The Daily Telegraph - Features
Concealer and ‘face yoga’: how French women stay fabulous
Our stylish neighbours know a thing or two about looking good over the age of 50, says Sonia Haria
This time last week I was in the fanciest hotel on the French Riviera and couldn’t help but marvel at how well put together the older French women were. One woman in her 50s had a grey streak in her brunette bob that looked like it had been artfully placed by a master coiffeur. Another woman in her 60s appeared not to have a scratch of make-up on except for a slick of creamy red lipstick and brushed-up eyebrows.
The following day in bustling Cannes, there were even more glamorous older French women. By the time I was back in London, the likes of Carla Bruni, Philippine Leroy-Beaulieu and Isabelle Huppert had graced the film festival’s red carpet looking way more glamorous than women 30 years their junior. So what is the magic formula to French beauty?
The glamorous 68-year-old French make-up artist Terry De Gunzburg certainly knows a thing or two about mastering effortless French beauty. It starts with a relaxed attitude towards beauty and appearance, she says. “We are concerned by our looks but not as much as Americans, for instance. It’s style before statement for French women. We want to keep our appearance looking nice but it’s also not the most important thing.”
De Gunzburg cites her 71-yearold friend Isabelle Huppert as the perfect expression of French beauty. “You might be doing little touches of things here and there but it’s the inner beauty, personality and a good smile that is much more important,” she says.
Violette Serrat, another leading French make-up artist, agrees. “In France we take care of what Mother Nature gave us,” she says. “We are not chasing an ideal of youth, because we’ll never be happy.” With her own brand Violette FR, and as the creative director of the heritage French beauty brand Guerlain, Serrat is a leading authority on what she calls “French woman beauty”.
“We have a mentality of self-acceptance and we don’t use beauty to change how we look, but instead as a tool of expression,” she says. “We work in little touches of make-up rather than a full look.”
While there has been a huge trend to chisel, contour and shape the face using a whole host of beauty products, Serrat explains that, in France, it’s more common to just have a few touches of make-up when you feel like it, rather than being committed to a full “look” on a daily basis.
Of course, it’s hard to overlook that skin over 50 often needs a different treatment to that of a young 20-something. “Over the age of 50 we still do need make-up, but we need to use it in a more clever way,” explains De Gunzburg. She favours colour-correcting skin care creams (“CC” creams) over heavy foundations.
“The ‘healthy’ look is more important than the ‘perfect’ look, so French women often use make-up for optical correction such as a dab of concealer where you need it rather than a full face of coverage. The French attitude is to wear make-up but pretend you’re not wearing it at all.” Try the Brightening CC Foundation, £62, by By Terry or the True Match Nude Plumping Tinted Serum, £14.99, by L’Oréal Paris. Add a touch of vibrant blush, et voila!
The culture towards skincare in France has always been very different to that of the UK or America. In France it is more customary to buy skincare from the pharmacy, a cherry-picked selection advised by pharmacists. “From a young age we are taught to avoid the sun and protect the skin from sun damage,” explains De Gunzburg, who says Huppert is “obsessed” with suncare.
“We don’t have long skincare routines, it’s just about using the right formulas but less product.” In Gunzburg’s own By Terry range, which she says she formulates first and foremost for herself, a good skincare routine comprises a hydrating serum, a cream, a good eye cream and, in the day, a high-factor sun protection.
Still, it’s hard to avoid the allure of injectables and in-clinic treatments. While De Gunzburg agrees that certain injectables, such as botox, can refresh the face, she says the trend in Paris is to do little tweaks without changing the shape of your face. De Gunzburg herself has mesotherapy (a cocktail of vitamins injected into the skin) once a year to improve the quality of the skin. Day to day, she does “face yoga” – which you can find in various online tutorials.