Meet the Revolutionary Red Lipstick Brand Beloved by Model Anja Rubik
time2017/10/25
Meet the Revolutionary Red Lipstick Brand Beloved by Model Anja Rubik
Did you know that an estimated 1 billion lipstick tubes are thrown out each year? It is a notion that is made even more astonishing when you think about where the waste ends up: the ocean. Now there is an attempt to curb such contamination with the launch of a luxurious refillable lipstick line called La Bouche Rouge, a new Paris maison maquillage that is supported by LVMH and available to purchase online and at Colette. Made not from plastic but instead the same natural leather that is used by the likes of Hermès, the goal is “to incite people to buy less in order to buy better,” says founder Nicolas Gerlier of the eco-friendly casing that can be monogrammed. “We avoided [materials like] plastic from the beginning to the end.”
The rouges, which are unscented and free of harmful ingredients like endocrine disruptors, allergens, polyethylene, and polymethyl methacrylate, come in almost every shade of red. “Every woman wants to have [a lipstick in] the right red,” says Gerlier, who, along with the brand’s creative director, Ezra Petronio, tapped British celebrity makeup artist Wendy Rowe to perfect the two textures—a soft matte and a luxurious satin—as well as six hues, which range from a Pop-y, Andy Warhol–esque orange to a pigmented rust.
“I like the idea that buying a lipstick can become activism,” says model and ocean advocate Anja Rubik, who, as La Bouche Rouge’s first face, collaborated on two custom shades: a deep red, inspired by the Anthony Vaccarello dress she wore to the 2013 punk-themed Met Gala, and a caramel nude (the Spring 2018 season’s new classic), both of which she delicately pats above the lip line. “I always cheat,” she says of the blurred-lines lipstick move. “It gives you a really nice, full lip.” Talk about a game changer.