Annabel Rivkin on the conundrum of the nude lipstick

Annabel Rivkin goes nude… but naturally this time
The Chanel perfect nude
Annabel Rivkin31 October 2019

Oh, the conundrum of the nude lipstick.

They’ve sold us a myth, my beauties: it’s so easy… anyone can wear it. Nonsense.

Generally, nude lipsticks are among the most intimidating because they can be so… deadening. Slightly pinky and they can make us look like regional newsreaders or mothers of the bride. Too beige and they can corpsify the bonniest of us. Also the more fashionable, browner shades are unkind to teeth, yellowing them dishearteningly.

I recently visited the American Smile clinic just off Sloane Square, for its very time efficient and gentle-to-teeth whitening treatment. I watched telly for two hours and left with pearly — but not glaring — gnashers, so perhaps I was emboldened to revisit the nude lip. Chanel’s Rouge Allure Ink Fusion sealed the deal. Less of a lipstick and more of a paint, every shade in the vast and gorgeous range has its own story. But we are here for Beige Naturel, the most flatteringly wearable nude ever.

For a super-dressed-down girl next door vibe, you can pop this on with tinted moisturiser and run — ne’er a mascara or a contour in sight… For increased elan, start with a good lipliner and end with a fudgey, polished eye and an apricot blusher. Either way, it comes out utterly — yet approachably — matte, but it never reminds you that it is there with the desperate dryness that can set in with some matte lipsticks. But it is there. And it will stay there. Nude but, for once, natural. And easy. Rouge Allure Ink Fusion, £31 (chanel.com)

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