Be Sexy and Hot Loud Mouth Red or pink, full and luscious or thin and stern, lips are an important part of our facial anatomy. In fact, imagining a face without lips is inconceivable. For a woman, her lips, along with her eyes, play an important part in her seductiveness. Over the centuries, women have always reddened their lips in a bid to appear more alluring. Either with carmine, or other natural pigments, and of course, in the modern age, with synthetically created formulations with pigments called lipsticks. Remember how Cleopatra used her deep kohled eyes and carmine-reddened lips as tactical seduction weapons to keep the Romans from gobbling up her kingdom? Lips, according to noted anthropologists like Desmond Morris, are uniquely important to the human female because, her other erogenous zone being covered, these can mimic its reddening and arousal. SHAPE UP, BABY The lips of classic sex symbols like Marilyn Monroe have always been lush, bow shaped and a deep seductive red. Modern day sex symbols like Jennifer Lopez may tone down the lush and the deep red, but they add on shimmer and shine. According to those who measure beauty, ideal lips have a certain size and shape. In profile, the lips should have a gentle S-shaped curve with a four-millimetre depression between the lips and chin. Vertical lines imaginably drawn down from the inner corners of the eyes delineate the overall size of the lips. The upper lip should be no more than 75 per cent the size of the lower one. This ensures that there is an overall pout to the lips — no matter how plump or full they are. Before you rush to the mirror with a measuring tape, remember that there have been various ideals of lips down the ages. At the turn of the 19th century, the ideal lip was a small rosebud mouth, which became the thin cynical slash of lipstick in the 1920s. By the 1950s and ’60s, full blown bow lips, red and glossy, became every woman’s trademark after they were immortalised by Monroe. Over the next couple of decades, lips went from shimmery to natural, and now are poised between being pink, glossy and pouty and natural, nude and wide. PERFECT POUTERS It isn’t enough to just redden your lips — your puckers also have to be perfect. That brings on a whole slew of lip products from lip creams with alpha hydroxy acids (AHAs) to remove dead lip skin, and products to even out wrinkles above the lip line. Applying colour on bare lips is passe — you need to line and prepare them with a base solution first. Then lock in colour with a lip sealant, to help the colour stay on for hours without smudging or wandering into the fine lines along the lip line that only youth doesn’t know about. A permanent lip line — using a natural pinkish pigment to tattoo your lips — can be obtained via a procedure being offered bymost beauty clinics and cosmetic centres. Saves the hassle of daily lip lining, and lets you have a defined lip line even with bare gloss. Getting a permanent lip line done is no more dangerous than getting a tattoo, and just as irreversible. It’s an affordable two-hour procedure that’ll leave your wallet lighter by Rs 7,000 at reputed clinics like VLCC and Berkowitz. Lips also tend to develop lines around the edge, which causes lipstick to bleed. Not very attractive when you wear a dark colour. This makes way for another product, the lipstick fixer — a product that ensures your lipstick doesn’t bleed around the edges of your lips. PLUMP UP THE VOLUME Whether a pouty version like the one Malaika Arora carries around or the full-blown version that Angelina Jolie sports, lips have to be plump and inviting. Young lips are plump lips and red lips (or pink, depending on your natural colouring). As we age, the underlying supporting layers of tissue in our lips get thinner. And of course, muscle tension and tone become lax. As a result, lips begin to hang, lengthen and thin. Smoking also makes your lips darker and causes them to develop wrinkles and pucker lines. Worse, their texture gets rougher and unattractive. It’s no small wonder then that women (and some men) across the world are going in for lip enhancement surgery, to either plump up their puckers or, more commonly to get asymmetrical lips evened out through plastic surgery. SURGICAL SOLUTIONS If you have problem lips, there is no reason to be stuck with them. Make-up can help, and so can the surgeon. You only have to determine how unhappy you are. For the surgery-shy, temporary lip plumping products can give you that bee-stung look without any needles. These products, containing vitamins, AHAs and honey, claim to make thin lips voluptuous if applied correctly. Cosmeceuticals’ Vitamin C Lip Plumper, Coneflower Lipline Firmer, Benefit Lip Plump and Joey New York Super Duper Lips (not available in India) are among some of the products that make you look like the female version of Mick Jagger. If you don’t mind getting yourself some surgery, your options range from a 20-minute anaesthesia-free procedure that allows you to return immediately to work without swelling or discomfort, all the way up to a two-hour hospital procedure under general anaesthesia, entailing significant swelling, one to two weeks off work, and some pain. And, according to Dr Vijay Sharma, noted cosmetic surgeon, lip enhancement is not just for models and actresses any more. “The average middle class person also doesn’t mind spending a little to enhance her lips through surgery.” Before opting for any surgical procedure, you must check how your teeth influence the way your lips appear. Any protruding or missing teeth can alter the way your lips appear. There are three general categories of procedures that enhance the lips. These are: Injections of materials such as collagen, Grafting of substances such as gorotex or fat, and Creating local flaps and incisions that redistribute the tissues from inside the mouth to outside. The results can be temporary or permanent. The simplest of these are collagen injections, which provide an instant enhancement, and adjust asymmetries or unevenness of the lips. The number of injections required depends upon the size and shape that the patient desires. All that is required is some topical anaesthesia on the surface of the lips. The lips are injected with a combination of collagen (a purified preparation of bovine — animal — skin available in different concentrations and compositions), dermalogen (derived from human skin — the dermis), autologen (prepared and derived from a patient’s own skin) and fat (taken from the patient’s body itself during liposuction). Grafting involves injecting products like goretex, a biocompatible substance that comes in sheets or strips, alloderm (a sheet of human collagen tissue which has been purified and rendered non-immunogenic) and dermis fat. The surgical creation of local flaps is a full-fledged operation. Remember, a plastic surgeon is the best person to advise you on which procedure would be the best for you. LIPSTICK ON YOUR COLLAR In any discussion on lips, how can we miss out on that one essential cosmetic that can be found in the vanity case of every woman from the ages of 15 to 80? Today, it isn’t just any old lipstick that will do. One product multi-tasks as sunscreen, moisturiser, non-transfer colour and vitamin enhancer. The latest generation of lipsticks offer non-transfer colour, SPF, bad breath-fighting benefits and a fruity taste. What more could one want? And then there are the types to choose from — matte, glossy, frosted, liquid or stain. If choosing from these wasn’t tough enough, there are the wonderful lip balms that most people seem to be toting around in their handbags these days. “Just some lip balm and deep kohl, and I’m set,” reveals model Bipasha Basu. Model-veejay Achala Sachdev is another balm fanatic. “I go nowhere without lip balm,” she says. For sure, lip balms are an essential component of one’s routine today. nd these lip balms come in a variety of tempting tastes and fragrances — from mint julep to mango and papaya, and for the truly addicted, chocolate and coffee. THE LIP WISH LIST FROM FOREIGN SHORES Kiehl’s lip balm: To quote make-up guru Kevyn Aucoin, “Every single person in the world uses this. Well, every model and actress I know does.” The Body Shop Lip Balm: Well, every single model we know uses this. Vaseline: Nothing works better on chapped lips. MAC Lip Gloss: Stays on forever and adds great shimmer to lipstick. L’Oreal Liquid Lip: Glossy. Very glossy. Diorific Plastic Shine: Glossier. By Kiran Manral