing as pistachio-marshmallow lollipops exists in this good world, and This Charming Candy sells 'em.) Reality bites: Speaking of shoes, how many pairs do you think you own? Now go count them: How many pairs do you actually own?… Read More...

For my money, the most unrealistic part of Sex and the City was always the friendship. “Friendship porn,” I once heard it described as. People fingered Carrie’s wardrobe as being truly ridiculous, but after years of working in an industry where I’ve seen an adult woman spend a day at the office wearing a dress made entirely out of ribbon, I accepted that part of the show without question. But having a group of friends I have brunch with every weekend? Where would I find that? So I’m interested to see that part of the critique tsunami surrounding HBO’s Girls has examined the characters’ friendships. It’s brought us everything from a feminist social history of best-friendship to a zoological history of the same. In fact, there’s been a good deal of attention paid to female friendship lately, including with the number of people who linked to this essay, which made… Read More...

What's going on in beauty this week, from head to toe and everything in between. From Head... Naked hair: No More Dirty Looks is doing their annual summer hair challenge, which amounts to nothing more than sending in a picture of what you look like without any hair styling whatsoever. I hardly think of myself as a blow-dry addict but realized upon doing this challenge last year that it really had been a loooong time since I'd gone au naturel. Participate! There's a prize! ...To Toe... Toeing the line: Ohio man downs 12 drinks, then walks into a nail salon carrying duffel bag full of cash and demands to receive a pedicure—first from salon workers, then from patrons. Well-heeled: The NBA is now licensing stripper heels. As Tits and Sass points out, "These are perfect for dancers, but for female sports fans? Jerseys that fit would be a nice gesture,… Read More...

What's going on in beauty this week, from head to toe and everything in between. From Head... Moral of the story is, carry your freckle cream with you at all times: Evidence for proclaiming that Amelia Earhart landed and died on an uninhabited Pacific island grows, this time with found remnants of a glass jar that, when reassembled, matches up with the container used for Dr. C.H. Berry's Freckle Ointment. (Earhart was apparently known for disliking her freckles.) ...To Toe... Death by newsprint: "A fish pedicure shop has been forced to close because reporting of the industry in a national newspaper allegedly ‘killed’ the business, just when things were taking off." ...And Everything In Between: Procter & Gambled: I've been trying not to overdo it here on the trial of Rajat Gupta, the former Procter & Gamble exec currently on trial for insider trading, because I… Read More...

Unlike the names in this McSweeney's list, all of the below exist.   Headz Ain’t Ready, Jackson Heights, New York Bushwacker, Houston, Texas The Hairy Elephant, Ballwin, Missouri Haffner’s Vacuums, Sioux Falls, South Dakota Rusty Razor, Billings, Montana New Heads on the Block, Salem, Massachusetts Headonizm, London, England The Hair Force, Box Elder, South Dakota Chainsaw Massacre Salon, Victoria, Australia Hair We Are, Mechanicsburg, Pennsylvania Curl Up and Dye, Las Vegas, Nevada Hirsute, Rochester, New York Cut the Crap, Amsterdam, Netherlands Scissors of Oz, Millville, New Jersey Bouffant Daddy, St. Louis, Missouri Anita Barber, Abilene, Texas Sunny & Shears, Warwick, Rhode Island Best Head, Rolling Meadows, Illinois 911 Hair Salon, Milwaukee, Wisconsin Blood, Sweat & Shears, West Palm Beach, Florida Read More...

I first set foot in ladymag land in the fall of 1999, when a teen magazine hired the 23-year-old me as the lone editorial assistant. Since then, I’ve worked in women’s magazines in some capacity—running the gamut from fitness rags to fashion, teen to adult, highbrow to lowbrow, freelance to staff and back to freelance again—for the majority of my 13 years of being in the workforce, which is to say the majority of my adulthood. Which is to say that for the majority of my adult life, I have spent thirty-five to, oh, eighty hours a week working on women’s magazines, or physically surrounded by them, or thinking about them, or reading them. And as a copy editor, which has been my primary professional role for most of those 13 years, when I say “read” I mean I read, very closely,… Read More...

I have a regular Mad Men date on Wednesday evenings, which is a fantastic way to have good conversation about the show, but a poor way to blog about it since I’m three days later than everyone else. But this week’s episode was so chock-full of material on erotic capital, beauty, and power, that I’m going to jump in anyway. Do I even need to say there are spoilers here? There are spoilers here. If Mad Men were a less nuanced show that hadn’t worked hard to win viewers’ trust over the years, this week’s episode might have seemed hamfisted. We have Peggy Olson, the show’s stand-in for feminist career gals, leaving Sterling Cooper Draper Price for greener pastures, or at least pastures with more greenbacks; in the same episode, we have Joan agreeing to sleep with a client, at his explicit request, in… Read More...