I’m just a girl, sitting on front of a glass of wine, asking it to love her. Your weekend homework is to watching Notting Hill, if you haven’t already. Pop quizzes on Monday (P.S. Anyone else as in love with Hugh Grant from the 90s as much as I am?). This photoshoot was born out of the realization that my upstairs bathroom has great light and the fact that nothing quite says “it’s-Friday-after-a-long-ass-week” like sitting on your bathroom floor drinking a goblet of red wine.
I’m also obsessed with my new slippers that in just the perfect shade of neutral brown with a slight hint of pink in them. They feel more substantial than your average slipper because they have rubber soles so you can wear them outside if you wanted to (we don’t, because we’re a no-shoes household, but I like having the option if I’m feeling rebellious against…my own rules?)
SHOP MY LOOK:
Pillar Slippers In Nude Faux Fur
Chunky Cable Knit Sweater in Camel
Cotton Fleece Jogger Pants in Heather Grey
If you haven’t been following my stories on Instagram, I’ve been thinking a lot about what mainstream beauty looks like as I search for a makeup artist (MUA) for our wedding. It has been shockingly difficult to find an MUA who has decent representation of non-white brides on their marketing materials. Given that it’s 2021 and almost half of American brides these days are not white (that is not a statistic that I know for a fact, but I’m making a educated guess that the only people getting married are not just white women), I find it to be disappointing that more MUAs have not felt the need to accurately reflect the diversity of their clientele.
But, beyond that, it’s about more than just makeup, it’s about representation and feeling beautiful in your own skin if it isn’t white. I spent so much of my childhood and adolescence trying to be someone I wasn’t because I had no examples of what a beautiful Asian woman looked like (other than my mom, of course! But, she doesn’t wear makeup, and so she couldn’t teach me how to do mine). When I was around thirteen and just starting to learn how to use makeup, my mom saved what little she had to buy me a lesson with a professional MUA. She wanted me to feel confident in my own skin because I was very insecure as a child growing up in a predominantly white community. Unfortunately, I walked out of that lesson feeling defeated because I looked like an orange clown that had been punched in both eyes. I felt as if I was so hideous that even a professional make-up artist couldn’t make me beautiful, and that I was always going to be a second-class version of a white woman.
I had an Asian-American bride-to-be message me, and she told me how she thought she was being overly picky with her MUA and that she was going to have to settle before reading my story and deciding to keep looking. First off, good on her to keep looking, but more importantly, I hope you never settle into the belief that you are a second-class version of what someone else’s idea of beauty is.
Today, my idea of beauty happens to be sitting in my sweatpants and what I have now dubbed my “fancy slippers” drinking red wine out of a bathtub. Happy Friday, guys.
xx,
Anna
“Always be a first rate version of yourself and not a second rate version of someone else.” – Judy Garland
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