There was a brief window, during my art-school days a decade ago when — temporarily trying on a new personality — I tried to make red lipstick my thing. Alas, it was too high maintenance to fully commit. Elizabeth Taylor I am not. Just as fast as red lipstick is smeared on my mouth, I reach for a tissue to wipe off every last stain of scarlet. I don’t like a beauty look that takes itself too seriously — which perhaps explains my now yearslong love affair, instead, with a perfect smudgy French lip. There is something quietly seductive, laissez-faire, low-effort about a swipe of tinted lip balm that leaves a barely there trace of color.
I’ve tried tons of tints over the years — from Vaseline’s Rosy Lips therapy tin, budget-friendly with a sheeny rosy tint; graduating to Chanel’s Rouge Coco Baume, which comes in the most beautiful shades that melt like butter but needs reapplication every five minutes (arguably the most unsustainable option for a freelance writer in a recession). I spent my time flitting between different formulas, searching for the one that would satisfy my every want: a nude that wasn’t pink, something moisturizing but matte, that wouldn’t slip off without so much as a sip of coffee.
Frankly, I had almost given up the search entirely, resigned to a lifetime of Rouge Coco Baume–induced debt, until early spring at a friend’s dinner party. She’s a beauty editor at the Evening Standard and very generously encourages her guests to rifle through her piles of press samples, and to take some home with them as a party favor. It’s a rather frenzied experience. Tipsily, I mined through four or five big bags of goodies; trying not to be too greedy. Among them, I discovered Refy’s Lip Blush, a product that sits somewhere between a soft-focus matte lipstick and a hydrating balm. It is like the perfect slip dress in makeup form: a little underdressed and so lightweight you barely notice you are wearing it.
My preferred shade, Amber, is an earthy nude. It’s distinctly romantic: creating a blurred, just-been-kissed, and kissable, almost worn-in effect. When I wear it, I am playing the part of an early ’90s Julie Delpy in Before Sunrise, reading a Georges Bataille anthology, and later laughing with a stranger on a train. It is feminine without being girly. It is neither shiny nor candy-bar smelling.
If you’re being more conscious about what you put on your face, this is vegan, fragrance-free, and the packaging fully recyclable. Bonus points for the lazy girls gathered: One need not a mirror, simply dabbed on or one swipe and slightly blended with your fingertips will suffice, and it triples as a cheek blush and eyeshadow. It is the one item I will not — bar keys, wallet, a book that will realistically go unread — leave the house without. Me and the lip blush are one. Welded together at art galleries, hiking, slumped on a sofa, making out, writing, eating dinner. It has survived a five-course dinner and one glass of wine too many. After nearly seven months of everyday use, we recently were miserably separated for 24 hours, the interim period between purchasing a second one.
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