So the big make up companies are stepping up to the plate with a whole new range of make up that is suitable for the HD world – make up that will help minimize and in most cases elimate distracting flaws.

Now you may be thinking, what does this have to do with me? I’m not on camera!  But you would be wrong – the new make up is great for everyone. Chock-full of light-reflecting pigments, the new stuff will make even the most terrible skin look airbrushed.  Obviously the results will be different from person to person, but invest in a good brush to apply the foundation (Giorgio Armani does a spectacular one) and you’re good to go!

Here is a selection of make up that is HD friendly and YOU friendly:

Chanel Lift Lumiere

Givenchy Photo Perfexion

Dior Nude

Smashbox Halo

Laura Chesler

www.laurachesler.com

Summer, or Super Wrinkle season as I like to call it, is upon us. This means scores of ignorant women will be exposing their tender skins to the harshness of the sun and the tanning salon in a desperate attempt to look good this weekend at the beach – never mind what they will look in bed in ten years time.

Once upon a time, women were afraid of hitting their forties and finding themselves with faces more lined than a walnut. Now however, girls as young as eighteen are sporting the kind of wrinkles my own grandmother would be ashamed of.

Abominable!

I am simply stunned at the number of teenage girls I see on a daily basis who have laughter lines and crows feet so deep it makes you wonder where their mothers were when these poor idiots first started sun-worshiping.

It never fails to amaze me that some older women will, through some very simple daily actions, maintain skin like a baby’s bottom well into their fifties – while young girls, with all the advantages that youth and energy and natural collagen can supply, will manage to look like a crypt keeper at the tender age of seventeen.

Add another thirty years of baking and the seventeen year old will look like Liza Minelli. Magnifique? Non!

This is an outrageous state of affairs but! It can easily be remedied by the simple daily actions I just referred to. Here they are:

a) WEAR SUNBLOCK. At least factor 30. I really don’t know how much simpler to make it. Wear sunblock. Every day. Every single day, rain or shine, cloud or bright – wear sunblock. Reapply it as per the instructions on the bottle, but especially after lots of sweating, swimming, sun exposure. Make the application of sunblock the focal point of your morning beauty routine, and NEVER skip it. Sunblock is highly effective in the prevention of wrinkles, lines and premature aging. It will stop you from looking like a tanned leather baseball mitt at the age of twenty. For the love of God, wear sunblock.

b) STOP TANNING. Yes, thats right, stop tanning.

But a tan makes me look skinnier!

Believe me my sweet, there have been many developments in the field of losing weight, and spending your tanning bed money on the occasional salad and a gym membership will make you look good a hell of a lot quicker than baking your copious behind on a tanning bed.

Not to mention the dearth of amazing fake tan products out there – gone are the days of the orange glow. We now live in an age where a gorgeous-looking tan is achievable without frying one’s skin in baby oil. No excuses!!!

c) WEAR BIG JACKIE O STYLE SUNGLASSES.

I don’t want to hear about how last year they are – the skin around the eyes is the most sensitive skin on your face, and it will be the first place to show lines and wrinkles. By all means apply sunblock there, but wear big glasses too. Trust me, people will think you’re a movie star.

d) PUT SUNBLOCK ON YOUR WHOLE BODY.

Honestly, what is the point of having a lovely face if your hands look like the surface of the moon? Age spots are not attractive. Apply sunblock to every inch of exposed skin, and ladies, wearing driving gloves is not only chic but will do wonders for your paws!

And that’s it! Those are all the steps you need to have gorgeous skin well into your old age, an old age you can actually enjoy because you’re not spending hours in chemotherapy wishing you had taken five minutes out of your precious day to apply sunblock.

Remember – it is never too late to start taking care of your skin. All the botox in the world can’t save your craggy face if you don’t protect it from the sun! And never mind those silly women who bray about inner beauty and dignified aging, as if inner and outer beauty are mutually exclusive. Believe me, it is far easier to be dignified when you don’t have the appearance of a sun-dried tomato.
Madam Plumrier is currently watching Indiana Jones: The Kingdom of the Crystal Skull (“Karen Allen looks like unnecessary hell!”). She invites readers to send in their beauty questions and concerns.