Covet: L’Occitane Fall 2013 Shea Flowers of Love Collection

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Sorting through a few press releases in my e-mail in-box, I was happy to read this announcement (and to see these lovely images):

“This October, L’OCCITANE will introduce a colorful Limited-Edition Shea Butter Collection, Shea Flowers of Love. The series adds a touch of cheer to winter by combining three unique scents (Rose Tenderness, Subtle Violet and Passionate Jasmine) with their signature ingredient, Shea Butter.”

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Each scent will be available in a travel-size hand cream ($12), a body cream ($22), and a lip balm ($12). Since rose and violet are my two favorite fragrance notes, and I’m a longtime fan of L’Occitane’s shea butter products, I’ll be tempted to scoop up a few of these limited edition items. 

Information and images via L’Occitane.

 

A Busy Week (or Two)

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I haven’t been keeping up with my usual blogging schedule! Last week I was getting ready for an out-of-town weekend (visiting friends in Detroit) and now I’m facing several short-term deadlines at work. I should be able to find more time for writing next week!

Image: Francis Davis Millet, Reading the Story of Oenone (detail), Detroit Institute of Arts. Photo by Tinsel Creation.

Lipstick Samplers from Besame Cosmetics

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When the vintage-inspired Besame makeup line was launched, back in 2005, there was a lot of online chatter about its richly pigmented, glamorously packaged lipsticks. We realized that these lipsticks were tiny, but mighty, and we all admired their vivid, feminine colors. No minimalist nudes here!

The one problem was the difficulty of sampling the colors before purchasing a lipstick. Since Besame has never been distributed widely, it was hard to see the products in person. (Henri Bendel carried Besame for a brief time; I bought a Merlot lipstick. Then they dropped the line.)

At long last, Besame is selling samples of the lipsticks, in a particularly clever way. The new lipstick samplers look like a fancy matchbooks, and inside each one, six cardboard “matches” are tipped with small amounts of lipstick. Each sampler includes two colors to try, with three samples of each color. Each sample is enough for three uses.

Seven color pairs are offered. Which would you choose?

Each sampler sells for $5 at the Besame website.