The GBY Summer Face
By August, Los Angeles has the atmospheric quality of a hair dryer and New York feels like a silk blouse placed directly into a steam room. This is not the moment for a complicated face.
Summer exposes the difference between beauty that sits on the skin and beauty that belongs to it. Foundation becomes itinerant. Powder forms alliances with perspiration. Mascara leaves the eye area in search of a more temperate climate. The features that survive are usually the ones addressed in advance.
A lash lift is particularly persuasive in hot weather because it removes a daily negotiation. The eyes appear open, the lashes retain their shape, and mascara becomes optional rather than constitutional. A tint can deepen the effect when appropriate. Brow lamination performs a similar service, lending direction and fullness without requiring the brow to be redrawn each morning like a disputed border.
The result should not look rigid. The modern brow has texture and some evidence of life. Brush the hairs upward at the front and outward through the tail, using less gel than seems emotionally satisfying. A clean spoolie can revive the shape after a hat, a swim, or an hour spent leaning against the air conditioner.
Skin calls for the same restraint. Let moisturizer and sunscreen settle before applying anything else. Place concealer only where it improves the situation. Use color strategically: a stain on lips and cheeks, perhaps, and powder through the center of the face if shine has moved from luminous to infrastructural. Thin layers fail more elegantly than thick ones.
The August bag
- Tubing mascara, if for some reason you haven’t been in for your lash lift lately
- Broad-spectrum sunscreen for reapplication
The portable fan may offend one’s aesthetic principles until the temperature reaches ninety degrees, at which point it becomes the most beautiful object in the room.
There is a particular elegance to accepting the season instead of trying to defeat it. August beauty can be bare, warm, a little glossy, and still exact. Lift the lashes. Establish the brows. Protect the skin. Add sunglasses and one good lip color. Let the weather have everything else.