Many of us unwittingly sabotage our appearance, adding on years and advertising our age and not even aware we are doing so! Certain things we wear are immediately associated with the older generations and they are very easily avoided - if you know what they are!
As you read this are you wearing?
- Dark lipstick?
- Eyeglasses attached to a chain?
- Half glasses or bifocals?
- Jeans or pants that come all the way up to your waist?
- A bra that allows those girls to dangle down?
- A mid-calf length gored denim skirt or any garment embellished with patchwork?
- Fingers full of inherited rings?
- Black trakkie daks with a white stripe up the side?
It really doesn’t take very much effort to look as good as you possibly can right now.
- Sweep your hair back off your brow and expose your temples.
- Tuck your hair behind your ears.
- Push your sleeves up to three-quarter length.
- Un-tuck your shirt or top.
- Tighten your bra straps. How long is it since your breasts sat pert and pretty in their proper place half way between your shoulder and elbow? Many of us only ever adjust our bra straps once (when the bra is brand new) and then we forget to ever adjust the straps again. So, haul ‘em up and see how much more youthful you appear. If you don’t wear a bra the chances are that it’s time you did, no matter what size you are.
- Stand up straight. Really straight! Shoulders back, tummy in, butt in, chest out.
- Slick on some glossy pink lipstick. Fantastic!
And there is another point –
Call your hairdresser right now and book an appointment for a new hairstyle!
As we mature we need more maintenance than we did in our youth. Maintenance takes time and effort, it is on-going, always evolving, it is fun and fascinating because it’s about you and the results speak for themselves!
Essentially maintenance is the difference between the fifty year old woman who barely looks forty and the fifty year old woman who appears to be nudging sixty.
Some women become progressively more attractive with their years. You would've seen these women. They are the women we look at and think “she takes good care of herself”. And she probably does. She spends time on maintenance! There’s no reason on this earth why you cannot be one of those women! Just spend some maintenance time of yourself!
And, while we're at it, you should know that we are never, ever going to celebrate our wrinkles! For goodness sake they’re not a prize for making it to the age that we have! They’re a bi-product of our achievements and they fall into the same category as grey hair – we know that we’ve got ‘em, we know they’re there, but to maintain the illusion of youth we are going to manage them, we’re going to minimize and disguise them and then we’re going to ignore 'em. From now on wrinkles are irrelevant.
Looking the best we possibly can is not all about vanity or personal pride. It’s often a vital element to retaining employment. Our boomer generation is well educated, a large proportion of us have tertiary qualifications, hold senior management positions or successfully run our own companies.
But many of us are flying solo without support from partners or husbands and have to stay in the workforce as an employee simply to survive financially. When there is a pay check to preserve we may have to do all we can to look youthful.
University studies on people in the workforce concluded that regardless of their intellect, those who were young, slim and attractive were more likely to be offered jobs, more likely to keep them, and more likely to be candidates for promotion, than people who were not as young, slim or as attractive.
Those of us who’ve glanced around the workplace and realized our colleagues are all younger (and not by just a couple of years) will have experienced the alarm this realization can bring. We need to look young and modern, actually, we need to look fantastic to keep the dollars coming in and prevent our self esteem (and living standards) from taking a nosedive.
If everyone else rocks up to your workplace in jeans please don’t be the one sitting at the desk in a pleated skirt, pantyhose and sensible shoes. Don’t be the person wearing non-descript grey hair when your co-workers are sporting choppy layers and caramel highlights.
So, how do we go about looking youthful and current?
First and foremost, we need to defy gravity – visually, apparently and actually!
Essentially any earth-bound body parts add years on to our appearance. So, anything drooping downwards needs to make a U-turn and thrust back heavenwards!
Absolutely everything that can be hoisted up (breasts, butt, brows,) must be hoisted up.
Next, to look youthful and current we need to dress to encourage attention upwards. People have lazy eyes that find the most obvious highlight and then focus upon it. The easier we make it for people's eyes to travel smoothly up the body or the outside silhouette to the face while skipping over any wide issues, the more youthful we’ll appear. So, guide other people's lazy eyes by providing vertical lines for the eyes to follow and they’ll flick over broader horizontal distractions such as hips, waist, bust or shoulders.
Most people would like to appear tall and slim. Vertical influences give the body a longer and narrower appearance. The most powerful vertical line flows up the middle of the body.
How to look ten years younger and 20 kilos lighter - in moments:
The clothes we wear have an enormous impact on our apparent (visual) weight and height. Stand in front of a full length mirror and calculate how many vertical influences you have on right now. Add a few of the following suggestions to the outfit you are currently wearing and see how much longer and leaner you appear.
Each vertical influence that follows will visually deduct 2 kilos (to a maximum of 20 kilos) from your appearance:
- Pointy toed shoes (subtract another kilo if they are nude coloured or tan!).
- Stiletto heels.
- Tights with seams running up the back of the legs.
- Straight skirt.
- Long straight pants without a cuff.
- Pants with a hemline that skims the lower part of the heel of your shoe.
- Long straight pants with a vertical crease ironed up the front.
- Button through dress (shirtdress).
- Skirt hemline finishing at the knee (legs are strong verticals).
- Any vertical zips, slits, diagonal or vertical pocket openings (welt, flap or jet), stitching details or embellishments – 1 kilo for each.
- High waisted pants without a waistband (but not jeans).
- High waisted skirt without a waistband.
- Knuckle length jacket.
- Knuckle length top.
- Front closing zip.
- Long length necklace.
- Bag carried over one shoulder with a long thin strap.
- Tapered three quarter length sleeves.
- ’V’ neckline.
- Shirt or blouse buttons open to form a V neckline.
- Uplifting bra.
- Long thin scarf.
- Soft flowing folds – take an extra kilo if they are part of a summery crushed fabric ankle-length peasant skirt without tiers, bands or any interfering horizontals.
- Vertical pinstripes (as long as they are straight).
- Drop earrings.
- Eyeglass frames that sweep upwards.
- Eyeglasses with decorative interest on the upper part of the frames.
- Short, bouncy hair.
- Arched eyebrows.
- Colour blocked clothing running through the centre of the body, i.e. dark pants and top beneath a medium coloured jacket worn open.
- Colour blocked clothing running up the outer body silhouette - dark pants and jacket over a medium coloured top.
Switch your clothes around a little, put on a pair of dark straight legged pants and a long dark top with ¾ length sleeves and see how much slimmer you look. Add dark shoes, dark knee-highs under the pants and a long necklace then marvel at the kilos and years you’ve subtracted from your appearance!
The five minute make-up
The last task towards creating an instant impact is to put on some make-up! Don’t worry if you don’t have all the cosmetics described here, just put on what you do have in your stash, and go lightly, especially if you haven’t worn full war paint since you were in your teens!
Once you’ve established a simple routine it’s easy to pull together a polished look in five minutes. Not a lot of time out of a day is it? So on with some slap and up with your spirit!
Step 1 Skin (30 seconds)
Foundation or tinted moisturizer. Here’s the thing: apply foundation or tinted moisturiser only where the skin tone needs to be evened out, or to cover blemishes, discoloration, or redness on either side of your nose.
Apply creamy concealer under the eyes, use the pads of your ring fingers to blend it in really well.
Apply a light dusting of face powder, again only where you think it’s needed – nose, chin and forehead are the major shiny culprits.
Step 2 Eye shadow (1 minute)
Brush light coloured powder eye shadow over the entire upper eyelids. Choose a matte shade with a neutral sounding name like vanilla, tawny, beige or sand. You’re not making a colour statement here, all you are doing is bringing luminescence to the eyes and disguising and neutralizing any redness on the lids.
A smudge of eye shadow in a medium to dark shade brushed onto the outer corner of the eye from the crease to the lashes will add a little drama.
Step 3 Eyeliner (1 minute)
The secret is in the technique. Work with a soft eyeliner pencil until you get the hang of it, and then switch to liquid eyeliner if you prefer.
Rest your elbows on a solid surface (table, vanity top, etc.) to keep your hands steady.
Use an eyeliner pencil with a soft point and make a line of tiny dots right next to each other as close to the upper lash line as you can draw them. You might find dots are easier to control than a continuous line when you are reacquainting yourself with eyeliner; and when the dots are drawn close together they create the same depth as a continuous line. Apply to the lower lids too, try using a soft colour that enhances your eye colour, instead of hard dark brown or black. Do not line the inner rims of your eyes (inside the lashes), it’s so 1980s! Use a cotton tip or a small brush to blend the eyeliner and soften the edges.
Step 4 Cheeks (30 seconds)
Apply sheer blush to the apples of your cheeks and blend the edges to meld into the foundation or tinted moisturiser applied in step 1.
Step 5 Eyelashes and eyebrows (1 minute)
Coat upper and the lower lashes with mascara, starting at the root of the eyelashes and brushing towards the tips.
Define and strengthen your eyebrows with eyebrow pencil or eyebrow gel applied in short feathery strokes.
Step 6 Lips (30 seconds)
Use lip liner pencil to outline your lips and here’s another little trick:
Apply the lip liner pencil only to fill in gaps, define the line or correct any natural wobbly edges.
Fill in the lips with glossy pink lipstick or shiny pink lip gloss. Or both!
Step 7 Hair (30 seconds)
Apply a dab of volumiser or mousse to your dry hair and massage it into the roots. Heat- style hair with a blow dryer, directing the warm air onto the roots and lifting the hair as you do so.
If you wear your hair curly, scrunch it into place, but don’t over-manipulate it.
For a straighter look, upend your head and apply heat from a blow dryer on the dry hair as you smooth, brush or finger-tip it into place. Alternatively use an electric straightener or flat iron.
Fabulous! Instant impact gorgeous!
