🌀 Welcome to Empties! 🌀 This is a new series where we go deep on three healthy and healthy-ish things cool people are using to the last metaphorical drop. These can be legit, science-backed healthful or simply health-adjacent, as long as they don’t impact their wellbeing in a negative, unhealthy, or toxic way.
Today, we’ve got Arabelle Sicardi, a writer and creative that focuses on the relationship between aesthetics and political power. “Beauty is terror, but terror is a useful teacher — and I’ve always loved horror movies,” Arabelle told Un/well. “Long Live the Final Girl.”
Arabelle is one of my favorite writers covering beauty, its history, and its consequences, with stories about how the Kardashians changed the way we see beauty, what happens when the government enforces beauty standards, a history of lipstick as warfare, and the connection between god and perfume and power. They also have a very good newsletter.
Arabelle just finished revisions on their forthcoming nonfiction book about the beauty industry and is working on a draft of a young adult fantasy series. They’re also working on a non-profit that centers nail artists as artists first, service providers second.
“Archiving beauty culture and the people who create it is deeply important to me, not just as a writer but as a person,” Arabelle said. “Writing is just one way I do it, but I want to celebrate people who take care of other people in all kinds of ways.”
They thinks it’s 😎 cool 😎 that wellness “can be an act of liberation and caretaking of people—including yourself—that are neglected, exploited, exhausted, unseen. Taking time to take care of yourself in a world that wants you to produce more, produce faster, cheaper, for as many people as possible—it is an act of refusal in a pressure cooker of capitalist’s rat race. To take time to be tender, it can be so loving and so revolutionary. I’m not interested in the definition of wellness as beige-space luxury for moneybags. I see it as a survival strategy in a collapsing society.”
On the other hand, Arabelle thinks the wellness industry is 👿 insidious 👿 when it’s seen “as a privilege to be well, and that to be well you must be removed from earth’s ills and worries and in a little bubble where you’re coddled and safe from everything that could possibly hurt you. It’s a dangerous fantasy to have—to equate an experience of wellness to being hermetically sealed in a place where everything caters to you. Where every aspect of you is monitored, baselined, data farmed for optimization, competition, perfection as uniform expectations.”
They continue: “I see why venture capital loves to throw money at this idea of the wellness industry as something scalable and measurable and profit-oriented, but it is so demonic to me, so antithetical to why I care about beauty and wellness to begin with. I think the world caters to the wealthy well enough already, and it’s the uber-wealthy that really capitalize on and occupy a lot of wellness culture. All this wealth dedicated to bypassing longevity velocity - wellness as reaching for immortality - it’s dystopian, really. Why can’t we focus our money and energy and capacity on helping the most vulnerable, the most in need of care, and go from there? Why live forever, when most don’t even live short lives well?”
Let’s take a look at three of Arabelle’s favorite items they use to the last drop:
Paula’s Choice 2% BHA Exfoliant
💞 Healthy or healthy-ish?
Ish? BHA exfoliants help with cellular turnover so redness, hyperpigmentation, whatever goes away faster. It helps with clogged pores, which is something I deal with constantly.
⏰ At what point in the day do you use this?
I only use this at night and perhaps every other night at that. I use it after washing my face and after using it, I use a pH-balancing toner or skin softener after a minute or two of letting the product settle in.
🤔 Let’s get introspective for a moment. Why do you think, deep down, this serves you? Or is it not that deep?
If I didn’t address my clogged pores in some way I would probably poke my face a lot when I’m anxious and ruin my face in a worse way trying to smooth it out, so it is crisis management on the lightest scale.
I don’t expect to wake up one day with the poreless face of a doll, but cystic acne and acne as I age in general gets more painful (hormonal changes!) and so making sure my skin - and therefore my body - is not dealing with needless pain is worthwhile to me.
☎️ You have the product designers on the phone. They said they can grant you one wish: You get to make one change or adjustment to the product to make it even more indispensable. What is your wish?
I am not equipped to answer this compared to other die-hard Paula’s Choice fans (there’s multiple excellent meme accounts! I mean!). I have no notes for this product in particular, though I know they’re doing reformulations in the general line that are upsetting some longtime fans. I think it has more to do with adhering to new industry regulations than anything else, so I don’t feel betrayed by it or anything.
⏳ Is this something you can see yourself still using in 10 years, or will it have run its course/be obsolete?
I’ll probably be using some version of it if not the same thing. I’ve already been using it for something like 10 years, on and off.
👽 Aliens from another planet just arrived on Earth. They’ve never heard of this product. How would you describe it to them in just one sentence:
Cellular regenerative dermal potion for human vanity, a profitable enterprise with some scientific backing.
💬 In one word, describe how this exfoliant makes you feel:
Shiny!
You can buy a bottle on Dermstore.
Supergoop! SPF 30 Sunscreen Body Mist
💞 Healthy or healthy-ish?
Healthy.
⏰ At what point in the day do you use this?
I use it every time I went outside throughout the day and I am one of those Asian aunties that does actually reapply sunscreen when I’m outside - so, multiple times a day. It’s a mist, so it’s easy to apply, but you need a lot to get coverage.
🤔 Let’s get introspective for a moment. Why do you think, deep down, this serves you? Or is it not that deep?
I prefer to not have skin cancer or other health conditions down the line. My American healthcare plan is not that comprehensive. Also, I am uninterested in expanding my foundation and concealer ranges any further than they already are.
☎️ You have the product designers on the phone. They said they can grant you one wish: You get to make one change or adjustment to the product to make it even more indispensable. What is your wish?
I actually think I would need to be speaking to a magician to make it an endless bottle, because if you’re using it as often as you should be to re-apply properly throughout the day, you go through this like water in the desert. I go through sunscreen tubes and bottles faster than any other product besides toilet paper.
⏳ Is this something you can see yourself still using in 10 years, or will it have run its course/be obsolete?
I will be using sunscreen until we are all obliterated during a nuclear event. The ozone layer is disappearing, guys, get some store-bought ozone while you can!!! This one is fine but honestly I use like seven different ones in rotation.
💬 In one word, describe how this sunscreen make you feel:
Shiny? Smug? Hahaha.
You can buy a bottle on Supergoop!
Mandelic Clearing Serum
💞 Healthy or healthy-ish?
???
⏰ At what point in the day do you use this?
I use it every other night. I’m not using another exfoliation product of some kind, you don’t want to inflame your skin barrier.
🤔 Let’s get introspective for a moment. Why do you think, deep down, this serves you? Or is it not that deep?
It is soooooo good for clearing up acne without burning your face off.
☎️ You have the product designers on the phone. They said they can grant you one wish: You get to make one change or adjustment to this product to make it even more indispensable. What is your wish?
I have no notes, Sofie did a great job on this and you can untwist the pump to get every single drop out (which I did). Products made by actual experts are very satisfying! I think I began using this before it was officially launched, so I’ve had more time than most to see how it does on my skin.
And it’s been a great member of my skincare team. It’s very gentle. I think a lot of people go too hard on their skin thinking higher percentage will be better for them, and they end up fucking their skin up.
⏳ Is this something you can see yourself still using in 10 years, or will it have run its course/be obsolete?
I’d happily continue using it, sure. Though I imagine there will be other buzzy exfoliation products that will rotate in and out of my routine, too.
👽 Aliens from another planet just arrived on Earth. They’ve never heard of this product. How would you describe it to them in just one sentence:
It’s a gentle exfoliation serum for the human dermis.
💬 In one word, describe how this serum makes you feel:
Satisfied. I love a product with a pump.
You can buy the serum on Sofie Pavitt Face
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Header and illustrations by Olivia Fu