Rosie Scott Blog about Women

When your vision is as horrendous as mine, putting on eye makeup is a daily struggle. Challenge number one: I'm blind as a bat, so when I take my glasses off to do my makeup, I have to get so close that I'm practically kissing the mirror before I can see what I'm doing. Then after I'm done and the glasses go back on, the lenses make my eyes look smaller—not exactly the desired effect. To help my fellow four-eyed makeup enthusiasts, I reached out to some top makeup artists to get their expert tips on wearing makeup and glasses.

Change your mirror. "I recommend using a strong magnifying mirror—12 times magnified is good—to act as your glasses." —Quinn Murphy, who works with Freida Pinto and Olivia Wilde

Don't match your frames to your eye shadow. "Doing this will make you look dated and take away from your natural features. The best choice is nude, sheer tones."—Romero Jennings, director of makeup artistry at M.A.C.

Use a different mascara. "Try tipping the ends of your lashes with a waterproof mascara so that your mascara doesn't smudge against the lenses." —Fiona Stiles, who works with Dakota Johnson and Gigi Hadid

Rethink the way you apply mascara. "Using the lashes is great to open up the eye and grab attention even behind the lenses. Think boldly curled lashes, and apply an extra coat on the bottom lashes. You can also get away with playing with colored mascara." —Molly Stern, who works with Camilla Belle and Reese Witherspoon

If you're nearsighted, use lighter shades of eye shadow. "For a nearsighted person, your lenses can actually minimize the size of your eyes. It's best to skip a heavy black liner and stick to a soft midtone shade, like M.A.C. Eye Shadow in Naked Lunch and finish with a even coat of mascara." —Keri Blair, senior artist at M.A.C.

If you're farsighted, go for darker shades."If you are farsighted, like me, your eyes may appear larger through your frames (I happen to love this about wearing glasses—in my opinion the bigger the better!). However, if you are finding that your eyes seem too large, try using midtone to darker shades of shadow or liner in more matte or satin textures to minimize." —Blair

Choose a strong eyeliner. "This is something I have a lot of experience with because my mother wears glasses, and whenever I do her makeup, I make sure to define her eyes with a gel eyeliner. Eyeliner is the best way to make your eyes pop under glasses. I typically use the Bobbi Brown Long-Wear Gel Eyeliner in Black Ink. —Vincent Oquendo, who works with Bella Hadid and Soo Joo Park

Make sure the bridge of your nose is extra primed. "My favorite trick is to place a small amount of M.A.C. Prep + Prime 24-Hour Extend Base right across the bridge and down the sides of your nose before applying your foundation or powder. It keeps your touch-ups to a minimum." —Blair

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Jacqueline de Ribes has an actual title — she’s Jacqueline, Countess de Ribes — and she’s been given many more. “Reigning Queen of Paris,” for example, and “Empress of Café Society.” Unlike the formal title, which she was both born with and married into, the others she earned over 86 years of totally over-the-top living, doing things like arriving very late for dinner dressed in a Turkish disguise. Her father-in-law once described her as a cross between a Russian princess and a showgirl from the Folies Bergère.

De Ribes had a dark, if privileged, childhood in wartime France. There were châteaux, sure, but there were also Gestapo staying in them, and her parents were as glacial as they were glamorous — she often says that as a child she was kissed only once.

At 18, fresh out of the convent, she married Edouard de Ribes, and a particularly flamboyant uncle took her to buy some dresses at Christian Dior (“I’m the last customer on Earth who remembers the actual Christian Dior,” she points out). What followed was a lifetime of haute couture patronage (Dior, Jean Desses, Emanuel Ungaro, Yves Saint Laurent) and attendance at a never-ending cycle of charity galas and bals masqués.

De Ribes is unusually beautiful, with a long, graceful neck and a big, distinctive nose that inspired Richard Avedon (who photographed her dozens of times at the suggestion of Diana Vreeland) to express pity for all the other girls in the world with noses less extreme. Soon, lots of people were calling her Nefertiti.

As a fashion client, she could be quite imperial. “I always wanted bigger sleeves or shorter sleeves,” she says. “And they always said okay. They knew that Monsieur Saint Laurent would always agree with me.” Then, at age 53, de Ribes began her own label, picking up clients in America (Barbara Walters, for one), Tokyo, and elsewhere with a collection that matched her lifestyle: black-tie dresses with long sleeves and necklines, but also suggestive panels of sheer black lace. When her family refused to invest, she found backers on her own.

A few years ago, Harold Koda and Andrew Bolton from the Metropolitan Museum of Art’s Costume Institute were invited to lunch at her Parisian hôtel particulier and discovered an astonishing cache of perfectly preserved couture. On November 19, an exhibition opens featuring clothes from all the major couture houses as well as from her own line.

At 86, the countess is a great-grandmother of three and still quite busy in Paris. She was widowed several years ago and mourns her husband deeply. “My real admirer was my husband,” she says. “He was wonderful, and I am just so sad without him every single day.” She still keeps up with fashion (she likes the new team at Valentino) and has lots to say about style. Like on the topic of vulgarity: “First of all, loudness in general is vulgar. You can have loudness in so many ways. The way you move, the way you talk. If you laugh too loudly, it’s vulgar.” And on sex appeal: “You must remember that you’re never going to be sexy for everyone. You are sexy for someone, and for someone else you are not. Being totally nude is not sexy. The art of being sexy is to suggest. To let people have fantasy.”

Asked whether, in all her titled years, she ever made a fashion mistake, she has this to say: “My mirror is my best adviser. Once I did make a mistake. There was a great hairdresser in Paris named Alexandre, and he was going to have a story on him in Life magazine. He said, ‘Could you give me the great favor that I will do your hair in front of the camera of Life?’ But then, after, when I saw the pictures, I discovered that I had hair up in the air and I was covered with too many diamonds! I only did it to be nice to him. And I hope he was happy.”

The Met show is a couture lover’s dream. These clothes were made perfectly, and they were worn in the context for which they were intended, a context that doesn’t really exist anymore. No one would’ve thought to whip out cameras at the parties de Ribes attended for most of her life, an idea almost inconceivable in an age when the whole point of fashion can sometimes feel like providing fodder for Instagram. There was never an ounce of democracy in any piece of this wardrobe, and now here it is, available for the world to lay eyes on. “My upbringing was always to be discreet,” de Ribes says. “When you are an aristocrat, you are not supposed to be in the press, so of course for me, this thing of being in a museum makes me go back in time — for the past 20 years, I have been very calm, and now to go back in the press when you are an old lady — I will just say that it is a very wonderful feeling.”

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Doesn’t dressing up celebrities (as a career) sound like the best profession on earth? Working with someone as chic as Mahira Khan, especially, can safely become a dream job and that’s exactly the way Amar Faiz feels as Mahira Khan’s wardrobe stylist.

We caught up with the suave celebrity stylist Amar Faiz, whose client list includes some of the biggest names in international fashion and we are talking everyone from Kylie Minogue to Iggy Azalea and tons of other red carpet regulars, to find out his experience of styling the Lux Lady, Mahira Khan at the Lux Style Awards 2015.

Instep: First things first, can you please elaborate what a wardrobe stylist’s resume looks like?

Amar Faiz: A Wardrobe Stylist is one of the most popular emerging professions in the fashion world globally. It is someone who understands the client’s style sense, sources and selects the clothing and accessories for his or her campaigns, shoots or public appearances. He helps a client define his or her personal style and choose different outfits to suit that style. It’s a common concept around the fashion world but it’s fairly new in Pakistan.

Instep: So you chose all the stunning outfits that Mahira wore at the LSAs?

AF: Well no, she had the final word on the dresses. But I had shortlisted them, based on the discussions we had about the look that she wanted for the big night. Plus, we both wanted something international and exclusive. A stylist’s job is to make the star’s life easier by short listing the hundreds of dresses for consideration. And if the star is someone like Mahira Khan, then more and more designers want to dress her up. Hence, it makes the selection process much more difficult. And this is where a stylist plays a major role.

Instep: How did you manage to get international designers on board?

AF: I have been in this business for the last 13 years and have developed a network with international designers and PR companies. My aim was to introduce Mahira to a different region and to create her international profile. So when Mahira and I had a discussion about the different looks she wanted for the LSAs, I liaised with the fashion designers based on her requirements. I shared Mahira’s portfolio with them, which was very well received. She has significant presence on social media; Twitter, Instagram and Facebook fans number in millions and that says a lot about her profile. Social media following is also one of the barometers to assess a star’s popularity. And Mahira Khan is already on her way to be the biggest star that Pakistan has ever seen. She is taking the right steps, doing the right projects and with the right people. There is nothing that can stop her.

Instep: How many dresses were shortlisted for Mahira? And what was the story behind the ice-blue dress by Georges Hobeika?

AF: We short listed at least 35 dresses before she confirmed that one. It had to be special as she had to attend the red-carpet in that dress plus she was opening the show as well with that one. And finally she picked Georges Hobeika, the Lebanese Haute Couture designer who has dressed names like Jennifer Lopez, Selena Gomez, Katy Perry, Hilary Swank etc. For many months she had been receiving a lot of attention from several Arab designers and they had shown their interest in her.

Instep: How did a sari make way amongst the gowns? I mean the beautiful Feeha Jamshed creation?

AF: Honestly, it was very last minute. Mahira wanted to go for another change before sliding into another gown. But the clock was ticking and we just had a few days before the show. We had a Chinese designer’s exclusive creation as backup which was a black gown but Mahira wanted to wear something eastern to balance her multiple appearances. So we checked with her friend Feeha Jamshed, whom she trusts completely and time and again she has donned her creations. I personally love Feeha’s sense of style. We know each other since 2006 and I knew we could count on her. She was kind enough to agree and delivered within a week. That’s how the sari happened. I think she looked fabulous in that.

Instep: What about the swan-white grand finale dress?

AF: That white one was a tough call. Actually, Mahira had shortlisted a Brazilian designer’s creation but when I checked, that dress was reserved for Giuliana Rancics (from E-Entertainment) for an event that was scheduled two days before the LSA night. Even though the designer insisted to send it across to Pakistan but I did not want to stress out as it would have been a close call. So logistically it was not feasible. So I whatsapped around a dozen images to Mahira to select from and she chose this beautiful runway creation by Cecilie Melli. But to make it event appropriate I suggested adding Chantelle lace to the upper part of the dress and it was especially customized for Mahira.

Instep: And how did they arrive from different part of the world to Pakistan?

AF: I got all the dresses couriered to Norway where I live and then brought them along with me to Karachi. The best thing about all these designers is that we did not have to do any alterations after the trial. Each dress fit her like a glove. Plus Mahira was extremely comfortable in each, which matters the most.

Instep: Will you be collaborating with Mahira for her future projects?

AF: I have known Mahira for a long time and I was supposed to collaborate with her for her Bin Roye appearances around the world. But it took me a while to sort things out and I missed the bus. So I thought to start off with the biggest event in town, the LSAs. But my association with her is not going to be a one-off. We see a great deal of synergy here and I will continue to be her wardrobe stylist for her appearance for Ho Mann Jahaan and Raees.

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Kiran Rao slowly sips on a glass of water as she waits inside the seemingly tranquil Wild Garden café at Amethyst. On a balmy October evening, the place is filled with notes of pleasant jazz floating above and the distinct hum of conversations below.

The launch of the newest Amrapali and The Amethyst Room on Khader Nawaz Khan Road will mark the presence of this lifestyle space’s third location in the city. The new store, which doesn’t have a café (“Nungambakkam has plenty of cafés”), came about when Kiran felt the time was right for a standalone boutique, and so she finally settled upon this place. The Amethyst Room will also exhibit clothes, gold and silver jewellery and more.

Kiran’s brainchild Amethyst, when it first opened its doors in Gopalapuram 15 years ago, was an old zamindari bungalow. It was later restored by Kiran, who was on the lookout for a small space to showcase “interesting and affordable jewellery. I was looking at something similar to the mada veedhi shops in Mylapore, when I came across this place — it was elastic and magical. Since I’m one of those ‘follow the rabbit’ people, I thought why not,” Kiran remarks. With a self-confessed passion for jewellery, Kiran draws her experience for retail from the many years she worked in the industry and in galleries in London, and from an “ad hoc continuous retail exposure”.

A student of Indian history and anthropology, Kiran says that it helped her develop an “unconventional view of retail”, in that she sees people “as artists rather than magpies” and not as “fashion victims”. She finds them to be greatly “too complex and genuinely interesting”.

In 2010, Amethyst moved from Gopalapuram to a new restoration project in Royapettah — a granary warehouse on Whites Road. “It was a simple box-like structure; it was not glamorous at all,” Kiran says, adding, “Anything can be made beautiful. It was a very good location and it offered me a chance to accommodate all the other things that I was already doing, such as preserving Nature, restoring heritage structures... There’s a lot of 1950s detailing in this building, if you notice carefully,” Kiran says.

Amethyst has now become a sort of a culture hub — it’s where some of the city’s intelligentsia and the glitterati gather for book launches, boutique showcases and author rendezvous. It’s also where the proletarians (if you please) sometimes come to think and relax amidst the chic-posh surroundings. Point out that she has eclectic taste, and Kiran more than readily agrees.

“I knew the ropes; I knew what would work. I’m my own interior designer. I had the space, and intuitively, I saw what it told me.” This was how the café (Wild Garden), the flower shop (Bloom), the fashion and accessories store (Upstairs), and the event and exhibition space (The Folly) at Amethyst came about. “There already was space in the garden; we enlarged it and that’s how The Folly happened,” Kiran says.

Apart from the store in Royapettah and the one on Chamiers Road (Chamiers), Kiran has also restored La Maison Rose in Puducherry. With its signature rose-pink walls, a huge atrium, and breezy evening engagements, the colonial-style restaurant has all the markings of the Amethyst at home. It’s a theme that runs across her properties and one that Kiran strongly believes in. Green. “I definitely have a missionary zeal for green; I love natural-looking gardens. That’s how the name ‘Wild Garden’ evolved — the name just suggested itself.”

Born to a European mother and an Indian father, and having studied in Church Park, Kiran is an out-an-out Chennai girl. But she does acknowledge the influence that being abroad gave her in setting up Amethyst. “It brought a remembered past to this place — a slower, relaxed pace of life, it helped me create an ambience as you slow down,” she says, as she waxes eloquent about life in general. “You’re always looking for contradictions, for luxurious beautiful things that provide escapism from the mundane and the ever practical.” It’s what she envisions Amethyst to reflect — “a space where people can express themselves; where people can sit for hours and not be trailed or badgered.”

So what does it take to be as successful as her? Well, for one, Kiran says that her trick is to view everything she does as separate businesses — “I’m running several businesses, not the one” — and that there’s only one lifetime so it’s better to not be typecast as someone or something.

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La La Anthony, the mega mogul we all love, recently shared news for the first time about her experience dealing with psoriasis, an autoimmune condition that appears as scales and flakes on the skin. Anthony recently teamed up with the National Psoriasis Foundation to launch the awareness campaign, Picture Positivity, and shared with us how the condition has impacted her self-esteem and confidence, but that she has never let it get in the way of her goals and achieving her dreams.

When did you begin to deal with psoriasis?

About 10 years ago, when I was in my mid twenties, I started to experience psoriasis symptoms. I noticed that there was something 'not quite right' with the skin on my scalp, along my hairline and behind my ears, which was scary for me as a young woman and, of course, for someone in the entertainment industry. I was concerned that others would think my symptoms were due to a contagious condition or poor hygiene.

How did you begin to notice it? What were your initial steps towards treatment?

When I first began noticing psoriasis symptoms, I wasn't super familiar with psoriasis so after being diagnosed, I worked closely with my doctor to understand the disease. I also sought out others living with psoriasis and leaned heavily on them for support, tips and inspiration. I never allowed my disease to hold me back, and I want to encourage others with psoriasis to do the same.

What has your treatment been like?

Treatment is something that is very personal and individualized. It should be based off of conversations with your doctor to determine the best path for you. I've also found helpful ways to switch things up when I am having a flare, like changing my outfit, hairstyle or even my makeup to help make myself feel a little bit better about how I look.

Have you dealt with similar issues in the past, or was this your first time dealing with a chronic skin issue?

Being diagnosed with psoriasis was the first time I had any kind of skin symptoms or issues. Because I live in the spotlight, many people assume that I'm confident all the time, but my psoriasis has affected so many aspects of my life. My psoriasis has forced me to change my style, cancel public appearances, miss time with family and friends and skip business meetings. Additionally, I was diagnosed with psoriasis when I was in my mid-twenties and that made dating a very nerve-racking experience. Despite these things, I just wouldn't let it hold me back from living my life.

Tomorrow, La La reveals how she has been able to overcome the challenges of psoriasis and still achieve success, all while looking her best.

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With the autumn season reaching its fashion climax, furs (hopefully faux) and animal prints are bound to make their much-awaited reappearances from attics, suitcases and the dusty top shelves of our wardrobes. For some of you, this winter-ready haul may include a leopard-print coat. My advice? Be charitable and throw it into the donation bin.

I have yet to figure out what makes the leopard print so appealing to women in this region. Sure, blingy, bold and rather ostentatious style elements are stereotypically key to Middle East dressing, but why is it that, season after season, leopard-print garments make tiresome comebacks in stores here?

Many of us have that odd leopard-­print top hanging in our wardrobe, saved for those once-in-a-blue-moon days when we simply have nothing else to wear, or are just bored by the multitude of geometric and floral patterns that hang around it. At times, we may feel like getting rid of it, but we hold onto it as if there’s some unspoken rule that every woman must have at least one leopard look in her wardrobe. Others limit the print to our beachwear or undergarments.

Maybe my tone is a tad too extreme, because I’m not a total hater of animal prints. I’m quite a big fan of python patterns, especially in luxe greys and beiges. I don’t think I’m alone in my favour of sleek snakes over garish leopards, so all of you undercover leopard haters should step out from the shadows of catty clothing, and have the courage to turn down the spotted pattern. The leopard print is one that you must absolutely adore to pull it off comfortably and confidently. If you’re not quite sure where you stand, stick to less-palpable patterns, such as python.

There’s a swanky safari trend currently in vogue, and if you ask me, it’s one of the few instances in which you can get away with rocking a leopard print right now. Khakis, olive greens and whites are great colours to play with, and leopard spots make nice accents. Carry off a serene and subdued colour palette – don’t turn to jewel tones with satiny sheens, which will cheapen your look.

I wouldn’t be caught dead with some of the leopard-print bags on the market – there’s quite a vile design in stores by Saint Laurent. It’s beyond me why someone would drop about Dh7,000 on this, when they could instead go for classic all-black or burgundy quilted design. That said, the new collection from Coach does have some rather nice leopard totes and cross-body bags, along with a range of travel accessories – perhaps it’s the scale, shade and texture of leopard prints that determine whether they’re hits or misses.

Still, no matter what the scale, leopard coats don’t ever become hits, especially if they’re of a furry texture – tacky much? Make sure your outfits channel icons other than Cruella de Vil, and downplay the leopard. Think flats, scarves and even the occasional button-down blouse with the print. There’s also something about a leopard-spotted maxi dress that can be quite fun – a cotton number for poolside, or a tiered chiffon design with a dramatic slit for a fancier evening out.

Be warned, the same sultry-­yet-playful-effect isn’t achieved in a skirt of the same print. Leopard skirts can make you look like an overeager cougar or a not-quite-there newbie at a fashion magazine whose outfit lacks that effortless appeal. So if it catches your eye on your next shopping escapade, give ample thought to this risky pattern before you open your wallet.

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