Beauty is Truth, that's all I know

Back in 2001 I slaved over a persuasive, compelling shelf talker for my first ever contribution to the store’s “Staff Favorites” display: Paula Begoun’s Don’t Go to the Cosmetics Counter Without Me.

Noone bought the book.

But, with a fresh breeze of enlightened curiosity blowing through our well-groomed readership, this is the perfect time to re-introduce Begoun’s deliciously comprehensive compendium which reviews the bogus claims and empty promises of 30,000 skin care and makeup products.

I’ve cultivated my life-long commodity fetishism for skin care technology through beauty blogs, cosmetic trade publications, those free department store cosmetic counter pamphlets, and Avon catalogue back issues.

But, none of those sources compare to Begoun’s truly subversive Don’t Go... which, if her confrontational message gets out, threatens the whole $29 billion cosmetics and toiletries industry, unfortunately, the news gathering that it’s generous ad budget supports (20% of the sector’s net sales, by one estimate), and a manicured and exfoliated army of magazine editors.

Begoun, a 25-year consumer reporting veteran, has compiled a concise, accurate efficacy rating system, and cosmetic ingredient dictionary, which sheds light on the silly “anti-gravity,” and “age-balancing” potions by cult brands with loyal consumer infatuation that have been repeating their lies so long some people believe them.

The book covers cleansers, toners, granular scrubs; eye creams; cuticle softeners, callous removers, anti-cellulite creams, lip plumpers, sunless tanning, night creams, flight creams, acne treatment, pre-shave oils and more.

Begoun (with Co-Contributor Bryan Barron), uses pointed, no-nonsense adjectives for luxury products like “mundane, out-of-date, exceedingly standard,” or “There is no logical reason to consider this product.” Likewise she often calls the prices of these so-called miracles in a jar, “ludicrous, obscene, and out of whack.”

You’ll usually find a used copy of Don’t Go to the Cosmetics Counter Without Me in the Red Delicious Room’s “Fashion and Beauty” alcove along with a super glamorous collection of books on tattoos, designers, and modeling, (and Gardening, ho hum).

The best books I read in 2010

Kevin D., stylishly putting the rest of us to shame.

The House of Versace by Deborah Ball is an absorbing business book for fashion lovers. Ball chronicles one man's creative development, and the partial dissolution of a glamorous brand due to his sister's hubris and excess.

The book unveils Gianni Versace's post-WWII modest Calabrian roots, intuitive sense for what makes women feel sexy and luxurious, his sad killing by serial killer Andrew Cunanan, his celebrity-packed memorial service, and his sister Donatella's sometimes unwise management decisions.

The author uncovers the shocking way the Versace family jettisoned Gianni's 15-year partner Antonio D'Amico from company profits.

I found Wall Street Journal Business Reporter Deborah's Ball's work to be impartial, astute, and compulsively readable, despite little description of Versace's actual designs.

(post script: The label's last Milan collection in September, impressed NY Times critic Cathy Horyn, who called the long-lengths, and tight-fitting styles- superior.)

Secret Historian by Justin Spring

My heart is bursting with gratitude for Justin Spring for his exhaustively researched and exciting Secret Historian. And thanks, too, to self-invented, self-identified sexual rebel (though no label suffices) Sam Steward, the esteemed professor turned Hells Angels' tattooist, turned above average erotic fiction writer, all while fighting a valiant battle with barbiturates.

Spring spent 10 years studying Steward's journals, letters and notorious card catalog of notes on casual sex left behind in his Oakland attic.

This necessary and fulfilling bio, rejected by 10 publishers before FSG stepped up, will make a lovely holiday gift, even if the recipient, (unlike Steward) does not favor beatings and humiliation by straight guys in dirty socks.