Mwah, mwah – it’s National Lipstick Day!
Elizabeth Arden and lipstick go back a l-o-n-g way – and it seems only right to bring them to your attention as we celebrate National Lipstick Day. (And oh, how we are celebrating being able to wear lipstick again without getting it all over the inside of our ‘favourite’ mask. If it’s possible to have such a thing.)
Actually, we just learned something about Elizabeth Arden that we didn’t know, actually: that she was a strong supporter of the women’s suffrage movement, and supplied red lipstick to the suffragettes, for whom it became a symbol of female independence. In the early 1900s, women’s suffragette leaders Cady Stanton and Charlotte Perkins Gilman wore bold red lipstick to protest for the right to vote, declaring ‘Lip rouge’ an emblem of emancipation.
One thing we do know: we’re all looking to celebrate pretty much ANYTHING after the last 18 months – but this is definitely something to wave the flag about. Because when you spend £50 on the Elizabeth Arden website today, you’ll receive a fabulous Ceramide Ultra Lipstick (in a show-stopping Coral), worth £22. Offering great colour pay-off, shine and comfort, the lipstick will be automatically added at checkout (while stocks last).
We thought we’d also share some other facts about lipstick – which remains our favourite, most cheering make-up product of all…
• Lipstick was first worn in the Sumerian region (now known as Iraq and Kuwait) as long as 5,000 years ago
• Both men and women wore lipstick during the time of the Roman Empire; it was considered a sign of wealth (though it ought to have come with a health warning, being made of mercury – which gave the purple/merlot colours)
• According to a French research paper (read it here), applying red lipstick can make you look younger, because we associate a deep contrast between features as being youthful
• Elizabethans believed that lipstick had life-giving powers, with Queen Elizabeth I applying it on her deathbed
• In Victorian times, lipstick was considered vulgar – so some women met in secret to trade recipes and create lipsticks together, in ‘underground lip rouge societies’
We hope you find a way to celebrate National Lipstick Day, today – perhaps with a gorgeous gift-with-purchase…?
And meanwhile, mwah, mwah from us!
