Posts with tag self-tanner

When you live someplace that's at least 90 degrees for 4 months out of the year, you spend a lot of time trying to look like you're not a big, sweaty, uncomfortable mess. This summer I'm trying to perfect wearing flip-flops without looking like a slacker, and -- as I mentioned in a previous post -- I think I might be saved by the comeback of cool-looking shorts.

Women, however, have considerably more to worry about -- frizzy hair from summer humidity, the necessity to look tan even though we're all well-aware that sunbathing is a one-way ticket to cancer, etc. I'm afraid I won't be much help in this department, but Second City Style has some good suggestions for keep yourself looking good when the temperatures are out of control.

In a recent post, Joanne Molina recommends keeping your nails looking "naturally beautiful" with a manicure and pedicure, using a headband to control unruly hair, using self-tanner, and more.

After all, you're supposed to spend the summer having fun -- not feeling gross.

As reported by Fashion Week Daily, beauty superstore Sephora is teaming up with the makers of a classic board game to create a Sephora edition of Monopoly.

Players will collect and spend Beauty Bucks, can end up in jail for heinous offenses like "bad hair days", incur fines for streaky self-tanner, and buy Sephora bags and Sephora storefronts for their purchased property in lieu of "houses" and "hotels".

I'm not yet sure which brand name has snagged the advertising rights to the properties that will replace "Park Place and Broadway", but some of the beauty advertising gurus such as Nars, Stila, and Murad will have their names on Cheek Street, Gloss Gardens, and Cleanser Crossing, respectively.

The new Sephora edition of Monopoly retails for $45.

I'll admit it. I have done lots of things to get that golden glow without actually subjecting my skin to the damaging rays of the sun. Oh, alright, I've done bad things, too, like cook myself in those horrible light coffins, but that was a long time ago. I've used self-tanners at home, had tanners applied by "professionals," and even stood in the Mystic spray-on shower stall. Though I certainly had a "glow," I looked more like a glowing orange creamsicle than a natural beach beauty.

However, there might be a technology on the horizon that actually produces the same type of natural color that comes from the sun. Researchers at the University of Kentucky are working on a product that stimulates the body's own tan-generating cells, melanocytes. The stimulation is produced by forskolin, a naturally occurring plant compound.

In laboratory experiments, not only does forskolin create a tan color, it also had the same effect as a sunscreen. A natural, non-orange-hued tan from a cream? It's looking good, but it's still a long way before it'll be available.