Powder Room

The Sunday Age

Sunday March 30, 2008

Natasha Hughes

It's time to put on a happy face, writes Natasha Hughes.

If the Melbourne Fashion Festival passed you by or the premature reductions on winter clothing leave you cynical and uninspired, there is another way to embrace the new season. Make-up is easier to shop for (no undressing), is cheaper by far than fashion (even the dearest foundation is reasonable on the "cost per wear" rationale) and lasts longer. Most of all, it's a lot more fun. Anyone can enter a beauty department looking drab or ordinary and be transformed in minutes. Such is the power of make-up.

And some really lovely products are being released. They don't all involve a seasonal "look" - which is debatable anyway, given that every cosmetic company and every magazine has a different take on what is "in". The new season also brings launches of products formulated with new technologies that are meant for any time of year.

Clinique's Invisible Blend ($48), released this month, is a reformulation of the loose powder in its original, 1968 collection. It can be worn alone as a sheer, blotting powder or over make-up as a smooth finishing powder. Benefit launches this week a concentrated, highly blendable concealer, Erase Paste ($46) that brightens the under-eye area. Elizabeth Arden's Ceramide Lash Extending Treatment Mascara ($45), released quietly six months ago, is my find of the season: it rivals Lancome's Definicils. And Chanel has reinvented the lip gloss with Aqualumiere ($42), to be released in two weeks. It has a half-gel, half-filmy texture, and is applied with a fine brush for a pearly shine. No stick or gloop.

Some of us do like buying into the limited editions. They're a bit of fun even if no one else notices your eyes or lips are devastatingly fashionable. The Vintage Glamour Collection, which was released to coincide with fashion week, has been another good seller for L'Oreal. But MAC is the trendsetter, releasing a trends-based collection every six weeks. The Naughty Nauticals collection, available May 19, features the blues so popular in the northern hemisphere spring, including a dark royal-blue nail polish ($22), ocean-blue frosted eyeliner ($35) and eye shadows in mauves and greys ($32 and $39).

Estee Lauder's Signature Eyeshadow Quads - silky, blendable and beautifully packaged - include a mauve to blue palette ($66, available May 11) and its Pure White Linen Colour Collection features water-inspired colours, including a soft grey eye shadow, Sea Breeze ($40). Also feeling blue is Glomineral's winter collection, which includes a sapphire cream eye liner ($39) and loose eye shadows in mauve and plum ($25). Maybelline, which always offers an affordable slice of fashion, is opting for plums.

The collections offer fresh alternatives to summer's bronze and pinks and the new dove grey, particularly, suits all.

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