Wealden Times | WT187 | September 2017 | Education supplement inside

Pretty
Beauty
pages
Josephine Fairley handpicks the latest must-have beauty books
When my co-author Sarah Stacey and I first approached
publishers with an idea for a beauty book, 22 years ago,
we were told: ‘Nobody reads beauty books.’ We had a
hunch they would – if those books mentioned products by name,
rather than saying ‘use A mascara’, or ‘apply AN eye cream…’ We
knew that what women wanted was names named – and so our
modus operandi became to send real products to real women to try.
Sine then, to date 28,000 women have taken part in the trials for
our books – making it the largest-ever independent consumer study of
beauty products ever carried out, anywhere in the world. Our testers try
real products – everything goes to groups of 10 women, hand-picked
for their shared beauty ‘challenges’: everything from ‘miracle creams’
to foundations, via fake tan, deodorant and body butters etc. They
then report back (with extraordinary consistency) on their findings.
(Bottom line? Something either works, or it doesn’t.) We’ve flowed
those results into our books, alongside wisdom we’ve gleaned from the
world’s leading beauty experts over what are now very long careers. And
you know what? Those books have been read by millions of women.
Since we first launched The Beauty Bible, though, there have been many,
many other really useful – actually, invaluable – beauty books published.
Notwithstanding the rise of the YouTube vlogger and Instagram minivideos,
at the end of a weary day the last thing many women want to do is
sit down and stare at a screen. Which means a book is still a fantastic way
to absorb information. So: aside from Sarah’s and my Beauty Bible series
(the most recent of which is The Anti-Ageing Beauty Bible), here’s what
I’d suggest you stock your beauty bookshelf with. The reality? Women
do – and should – read beauty books. If they’re good. And these all are…
Facepaint: The Story of Makeup, by Lisa Eldridge (ABRAMS Image,
£18.99). Talking of YouTube followers, Lisa Eldridge has millions – but
she’s also written a really fascinating book which isn’t a make-up ‘how-to’,
but a really authoritative, riveting look at the history of make-up – going
back thousands of years. It’s a subject that has fascinated Lisa her whole
career, and in the early 1990s she began collecting vintage make-up –
much of which is photographed for the pages of her book: covetable
compacts, beautiful blusher pots, snaps of Mary Quant products which
take us right back. She looks at ‘Makeup Muses’ from Elizabeth Siddall –
the Pre-Raphaelite artists’ model – right through to Twiggy, Elizabeth
Taylor and Grace Jones. There are glorious vintage ads, Egyptian
wall paintings and a nod to kabuki – and so, so very much more.
Bobbi Brown Pretty Powerful, by Bobbi Brown, £19.99 (Chronicle
Books). Bobbi may have stepped down from heading up the make-up
141 wealdentimes.co.uk