layered

The recent wig preoccupation prompted a good question, something like: do you ever change up, you know, your real hair?

And the answer is…not recently. I was in an auto-pilot growing phase, I suppose.

But what a good idea!

So, I hacked at the previous situation (which was nearly all one length with minor shaping) a bit, adding some rounding layers, until I got this:

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I essentially wanted the widest part of my hair to line up with the highest part of my cheekbone. Or, ideally, with the intersecting point of the eyebrow latitude line and an imaginary line that is the continuation of the upward sweep of the cheekbone. Right around there.

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Nailed it.

My face is basically square, or like a pentagon, and it’s large. Somehow my instinct is to have large, round* hair, to put the hair in proportion to the face. This (or a little bigger than this, actually) is the ratio that seems natural, harmonious, and to slick the hair back is to introduce severity via disproportion. Seems like we must all have some sense of this point of harmony, a point where you stop blow-drying or cutting or what have you, and decide it’s just right (or you don’t stop, and regret).

*I kind of like it as an offset pentagon, actually, I realize! The hair is a little boxy as well, but in a way that doesn’t line up with the face. If you follow… I like the squareness of my face, and don’t feel an urge to soften it as one might see in diagrams of hairstyles for different face shapes or something.

On another note, let’s give a shout out to purple eye makeup. This is basically…every purple product I own in a big smudgy mess. Recommended. The key is to keep smudging the color lower than seems advisable. Keep going! This is even conservative. And then I should have blended with a bronzer-type shade to make it even more sultry and massive…but one runs out of time.

Purple looks good on every eye color, though. Especially brown, I think. Certain shades of purple make me long for brown eyes.

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Pearls of Joy Tahitian pendant, Charlotte Tilbury Matte Revolution lipstick in Love Liberty (love this shade and formula, more on these later – FINALLY available in the U.S. but only for one month evidently).

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that J Crew look

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All  I wanted to do yesterday was wear these red shoes. Sometimes my wants are so few.

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It took so many tries before I could find the proportions I wanted for this style. The clean triangle toe, the straps of a particular width and placement. Many (many!) failures before coming across these red suede heels from Steve Madden, which love. Ankle straps get some flack for cutting the leg-lengthening effect heels otherwise have but they have the unquestionable virtue of holding the shoe securely to your foot. Not to mention making such minimal silhouettes as this possible. Anyway, I’m not convinced they negate whatever added height,* and who cares anyhow. If you like them. They’re trending now, and I approve.

*A lot of the supposed optical illusions fashion tricks are meant to conjure are suspect to me. I see what they are getting at but often doubt they are truly working. More common than seeing the illusion is seeing the trick, for me. Not that I don’t employ them when it suits me… Let’s get back to the main text.

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I was in the mood for a pencil skirt and that careless, layered J Crew look took over from there.

This look is so genius, in a way, so easy to tap into, with certain elements ultra-polished and tailored and other elements strategically undone, unkempt. The hair can’t be too precise, the layers can’t be too perfectly aligned. Colorful solids with one bold and colorful pattern peeking through somewhere. Natural face with the possible exception of a red lip.

Usually their looks are a bit too fussy looking for me, with only the thinnest veneer of  unfussiness or carelessness superimposed, but I like the color and pattern play and can like them as a starting point (or outright, once in a while).

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I got another cap, because this hair/hat combo had to be reprised.

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I am trying to make a firm reminder for myself that I should do this all the time. Leave hair down! Squash with hat!

UGH. SO GOOD.

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Oh, here’s one thing you can do with black lipstick. Avon lip pencil in deep plum with the NYX Macaron lipstick in Chambord (which is just black) in the center. Basically taking the bordeaux lip to its natural extreme. I like. You like? I like.

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J Crew linen sweater, thrifted plaid shirt, J Crew No. 2 pencil skirt, Steve Madden Abagail heels, Free People vegan leather tote, pearl ring from Pearl Paradise, Solange Azagury-Partridge lips ring, jasper necklace (eBay) as bracelet, Nike FC Barcelona cap.

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