bellabox Pout Pencils

I consult for bellabox, Australia and Singapore's leading beauty subscription as their Global Brand Director. I oversee the products that go in the box each month, and work with the international brands that bellabox import into both markets. I keep an eye on beauty trends and scout cult  brands for the online store.

Its a great gig, I get to try lots of beauty products, and my time there it has reminded me that you don't have to pay a fortune for good quality product, but one of my favourite things is when I get to develop product. For the past couple of months I have been working with an Australian company that make a lot of the products you see in pharmacy and department stores. I wanted to create a range of lipsticks that represent the perfect 'Lipstick Library', colours that every woman should own. I called in a range of colours from the manufacturer and consulted with the bb team as to which ones we should go with. We decided in a nude, red, hot pink and coral colour. I wanted them to have a high colour pay off and be moisturising at the same time, as I think that spring/summer lips should be glossy and bright.

One of the fun packaging components around at the moment is a wind up crayon. Clinque made them popular when they launched the chubby stick and lots of brands have them now. It is a little bit different from the normal bullet style lipstick and I think a bit cooler as well so we chose to have the lipsticks packaged in the wind up crayon.

 

I teamed up with the Editor of bellabox, Lauren to name the products. She came up with a great name, Pout Pencils, and we worked together to come up with the names of the shades. Nuuude is my homage so Prue and Trude from Kath and Kim, and I just cant say nude with out saying it in their accent, nuuuude. Ruby Tuesday is a tribute to Ruby, the little daughter of bellabox founder Sarah. Coral Me Maybe, well it was the song of last summer, so with a little play on words, it makes the perfect lipstick name. That leaves the pink lipstick, which was the hardest to name, I wanted to go with something that referred to The PInk Ladies from Grease, but we went with Lauren's pick, Pink Promise.

The result is a great capsule range of colours, that are moisturising and highly pigmented all for a great price. You can purchase them from bellabox, link below.

 bellabox Pout Pencils

A Fragrance for North Apartments Display Suite

I have a good friend who is a very talented designer. He is much in demand and I often get to go as his plus one to various designy type events. I quite enjoy going along as I get to bang on about my other fragrance love, scenting architectural spaces, to people who might just 'get it'. At one such event at the races, after much champagne, I met one of his clients, a lady who develops apartment buildings. She loved the idea of creating a fragrance for the display suite for her new apartment complex in North Melbourne

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I work with a company who supply scent dispensing machines so we hooked up two machines to scent the entrance to the display suite, and the kitchen and bathroom. The fragrance the client chose was White Tea and Ginger, a fresh crisp scent designed to make potential buyers feel relaxed and at home.

If you would like The Powder Room to create a fragrance for your display suite, store or office, please contact samantha@thepowder-room.com

Perfume Master Classes for Shopping Centres

I love having the opportunity to talk to people about perfume. When I was distributing Miller Harris and Penhaligon's, I used to hold master classes to teach people about my brands (and hopefully make some sales), however I realised that lots of people are intrigued by perfume and would like to learn more so I started holding classes that were not brand specific, but more about the art of perfume. Now my Perfume Master Classes cover the history of perfume, perfumers training and how perfume is made. Guests have the opportunity to experience the raw materials, the building blocks of perfume, that I have collected in my travels, and we chat about how to chose a new fragrance.

I was invited by Robina Town Center in sunny Queensland and Eastland in Melbourne to present a series of Perfume Master Classes as part of their Spring Fashion activities. Normally attendees to my classes are perfume addicts, so they already have a good understanding about perfume, however most of the ladies who came to these classes didn't have a lot of experience with fragrance, so they were very eager to learn more.  They asked lots of questions and really enjoyed experiencing the raw materials, there was lots of lively discussion! I also highlighted new launch perfumes available in stores at the center in order to drive sales for the stores. Mecca, L'Occitane and Estee Lauder were kind enough to provide samples for my guests to take home and try.

Little did I know that they had my photo blown up and placed on this rather large sign. Note to self, airbrush promo photo. Looking at your own wrinkles when they are enlarged to about 30 cms is enough to drive a woman to botox. I made an appointment the next day.

One of the things I love about what I do is when people tell me that I have totally changed the way they think about perfume. Most people don't put a lot of thought into their fragrance choices, wearing  something their partner gave them, or the latest launch just because it is a big name brand. Perfume tells a story, your story, so make it a good story and chose something that represents you.

If you would like to book a perfume master class for a private or corporate event, please contact samantha@thepowder-room.com

CEO Magzine

Recently I was interviewed by CEO Magazine, about perfume of course! Annabelle asked about my experience in perfume, how to chose a new perfume and my recommendations for fragrance for executives. High level executives should look for a distinctive fragrance, something that sets them apart from the rest. I recommended some of my favourite fragrances including Sartorial by Penhaligon's and Terre de Bois by Miller Harris.

If you would like to interview me for a publication or a blog, please contact samantha@thepowder-room.com