Oh my God, a boob!  Avert your eyes!!

So, here we have an intimate peek at Angelina Jolie breastfeeding one of the twins, in a photo taken by Brad Pitt.  It’s all so cozy and cutesy that I would want to throw knives at my computer…if it weren’t a genuinely beautiful shot.  (I mean, c’mon.  What sort of genetic deal did this chick strike with God?)  In all seriousness, I think it’s wonderful to see motherhood and the human body–okay, and St. Angelina–celebrated so.

Somewhere in Malibu, the equally lovely Jennifer Aniston weeps, then chain-smokes three packs of Merits.

I just stumbled across this press release, released in June by the American Society of Plastic Surgeons, predicting that cosmetic surgery procedures will top 55 million in 2015.  (FYI, that’s four times the number of procedures performed in 2005.)  It’s kind of scary when you consider that we’re a nation of just over 300 million people…but then I remember that Hollywood actresses and other surgery junkies probably really skew the national average.  Still…that is a hell of a lot of nip/tucks, huh? 

Otherwise titled as “A Post That Really Has No Point, But Just ‘Cause…” 

When I started working at Lucky, fresh out of college, I was a lowly beauty assistant with little input, terrified of everybody around me.  My job initially consisted of opening packages, arranging products in the beauty closet, organizing the in-demand director’s schedule (well, okay, that would be attempting to organize the in-demand director’s schedule, since I was universally acknowledged to be a terrible–but oh-so-eager!–assistant), and answering phones.  Hardly tasks necessitating an Ivy League diploma—yet I was hooked.  The place was drenched in glamour, each editor was more fabulous than the next, and as time progressed, I was passed micro-pieces to work on, eventually graduating to the Secret Ingredient page and occasional Q&A’s for the burgeoning website (oh, 2003, how long ago you seem!)  Those Q&A’s became the inspiration for the Beauty Questions I now answer (but which y’all have been lazy about recently, so send ‘em in!), and, of course, led to the creation of beauty blog 1.0 formerly called Jolie in NYC.

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If there’s one thing We don’t like, it’s a judgmental person.  (And people who use the Royal We.  Oh God, We hate Ourselves!)  Jolie believes in a Live and Let Live, To Each Their Own kind of Kumbaya universe, and feels that everybody has enough on their plate without worrying about their neighbor’s portions.  So, I have very mixed feelings about plastic surgery.  As you know, I work with two remarkable facial plastic surgeons in LA, and I love what they do, which is to say fixing the rhinoplasty eff-ups of other surgeons.  In Beauty Confidential, I specifically set out my policy toward plastic surgery: life is too short to obsess over imperfections, so either learn to love ‘em, or fix ‘em and move on.  I still feel this way.

Except, today marks one year since I’ve been living in Los Angeles, and, as so often happens in life, my views have changed without me realizing it.  I used to automatically lean toward the “Hell, fix it!” end of the spectrum.  Now, I pause.

I live in a city full of pneumatic bottle-blondes with pillowy lips and no hips…some genetically cultivated (thanks, Mom!), but most acquired through blood, sweat, and lots of money.  When you wander by the OR on a daily basis and are the only A-cup with soft thighs in a five-mile radius, it’s hard not to think, “Well…maybe…”  Why not a nip here?  Or a tuck there?  For me, the recent, and very real, proposition was even simpler: I know the anesthesiologist (who’s on her third surgery in what seems as many months), am chums with the Dr. 90210 surgeon, can get a free room at the after-care facility, will have the operating room fee comped, can get ample publicity for my book, be on TV again…and have thinner thighs, to boot!  Everybody wins!

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Dear Everybody in Hollywood (famous or otherwise),

Please stop fatting your lips up with crap.  It does several things: 1) Causes you to resemble a trout; 2) Is so distracting that you can’t tell whether you’re pretty or not, because all you can see are the two Silly Putty things clamped on your face; 3) Automatically makes you look like a porn star (and not in a good way…if there is such a thing); 4) Is tacky as hell.  What it does not do is make your lips look real, make you look younger (quite the contrary), make you look like Angelina Jolie, or add any sort of aesthetic value to your face.  Oh, and it creeps guys out, too, in case you care.

For the love of Eddie Vedder, just quit it.  There is nothing wrong with your lips.  Perhaps you should have your vision checked, instead.

Kisses, Jolie

Blighty celeb Katie Price (aka Jordan) in Hollywood after a breast reduction and lip augmentation

You’ve surely heard about the Vogue Italia issue that features only black models, which sold out and was promptly re-printed by Conde-Nast.  It’s been hailed as a landmark and had everybody buzzing, although I just read an interesting non-fawning take on it in the Guardian:

For although the melanin quotient has been dramatically upped (more than one non-white face in a fashion magazine is, true enough, a major change), glossy homogenisation is still the order of the day. Black models? Sure. But there’s not a “natural” or “kinky” in sight, indeed, barely even a mop of curly hair. This is black girls-as-white girls: all aquiline noses, large eyes, oval faces (bar the standard exception of “unusual” Alek Wek), hair coaxed into silky straightness or carefully turbaned away in shot after shot. As for “black”, it’s more latte than americano. Just in case even these carefully selected beauties fail to actually sell the stuff, the hefty advertisement content uses white models, as does the free runway guide.

Progress is progress, and I think it’s important to stop and acknowledge achievements like this–just as when, say, Glamour or Vogue publish their “body” issues that purport to celebrate women of all sizes.  But when we snap back the very next second to the tired old standard…you realize just how much ground remains to be covered.  Let’s not require magazine issues like this anymore: if editors and publishers would put models in their pages that reflected all real women (so, while, yes, some “real” women are skinny six-foot tall white girls, the majority of us don’t fit that mold in a myriad of ways), and not just as a publicity-savvy one-off, we wouldn’t need to hail it as a revolution.

Photo from People.com

The fold-out cover, featuring Liya Kebede, Sessilee Lopez, Jourdan Dunn and Naomi Campbell

Do you recognize this woman?  (Looks a bit like Nicolette Sheridan or Uma Thurman, no?)  She’s a composite of Angelina Jolie (straight, narrow nose and full lips), Madonna (almond, wide-set eyes and plumped cheeks), Michelle Pfeiffer (smooth brow and high forehead) and Demi Moore (angular jawline), and she is emblematic of The New Face, as identified by New York Magazine.  In an article titled “How Plastic Surgery Can Give An Older Woman the Face of a Baby,” the old adage that, after a certain age, it’s either your butt or your face, is turned on its ear: guess what?  You can be scary skinny and unhealthily obsessed with keeping your body slim through punishing workouts and increase facial volume to avoid the Skeletor face: plumpers are the name of the game! 

Photo from NYMag.com

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Congratulations to the 25 winners of the Nivea Good-bye Cellulite Gel Cream!  You’ll be receiving your tubes soon, and I expect reports back on your progress!  In honor of its “Good-bye Cellulite, Hello Bikini” challenge, I asked Nivea for their best tips on getting a bikini-ready body. 

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