Fashion Brief
I know many women who revel in their greying hair and feel perfectly fine about the odd wrinkle. But I don’t know anyone who’s happy to cross the Rubicon of ageing into proud facial hair-wearer. I’m all too aware that, after around the age of 35, rogue hairs begin to sprout from the chin, upper lip and/or cheeks, and at increasingly alarming speed. One can, as I do, pluck the occasional hair that’s thick and visible enough (you know, the ones that stick out like pipe cleaners among the regular downy fuzz – so satisfying), but for anything more, maintenance can feel like a Sisyphean task.
IPL (intense pulsed light) works brilliantly on dark hair, but not on blondes, greys and redheads, and is expensive. I generally wax or thread my upper lip for photographs, but both can leave a spotty reaction that’s as annoying as the moustache. Wet shaving is a ball and chain, and oddly upsetting for a woman.
For years now, I’ve recommended fuzz trimmers to women who feel the need to engage in daily epilation. I used to be able to buy them only in America, but the excellent beauty writer Emma Gunavardhana recently alerted me to their availability on QVC here (£11.50 for two). They’re brilliantly simple and effective. Just stroke the trimmer along the hair growth to remove. There’s no water or foam, and the safety guards make the whole thing infallible (you can even use it over makeup). More expensive, but extremely nifty, is the Philips Precision Perfect (£14.99, Boots), a posh version of the trimmers. It can be used and carried anywhere and leaves skin as it found it.
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