Did you oversleep this morning...?

Well, if you overslept on Monday, you had a great excuse:  it was National Sleep-in Day.  (Who knew...?)  But with the clocks going back, there's really no excuse not to be a little brighter and chirpier in the a.m., at the moment.
     However, a good night's sleep always helps.  In fact, there is, as we constantly witter on, no better beauty aid than shut-eye - so we are indebted to our mate Kathy Phillips (Vogue beauty guru extraordinaire) for making it just a little easier to catch those zzzzzs with her new This Works Sleep range.
     Infused with aromatherapeutic lavender - the classic waft-you-sleepwards herb - and vetiver (a wonderfully grounding essential oil, a.k.a. 'oil of tranquility') - there are four slumber-inducing products: Deep Sleep Bath Soak, a Sleep Balm, Pillow Spray and the beyond-divine Deep Sleep Heavenly Candle.
     What price a good night's sleep?  Beyond pearls, naturally, but since there's nothing over £22, we think it's pretty dreamily-priced.
     In fact - sorry, were we yawning there...? -  we simply can't wait for bedtime, ourselves.

www.thisworks.com

     

Cire Trudon lights up Marylebone

Once upon a time, long, long ago, Beauty Bible stumbled dreamily into a shop in Paris’s Saint-Sulpice – and found we’d gone to candle heaven.  Since then we’ve been devotees of Cire Trudon:  an extraordinary, historic brand, which illuminated the court of Louis XIV, and still produces its vegetable-based candles in an artisan way.

     Today, they’re mostly scented. Catholic church-y Spiritus Sancti.  Moroccan mint tea Abd el Kader.  Dada, which is a compelling infusion of black tea and vetiver.  Or Trianon, with its white flowers, which always makes us feel a bit reincarnation-of-Marie-Antoinette-in-her-shepherdess-days.

      Eurostar’s loss is Marylebone’s gain, then, now that Cire Trudon has opened its first London store, on Chiltern Street – instantly making it a shopping-boulevard-to-watch.  (And BTW, André Balazs is converting the fire station opposite into his first London hotel, so it’s poised to become very hip indeed.)

     Can we suggest you give your senses a treat and set aside a half-hour to breathe your way through almost 20 intriguing Cire Trudon candles in this beautiful yet quirky space, which are showcased (as per usual) beneath glass domes in which you’re invited to bury your nose. 

     It’s a little bit of Paris perfection, come to Paddington…

Cire Trudon, 36 Chiltern Street, London W1U 7QL/020-7486 7590
www.ciretrudon.com

The new superfacialist on the block

‘A life-changing experience.’  That's how Anne Hathaway put it.

      ‘Pilates for the face:  very lucky is the person who can experience a treatment in her hands.’  So said Joely Richardson. 

      ‘She does these facials that keep your face alive, so it doesn’t fall down dead!’  And that, you might like to know, was Juliette Binoche.

     To this roll-call of rave reviews for facialist and holistically-trained therapist Su-Man Hsu, Beauty Bible would like to add our own:  ‘This woman is the real deal.  A truly outstanding, face-waking treatment in which her hands do all the talking, through firming, massaging, contour-lifting strokes.  We wafted out of Su-Man’s studio – a retreat at the bottom of her North London garden – and simply glowed.’

     Our prediction is that Su-Man’s going to find herself in the Facials Hall of Fame before you can say ‘extraction’, taking her rightful place alongside Eve Lom, Amanda Lacey, Sarah Chapman and Emma Hardie.

     The catch?  You’ll have to make a pilgrimage to Holloway - though for special clients, Su-Man pays housecalls. 

     But never mind hopping on the Piccadilly Line (to Finsbury Park).  Frankly, we’d walk on hot coals to get to her...

To contact Sue-Man Hsu:  su-man@blueyonder.co.uk (no phone number, alas)

Aromatherapy's new epicentre

We've said it before.  And we'll probably say it again.  (And again.) When it comes to mood-shifting, no oils have the power of Aromatherapy Associates to lift us up or waft us off to the land of Nod. (Fact:  Beauty Bible's No. 1 Desert Island Must-Have is Deep Relax Bath & Shower Oil.)
     Their treatments, of course, are widely available - but now there's a new mecca for the stressed-out:  a flagship store and treatment destination in Knightsbridge.  
     Upstairs, you'll find the whole range of oils, skincare and bodycare, beautifully showcased.  You can experience mini-treatments, or learn by smelling the essential oils in their 'raw' form.
     But downstairs, heaven truly beckons:  boutique-hotel-style treatment rooms where you can enjoy facials or body treatments.
     And the ultimate luxury:  for £450, you can have a personalised oil blend created by AA's founder Geraldine Howard, which will be dispatched in an engraved botttle, and can be replenished with your customised oil at any time.
     What's ours?  We've called it 'Even Deeper Relax'.  We didn't think it was possible (and nor did Geraldine!), but it does just what it says on the (gold-lettered) bottle.
     Cue sound of gentle snoring, from the Beauty Bible office...

Aromatherapy Associates Boutique & Treatment Rooms, 5 Montpelier Street, London SW7 1EZ/020-7838 1117

The bathroom-cum-bedroom...

Have you noticed the trend for installing bathrooms in bedrooms? Honestly, everyone's doing it.  How practical it is, we're not sure.  (Though as long as the loo still has a lock, maybe that's fine.)
     Anyway, here's a rather splendid example of a hybrid bathroom/bedroom.  It nicely fills the spot we've specifically created on a Friday, to inspire all you bloghounds to give yourselves some pampering TLC over the weekend.  Found it on Greige Design, a new blog discovery of ours that anyone who's fond of Scandinavian or neutral interiors will probably hyperventilate over.    
     We like the idea you could almost roll right out of this silvered bath and into bed.  Or vice versa.  In fact, the only thing that would make this more inviting, as far as we're concerned, is if there was a massage couch set up in the foreground.  With a strong-armed female masseuse just out of shot.
     We like to think of it as creative visualisation, actually.
     But whatever you've planned, have a beautiful weekend...

For Greige Design's blog, click here

Love clothes, hate shopping...?

The title of this blog posting certainly applies to us.
     Department store fashion departments and high street stores in general can be the seventh level of Hades, as far as we're concerned.  As for fashion websites?  Who's got time to trawl them all...?
     So when we can, we both escape to small towns and boutiques where the collections have been edited for us.
     But now there's another option:  Dress Me Daisy.  They put in the footwork, so we don't have to.
     First of all, you can input your requirements on their THE HIGH STREET section:  item (dresses/shoes/swimwear etc.), budget and colours, and it comes up with dozens of options across 200 brands.  (Jo did this and immediately ended up buying a Junk Food t-shirt from Harrods.)
     Or use YOUR PERSONAL STYLIST to find a local Dress Me Daisy fashion-hound who'll provide solutions within 24 hours.
     Last but by absolutely no means least, you can ASK DAISY a fashion conundrum, or follow the site's HOW TO WEAR advice, which deconstructs current looks and tells you how to put them together.
     So prepare to save a lot of shoe leather.  And time.
     And (most importantly) your sanity.
  
www.dressmedaisy.com

It's Love Your Body Day!

We thought you'd like to know.
     Especially because so few women we know do love their bodies - and we'd like to see that change.
     We salute the efforts of the Dove Dove Campaign for Real Beauty to break the stereotypes that pervade advertising, and their work to boost the self-esteem of every girl, growing up.  And Psychologies magazine, too, whose Positive Beauty manifesto we wrote about here.
     We slap the wrists of advertisers who airbrush women's faces to erase wrinkles, or their bodies to sleek silhouettes.
     And yes, we'd like to see a much wider range of ages and skintones, throughout the media.  (We've always made an effort to do that, in our Beauty Bible books.)
     Love Your Body Day is the brainchild of the National Organization for Women Foundation, in the States.  (Wish there was something similar in the UK.)
     We're not saying you have to strip down to your skimpies to join the celebration.  But we invite you to feel good about your body, today. About the fact it works so amazingly.  About your 'good points'.  Even about your so-called 'flaws'.
     Because if you don't love your body, how can you expect anyone else to...?
     It's a good place to start, we'd say.

For more info about Love Your Body Day, click here
For more about Dove's ongoing campaign, click here