Lift Your Mood with Lipstick

When it comes to cosmetics, lipstick has always been the least expensive and most popular purchase on the market. There's something reassuring about twisting the color up from the small round tube and applying it to your lips. It glides on in a smooth film, adding not just color to your face, but an outer layer. A little something to help you face the world. That's why many women say they don't feel dressed without it.

Not all women wear lipstick - some women forgo makeup altogether. Others wear little or no actual cosmetics but do like a touch of lipstick. Many won't leave the house without doing full-fledged makeup and hair. Altogether, they fuel a 1.5 billion dollar lipstick industry in the US alone, according an article about Long-wearing lipstick by Meredith Epstein in The Wharton Journal. That means there's a lot of girls in the world who need and want their lipstick.

Lipstick has been around for thousands of years. Cleopatra had hers made from a mix of ants and carmine beetles for color. Queen Elizabeth I, in the sixteenth century, favored beeswax stained with plants to color it bright red. She emphasized the effect by painting her face lead-white and all fashionable ladies of the court followed suit.

Then came Queen Victoria, who ruled in the 1800s that makeup was vulgar, worn only by actors and harlots. The pale face became the order of the day and signified humility and goodness. No self-respecting woman would paint her lips in Victorian times.

Fast forward to World War II. Troops were fighting oversees and the folks at home rallied behind them. The movie industry began to come into its own with films that provided some distraction from a world at war. It was the age of the Hollywood starlet and she lit up the big screen with her fresh face and rosy lips. Suddenly it was a wholesome look that girls and women rushed to emulate. Lipstick sales soared.

Today the choices are endless. Matte, creme, moisturizing, gloss, frost. Tubes, tubs, sticks, brushes and wands. You can buy lipstick for as little as a few dollars in a discount or drug store or spend as much as you like at a specialty makeup counter. Either way, most women say they wear lipstick because it makes them feel good about themselves.

So brighten your day whenever you get the notion. Just reach for your lipstick.

sources:
Rita Johnson, "What's That Stuff", Chemical & Engineering News
Madeline Ogilvie and Pauline Kristensen-Back, "Why Women Wear Lipstick", Edith Cowan University
Gwen Kay, published in "Women in Chemistry", Chemical Heritage Foundation
Meredith Epstein, "Long-wearing lipstick: kissing and telling", The Wharton Journal