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A Good Curl is Hard to Find

By Jennifer Chininis |

Women do the weirdest things in the name of beauty—myself included. We are getting injectables as often—and as easily—as manicures. We subject ourselves to lasers to correct everything from sun spots to stretch marks. We’re not spending our lunch hours eating; we’re getting plucked, pumped, and primped.

Recently I decided that I needed to have my stubbornly straight eyelashes permed. (Ironic, isn’t it, considering all the curls on my head.) They will succumb to an eyelash curler, but only under certain conditions, i.e., cool and dry. I can forget it if I’m in a hurry and the bathroom is still foggy from the shower. This especially upsets me because I believe in a low-maintenance makeup regimen: eye cream, tinted moisturizer, a bit of concealer, translucent powder, blush, curled eyelashes, done. Maybe I will swipe on some lip gloss, but I don’t like to get it on my coffee mug. So you can imagine my distress when my eyelashes won’t curl. It’s as if I haven’t tried to look lovely at all.

Enter Laura Khalil, aka Laura the Brow Queen (www.laurathebrowqueen.com), who offers a small arsenal of beauty-enhancing procedures: waxing, brow shaping, facials, spray tanning, and, yes, lash perming. She’s in the business of fixing pesky problems, which worked out well for me, because mine was a tough case. She tried her favorite perming method first—gently gluing my lashes to a small premade form that sits on your eyelid, then applying the perming solution—but I was tearing up so excessively that she couldn’t get my lashes to stick. Undeterred, she pulled out two tiny white perming rods and tried again. This time, I had a tissue in my hand, ready to wipe away any tears, and Laura gently blew on my closed eyelids while the glue dried.

I’m not going to lie: it was uncomfortable. I felt a bit of a sting from the perming solution, not to mention someone was poking around near my eyeball. But I didn’t care. I was going to have the curly lashes I was always meant to have. I would emerge looking wide awake and perfectly put-together. I’d certainly been through worse than this. Besides, Laura is a hoot and knows her stuff.

Laura’s tenaciousness and problem-solving paid off, because I have put my eyelash curler in long-term storage. (The results can last up to four months, but for me and my stubborn eyelashes, Laura predicted two.) I’m now inspired to add another step to my low-maintenance makeup routine: mascara. How’s that for progress?

All the best,

Jennifer Chininis
Executive Editor

P.S. I hope you enjoy reading our inaugural D Beauty Awards, a celebration of the people, places, and products that keep us gorgeous. Do you know of someone or something equally amazing? Send me an e-mail at [email protected]. I love a good beauty secret.

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