Editor’s Letter: Hello, Beauties

Wed, 29 February 2012 10:25AM

Dearest Primpettes,

Allow me to introduce myself … my name is Kat and I’m jumping out of my exfoliated skin (courtesy of Kiehl’s Crème de Corps Soy Milk & Honey Body Polish, $39; divine) with excitement to let you know that I am the new editor here.

Wheeeeeee! (said jumping-out-of-skin-with-excitement sound)

You’ll no doubt get to know me (and my various, sometimes dubious, beauty habits) over the coming months and beyond – and I hope to learn all of your deepest darkest beauty thoughts in return – but let me start by giving you a few fun-facts about me:

• I’ve worked as a beauty writer/editor for 15 years. (eek, felt a new wrinkle creep in as I wrote that!) Mostly in magazines (you might have seen my name pop up in Cleo, Shop Til You Drop, Harper’s and Madison), so bear with me while I get my head around the technology that is online publishing.
• My beauty icon is Brigitte Bardot. Obsessed with her. The beachy hair. Sex kitten eyes. Pouty pout. Dancer’s legs… I gave up trying to look like her many moons ago (after a few messy teenage incidents with liquid liner, mousse and concealer-worn-as-lipstick) but I can still dream.
• My must-have beauty product? Ooh, that’s a toughie … Can I stretch the love and name a few? They would be: Cetaphil Gentle Skin Cleanser, from $7.60 (an oldie and a cheapie but such a goddamn-goodie); Lanolips 101 Lip Ointment, $17.95 (disclaimer: one of my besties makes it, but bias aside, boy oh boy, it’s good – nothing else smooths and softens my chap-prone pout like this beauty); Clarins Beauty Flash Balm, $60 (oh-so-predictable for a beauty editor to say, but it does the face-brightening job); Klorane Dry Shampoo, $8.95 (no explanation necessary); Becca Luminous Skin Colour, $54.40 (gives gorgeous glow); Palmer’s Cocoa Butter Natural Bronze, $7.95 (this tanning-moisturiser is actually a pleasure to use; massage the chocolate-y goo on at night; wake up with lustrous golden-brown limbs); Stila Eyeshadow in Kitten, $38 (a go-anywhere, suit-everyone shade, this champagne shimmer also wakes up the eyes like you wouldn’t believe); MAC Select Cover Up, $32 (a makeup artist once described this to me as “skin in a tube” and I’m running with that);  and, last-but-not-at-all-least, sunscreen (as long as it’s SPF30 and broad-spectrum, I’m a happy protected camper). Obviously there are many more, as my arsenal changes according to mood, weather, trends and, of course, new launches … so watch this space!
• My beauty blind-spot: I am embarrassingly lazy with my nails. Sometimes I get into a nice weekly-manicure routine and when I do, oh how I feel so smug and sophisticated. But then I get busy and miss a week, and fall back into my nail-neglecting patterns. It bothers me, it really does, but I reason: we can’t do everything in life all the time. Even the tidiest person has a messy corner somewhere, right?
• My ultimate beauty tip is to apply eye cream right around the eyes, even out to the temples. Basically where skin crinkles when you smile.
• My beauty career highlight … well, two come to mind … one was meeting the late, great Anita Roddick, founder of The Body Shop, in southern India on a tour of one of their community trade centres … the other, Christy Turlington for the launch of the ayurvedic skincare range, Sundari (she was once a co-owner). These two women also happen to represent real beauty to me, and it’s as much about inner glow than outer shimmer. Although even the most angelic among us need a good dose of illuminiser from time to time.

Anyway, I won’t go on and on right now – I have many more blogs ahead in which I can do that. I just want to sign off by saying that I feel seriously honoured to have this job. I’m sure you’re well aware of the amazing lineage of ladies I follow – Zoë, Yaz, Eliza – and I hope I can fill their very beautiful shoes nicely. (I’ve even had the pre-new-job pedicure to help me do so! FYI, OPI’s Malaysian Mist is the pitch-perfect peachy-nude).

As slightly-daunted as I am (and as clutzy as feel right now with all this new technology business), I’m so thrilled and energised to be here, and I’m going to work my butt off to make this site everything you want it to be. Along with some of the best beauty writers in the biz (you know Yaz, Eliza and Emma-Charlotte; the gorgeous Emily Taylor, a ten-year-beauty-writing veteran also joins our contributor team).

We have big, beautiful plans for the future of Primped – but we need you to be there with us on the way there. So please, I’d love to hear any of your thoughts… Loves? Not-so-loves? Wants? Needs? Etc. I’m all ears and all yours. Just leave a comment here or email me any time here.

Kat xx

Posted by: Katrina Lawrence

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Tags: becca, brigitte bardot, cetaphil, christy turlington, clarins, eye cream, featured, illuminator, illuminiser, kiehls, klorane, lanolips, mac, palmers, stila, sunscreen, the body shop, yaz, zoe foster