Hero product: Philip Kingsley Moisture Balancing Conditioner

My mother is going to throttle me when she finds out that each time I've washed my hair in her bathroom I've been using her Philip Kingsley Moisture Balancing Conditioner. It was the first bottle I pulled out from the cupboard: how was I to know it was her special occasion conditioner? Thing is I haven't been able to resist slathering it on: it's quite simply the best conditioner I've used in years.



My hair is silky soft, super shiny and light as a feather without feeling like I've been pouring silicone all over it. Even without using a hairdryer, it's the nearest I've come to feeling like I've just left a salon. Although I've always been a bit cynical about expensive shampoos & conditioners, I think this is worth every single penny.

Philip Kingsley Moisture Balancing Conditioner is available in the UK here & in the US here

Headmasters: glamorous (& inexpensive) UK blowdrys

I adore having my hair 'done'. It's not that I have an aversion to doing it myself but long hair takes time to style, and at the moment it's inadvertently grown so long that it's a right pain having to blow-dry it myself, let alone having to wield the curling tongs of death. So when I got an email about UK salon chain Headmasters' special festive blow dry collection, I tapped out a yes, please reply to their publicist quicker than Posetta Baddog can steal a sausage.

It just so happens that I'm a big fan of the Headmasters approach: every year they launch a new Blow Dry Collection, consisting of various looks for a customer to point at in the hope of exiting the salon looking just like the model.

Where Headmasters differs from most hairdressers is that the looks in their collections aren't those tortured, completely unachievable & directional styles, best left to Hairdressers Journal & The British Hairdressers Awards, but fantastic going out dos that won't leave you looking like you stuck your fingers in a socket.

Booked in for The Social Butterfly, as illustrated above, I was promised, "half up / half down hair...running in two textures - the undone tousled look and the blown-out soft wave - enabling you to choose the finish to match the occasion. The fringe is left out, a little height is created at the top and the hair is pinned at the sides. It's sexy, gorgeous, Bardot-esque hair that looks like you haven't tried too hard."

Creative director Jonathan (who I love for not picking up a strand of my fried split ends and blanching in horror), went for undone tousled (not that he had much choice given the condition of my hair) and created this silk purse out of my poker straight hair, backcombing the crown which I adore - so flattering, & inducing my hair into Mills & Boon-esque tumbling waves:



I was thrilled. Not least because I was tottering off afterwards for a rip-roaringly festive meal with choice members of the internets at blissful Scotts, and it's always nice for a girl not to look like she's been dragged through a hedge backwards whilst getting tipsy on vintage Champagne at lunchtime.



Truly, he is a miracle worker. And the shocker? The Social Butterfly blow dry is available at Headmasters salons nationwide from just £22. You don't get bargains like that in New York, I can tell you.

All I can add is: take an umbrella. I shrieked extremely unlady-like swear words that were decidedly not in keeping with my glamorous new hairstyle as I exited into the pouring rain.

www.hmhair.co.uk Call 08700 841 400 for your nearest salon

Dr Organic - Manuka Honey Rescue Cream

The prospect of snow is one thing. Dealing with it upon arrival is quite another. I took one step outdoors on Friday and my skin dried up like a raisin. It isn’t the snow so much as the wind that whips across it, turning my Clarins plumped cheeks into dehydrated pouches.

With the joyful synchronicity that often happens in my job, a parcel arrived containing Dr Organic Manuka Honey Rescue Cream.

I slathered it on, & ventured outdoors. An hour later, after dog walking, sheep feeding and general falling about in the snow I came indoors, defrosted and prodded my face. Still moisturised, still plump, no flakiness or wind burn. Impressive. I was glowing too, but I'll put that down the effect of unaccustomed exercise.

I usually test a product for a good few weeks before writing it up but, given that this is not an daily face cream, that I have used it for three days in below freezing conditions, and that my extremely sensitive skin hasn't broken out, (which happens almost instantaneously with the wrong product), I'd say this was a winner.

Unlike many heavy creams, which are dependent on mineral oil & petroleum (Creme de la Mer springs to mind), this relies on organic Manuka honey, known for its restorative & healing properties, hyaluronic acid which aids skin water retention, giving a plumped up look, soothing aloe vera, mosqueta rose oil also known for reducing scarring, sweet almond oil which is a lubricant, borage oils which restore moisture and reduce flakiness, and shea butter & cocoa butter instead of mineral oil.

Best news of all? It's just £7.99, and the range is produced by British health food store Holland & Barrett. It's hypo-allergenic, free from parabens, sodium lauryl sulphate (SLS), perfumes or artificial fragrances, GM ingredients or mineral oil.

Now I just need to find something similar for my wind ravaged hair. I suspect the hairdresser's scissors may be the best answer, as no product on earth can glue my split ends together.

Organic Manuka Honey Rescue Cream 50ml

Christmas presents: Votivo Red Currant scented candle

The first time I visited my wonderful friend Miss Whistle in her wildly chic Laurel Canyon home in Los Angeles there was something that felt vaguely familiar. All through the faint-makingly delicious Ottolenghi-inspired feast something nagged away at the back of my mind.

It wasn't the spotty dogs or the enticing piles of books or her fabulous taste that had caught some part of my attention: they were obvious and this was something nebulous that I could not place. Then I visited her downstairs loo and saw the Votivo Red Currant candle burning by the basin. The smell had been drifting through the hall, catching on my sub-conscious.

They are my mother's favourite candles and they scent our family home in the UK, along with the glass jars of diffuser reeds, and I can't smell them without being transported back to the English countryside.

I'm not a huge fan of scented candles as I have a wide-ranging floral fragrance intolerance which causes my rosacea to flare and gives me a hideous headache. I can't predict which smells, bar Madonna lilies which are poison to me, will set me off so I tend to avoid scented candles wherever possible.

But the entire range of Votivo candles, soy based and incredibly long-lasting - 50 hours, has only a benign effect on me. The Red Currant is utterly, utterly delicious, quite as lovely as anything Diptique produces, and less expensive too. I highly recommend for Christmas presents.

They are widely stocked in America, are exclusive to Liberty of London in the UK, and can be bought online in the UK at www.votivo.co.uk & in the US here

Charles Worthington High Gloss Serum

I fear that I am turning into one of THOSE women. One that is obsessed with her hair.
This is a new thing for me. I was always that girl who was stopped on the street and asked to be a hair model, that had hairdressers oohing over her hair's natural, glossy, healthy thickness & sheen.

Now of course that I have grown up, and realised that a little grooming goes a long way, I've sacrificed that healthiness on the altar of heated styling appliances. I can still do shiny, but the ends of my hair split and dry out well before my eight week trim is due. There's no fix bar scissors for my problem, but there is a product version of a sticking plaster for hair: serums.

A sample of Charles Worthington's High Gloss Serum from the Front Row collection magically appeared in the mail last week, and a few drops on my damp hair reminded me why serums are a very good thing. They smooth down the hair cuticle so frizz and knots disappear, and split ends are tamed. Sure it's not going to mend my split ends but as a temporary measure it'll do very nicely.

On closer inspection of the label I can't see any groundbreaking ingredient in the Charles Worthington serum that sets it apart from or makes it a better proposition than its competitors : like all these products it is basically a combination of various silicones. But it's at least as good as any other on the market, and today my hair is beautifully soft and shiny.

Charles Worthington High Gloss serum £5.99 Not yet available in the US.

Clarins Generation 6 Extra-Firming Botanical Intensive Care serum

A lovely reader (hello Cal!) emailed me to say she was a little confused by the whole beauty regime thing and could I please explain when one was supposed to use beauty serums?

I was reminded that I hadn't addressed her question this morning when I was massaging in a layer of gunk after my shower and admiring the plump, smooth texture of my skin.

God, that sounds narcissistic but bear with me.

Sure there's a lot of snake oil on the market and if we were to believe all the claims put forward by various beauty companies for their facial products (& take at face value their photoshopped advertisements), we'd all be walking around with the complexions of twelve year olds.

Although I was sent buckets of serums in my twenties, I never bothered with any of it: I had great skin and it was patently clear to me that adding another level to my skincare regime wasn't necessary.

Now that I've started the long inexorable fall towards old age (I'm over thirty), my skin could do with an extra boost and a good serum really can make a difference, delivering extremely concentrated amounts of supposedly active ingredients to your skin. After a week of using one my skin usually looks dewy, stays moist, and there is no flaking. With the really good ones I get no breakouts either.

This is important to me as I have rosacea, which is easily exacerbated by the wrong products. Unfortunately I have to use trial & error as I have no way of knowing which product will cause me to flare up in advance. The wrong one results in tiny white pustules (mm lovely) all over my cheeks which take a week to go down. Skincare for me is like Russian roulette.

Anyway, my current wonder product is Clarins Generation 6 Extra-Firming Botanical Intensive Care Serum. It's aimed directly at the over 40s (er,not me), with the promise of age-control, anti-wrinkle, extra-firming properties.

I take all those promises with a very large pinch of salt but, having used it religiously every morning straight onto my skin, followed by my SPF day moisturiser, and each evening massaged in for a few minutes before applying night & eye cream, I'm really very, very impressed with the state of my skin. It stays hydrated & even a little glow-y throughout the day and the very fine lines really do seem to be less noticeable, I guess because they are all plumped up. Put me in a Force Ten gale and I suspect they'll be noticeable again in seconds.

This particular serum can be used daily or as an occasional boost. I'm not a big believer in products if they aren't used regularly, so I would suggest an all or nothing approach.

I've never really used Clarins products before, but I have a small mountain to test, courtesy of the US Clarins press office, and, so far, so extremely good. I'm using the serum in conjunction with the Multi-Active Night Prevention Plus Cream (recommended for 30s) and I haven't had a single break out, blackhead or flaky patch in two weeks.

The Serum is UK £50 here, US $94 here

Bloom & Blossom Mother & Baby products

With the announcement yesterday that yet another old girlfriend is happily pregnant, I have barely a friend left in London or New York who isn't in possession of a bump or babies. On the plus side, it also means I have an army of willing volunteers to try out mother & baby products for LLG. That's because I won't run any beauty product on here unless it's been used but, given my resolutely single & child free status, there's not much point in me using stretch mark cream & nipple balm.

So a few weeks ago I arranged for the hero products from the lovely looking new mother & baby range Bloom & Blossom to be dropped off at my friend Ayla's London house. She's due to drop her second infant at the end of the month, so is perfectly placed for massaging unguents into her skin in between stopping her firstborn massaging carrots into her hair.

The background:
The Bloom & Blossom collection's USP is that it uses only the absolute essential number of ingredients in each product - no filling out their jars with cheap mystery ingredients with unpronouncable names - to reassure mothers that the products are completely safe for babies. For complete transparency, each product has a description of what each ingredient is, why it has been selected and what it delivers. The makers claim that with an active ingredient inclusion level of between 5-10%, their products are some of the most effective on the market. For mothers looking to keep both their pregnancy and their baby as clean as possible, there are no parabens, SLS, petrochemicals, synthetic fragrances or colourants in any of the range.

ANTI STRETCH MARK CREAM £18.00 (150ml) Total number of ingredients =12
Omega rich shea butter & cocoa butter help restore skin tone and provide a protective barrier to lock in skin’s moisture.There's a 10% blend of the active ingredients horsetail leaf extract and chasteberry

Ayla's thoughts: This has a strong expensively natural herbal smell. It has a nice texture, although it left my skin feeling a bit sticky whilst the product absorbed for about half an hour. There's a noticeable moisturising effect, and it contains exactly the natural products you would look for in a stretch mark cream.

SOOTHING NIPPLE BALM £11.00 (30ml) Total number of ingredients =5
This will help heal and protect sore nipples. It contains a 5% blend of the active ingredient organic passionflower extract and is safe to use during breast feeding. It can also be used to help treat other sore skin conditions, such as dry and chapped skin and lips

Ayla's thoughts: The packaging is gorgeous and it looks and smells really good. I tested it out as a lip balm too and it was very effective.

REVITALISING LEG & FOOT SPRAY £9.00 (100ml) Total number of ingredients = 11
Formulated to alleviate water retention and to refresh tired and heavy legs, swollen ankles and feet. The collagen boosting properties of aloe vera and tangerine leaf oil also improve skin tone. It contains a 10% blend of the active ingredients horse chestnut seed and yellow sweet clover extracts.

Ayla's thoughts: If you like a strong herbal-y, citrus-y, wood-y smell to revive tired limbs, then the Leg/Foot Revive Spray is perfect. It is very moisturizing so it does leave your legs a little tacky afterwards. I used a spray all through my last pregnancy which was invaluable and I recommend them.

Ayla's summary: The products all do exactly what they promise. They seem very natural and well thought out and I think the packaging and presentation is gorgeous. The whole range ( & I notice they do gift sets) would make wonderful presents for first time mothers who have a bit more time to spend pampering themselves than harrassed second timers! The price point is less than other premium ranges on the market, which makes it very attractive but obviously it is more expensive than the basic products out there. If this had been on the market during my first pregnancy I would have bought it all.

www.bloomandblossom.com

Bobbi Brown Nude lipstick

Whilst in my daydreams I wear scarlet lipstick in the manner of a film star of the 50s, in reality the unholy combination of rosacea and my blonde colouring means that I can wear only neutral lip shades.

In summer, when my morgue-like pallor fleetingly morphs into a bronzed tone through the wonders of the spray tan booth, I occasionally break out Revlon's shocking pink Love That Pink but my 365 lipstick is Bobbi Brown's Lip Color in Nude, which I've been wearing since maybe 2000.

For me the best thing about it is that it doesn't look too obvious: a swipe of it completes my look but doesn't scream, plus the creamy, semi-matte formulation stays nicely put. It also seems to suit most skin tones from my skimmed milk hue at the bottom of the scale through to that of my African-American friends.

UK £15 here & US $22 here

Beauty product of the day: Elemis Japanese Camellia Oil

A few years ago I started using oils on my face and body, as an occasional alternative to more traditional cream based moisturisers. Often they are purer, needing no preservatives or petro-chemicals to stabilise them, and they can deliver a more concentrated shot of goodness to tired, dehydrated skin.

I've tried plenty (John Masters Organics facial oils are wonderful) but I'm particularly fond of Elemis'Japanese Camellia Oil which I take travelling in hot, dry climates as it's such a great all-purpose restorative product.

Traditionally, the Japanese have used camellia oil for the care of nails, hair, scalp and combination skin. In the Elemis product, it's blended with sweet almond oil and I've found it works well combed through on hair as an emergency overnight solution for dry hair and, although I've never used it specifically on my nails, my hands are noticeably softer after applying it as a body moisturiser.

Which is where it really comes into its own: after I've been in the sun or skiing, my parched, crocodile skin drinks this up and in twenty four hours my skin is restored to its more usual supple smoothness. I've also found it useful as a massage oil: it's aroma neutral so it can be used on those averse to fragranced oil or as a carrier oil for essential oils.

It's available from Elemis in the UK here, and in the US here.

Ormonde Jayne Frangipani Absolute Bath Oil Giveaway

Now that the Northern Hemisphere's skies are grey and full of rain, a long hot bath is an essential rather than a luxury. Good bathing oil makes the whole experience that much more wonderful, and yesterday I wrote about how much I adored Ormonde Jayne's Frangipani Essential bathing oil.

"The matching bath oil is an exercise in deliciousness: it turns the bath slightly milky, and your skin soft and scented. As the scent diffuses a wonderful haze of flowers drifts upwards in the steam, out the door and throughout the house. It makes me feel as though I am in a seraglio. In the best possible way."

Several of you commented on how wonderful it sounded, and here's your chance to try it: after I posted, Ormonde Jayne got in touch with me to offer my readers three 100ml bottles of Essential Bathing Oil in Frangipani Absolute, worth £48 each. The Bathing Range is entirely free of parabens, mineral oils, sulphates, petrochemicals & GM ingredients, and has added moisturising botanical extracts which really do leave your skin feeling soft afterwards. (They will also include a 2ml perfume sample.)

So to qualify for the giveaway, just tell me what you consider to be your favourite fragrant indulgence? A scented bath, a new bottle of perfume, an apple pie just out of the oven...

Leave your answer in the comments below and I will pick the three winners using a random number generator and post the results on here next week.

A huge thank you to the lovely people at Ormonde Jayne!
www.ormondejayne.com

Scent post: Ormonde Jayne Frangipani

I can't get dressed without spraying or dabbing myself with perfume. To leave the house without it would be akin to leaving my handbag behind. Unthinkable.

Good scent makes me feel considerably happier. It's something I do for me, and for me alone. A purely private pleasure. I couldn't bear to wear a scent I didn't like. Loathing vanilla fragrances, I was unamused to read a survey somewhere recently that said that the perfumes men love on women usually have a lot of vanilla in them. Not the cloying, thump you over the head Neanderthal thwunk of Angel, but gentle comforting vanilla middle and base notes. Even Justin Timberlake gave an interview recently where he banged on about how much he and all men loved vanilla scents. (Although I do wonder whether he likes those on boys as much as girls).

I was almost tempted by India Knight's recommendation on her lovely blog of Frederic Malle's Musc Ravageur as another variation on the man magnet scent concept. I dug out the bottle of it I had from from a musk fragrance story I did last year, dabbed it on, waited for the dry down... and promptly washed it all off, remembering how I couldn't live with it last time round. I just can't do it. However single I am.

Unlike India, or my mother, I can't get my head round anything but florals. I wish I could but there will be no chypres or bois fragrances for me. I just like florals, both complex and single note.

Last year I went through a spell of wearing Ormonde Jayne's Frangipani and had forgotten how much I loved it until they sent me a lovely bottle of the eau de parfum recently. I've been floating in a glorious cloud all week.

There's an almost crisp top note of linden blossom, magnolia flower and lime peel but the dry down is an intoxicating complex floral dominated by white frangipani, jasmine and rose and tuberose absolutes. Of course there is a musk/amber/vanilla base to balance out the floral and stop it from becoming sickly, but it just adds a roundness.

The matching bath oil is an exercise in deliciousness: it turns the bath slightly milky, and your skin soft and scented. As the scent diffuses a wonderful haze of flowers drifts upwards in the steam, out the door and throughout the house. It makes me feel as though I am in a seraglio. In the best possible way.

www.ormondejayne.com

(Quick note: Ormonde Jayne are based in London (in the delightful Royal Arcade, off Bond Street) but ship worldwide. The Frangipani arrived in under a week to New Jersey.)

Reader Q&A: Which beauty products should I get in the US?

From Twitter follower Helen: "My boss is visiting Arizona this month - recommend any beauty products she can get me that aren't in the UK?"

There is very little that is sold over here that you can't now buy in the UK. I used to bring back Crest Whitening Strips for friends, but even those have been launched over there now. Tylenol PM & Melatonin are about the only things for which I am asked.

However, the price points of colour cosmetics & beauty products can differ substantially, so if you have a favourite or have been dying to try something, then it's worth doing some on-line research to see if it is cheaper in the US.

If your boss has a car and can get to Target then you are in luck. I'm a big fan of Sonia Kashuk's beauty range, which was initially launched in Target, and then picked up by Space NK earlier this year. Her brushes are sold in Space NK in the UK but there is a big price difference:
For example, the angled blusher brush is £24.47 at Space NK and a recession-friendly $17.99 at Target.

I understand from fellow blogger British Beauty Blogger that the colour cosmetic range will go into store in the UK mid-October, but I presume the pricing difference will remain, so it's definitely worth giving your boss a shopping list.

I raved about the travel make-up brushes & the gel eyeliner earlier this year, but also have the eyeshadow quads and the eyebrow kit on my list too.

Target also stock Jemma Kidd's make up line, which is about a third cheaper than UK Space NK's prices.

Anyone else have any US beauty recommendations for British shoppers?

L'Oréal Serie Expert Absolut Repair Shampoo For Very Damaged Hair

I haven't bought a bottle of shampoo in years, using whatever is lying around in my sample bucket. My hair doesn't present any problems: it's not coloured or permed, greasy or curly. It just hangs there.

Then I started torturing it with curling tongs and the ends went all frizzy as they do when you apply hot metal to them. So when I forgot to bring my pot of Mizani miracle worker with me to Manhattan, I was not enthused at the idea of having to buy something to deal with the frizz. Rooting around in my storage container, I came up with this unopened bottle of goodness.

I don't know why it works. It just does. My hair is soft & shiny again, and it seems to have miraculously straightened out the frizz.

Hurrah for L'Oréal Serie Expert Absolut Repair Shampoo For Very Damaged Hair. I bow down before you in homage.

Yes to Carrots C a Softer You Hand & Elbow Moisturising Cream

Lil'sis has been testing this for me: she Skyped me today, practically dribbling with excitement, to tell me that the seemingly ineradicable rhino skin on her elbows which has defeated every other moisturiser she has tried, disappeared in 24hrs after using this cream. She waved her new silky soft elbows at the webcam in proof, but it was difficult to see as there was a small dachshund trying to get in on the action.

I was already enormously impressed by the efficacy of the Yes to Carrots line, and I had used the Hand & Elbow Moisturising Cream before to great effect. So, when their publicist offered to send me it to try again, I suggested they send it to my sister in London so that she could pass it on.

Of course I hadn't counted on lil'sis thinking 'oooh fab, LLG won't mind if I just get stuck in', and smearing it all over. But, as it turned out, I'm glad the evil little bugger helped herself because it just reinforced my opinion that this is a hero product.

It's no wonder that Yes to Carrots C A Softer You Hand & Elbow Moisturising Cream is so effective: the ingredients are a roll call of some of nature's most effective moisturisers. The range is promoted on its use of beta-carotene, (in this case derived from organic carrots), and Dead Sea minerals, but there's also aloe vera and avocado oil, sesame & olive oils amongst others. Just as importantly, it contains urea, the most effective ingredient for promoting skin rehydration.

I've been a big fan of Yes to Carrots' products for a while now. I wrote about their night cream last year after I came across it in Walgreens and it remains a product I actually buy (as opposed to dug out of a brimming beauty sample box under my desk).

Their products are effective, cheap - this 200ml tube of hand cream is just £6.95 here or $9.99 here, free of parabens & phthalates and, maybe best of all, support the Yes To Carrots Seed Fund, a U.S. non-profit.

Its mission is to make a difference in people's lives by providing under-served communities with the resources to develop and sustain an organic food source and access to healthy nutrition, by providing donations to help with seeds, plants, equipment, irrigation support and technical know-how.

How nice to know when you are slathering on body cream to know that your purchase helps this cause.

Ingredients List: because this is impressive. No nasties here.
Water (Aqua), Daucus Carota (Carrot) Juice, Rosmarinus Officinalis (Rosemary) Extract, Stearic Acid, Aloe Barbadensis Leaf Gel, Cycloheptasiloxane, Chamomila Recutita Oil, Sesamum Indicum (Sesame) Oil, Cetearyl Alcohol, Persea Gratissima (Avocado) Oil, Prunus Amygdalus Dulcis (Sweet Almond) Oil , Calendula Officinalis Oil, Simmondsia Chinensis (Jojoba Oil), Daucus Carota (Carrot) Seed Oil, Olea Europaea (Olive) Oil, Dead Sea Water (Maris Aqua), Magnesium Chloride, Propolis Extract, Vitamin E (Tocopheryl Acetate), Algae Extracts (Rhodella, Dunaliella, Spirulina), Triethanolamine, Cucurbita Pepo (Pumpkin) Juice, Ipomoera Batatas (Sweet Potato) Extract,Cucumis Melo (Melon) Extract,Citrus Aurantium Dulcis (Orange) Fruit Extract, Honey (Mel) Extract, Silt (Maris Limus), Stearyl Alcohol, Ginkgo Biloba Leaf Extract, Niacin, Glyceryl Triisostearate, Tocopherol, Fragrance (Parfum), Potassium Lactate, Imidazolidinyl Urea, Punica Granatum (Pomegranate) Peel Extract.

This post was re-written to reflect my sister's opinion.

Best London Pedicure? Maybe...

There was some light relief during my recent trip to London. Darling C locked the infants under the stairs and booked us in one Saturday for mani pedis at her local place in Highgate as her birthday present to me. (My birthday is in December. And that's why I love her.)

The nail salon culture that is everywhere in New York & Los Angeles still hasn't really taken off in London. Whilst there are more salons now than there were when I left in 2007, the price list will come as a shock to anyone used to paying $10 for their nails back in America.

I've been having my nails done for years, so I've tried plenty of London places, from Nails Inc to the anarchy that is Top Nail on Camden Parkway. C's salon is on a particularly unprepossessing part of Archway Road, just opposite Highgate Station, but the family who run it are fun & friendly & dole out lovely cups of Chinese tea (you don't get THAT in NYC).

Oh and they do a mean pedi. It's a month since I was in there and this is the state of my feet:



My big toes are completely unchipped, with just a little flaking on two nails that don't show in sandals. Impressive, huh? Please excuse the photography. Have you any idea how tricky it is to photograph your own feet? And what's with my toes looking all wide-spaced? I suspect I was about to fall over. Figures.

The Nail Bar, 315 Archway Road, Highgate, London, N6 5AA
Tel: 020 8341 0293

The best hair treatment I've ever used: Mizani H20 Intense Night Time Treat

My new found love of the curling tong is not doing a lot for the condition of my hair. I'm lucky to have had shiny, soft hair in my thirties precisely because I've never really coloured it, used much product or even used a hairdryer regularly. But this year of using curling tongs has meant that the ends get fried pretty quickly in between trims.

I usually use Frederic Fekkai shampoo & conditioner, having been given a supply by the publicist. It makes my hair incredibly soft & shiny, but recently the conditioner hasn't been working at all, and it wasn't just the ends that felt dry and out of sorts. I was resorting to a cheapo bottle of silicone fuelled Herbal Essences in an attempt to regain that silky, conditioned feel.

Digging through my beauty box of editorial samples in the bowels of my storage container for some facial moisturiser, I pulled out this tub of goodness, Mizani's H20 Intense Night Time Treat:

I don't normally bother with hair masques and the such like. They're a pain to use in the shower, & I'm not much of a lolling in the bath type of girl. But my hair was calling out for some deep moisturiser and when I read on the side that it was an overnight treatment I was so there.

It's pretty thick and slimey, so this was a moment when I was glad to be single. I slathered it on & went to bed, making a mental note to wash my pillowcases in the morning.

After washing it out in the shower next day, I shampooed and conditioned my hair as normal and could feel, even under the water, that my hair was back to its usual silky feel. After letting it air dry I was astonished by the change in condition: truly a Top Ten product for me.

Mizani is a brand I've not come across before and, once I tracked it down on the interweb, I discovered it's part of a salon range owned by L'Oreal, " targeted to the African American salon/stylist and their clientele." However, given its stellar results on my hair, & the enthusiastic forum comments on the interweb, it seems clear that it's one of those rare products that works effectively on both Afro and Caucasian hair.

This makes me very happy, as one of the abiding problems of beauty writing is the feeling that you are excluding half the marketplace when reviewing products that have been formulated with Caucasian needs in mind first.

You can find Mizani H20 Intense Night Time Treat here

How I learnt to have grown up hair

My hair is long, naturally blonde and poker straight. It needs no product or clever cutting. It just hangs there, and so I've worn it in exactly the same style, that is no style, ever since I can remember. Bar the Christmas holiday of my final year at uni when I went to Harvey Nichols' hair salon, (for reasons I no longer remember), and had it all cut off in one of those sleek chin length at the front, shorn up to the crown at the back bobs.

I spent two years growing it out.

No one had told me that short hair was a royal pain in the neck. It needs styling. It requires product. And hairdryers. And God knows what else for it not to look like crappy bedhead. And I am really, really lazy when it comes to things like hairstyling. I just cannot be bothered. As I soon discovered, tousled Brigitte Bardot bedhead with long-ish hair is sexy. Bedhead on a 1960s Vidal Sassoon style crop is not.

So it's a shame that I hate my easy to manage flat straight hair. It was bearable in the days when everyone was obsessed with ghds, maybe five, six years ago. I was Little Miss Smug then, rolling out of bed and, after a couple of strokes with a Mason Pearson brush, looking like I'd been straightening it for hours. But I rarely want what everyone else wants. And in this case I wanted waves. Not so much Farrah Fawcett as Rita Hayworth.

For two years, whilst everyone else was sporting sleek curtains, I religiously went to my local granny salon in North London before parties to get my hair set in rollers, before being shoved for an hour to bake under a dryer hood with the rest of the purple rinse brigade. Thing is once the rollers came out, I only had a couple of hours before the curls drooped, leaving me with something nearer to a shaggy perm than sleek movie star waves.

I gave up when I moved to America 2,5yrs ago, making do with blowing out my hair with a round ceramic hairbrush, so it at least had bounce in a shampoo advert kind of way. I had a few pro blow drys from session stylists, hoping they could give me waves, but the artful lightly tonged loose curls they added looked wonderful for just about as long it took me to get home.

Then came the epiphany. I had to have my official portrait taken last summer for work. The Selby was commissioned to shoot it which was all well & good, (thanks Todd), but the real highlight of the shoot (sorry Todd), was the hair stylist, the venerable & lovely Francois Ilnseher, who asked me how I liked to wear my hair. Wavy, I replied, whilst thinking, my hair is dry, ramrod straight, silky just washed ; we've got barely 30 minutes to effect a hair & make-up transformation from sleep-deprived, over-worked office monkey to polished fashion editor. Good luck with that.

Unfazed, he proceeded to almost produce a silk purse out of this sow's ear. First he gave me the best smokey eyed make-up job I've ever had. Then he produced a pair of curling tongs, things I - and other stylists - had used before but never to any lasting success.

I raised an internal eyebrow but, not being one to make a fuss, let him get on with it. Soon there were bouncy tight Victorian ringlets hanging around my face. I looked like the girl off the old Quality Street chocolates tin. My internal horror meter was close to screeching point, as he produced a cushion hair brush. I squeezed my eyes shut as he brushed through the corkscrew curls. Upon opening my eyes I was gobsmacked. Instead of the frizz I was expecting, I saw the hairstyle of my dreams: beautiful deep waves in a Rita Hayworth kind of way. As the day continued, the waves just morphed into gentle volume with a little curl at the end of each lock.

What a revelation. The secret was to take the curls tight with direct heat so that there was no danger of them dropping. Next day I hotfooted it to the hairdressers supply store down on Fifth, bought a ceramic curling iron and sure enough, I got similar results.

It had never, ever occurred to me that you could just brush out hideous, tight ringlets to achieve waves. A good spritz with Elnett Extra Hold Hairspray and the waves stay in for a good while too. I invested in a Braun Cordless Hair Styler ,(a small portable curling iron), for my handbag, and became an adept at curling my hair in the back of Town Cars, on trains, buses and in the loos at restaurants. In fact I'm usually better at it now than a hairdresser, which has saved me hundreds of dollars and hundreds of hours in the styling chair.

Finally, I have a hairstyle that takes maybe twenty minutes, looks grown up and makes me feel sexy. A win, win.

Thank you Francois. You are a gentleman & a superstar.

Product of the day: Caudalie Energising Concentrate

The humidity of a Manhattan summer usually keeps my dry sensitive skin hydrated, but I've been sleeping in an air conditioned bedroom for the past month and I can see the effect it has had on my skin.

Fine lines were appearing, and my skin felt dry, so I reached for the little phial of Caudalie Energising Concentrate $39 last week to see if it would give my skin an extra boost.

Normally I wouldn't write about a product until I'd tried it for a month, but I am blown away by the difference it has made in just seven days. I have absolutely no blemishes or marks on my face any more, and the skin is plump & glowing. It's made a very visible difference.

I have rosacea so have to be careful about what I use on my skin. This blend of essential oils is particularly unadulterated, containing,(apart from Caudalie's patented stabilized grape seed polyphenols, the following ingredients.

Caprylic/Capric Triglyceride, Prunus Amygdalus Dulcis (Sweet Almond) Oil, Rosa Moschata Seed Oil, Citrus Aurantium Amara (Bitter Orange) Oil, Daucus Carota Sativa (Carrot) Seed Oil, Santalum Album (Sandalwood) Oil, Helianthus Annuus (Sunflower) Seed Oil, Lavandula Angustifolia (Lavender) Oil, Rosmarinus Officinalis (Rosemary) Leaf Extract, Geraniol, Limonene, Linalool.

I especially like that there are no parabens, phenoxyethanol, mineral oils or artificial colorings in the Concentrate.

Perfect travel makeup brushes: Sonia Kashuk

As I've got older both I & my makeup routine require more attention. No longer can I just swipe on some lipstick & mascara and hope to look dewy skinned and perky of visage. Nope, I require a little more in the way of reconstructive work.

And, as we all know, courtesy of every single glossy magazine we've ever flicked through, convincing makeup requires correct application with the correct tools. In addition, the kind of makeup I wear nowadays is a little more sophisticated than the stuff I wore in my early twenties: gel eyeliners require specific brushes and decent pigmented eyeshadow needs to be applied with more than one type of brush.

That inch tall free sponge applicator nestling in your new eyeshadow quad is useless for more than a random stabbing in the general direction of your eyelid.

Whilst ferreting about in my new favourite store* on Saturday, I came across this brilliant set of magnetic makeup brush heads from Sonia Kashuk, which attach securely to the supplied handle.



The inexpensive price point ($14.99) means these can stay in your handbag as a second set, so you don't need to haul around your entire arsenal of makeup tools each time you leave the house. They are more hygienic too as they can be stored in the compact little case they are sold in, rather than rolling around in a grubby makeup bag.

Don't be put off by the cheapo price point. In this instance it doesn't mean scratchy nylon brushes. Like most of the products in the Sonia Kashuk range, these are exceptionally well made with good, soft bristles, and compare well to brushes at twice, even three times the price. After all, there is a reason why Space NK have picked up the line and are selling it in their standalone beauty boutiques in Bloomingdales.

Image style.com
*Target

Eight best summer makeup products

This was going to be my Top Ten list, but I could only come up with eight must have summer makeup pieces: less in always more in the summer. My list of top summer body products is coming soon.

Estée Lauder DayWear Plus Multi Protection Anti-Oxidant Moisturiser SPF15 $39.50 / £29.50
I've used this ever since a bottle landed on my desk from the PR. One squirt & I was hooked: the lovely sheer, tinted coverage works on a range of pale-medium skin tones and smells of heavenly cucumber. Summer in a bottle.

Laura Mercier Tinted Moisturiser in Sand SPF20 ($42.00) / (£34.26)
Slightly more coverage than the EL with a creamier texture. The Sand tone seems to be universally flattering, and it stays on all day, giving a healthy, natural glow.

In the winter I am morgue pale, so I take advantage of my fake tan in the summer to wear the coral & bright pink lipsticks my skin tone can't normally take.
My current favourite is MAC's Slimshine Lipstick in Hot 90's, a sheer, glossy coral shade (discontinued, available on eBay), but I'm also loving the sheer hot pink Slimshine Urgent ($14.50) (£12.50) and MAC's matt bright coral classic lipstick Lady Danger too ($14.00) (£12.00)

A bright nail varnish looks great against a tan. I try to avoid looking too matchy, so if I have coral toes, then I wear pink lipstick, & vice versa. Essie Nail varnish in Coral Carousel ($8.00) is perfect right now. (I bought a bottle which I take to the salon, so I can touch up my toes inbetween pedicures.)

Sue Devitt Seaspray Gel to Powder Blush($20) (£12.50)I love cream blushes in the summer and Sue Devitt's Malay Reef is a sheer peachy coral-pink, which blends well into tanned skin, avoiding blusher stripes. It also comes in a handy small mirrored compact.

With a swimming pool in my backyard this summer, I am relying on the old standby Maybelline Great Lash Waterproof Mascara in Brown Black ($4.69) I still remember the days when this wasn't sold in the UK. British magazines would extol its glories monthly, and I'd beg friends to bring it back from their holidays. It stays on for days, doesn't run and never clumps. (Can't find it online in the UK, but Boots sell it)

Whilst I am loving my Sonia Kashuk Dramatically Defining Long Wear Gel Liner in Cocoa, Smashbox's Jet Set Waterproof Eye Liner in Bronze ($22) is a waterproof, smudge-proof eye liner, which doesn't look too done on the beach & makes blue eyes pop. (I'd love to always go au naturel by the water, but my light blonde lashes and eyebrows need perking up.)