Month: February 2015

Posted on

into the Glossier

I’ve been reading Into The Gloss for years, a website about style and beauty getting the inside scoop from industry veterans. I especially enjoy the top shelf series, wherein beauty obsessives, models, actors, makeup artists, skincare moguls, etc, list their favorite products. So I watched the emergence of Glossier, a beauty brand founded by the founder of ITG, Emily Weiss, with interest. The brand is playful and modern, and obviously very carefully designed.

The product list is small at the moment, highly curated, and rolling out bit by bit with some really smart marketing. The brand presents itself as real, current, and friendly, building the line from the basics, which basics were created to be the happy combination of the best parts of all makeup everywhere, for the modern woman. [Or, more the modern girl/woman, as this targets quite a young audience, I would say.] The modern woman here being one who wants fresh, natural skin first and foremost (I agree with this completely, actually). It’s developed a solid community already, and, while I don’t want to get everything, I am paying attention. I definitely want to get some things.

IMG_9571

Check out this packaging situation! Stickers! Very cute.

I picked up the skin tint in medium, an extremely thin, smooth liquid formula that is truly difficult to detect on the skin, which was just what I’ve been looking for. It doesn’t make a large difference, but I don’t want a large difference…I want a very subtle evening of skin tone. I like this.

I also picked up the LE glitter liquid liners they put out around Christmas, because I am a sucker sometimes, when it comes to metallic gold shimmer, and I don’t like them as well. The texture is OK but a bit sticky, and I expected a more concentrated metallic shimmer. Still, I can tap my own glitter on to the sticky base…I can work with it but not everything I’d hoped.

So, Glossier, I’m watching. I’ll probably pick up you lipstick, when it comes out.

 

Posted on

reading: cookbooks

IMG_9606I am a frequent reader of cookbooks, some for practicality, some for fantasy, some for inspiration. Being a better cook is important to me (is part of my aspirational identity, part of my style, is non-negotiable), as is trying new foods and learning about other cultures through food. Here’s the stack I’m browsing currently:

The New Persian Kitchen, Louisa Shafia — I often like, in the case of cookbooks that focus on a particular culture, the section of the book that outlines specialty ingredients, describing their peculiarities and uses, and where you might find them, what they might be substitutes for, or what you might substitute for them. Expanding the culinary glossary. Immediately I imagine my own uses for them, how they might add interest to my existing repertoire. Immediately I want to go find them, if I don’t already have them. Immediately I want to use them if I do already have them. So far this is a great cookbook in that I want to make many of the dishes and I’m interested to read the small details, which seem well done here, about preparation. Not only preparation of the dish itself, but lots of good information about preparation of the ingredients. Ex. After reading this, I will be soaking some grains before cooking.

Simple Thai Food, Leela Punyaratabandhu — Also quite good, more the kind of cookbook I graze, skimming for what I want to read in more detail and absorbing the broad concepts, basic formulas, for later application rather than intending to cook a specific recipe (partly because many of the dishes are so flexible). Lots of explanation again, useful and clear, a little bit of bio mixed in, anecdotal evidence, all to the point. I love Thai food.

momofuku milk bar, Christina Tosi — The book born of the famous bakery, this is a fantasy read. These dishes are over-the-top, beautiful, innovative…complicated. Time-intensive. Gadget-intensive, stuff-intensive. I don’t really want to make them, but they are cool. Well, I might try a few of the easier ones…

Plenty More, Yotam Ottolenghi — I’ve enjoyed all of Ottolenghi’s books, interesting and uncomplicated (that is, often not many ingredients, though certain ingredients are complicated in themselves) combinations. Again I mostly skim here for concepts. You don’t need the recipe, you just need to remember the concept of the combination that is the key to the interesting flavor profile, and store it away, let it join the mix of the other flavor profiles in your flavor bank. His combinations inspire your own, which inspire still more, and so on. The kind of book that makes me hungry.