e’ve all had the experience: a lifetime of trial and error finally leads you to the perfect shade, and then the lipstick is discontinued (lost to time) or goes missing (lost in the handbag). For me, it was an almostmaroon Chanel that I plucked from the beauty cupboard at the office and then wore to my sister-in-law’s wedding at an outdoor railway museum. The colour was somewhere between plum and a brick path after it’s rained; putting it on was like becoming another person, a woman with something crisp to say, even when her lips weren’t moving. It was an old-timey wedding, with pin curls, tea-length dresses, and a Paper Moon-style photo set-up. We rode a rattling antique car to the ceremony site, and I felt, in my sepia shade, like I had been lifted from a
