“His life was a constant war with insensate objects that fell apart, or attacked him, or refused to function, or viciously got themselves lost as soon as they entered the sphere of his existence.” This is Vladimir Nabokov’s description of Professor Timofey Pnin, the hapless protagonist of Pnin (1957), but it is also a perfect… Read More Noteworthy Neutrals: Revlon Sultry Matte Balm and Pink Truffle Lip Butter
Name: Revlon Colorburst Lip Gloss in Peony Date of Purchase: Fall 2012 Grade: B+ Notes: This blog has taken a turn for the glossy, hasn’t it? I swear it’s just a coincidence that my current Gloss Period (cf. here, here, here) intersects with the part of my lipstick chronology that comprises my first Gloss Period,… Read More Lipstick Chronology #18: Revlon Peony
Name: Revlon Colorburst Lip Gloss in Fire Date Purchased: Fall 2012 Grade: A- Notes: If you’re my friend for any length of time, you’ll eventually have to watch one of three films: The Draughtsman’s Contract, Revengers Tragedy, or Velvet Goldmine. If I really like you, I might make you watch all three. And since I’ve… Read More Lipstick Chronology #17: Revlon Fire (and a Tribute to Velvet Goldmine)
Name: Revlon Colorburst Lip Gloss in Bordeaux Date Purchased: September 2012 Grade: A Notes: I’ve been having a major lipgloss moment. This winter has been unusually long and cold (15°-25°F below average on most days), and my lips, chronically dry to begin with, have not been happy. They’ll be fine for a day or two,… Read More Lipstick Chronology #15: Revlon Bordeaux
Names: Maybelline Color Sensational Lipstick in Make Me Pink; Revlon Super Lustrous Lipstick in Primrose; MAC Cremesheen Lipstick in Creme Cup Date of Purchase: Spring-Summer 2012 Grades: A-, A, A- Notes: Auxiliary Beauty lives, barely. I suspect that I surrendered my beauty-blogger credentials this past week, while scrambling to finish a fellowship application that was… Read More Lipstick Chronology #14: Three Mod Pinks (MAC, Maybelline, Revlon)
Name: Revlon Super Lustrous Lipstick in Black Cherry; NYX Round Lipstick in Black Cherry Date of Purchase: Summer 2012 Grades: C+, A- Notes: Why are there so many lipsticks called Black Cherry? Can makeup companies really not come up with another name for a blackened red? As fall 2012 approached, I began searching for a… Read More Lipstick Chronology #13: Two Black Cherries
Name: Revlon Colorburst Lip Butter in Raspberry Pie Date of Purchase: Summer 2012 Grade: B+ Remember the rapturous hype when Revlon released its Lip Butters in late 2011? More moisturizing than a lip balm! More pigmented than a sheer lipstick! Burn all your other lipsticks in a colossal auto-da-fé, these are the only ones you… Read More Lipstick Chronology #12: Revlon Raspberry Pie
I’ve been carrying my tube of Maybelline Vision in Violet all over the Eastern seaboard this weekend, reminding myself repeatedly to return it to CVS. I’m a poor grad student; a $9.50 lipgloss, especially one that I won’t wear often, is hard to justify to myself. And yet. It’s an opaque blue-toned purple lipgloss! A… Read More FO(lger)TD
Name: Revlon Super Lustrous Lipstick in Cherries in the Snow Date of Purchase: August 2011 Grade: A Notes: It’s snowing! I didn’t plan for this post to intersect with Winter Storm Janus, but isn’t it nice how that worked out? (Addendum, a month after writing the post: If I’d reposted it on blogspot yesterday, or… Read More Lipstick Chronology #6: Revlon Cherries in the Snow
Name: Revlon Colorburst Lipstick in Soft Nude Date of Purchase: September 2011 Grade: B+ Notes: This was one of many Tumblr-induced lipstick purchases at the CVS across from campus. That summer, I’d kept coming across images like this one, from Creatures of the Wind Spring/Summer 2012: Now, if I asked you how you’d replicate this… Read More Lipstick Chronology #5: A Tale of Two Undertones, Part 2
Auxiliary Beauty 