Shades of Grace

If ever there was a poster girl for stylish sunglasses it was Grace Kelly, whose fondness for slightly masculine tortoiseshell shades – which complemented her blonde hair and fair skin, and looked as if they had been borrowed from co-star Cary Grant – became a hallmark of her classic style in the 1950s. She wore variations on those throughout that decade, when she wasn’t sporting her normal prescription glasses, which she was often photographed wearing  at events.What’s interesting about trawling the net for photos of Grace in her sunglasses is that she invariably teamed them with hats or turbans – not an easy thing to pull off with any degree of comfort as anyone who has tried to keep a straight sun hat while putting on sunglasses knows.

We may all love that classic Kelly sunglasses look, but she moved with the times and reflected changes in frame fashions, going on to experiment with variations on the cat’s eyes style which had been popular when she was  honing her signature look.

I’m not sure if the next pair are sunglasses or not (or if they are the same ones as shown above!) but they are certainly worth including as they show yet again how beautifully Grace carried off her shades and hat combo.
During the 1970s, she was occasionally photographed wearing fashionably oversized frames but these weren’t always successful; in fact, some of them are, surprisingly, real howlers. Still, if you’re the queen of sunglasses, there’s only one way to go – down! Here she is, pre-princess, in her still-inspiring signature style. 

True Grace

There are lots of areas in which Grace of Monaco, the new biopic of Grace Kelly/Princess Grace, fails spectacularly and although it reeks of style – as befits a film about the rich and famous in the glamorous 1960s – it doesn’t really have much of Grace Kelly’s distinctive style about it. Nicole Kidman’s princely (don’t think there is a female equivalent) wardrobe is certainly a pleasure to look at, but it’s not a patch on the original, and – it seems – only one or two of the original ensembles are actually recreated.

What they did do rather a nice job on, however, was Princess Grace’s hair (see pic of Kidman as Kelly, above). In the 1960s, the style icon who had been known primarily for her pearls and accessories in during her movie star days, made her repertoire of formal – and increasingly outlandish – up-dos (created by the hair couturier Alexandre de Paris) her trademark. Here are three of the most memorable.  

 

 

 * Grace of Monaco is in cinemas now (if you’re not careful!)

My Week in Beauty

MONDAY

A hair crisis was narrowly averted on Monday – thanks to James Brown Hair Reviving Dry Shampoo (£5.99; www.boots.com).

Having promised to go out with the family after spending the morning and much of the afternoon working at the computer, I found myself without enough time to get both my hair and my make-up done… The choice was: wash my hair and risk the family’s wrath, or skip the hair-washing. In which case, I might as well have also gone the whole hog and worn my jammy bottoms for the rest of the day.

It was only when I remembered about the can of dry shampoo in my cupboard that a third option presented itself. And you know what? My hair actually looked better, post-James Brown Hair Reviving Dry Shampoo, than it has, post-normal shampoo, for ages.

TUESDAY

On Tuesday, I was still flirting with the new Dior mascara, Extase, which was sent the week before. But, as always happens when I start a relationship with a new mascara, I began to reminisce about past favourites.

Friends are always asking me for mascara recommendations, and there’s no better recommendation from a beauty writer than to say which items she would buy if she had to…

Any time I can’t find a satisfactory mascara among the latest offerings, I turn to one of the following: Estee Lauder Sumptuous (£18; www.esteelauder.co.uk), Bobbi Brown Party Wear (£17.50; www.bobbibrown.co.uk), Revlon Double Twist (£6.29) or Boots No7 Lash 360 (£11.50; www.boots.com).

All of these are fantastic for adding length, boosting volume and curling the lashes. Put it this way, I always have at least one of these mascaras in my cosmetics cupboard – just in case the latest wand I’m testing fails to work its magic..

WEDNESDAY

The weather was really warm on Wednesday and a lighter foundation seemed in order – especially since my skin seems to be behaving, for once, as far as being shiny is concerned.

Bobbi Brown Skin Foundation SPF15 (£28), which launched early last year, has become one of my favourite bases; a must for when I want light, natural-looking coverage and I don’t expect to get hot, bothered and shiny (it’s better for the dehydrated/dry part of my combination skin than my oily part).

Ordinarily, I’d avoid a shade called Sand – Ivory, Porcelain or some other shade of “as pale as they come” is usually the one for me – but this one is absolutely perfect. I dread to think what the girl who wears one of the three paler shades looks like sans make-up. Something out of Twilight, perhaps…

THURSDAY

The press preview of theV&A’s  Grace Kelly exhibition took place today. One aspect of her style which isn’t covered is the make-up that she used to create her classic, fresh-faced American look.  Coral was her favourite lipstick shade,  so I’m sure she would have loved Dior Addict Lipcolor (£21.50) in Coral Craze, from the forthcoming summer collection. I do! It could well be the replacement for my last favourite coral lipstick, Estee Lauder Pure Color Crystal Lipstick in Coral Reef, a limited edition two years ago..

FRIDAY

Having highly sensitive skin – possibly as a result of testing too many creams and cosmetics over the last 14 years – I am always very careful about what I’ll test on my own face, and which lotions and potions I’ll delegate to tried and tested testers.

Luckily, I decided to give Dior’s latest anti-ageing moisturiser a whirl myself. Why? Because Hydra Life Pro Youth Comfort Creme (£40) is extremely kind to even the most sensitive of skins. It’s one of several new products in the new Hydra Life collection which claims to delay the signs of ageing using pure plant extracts selected from Dior gardens.

Only time will tell if the signs of ageing are delayed but in the meantime, I’m relishing using this highly hydrating, delightfully scented and luxurious-feeling cream which – like its siblings in the Hydra Life family – contains a unique concentrate of plant extracts from Uzbekistan, France and Madagascar.