In Which We Discover That High WASPs Approach Perfume The Same Way They Approach Life. Intoxicated.

It turns out, oddly enough, that High WASPs take the same approach to perfume as they do to life. I know, I know, it sounds preposterous. Hear me out, if you would be so kind.

1. We mean well. Which sometimes drags on to the edge of politeness. But eventually we honor our commitments.

A reader of Privilege wrote me back in December of 2009, asking me about High WASPs and perfume. Today, October 4th, 2010, I honor my commitment. A more revealing test of 'better late than never' we cannot imagine. Jessica, if you're still out there, um, sorry. And here goes.

2. When we look back, we realize we have come far from our origins. We also see that American culture has wandered far from the world of dressing tables, signature scents, and Grandmama.

My grandmother, the Artsy Grande Dame that she was, had a signature scent. Diorissimo. Lilies of the valley. Very sweet. My mother wore Miss Dior. My Aunt Priscilla gave me Caleche, when I was in high school, and then Paco Rabanne's Calandre. I wore them constantly, until, one day, I just didn't. For the past 30 years I have assumed that I hated perfume, that I was allergic to it, that it made me feel ill. I have also watched, and wondered, why anyone would want to smell like Britney Spears.

3. We do research, relying on decades of retail experience. Which more often than not brings us to our spiritual home, also known as Saks Fifth Avenue.

When I finally, finally, organized my various and remaining competencies enough to get myself to address perfume, I thought I'd go to Barney's New York, in San Francisco. I drove up our unscenic Highway 101, and parked at Union Square. I stopped by Saks, "just to look."

3. High WASPs succumb to adventure.

I walked by the Saks perfume counter. And paused, a bit. The saleswoman began to talk to me immediately. I could barely hear her, so overwhelmed was I by all the shiny bottles and waiting scents.


High WASP inbreeding has left us unable to think and smell at the same time. A pity, really. Who knows what acts of irresponsibility have been committed in lavender fields and peat bogs?

Once the saleswoman began to dab me with perfume I was lost. Drowning. You might think I'm exaggerating. I wish that were true.

This was a newish perfume line called By Kilian. Kilian is apparently the heir of the Louis Vuitton Moet Hennessy fortune whatsit. One can imagine that amidst all those Ls and Vs he needs to spell out his name like a 6-year old. This does not improve the brand for me but I was far beyond logos and marketing by this point.

She dabbed onto my unsuspecting skin (skin is always unsuspecting, that's part of its tragedy, don't you think?):

• Prelude To Love
• Beyond Love
• Love and Tears
• Liasons Dangereuses
• Cruel Intentions
• A Taste of Heaven

These names offered me no guidance whatsoever.

Did you know that to smell perfumes for purchase you should:

1. Wave your wrists to dry them off after first spraying?
2. Use each wrist, each elbow, the back of each arm, and a few fingers for different scents?
3. Lie your face against your wrist sideways, to breath it in indirectly, not snort it right into your nostrils.
4. Walk away and come back 20 minutes later for the final version of your scent? This is called the "dry down." But had I walked away I would never have returned, thus failing to honor my commitment. So the dry down had to wait.

One bottle smelled like the good part of bugspray, and gasoline. Mixed with rubber. And in the background, sweetness. A tired sweetness. The saleswoman said it was made of something called, "Oudh." And rose. Rose attar, maybe.

All I knew was that I liked it and I had to get out of there or fall down in public. High WASPs do not like to fall down in public.

5. Our senses call us to experiences we cannot predict.


$400 later I owned a large black bottle of scent. Named "Rose Oudh." Which appears to require its own lacquer box adorned by a gold-colored plate engraved with a fancy "K." Oh, and a key. I am still not sure why to lock a box that one can simply put into one's backpack if one is a robber, but I have told you before and I will tell you again, I am at heart too Sturdy for much high concept retail.

4. We call home for comfort and discover that the old High WASPs had some priorities very straight.

When I finally made it to my car I called my sisters. Only to discover that my sisters don't wear perfume at all. I called my mother.

Me: Mom, what's that perfume you always wore?
Mom: I don't know. I don't wear it any more. I hate it.
Me: Well what did you use to wear?
Mom: I don't know. I used to keep the bottles on my dressing table but I thought they looked trashy so I put them away.
Me: Well, Mom, could you do me a favor and go look and see what they are? I'm trying to write a blog post.
Mom: OK but I have to go back across the house to the bathroom.
Me: That's OK. I will wait.
*crickets*
Mom: Lisa?
Me: Yes Mom?
Mom: I found it. You tell your blog people I had to crawl back into my bathroom cupboard to to get it. (Note. The bathroom cupboard is under her sink.)
Me: OK Mom, I will. What's the perfume?
Mom: It's something called Hermies.
Me: Hermies? *laughter* Mom, it's not Hermies, it's Hermes!
Mom: Well I had to crawl into the bathroom cupboard to get it.

My mother doesn't care one bit for brands. Or labels. I doubt she would understand the phenomenon of young Mr. Kilian.

5. We keep anything that dizzies the senses far away from our reading glasses, our well-flossed teeth, and our pearls.

In the past few weeks I have discovered that I have to wear Rose Oudh behind my knees. Anything closer to my face is too much. Good thing too. Perfume oils are bad for pearls. Everyone knows that.

Everyone knows that perfume was invented to disguise the smells of human life pre-plumbing.

Everyone also knows that perfume is just perfume. But they're wrong. The Three Kings knew what they were doing. All that myrrh and frankincense was the original Trojan Horse.

It's Lipstick Time Everywhere, Or, Saturday Morning at 10:25am

This morning I am glad to be, sniffle by sniffle, recovering from 30 days of viruses. I have used up an entire Costco case of tissue boxes. Didn't know that was possible and assumed they'd be out in my garage for all eternity.

This morning I am also glad that you all read Privilege. And comment. And, apparently, take pictures. Here are some photos from readers, following our lipstick adventures of yesterday.

From lauren, and her cuttlefish Flickr stream. Click through to see in larger format. A tribute to lip products and their implied special powers.

ye old lip product daguerrotype

From Emmaleigh504, on Yfrog (a Twitter photo link site). She bought a new lipstick, as you can see. Dior.

Until the moment I saw this photograph I had never understood that this blog went out to you. I know you come here, I forgot that I also go there. My apologies. Thank you for having me.


In closing, Emmaleigh's big lipsticked smooch. Cropped and smudged. Nothing quite like a big smooch, now is there?

If we're lucky, we get a little bit of the sublime, and a little bit of the ridiculous, every single day. The good kind of ridiculous. Have a wonderful weekend.


And if you are still wondering about Twitter, yes or no, unnerved, here is a link to my How To Get Started On Twitter post

The Truth Behind Women And Their Lipsticks

Some women buy a lot of lipsticks. Why? Is it necessary? Do we change our lip color every day? And what is up with that basket of lipsticks on the bathroom counter?

Une Femme D'Un Certain Age recently reviewed her lipstick collection. Which got me thinking. Here's the thing. I buy my lipsticks because they are magic. Little red wizards with convenient pop tops. I imagine I'm not alone.

The Privileged[d] lipsticks of 2010.


Most days a pair of colored lip balms. I have a drugstore pink version purported to contain grapeseed oil. I have a reddish Burt's Bees Balm, which I'm told is absolutely fully of pomegranate something or other. In any case, everyone ought to own a similar duo. The chief benefit being that when you put lip balm on without a mirror you don't look even one tiniest bit like a clown.

For dress up, I continue to recommend Lipstick Queen's Medieval red. Manages to show up both sheer and matte. The only red lipstick 99% of the population ought to wear. With black or brown eyeliner and mascara. If you are in the mood for adventurous eyes, green, purple, red, whatever, you'll want a nude lipstick. I wear Nars Cruising, with YSL Golden Praline lipgloss on top if I feel a need for shine.

Done.

Or so you might think.

I also wear LipFusion lip plumper, on occasion. I swear either technology works or placebos are powerful. However, I made a mistake last time and bought a pink called Full Frontal. What was I thinking? I recommend clear, you can wear it with anything.


So, now, done, right?

Nope. Now we enter the halls of what might be. What used to be. What should have been.

I used to wear the dusty taupe mauve below. To work. Every day. It was the color of my lips. Myself, but vice-presidential. In time, my lips faded, leaving me eclipsed by my lipstick. Never a good thing. Luckily I came to the end of the tube. It can be hard to relinquish the tools of our youth. Then Nars discontinued the color. Damage, it was called. Quite apt.

And then, of course, we have the lipsticks of all the women I imagined myself to be. Rarely worn. The Nars orange Giza gloss was the most risky, for the few days when I found the Versace gal in my soul. Not sturdy at all.

Then I collected various pinks. Because Charla Krupp told me that women over 40 should wear pale pink lipstick. Which perhaps they should. But I don't. And won't. Especially not one full of gold flecks. Nars Galaxy Girl. I'm no longer a girl contemplating galaxies. But I might have been. Once.


Oh, and who doesn't own a tube of lip stain? Vincent Longo's Cupid's Breath. Purchased in a burst of baroque. Believing that pigment mimicking bitten lips would indicate, perhaps even provoke some deep inner, um, depth. An Artsy Cousin to Sylvia Plath. Only without the ending my own life part. Didn't work. Turns out stains are no more romantic than anything else. But in the right light, the little bottle appears to hold blood against a vampire's visit. So I keep it for my long-lashed, porcelain-skinned, tragic imaginary self.


And finally. One New Year's Eve Shanghai required my presence. I scooped up a lipstick at the airport Sephora en route. Redder than anyone in their right mind would wear. The evening was spent at the Jin Mao Grand Hyatt, some 50 floors above the street. No one seemed to find my red mouth even one bit unexpected.

I haven't worn it since.


Lipsticks open more space in my imagination than they take up on the bathroom counter. I will not throw them out until they decay.

Brutal Pearls And Subtle Bright Red Lipstick; The Power Of An Oxymoron

"Cool" fashion usually involves tension of one sort or another. The wearer has enough force of character, or enough vision, to carry off a union of unmatching goods. Combining patterns, textures, or "high-low" elements.

While cool isn't a dominant High WASP trait, some style archetypes are cooler than others. The Grande Dame wears a messy bun with her red satin ballgown. The Artsy Cousin mixes ikat, madras, and pearls. The Sturdy Cousin, well, if she's cool it's usually inadvertent. She buys a mariniere t-shirt while biking through Normandy, and upon her return to the US she finds it's an overnight fashion sensation.

But, as a Sturdy Gal myself, I am drawn like a taupe moth to the blood-red flame. And would like to offer up two possibilities for high tension fashion. For the oxymoronic among us.

First, "brutal pearls." Duchesse at Passage des Pearls put together a list of presents for 20-year olds. Among the suggestions, a pearl necklace strung visibly on linen. Brutal, if you will.

Brutal Pearls by High WASP on Polyvore.com

Pearls on leather or rubber. Diamond ornamentation, even. Style oxymorons. Or, similarly, a gold plaque on wrapped, rough leather from a wonderful jewelry store with endless online goods, Ylang23. One might engrave on it, as a reminder, what Lydia, or @littlefluffycat's dad used to say. "All you can do is all you can do, but all you can do is enough." Therapeutic for the Sturdy Gal. Or one might mix modes even further, and engrave one's monogram, ornate and classic. I know, right?

Second, I would like to suggest a subtle, but bright, red lipstick. This is a recent purchase. Jane at simple + pretty recommended Lipstick Queen. For some unknown reason, as I have said, I have a faith in makeup that I have long since discarded vis-a-vis clothing. My faith is not misplaced here.


Lipstick Queen "Medieval" red lipstick.

I am another proponent of lipstick that looks like your lips but better. In the Nars "Cruising" I found a nude. In the Lipstick Queen "Medieval," what we have is a glamorous, sultry, lip-bitten, subtle, easy red. That is completely and totally wearable when you run to the grocery store in your son's khaki pants, a white tee, and turquoise Haviana flip flops. I know. I've done that difficult experiment for you. And, in case you wondered, even cool people with red lipstick sometimes then leave all the produce they just purchased in the store. No matter. A lipstick with all the allure of red, one that even Sturdy Gals can wear to leave the house, makes up for so many missteps.

Note: To anyone new to Privilege, the Grande Dame, Artsy Cousin, and Sturdy Gal are High WASP style archetypes. If you search the blog, using that handy search box on the upper left hand side, for any one of them, the general tomfoolery will become clearer. I think.

No recompense was received for this post.

On The Tyranny Of The Cosmetics Counter, Or, Saturday Morning at 10:00am

I have red, swollen, chafed, eyelids. And I blame it on my High WASP upbringing.

As I have said before, my ilk live in deeply ingrained fear of behaving "inappropriately." Now, this doesn't mean acting in a "ladylike" manner per se. The full definition of "appropriate" would require terabytes of data storage, since it's replete with "If/Thens." More fully described, "If this is true, then that is appropriate. If this other thing is true, then that other thing is also appropriate."

The problem is that we don't always know, even we who wrote the sometimes silly code, just which behavior applies where. And occasionally we make mistakes with lasting consequences.

I have recently learned that it is appropriate to raise one's voice in department stores.

The other day I was dawdling in Saks San Francisco, killing some time. This is also known to the cognoscenti as buying eye makeup. Poppy Buxom's posts had gotten me interested in lilac eyeshadow. Like mom used to wear. I asked the nice lady behind the Chanel counter if I might give it a whirl.

The next thing I knew a tall, slender, Eastern European man was shaking his head at me in disapproval. "You cannot wear purple," he said. "No one is USED to you in purple." Aiyeeee! He was telling me I risked the inappropriate! How did he know my deepest fears?

He began to apply pale, pale blue to my eyelid. He applied it for a LONG time. He applied it with force. Then brown, for contouring. Which again, went on for a LONG time. With force. Sort of like he was attempting to shove the color into my skin, removing a layer of cells in the process. I have had people do my makeup many times, over the years. It's my secret compulsion. I'm rational about clothes and wholly irrational about face painting and its potential for beautification. And I am telling you. This was not normal.

I sat there. I said nothing. The implanting of pigment into my eyelids went on so long I realized I'd be late for my dinner appointment. High WASPs hate to be late, but not, apparently, as much as they hate to offend tall Eastern European men at Chanel counters. I sat there some more. He put blush on my cheeks and very shiny gloss on my lips.

I stood up. I thanked him. I actually thanked him. I wiped my lips off, and my cheeks, in an act of supreme defiance.

Then I bought the damn eyeshadows. I cannot deconstruct this behavior. Evidently it runs too deep.

Have a wonderful weekend. If you see a woman wandering about the San Francisco Bay Area with A&D ointment on her eyelids, that's me. I'm pretending it's a trend. "The neutral eye, in a matte gloss, restrained, but hinting at celebratory depths. Oxymorons are SO on trend. An end-of-recession, post-millenial look...." Feel free to participate. I have recovered my impunity, just a little too late. And I still want lilac. Tarnation.

*For those of you similarly afflicted, the blue was Lagoon. The brown, Trace. Highlighter, Beige. All in the Ombre Essential line. Highly rated by Allure Magazine. Sigh.
**I hope the A&D isn't left over from someone's long ago diaper rash. Then I'd be in even bigger trouble.

What I Have Been Doing Wrong With Skincare. I Will Do Better.

Above you see much what of I've been using for skin care. I plan to keep on with some of it, but also make some changes, given what I now understand. Here's what I have done wrong, and what right, in making my choices to date.

Wrong
1. Get taken in by a saleswoman, albeit one good enough to found her own company
2. Fail to understand the (complicated!) biology behind skin care
3. Let my fear of chemicals trump proven research

Right
1. Use peptides for collagen restoration
2. Follow my nose to lavender
3. Get sensible about the cost of scented body lotion
4. Find the strongest sun screen I can stand to wear
5. Win a giveaway for Perricone skin care hosted by Mary Jo Matsumoto, here

But let's back up. I'm 53. I have stayed out of direct sunlight most of my life, so I'm not too bad in the sun damage department. Not dry, a tad oily. My skin reddens easily, and I already know I can't use AHAs or any other chemical exoliants. I tried. Wound up with rosacea, exacerbated by stress. Imagine you're flying around Europe on a private jet with a newly-minted millionaire, to promote his acquired product for Sun Microsystems, and every night you stare at yourself in a mirror, in Prague, in Hamburg, in London, wishing an ugly red rash would disappear. All glamor out the window. But I digress.

I started using MyChelle products because I liked their premise. Ingredient-based, natural products. No parabens, no scary chemicals. But eventually they irritated my skin. Reading Paula Begoun's Beautypedia, I see that Ms. Begoun thinks the formulations are less than optimal, and the packaging virtually guarantees ingredients degrading into uselessness. The founder is characterized as a great saleswoman. Ooops. She got me. However, I also use their Honeydew unscented cleanser, and that one Ms. Begoun likes. I'll keep it.

I started using the Avalon moisturizer because it was for sensitive skin. I see Ms. Begoun doesn't approve. She thinks the lavender extract will irritate. Here's the thing. I love lavender. I've always loved it. The smell makes me happy, almost ecstatic. As it turns out, maybe there's a chemical reason for that. It seems to calm my skin down. Sometimes you should ignore the experts. As Maya said in comments yesterday, I'm guessing that your mind can affect your skin.

I started using Perricone a few years ago because I liked his ideas on preventing inflammation. Stopped when I lost my job because, um, expensive. Started again this year, when I won a giveaway on Trust Your Style. His products have a wonderful feel, with a great slip to the fingers that works well under makeup. Temporary tightening, temporary wrinkle filling, all good. Thank you, Mary Jo. Ingredients are pretty high quality, including Ester-C, DMAE, and Alpha Lipoic Acid. No parabens. Paula likes his products, calls their formulation, "elegant."

Uh-oh. A new voice crying danger enters the fray. Dr. Samuel Epstein says that nanoparticles are dangerous. Perricone uses nanoparticle technology to address the issue of active ingredients penetrating the dermis. No need to panic. I have come to understand that these alarms are first raised with very little data, and I will use and enjoy until I run out. Then reassess.

I started using Kiehl's moisturizer with SPF15 because one day I was wandering through the mall and thought I'd try, yet again, to find a sunscreen I can stand to have on my face for more than 2 hours. I just hate the way most sunscreens feel. Paula doesn't rate this one, but the ingredients are known to be effective and the risk factor on the skincare safety site, Skin Deep, 0-10 scale is only 6. The sunscreen stays.

I started using Shikai lotions because you can buy them at Whole Foods and CVS, they are cheap, smell fantastic, and have no parabens. Skin Deep rates Shikai risk somewhere around 5. A keeper. Besides, I've tried almost all the fragrances and can't decide which I like better, Sandalwood or Vanilla. I use their bodywashes too and tell myself I'm layering scents.

What other changes? Maybe I should try Retinol again. With a coupon. Maybe the lavender moisturizer will protect me from redness and scary visions in my mirror. I know I should stop using my son's leftover ProActiv as an exfoliant. Did I say that? Eek. Begoun says that a washcloth works just as well as most scrubs. No parabens in a washcloth, either. I'll think about it. Luckily, skin care experimentation is fun, not too expensive (if you stay away from the ReVives of the world), and for the most part consists of patting yourself on the face with something that smells good. Sturdy Gals can do that.

*And yes, that's me on the sidebar. Seemed only right that if I'm going to talk about skin, I show you the one I'm in. And I can't hang my skin on a wall or put it in a light box, so there you go.

The Study Gal's Short List Of Skin Care To-Dos

Skin care can be confusing. In part, the industry wants us to stay confused so we continue to buy. In part, scientists are out there searching for the pot of gold. We are left bewildered by faraway cries of, "Gold, gold!" as they run, from rainbow to rainbow. Lab coats flapping.

Not surprisingly, High WASP women traditionally follow skin care regimes according to type. This used to be simpler. Grandes Dames bought Christian Dior, or Elizabeth Arden, silver-lidded jars from the department store where they shopped. My mother was on Team Saks, consumer loyalty to be taken as seriously as Pepsi vs. Coke. Artsy Cousins loved Dr. Bronner's Peppermint Soap, purchased in a health store where it sat next to brewer's yeast. Sturdy Gals used Ivory Soap, some sort of moisturizing lotion, and witch hazel.

These days the Grande Dame has been known to buy a pound of Creme de la Mer in one go. To wash with fragrant cleansing oils from Japan. Artsy Cousins will make their own remedies, or hunt down obscure African nut butters. Sturdy Gals are simple folk. We just want products that work. Maybe smell good. OK, maybe help us look young and beautiful. Because let's face it. Few are all that sturdy when it comes to skin care and the promise of youth in a jar.

Ever since science entered the picture, we have had to at least try to find skin care products that speak biology, not Faery. I have hated biology since I was 14. All those impossible-to-remember-or-understand words. I much prefer fairy tales. But I digress. Research is required. On websites that use words like mitochondria, and glycation. You may want to pour yourself some Lapsang Souchong, and sit for a while. Here is what we uncover.

The first step in good skin care, for all ages, is to deal with your skin's oil production capabilities, or lack thereof. This is fairly straightforward to assess, although not always easy to handle. You may have acne. You may break out occasionally. (You may think you will be done with breakouts by your early 20's. You will most likely be wrong.) But breakouts are their own science and I will leave it to ProActiv and dermatologists to advise.

You may have dry skin. Moisture is good, apparently. Keeps your skin safe from irritation and infection, and allows the upper layer to protect the lower layers. Who knew? However, when you're young, unless you chap or chafe, unless you live in Arizona with relative humidity of -40%, or in cold winters of wind and heaters, you don't really need moisturizers. As you age, make sure that whatever you use to prevent wrinkles or spots or sagging includes moisturizing ingredients. This isn't hard. The skin care industry likes to moisturize us. It's a known technology.

So it appears that this billion dollar business actually lives or dies by aging. Or, to be more specific, the prevention of age effects. Unfortunately, skin aging is just part of regular aging, made more acute by sun exposure, and the fact that our skin is on our outsides. Battered and abraded by the exigencies of life. Since we haven't yet understood regular aging, we haven't completely understood skin aging either.

We do know that what's good for your body and soul is good for your skin. Exercise, eat vegetables, don't smoke, keep your weight at a healthy level. Wear sunscreen often. No blue glass, no scent, no silver lid. I hear that answer, but I knew it already, and I want more.

In fact, there are a few products of proven value, and a whole bunch more that you can experiment with. Great, right? Done, right? But no. Enter science, once again. Chemicals may be dangerous. Yes. The task of finding good skin care involves understanding which ingredients have been proven to work as claimed, which ingredients may work as claimed, and which ingredients may, in fact, be harmful. Damn biology, and its nasty little friend, chemistry.

A Brief Summary Of Skin And Aging Biology (only for you guys, only for you)

Skin has three layers:

• The top one (epidermis) is to protect, the next one (dermis) holds the structure of collagen and elastic, the bottom one consists primarily of fat. Wrinkles happen in the middle layer, coloration in the top layer.
  
• To have any effect, products must penetrate the top layer.
• Active molecules have to be little, applying collagen, for example, does nothing.

Aging involves:

• Slowdown of new cell growth and old cell elimination,
• Degeneration of the collagen and elastin that sustains skin's structure
• Changes in pigmentation as, um, pigment stuff clumps up. (I just can't get any more biological than that.)

Skincare Efforts Proven To Work (In As Much Non-Scientific English As Possible, To The Best Of My Understanding. That Was A Disclaimer.)

Clean Carefully. Soap takes off too many lipids (fatty stuff you need), exposing skin to, well, the world. Find something gentler. Cetaphil, if you don't mind non-plant based formulas. If you want plant-based, you've got to experiment and watch out for irritation.

Take Dead Skin Cells Off The Top Layer. Exfoliate with chemistry or physics. If your skin can tolerate AHAs and BHAs, they are the most effective. If your skin is irritated by these products, use a physical exfoliation product. A gentle one. With smooth particles. Those rough ones will rip the heck out of your skin.

Protect And Keep Moisture In Top Layer. Use moisturizing ingredients, occlusive ones for really dry skin (that means they make a film), or ones that attract water, like hyaluronic acid, glycerin or dimethicone, for the rest of us.

Renew Collagen, Retinoic acid, i.e. Retin A, has been proven to make us grow collagen faster. (It also makes that critical middle layer thicker). Retinol, which is commercially available from Roc, Neutrogena, you name it, also works, without prescription but less effectively. Copper peptides and vitamin C have been shown to help skin to produce collagen, copper peptides also help heal and reduce inflammation, Vitamin C is also an anti-oxidant. Were we to move beyond routine skin care to the world of dermatologists, we would undergo laser therapy and deep peels. Just be clear that dermatological interventions work via what they call controlled tissue injuries. Eek. I may do it anyway.

Reduce Dark Patches. We have known how to help fade dark patches for some time. Hydroquinone works, but there has been enough concern about its safety that prescription is now required for concentrations over 4%. Companies are trying out arbutin, a related compound, in hopes of finding a less worrisome replacement. Beauty roulette.

Experimental Skin Care

Prevent Free Radicals From Rampaging Through Your Skin. Free radicals are implicated in aging overall. We find a different anti-oxidant, to combat free radicals, advertised every time we turn around. Q-10, Idebedone, Alpha Lipoic Acid, Vitamin C, Vitamin E, and so on. It appears, however, that little proof of topical anti-oxidant effectiveness exists. We know they are good for us if we eat them. We suspect they are good for us if we put them on our skin. So anti-oxidize away. Just be clear, you're experimenting.

Prevent Degradation Of Collagen And Elastin. Some theorize that just growing new collagen and elastin isn't good enough. We need to prevent the stuff we've got from falling apart. To this end, skin care companies are researching, and in come cases offering, topical tropoelastin, Ethocyn, and topical matrix metalloproteinases inhibitors. Yikes. I told you this stuff was biology.

Temporary Fixes, Because Why The Heck Not?

Spackling Wrinkles. You can fill your wrinkles in with silicon. And why not, I ask? No reason. But it's temporary. On the other hand, so is life.
Distract With Mirrors. Some ingredients reflect light and ostensibly blur the look of wrinkles. OK. I'm always up for fun at makeup counters. My kind of research.
Plumping The Shriveled. Hyaluronic acid, and other water-binding compounds, can have a temporary plumping effect. Sounds good.
Tightening Sagginess. Some ingredients have a temporary tightening effect. See life.

Skincare Chemicals Proven To Be Harmful
Here's the thing. I see no evidence that skincare ingredients currently offered have been proven harmful. Not the the way the Western scientific community defines proof, or harm, for that matter. The Western community is more upset about the use of botanicals that may be ineffective or cause irritation and allergic reaction. However, alarms are now sounding about many compounds, parabens being the poster child. And as we know from history, smoke, when hovering around the fires of commerce, often means fire.

Stuff You Maybe Hadn't Thought Of (I Certainly Hadn't)
Turns out that packaging may be more important than a host of other things we pay attention to. Active ingredients become inactive very quickly. Jars are bad, little pumps are good. Clear is bad, opaque is good.

The Most Important Part Of This Post, Otherwise Known As, So What Do I Do Now?
You have a few choices. As long as you are wearing sunscreen or hats, exercising, and eating well, I believe that skin care falls into the do-whatever-makes-you feel-best-category. Especially if you are under 30. That said, if what makes you feel best is trying to act on current science, I present:

The Sturdy Gal's Short List Of Skin Care To-Dos.

• Find a non-soap cleanser at a happy juncture of price, ingredients, feel, and scent.
• Pick an exfoliation strategy. Minimal for the young, more intentional for the older. Chemical, or physical, your choice.
  
• Use a moisturizer with an anti-oxidant that doesn't irritate your skin. Or a copper peptide cream.
  
• Rotate Vitamin C serums and/or Retinol for collagen support to see what you can tolerate. Make sure the packaging protects from oxygen and light.
• Choose between Retinol, peptides, Vitamin C, and any other anti-oxidant cluster. Pick 2 only. Using too many different ingredients at the same time is not a good idea.
• If you want to avoid scary chemicals, you should sample several different natural product lines. Everyone has different skin, and botanicals can be unpredictable.
  
• Find a sunscreen you will actually wear. 45 SPF doesn't work when it's in your drawer because it feels horrible on your face.

Of course, if you are truly Sturdy, feel free to ignore everything I just said. Nothing wrong with Dove soap and some Aveeno after to avoid that too squeaky feeling.

Finally, if you really want to optimize (any engineers out there?), I recommend that you take a peek at the three websites I relied on for my research. Paula Begoun's Beautypedia, available for a minimal subscription fee, takes the Western stance. Science is all. She excoriates many skin care products for complete ineffectiveness or appalling over-pricing. Well worth the read. But, and it's a big but, she pays no never mind to questions of toxicity. For that information, you need to go to Skin Deep. They focus on ingredient safety. Cross reference, if you will. Take your list of products and go see what these sites say about them. Rinse, lather, repeat.

The third resource, Smart Skin Care, provides the background against which to understand Beautypedia and Skin Deep. But it's just full of biology. Biology and that little sot, chemistry. Some of you are good at that stuff. If you see something I missed, let me know. Unfortunately, you'll have to use English or it may take me a long time to understand what you say. Everything I say here is as true as I can make it.

Note: This post was at a reader's request. Months ago.
Edit: Hahahaha. I just realized the headline has a typo. Freudian slip. This was in spirit from the Study Gal, not the Sturdy Gal. I think I'll keep it.
Image: .snow's photostream on Flickr