A few days ago, I was being interviewed for an industry event, and I found myself saying the following words: "It sounds silly for a beauty editor to say, but I hate beauty trends." And it's true—I don't follow the latest hair trends (I've sported the same balayage look for over a decade), I reject nail trends and stick to my signature sheer polish, and as for make-up trends? I laugh in the face of them. Or, I thought I did until Kaia Gerber's latest brown-lipstick make-up look stopped me in my tracks on Instagram last week.
You see, it takes an awful lot for me to show interest in a make-up trend. I don't wear a huge amount of the stuff, and I'm impossibly lazy—I want my make-up looks to be as undetectable and low fuss and possible. But when I saw one of my favourite make-up artists, Nina Park, post her latest creation on Kaia Gerber a few days ago, I was in awe. The bronzed, brown-hued look is basically all of my make-up dreams come true—a matte smokey eye, a freckled, sun-kissed nose and soft, fluffy brows. The thing that stood out most to me, however, was the nineties-esque, heavily lined, brown, shimmery lip.
While I don't wear lipstick all that often, I have always had a soft spot for brown lipstick—not only do I think it makes for the most effortless of statement lips, but it also makes me feel somewhat nostalgic. Kaia's look actually got me thinking about two of my greatest make-up loves ever: Rimmel's Heather and Coffee Shimmer lipsticks. While these two brown-hued lipsticks featured in almost every woman's make-up bag throughout the nineties and noughties, in recent years, trends have steered us away from dark, shimmered lipstick looks. And I've been sad about it.
I have been so sad about it, in fact, that as soon as I saw Kaia's brown-lip look, I ran straight to my beauty stash and dug out my Heather Shimmer and Coffee Shimmer lipsticks. (They're still in date, I promise, I just insist on keeping iconic products like these for journalistic purposes.) And after spending the last few days playing with them both, I have firmly decided that the only lipsticks touching my lips this season will be brown. With a bit of lip liner underneath and a slick of glossy oil over the top, I officially declare Autumn 2023 the season of the great brown lipstick resurgence.
