Longer, greyer and funnier – news from the lingerie universe

Vintage Christmas Lingerie Looks

The 1940s pin up look is totally hot this winter. With rolled hairstyles or sleek curls, a matte face and lots of sexy lipstick, this look works perfectly for lingerie and is also a great way to harmonise with your Christmas décor if you’ve gone for this year’s purple and/or silver themes, as the colours blend beautifully.

One problem with the ‘40s look is that the perfect foundation base on which the look is painted normally requires a heavy matte base, (Max Factor’s Pan Sticks, which were used in wartime movies, really were ‘slap’ – both dense and unnaturally pale for anything other than black and white films!) so to help you bring the look up-to-date, here’s our quick guide to vintage pin-up beauty:

• Dampen your front hair and roll it on big sponge rollers while you put your face on.
• Mac’s Prep and Prime is a perfect base – it is quite heavy feeling on the skin but gives a wonderful priming base for foundation – choose a neutral shade of foundation and apply it with a sponge or large brush, blending well into the hairline, over the natural eyebrows and the lips.
• Reshape your brows using brow pencil in a natural shade, brown for blondes, black for brunettes and focusing on the fine natural arch that was popular at the time, then cover your lids with a neutral beige shadow and add black liner – not too much of a cat’s eye look though, use the liner to define, not to alter the natural eye-line. Mascara was black, black, black, even for blondes, in the forties.
• Cheeks should be lightly brushed with a natural pink (rose) colour. Blush, at this time, was simply a hint of colour, and while you might think you don’t need it, your primer and matte base will leave you looking ghostly if you don’t give yourself a healthy hint of cheek glow.
• To get the wonderful matte lip colour that was so popular in the forties, the foundation that you blended over your lips make the perfect base – draw on the lip line you want using feathered strokes of a neutral lip pencil and fill in with your chosen lip colour, using a lip brush for a precision finish – alternatively use a lip stain but be sure you’ve tested it first as some ‘bleed’ out of the lip line after a while. Finish in either case with a lip-locking lipstick sealer for that perfect all night pout. We love matte red but it can be drying and overly harsh, especially for less than perfect smiles, so we’d suggest Shiseido’s Perfect Rouge Glowing Matte – a flattering red that doesn’t signpost poor skin or imperfect teeth.
• Set with translucent powder; the new mineral powders are perfect, on the T-zone only, using the same big brush that swept your foundation and blusher into place.
• Take your hair out of the rollers and it a little spritz of mousse or other moulding treatment and then part slightly to one side. If you have long hair, pull the back hair out of the way with a band, then lightly backcomb to ensure your look stays in place. Roll the hair up, over and back, pin, and give a good squirt of hairspray, repeat with the other side, then shimmy into your 1940s themed lingerie. We recommend seamed stockings, bullet bras and bold suspender belts like the Soir de Venise Waspie.
• Delight your partner! 

This year’s three must have stocking-filler sex toys

1. For ladies, the best lube around right now is Good Vibrations Please Cream – cutely described as eco-erotic, it’s all natural ingredients and works to add comfort and pleasure to even the most sensitive of female regions.

2. We love Cosmopolitan so when they recommended the We-Vibe 3 and we’d got over the idea that Nintendo had moved into sex toys, we tried it out. They weren’t wrong – it’s a couple-pleasing, bendy, powerful and deliciously structure dual play toy – not a throwaway price but we think it could become a classic addition to the repertoire of couples who like toy-play.

3. Top of our stocking though is Screaming O’s Vibrating Mascara wand – it looks like mascara, you could get it through an airport security searh as mascara, you can carry it in your handbag without fear, and yet it does the job. It really does the job! And when we say it’s in the top of our stocking, it’s really that tiny, but it doesn’t lack for power. We think it’s the most fun in a small package we’ve had all year!