The ideal woman for any man is half his age, plus seven years, so is it any wonder women still spend billions on anti-ageing products? writes ORNA MULCAHY
LADIES, GET ready to invest in some new tools for the bathroom cabinet. DIY gadgetry is set to be a big trend in the beauty business, according to Vogue magazine. Beauty companies “recognise that consumers are increasingly confident with self-treatment”, trumpets the April issue, and so are preparing to provide some new tools to be used at home. Or put it another way: beauty companies see an opening to sell gadgets to recession-hit women who can no longer afford weekly spa visits but who are desperate to lift their complexions.
There is a waiting list for the first of these home help items, the Pore-Fector from Bliss, a vibrating palette knife that passes over the skin, extracting blemishes as it goes, or so it claims. Blackheads apparently leap from the pores under the sonic waves from the knife, which at no stage penetrates the skin. Yours for £125 and leaves no marks behind.
If the budget doesn’t stretch to that may I recommend an old remedy: a body brush – available from any good chemist, or indeed veterinary supplies – will remove dead cells from the skin in a jiffy, while a whipped-up egg white, if allowed to set on the face for 15 minutes, will produce a surprisingly taut result, and you can use the leftovers for meringues.
Anti-ageing is on my mind this week, what with that terrible photograph of Carla Bruni doing the rounds. The one where she looks all pale and weirdly frozen, as if she has been doing a bit of DIY botox in the privacy of her own boudoir and it has gone badly wrong. All of a sudden she looks less like Carla, the free spirit, and more like the free spirit’s witchy mother. The blogosphere is full of comments comparing her to that poor woman who allowed her husband to operate on her for years and ended up looking like a demented cat.
It’s just not fair. She’s only 42, and if a 42-year-old former top model once considered the sexiest woman in all of Europe feels she has to do things to her face, then what hope is there for the rest of us? Forty-two isn’t old. Plenty of women put off having babies until they’re over 40, so it can’t be considered old. And yet, as any women who has passed the mark will tell you, it’s not young either. A couple of centuries ago, a 42-year-old woman, were she still alive, would be minding the grandchildren and coping with her teeth and hair falling out. Now women of 42 are expected to be sexy and confident and on top of whatever game they’re playing.
But one thing that an older woman cannot do is look like a far younger woman, and that is her tragedy, particularly if her man likes far younger women.
The ideal woman for any man is half his age, plus seven years. I didn’t make that up, it’s a well-known calculation. You can buy Half Your Age Plus 7 T-shirts and mugs on the internet. Explain it to a man and you watch his face puzzle for a moment and then clear before giving in with a graceful smile . . . yes, you see him think, that is actually quite right. How clever of someone to have worked it out! Thus, your 40-year-old man realises that indeed it might be nicer to be with a 27-year-old rather than with someone his own age, who might be losing definition in all kinds of places.
Kate Winslet is feeling the effects of this cruel bit of maths. There she is, rich and successful, an Oscar winner and not yet 40, but still she has been popped back up there on the shelf by her mid-40s husband, film-maker Sam Mendes, who apparently has gotten closer to another actress, Rachel Hall (27). Ha! Okay, so the calculation is a little out, but the picture is roughly the same. He’s trading Kate in for a younger model, to be perfectly blunt and horrible about it.
Meanwhile spare a thought for Oscar-winner Sandra Bullock (45), whose husband Jesse James, is said to have had a fling with model Michelle “Bombshell” McGee, who is “in her 20s”. The pair share an interest in all-over body tattoos and McGee’s excuse is that she thought the couple had already separated when she and Jesse were carrying on.
There is nothing new about these May and September liaisons in Hollywood or anywhere else. Scientists have established that men seek out women with clear skin and shiny hair, two attributes of a healthy body, ie one that can still bear a child. A beautiful mind is somewhere down the list of requirements. That’s why women continue to spend billions each year on anti-ageing products, from moisturisers to collagen implants and from laser treatments to liposuction. The ads are constantly promising and the technology is constantly evolving. The Pore-Fector is just the latest in a long line of products stretching all the way back to Cleopatra’s bath of asses’ milk. Deep down, we know it’s not going to work in any lasting way but heck, it’s always worth a try.