Lips / Neck
Lips
Up until a few years ago, what God gave you in the lips department was with you for life. But with the introduction of collagen and hyaluronic acid (babies are full of this - look at their skin), thin lips are a thing of the past.
If your problem is simply dry lips, slap on some lip balm. For thin lips, try Susannah's trick of brushing a damp toothbrush back and forth over the lips (not too hard) for a minute. Lip plumpers will make thin lips temporarily fatter. DuWop's Lip Venom contains cinnamon, which reacts on your lips and makes them tingle.
For those with lined lips (either through smoking or talking too much), the best medium-term solution is to use a wax-based product around the area to fill in the cracks. Trinny also massages her wrinkle cream into her lips every night for two minutes.
If you are looking for a long-term solution for either lip plumping or just line filling, make sure, before you succumb to the likes of Restylane (a hyaluronic acid filler) or Hylaform, that you work out how much bigger you really want your lips.
The technician who does the treatment should be able to work out the best lip size to suit your features. There are new fillers coming on to the market all the time, so check with your technician that the one you choose has undergone sufficiently rigorous research.
A toothbrush is a useful and quick way of livening up lips.
Short term
- Aveda Lip Saver SPF 15
- Crème de la Mer The Lip Balm
- DuWop Lip Venom
- Dr Hauschka Lip Balm
- Helena Rubenstein
- Collagenist Lip Zoom
- NV Perricone ALA Lip Plumper
Medium term
- Mary Cohr New Youth Lip Care
- Origins Line Chaser
- Paula Dorf Line Smoother
- The Organic Pharmacy
- Lip & Eye Treatment Cream
- Prescriptives Magic range Invisible Line Smoother
- Scrub your lips gently with a soft toothbrush each night
Long term
- Hyaluronic acid filler such as Restylane Touch, Hylaform or Juvaderm from Fiona & Marie Aesthetics, Dr Sebagh and all good cosmetic surgeons and facial aestheticians
Neck
So many of us spend a fortune on our face and totally forget about our neck. The neck gets a hard time of it anyway.
We recline in bed, neck bent towards book, wrinkles forming as we read. We forget our neck when applying the sun lotion. It's only when it's too late that we discover the place with the most lines on our bodies is our neck.
How many face-lifts have we seen where the neck was forgotten? The combination of 30 upstairs and 50 below is dreadful. Like the hands. If you are reading this book in your thirties, remember the earlier you start the better. Slap on that moisturiser, SPF 20, and try to read less in bed. If you have hit your forties and the sag is setting in, no neck cream will give you any permanent results (although Sisley and La Prairie will give you temporary relief).
If you can bear it, Botox can be injected into certain necks, but you have to have the right muscles or it can be quite dangerous. If done regularly this can prevent further damage.
For the most permanent change, liposuction can remove excess fat, and a face-lift can add to a chin, thereby giving some shape that will hide the worst of the neck.
Sisley Neck Cream helps in the short term.
Short term
- Korres Passion Flower Firming and Line Smoothing Neck Cream
- La Prairie Neck Cream
- RéVive Fermitif Neck Renewal Cream
- Sisley Neck Cream
Medium term
- Botox
Long term
- Polaris Tissue Tightening treatment using radio frequency, from the French Cosmetic Medical Company; radio frequency treatments are also available at good aestheticians and cosmetic clinics
- Surgical neck lift
