I’m very skeptical about the marketing babble around beauty products because most of the time, the products do not deliver the promised results. Philosophy’s Microdelivery Peel, however, was a huge surprise. I was expecting to be disappointed but I ended up with a very smooth, soft face. The results are so impressive that I decided I did not need foundation after a session with this product.

It’s very easy to apply: you start with the yellow crystal paste which is in the jar. You massage it gently for a minute, then add the clear liquid which creates a foamy cream on your face. Gently massage some more for a couple of minutes and leave it on for another minute or two. After you wash it all off, you are left with beautiful skin.

You can buy Philosophy products at Sephora and any major department store, or you can go to Beauty.com which does not charge shipping or sales tax.

I can’t believe no one thought of this sooner. Mypressi TWIST is a portable espresso maker for people who want to have good coffee wherever they are, even in a location infested with Starbucks coffee outlets. According to the mypressi website, “the TWIST requires no external power to produce single or double shots from either fresh ground coffee or ESE pods. Just put in the ground coffee or pod, pour in some hot water and pull the trigger. Seconds later you can enjoy a perfect espresso extraction. Clean-up is just as easy: give the TWIST a quick rinse and you’re done.”

You can go online and order it now for $169 at http://shop.mypressi.com/.

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Fall is just around the corner. You can feel the chill in the evening air. With the cold and dry weather, we need to nourish our skin a little bit more and pamper ourselves as the days get shorter and the darkness falls upon us.

Here are my shopping picks of the day: the theme is nourishing and revitalizing. I have used these products and recommend them wholeheartedly.

1. REN Bath Oil, Moroccan Rose Otto: Soaking for a long time in the bath really dehydrates the skin. So you must add bath oil. This one smells lovely and leaves your skin feeling soft. Unlike other rose-scented products on the market, this one does not smell harsh and overwhelming.

2. Avene Cleanance Soap-free Facial Gel Cleanser: I’ve been using Avene products for years when I was living in Europe. You couldn’t get them in the US in the past, but that’s changed. Beauty.com now carries Avene’s products, which are great for sensitive skin.

Avene targets this soap-free cleanser to people who have oily, blemished and sensitive skin but I’ve used it and my skin is combination and not blemished. Unlike other companies’ products which strip oily skin and inflame it even more, this one does the opposite. The price is very affordable.

3. Decleor Aromessence Neroli Comforting Concentrate: I love Decleor products and this one is my favorite in the winter time. It’s a pure oil that you apply sparingly all over your face, neck, hands, wherever your skin feels dehydrated and raw.

4. Eve Lom Cleanser: This is not your typical cleanser. But it takes off ALL makeup, including the most waterproof mascara and long-lasting lipstick. What is so different about this cleanser:

• It is an thick, opaque paste that you apply to your face, spread around and massage. You take the muslin cloth that comes with it, soak it in warm water and use it to take off all of the paste. The stuff turns into a milky white fluid when it comes in contact with water (similar to oil cleansers).
• The smell of the cleanser is quite awful — reminds me of motor oil — but you get used to it. It’s a small price to pay for the result: a clean, smooth face that does not feel tight.
• Used over several nights, you will find that your skin feels softer and smoother.

I used to go to the Eve Lom skincare salon in London for my facials. Alas, Eve Lom has no salon here in San Francisco. Eve Lom’s products are sold in the Space NK boutique in Bloomingdales if you want to check them out before buying online (Beauty.com carries the range of Eve Lom products). This is the best cleanser you will ever use. It comes in a small jar and a larger one, the latter being more economical.

5. Jimmyjane Ember, Natural Emollient Massage Candle, Lapsang + Lychee:  Jimmyjane makes the most unusual candles. This one has a gorgeous lapsang-lychee scent which is quite exotic. It’s a regular scented candle but you blow it out and drizzle the warm wax over your body. When heated, the wax liquefies into high-slip massage oil that softens and hydrates the skin.

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Of the new fragrances launched this fall, my favorite is A Scent by Issey Miyake. It smells very clean and fresh with notes of hyacinth and galbanum, as well as verbena and jasmine. Miyake’s last fragrance launch was over 10 years ago so his design house made an effort to launch something truly unique. They asked bottle designer Arik Levy to create a bottle that looks as though it were sliced “from a single, continuous block of light-filled glass”.

How to wear this fragrance: get the shower gel, which smells divine, and layer on the body lotion (also in beautiful, minimalist packaging) and finally spray the eau de toilette all over yourself.

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I have been a fan of Toast for many years. Toast is a UK-based shopping catalog which has both a beautiful paper catalog and an online shop. Not only are the photo shoots so mysterious and atmospheric, the merchandise is unique and gorgeous.

Since it’s getting colder, you’ll find Toast’s cozy throws and blankets, sweaters and jackets, mittens and socks to be all you need to thrive this winter. I especially love the flannel pyjamas and bed linen. Toast also sells housewares, such as ceramic bowls, rugs, and bins.

Toast opened a few shops in the UK, including a small concession in Selfridges in London. But for those of us who do not live in the UK, it’s good to see that they still have the online catalog.

Toast
191 Westbourne Grove
Notting Hill
London, W11 2SB
United Kingdom
+44 (0)20 7229 8325
www.toast.co.uk

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One of my favorite cosmetics brands, Prescriptives, won’t be around much longer. The Estee Lauder Group, which owns the brand, has decided to kill it. I have been suspecting for many months now that Prescriptives was on the list of soon to be dead brands because they have not had product launches in a while, they are not advertising and their counters do not have staff. It just felt empty. Now we know why. The Estee Lauder company has not been investing at all in this brand.

Prescriptives was the first brand to categorize colors of foundation, eye shadow, blush and lipstick into three color groups — warm, neutral and cool — to help women choose the right shade for their complexion. It was also one of the first to create yellow-based foundations which appealed especially to Asian women. Despite its innovations in the early years of its existence, other brands caught up and Prescriptives never really came up with the *killer* product. Brands like MAC and Benefit targeted younger women with trendy packaging and edgy advertising campaigns. But in its own market — high-end cosmetics for older women — other brands, including those within the Lauder group, were more successful.

The last products I bought from Prescriptives was their custom-blended foundation. This was an absolutely brilliant way to get a foundation that exactly matches your skin tone. They also had custom-blended powders and lipsticks.

Few articles of clothing allow us to express ourselves as much as T-shirts have done in the last thirty years. The T-shirt has become the uniform of modern civilization. So I’m always on the lookout for tees that are much more creative and unusual than those you would find in a chain store. That’s why I like Super 7, a funky emporium located in a tiny shop in Japantown, San Francisco, started by SF artist Brian Flynn. And they have more than T-shirts. Read my review on NBC Bay Area News.

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This week, I am profiling fashion designer, Xuan-Thu Nguyen, a young Vietnamese woman who emigrated to the Netherlands with her family, but now lives in Paris. She has both ready-to-wear and couture collections. Her boutique is in the fashionable district of the Marais. I met Thu in Amsterdam a few years ago. I have always loved her clothes and accessories. They’re feminine and modern, and they do not borrow slavishly from the past.

Via email I posed several questions which she answered, as usual, with the same modesty that is uncommon in many young designers.

(1) What were your inspirations for the fall/winter 2009 collection?

The collection is about sand lines, water wrinkles. Starting something that can go either way . . . gone quietly or having texture like: pleats or ruffles to enhanced the shape.

(2) What are the advantages of having your own label vs. working for a fashion house? What are the disadvantages?

The advantage of having your own label is that there are no restrictions and fewer expectations. The disadvantage is not having a readily accessible network and the financing that a larger fashion company possesses.

(3) When you first came out of design school, did you already think of opening a Paris store? Or was that a distant dream?

I did not think about having a Paris store at all. I always thought it would be too much work to have my own boutique. But in 2005, we opened one anyway, in the Marais, which is a trendy district in Paris. And it was the best decision I have ever made.

(4) Why did you move from Amsterdam to Paris?

I moved to Paris because we opened the boutique and I needed to be there full-time. Originally, the plan had been to open the first shop in Amsterdam, but after thinking about it, we thought it was better to open the first one in Paris. After all, Paris is the fashion capital of Europe. My sister, Lan, also moved to Paris and has been of tremendous help to me.

(5) What advice would you give to any young designer who wants to start his or her label? What advice would you give about opening a shop in Paris?

My advice is if this is really what you want, then go for it! It is a lot of hard work and there is nothing glamorous about it. I do it out of passion!

Here are two pieces from her fall/winter 2009 collection:

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Spring/Summer 2009 Couture Show

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Xuan-Thu Nguyen
1, Rue Ferdinand Duval
75004 Paris
France
+33 (0)1 42 770 860
www.x-tn.nl

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There’s no reason to spend massive amounts of money on shower gels and moisturizers for the body. If you go to department stores, you’ll see body lotions selling for over $30. Although they may smell better than drugstore brands, the truth is that they do not make your skin softer. In my experience, the best body moisturizer is still Vaseline Intensive Care. I’ve tried a number of department store brands and nothing comes close, except perhaps Aveeno, which a lot of dermatologists seem to recommend to their patients. Vaseline has a large number of moisturizers with gimmicky names, but I like the original formula. It’s not perfumed either.

In the shower gel category, I like the bath gels from EO which is a line of organic skincare products that smell very good and are gentle on the body, especially the French lavender. EO also sells shampoos, conditioners, hand soap and body lotion.

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It’s fall once again and that means cosmetics companies are launching new skincare and makeup products. I visited a department store in downtown San Francisco and was amazed to see that some companies are pricing their new facial creams at over $200. Have they spent the last 15 months in a spaceship orbiting Earth detached from the economic crisis affecting the humans below? Many of these creams promise eternal youth or “anti-aging” as the industry likes to call these creams and serums. But the price never justifies the results. If you read the ingredient list you will see that the chemicals in the products do not arrest the aging process. At best, they soften your lines. And there are enough drugstore products that create the same effect for a fraction of the price.

So I have decided to post my two favorite, cheap facial moisturizers: one for day (with sunscreen) and another for night.

The day cream is Neutrogena Healthy Skin Face Lotion with SPF 15 Multivitamin Facial Treatment with Alpha Hydroxy. The alpha hydroxy acid in the lotion exfoliates the skin on your face, creating a smoother texture over time. I have been using this cream for over a year with great results. Some people may feel a slight stinging but it goes away after a while. The packaging is very important: it’s in an airtight container to protect the ingredients from sunlight and air. Avoid moisturizers packaged in a pot.

The other favorite is the Cerave moisturizing cream in a tube. I use this at night because it does provide moisture and softness, but without the greasy, sticky effect of other heavy night creams.

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