Ooh la la, the mademoiselle of old has been revised as a modern muse, with a refashioned take on an old French classic.

The Bec & Bridge girls sauntered down the runway in fanciful frills, tricked-up denim, chalky whites, oversized cuffs, smoking pants and matching tuxedo jackets, all with jolts of electric blue and super-saturated red (an ode to le flag).

Beauty too, spoke French. Skin was teeming with light; fresh, barely-there, dabbed only with dots of sheen, to brighten, not glimmer. It was minimalist and not overly manicured, reminiscent of that intangible savoir faire.

It also made way for a spectacular rendition of the red lip, a French girl favourite.

With youthful exuberance, M.A.C’s Nicole Thompson took a classic French red and modernised it with orange neon pigment. The personality-filled pout literally popped off the runway, just as stylist Kelly Hulme had intended it to. Pop-art worthy, it was all kinds of brilliant.

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“The lip is amazing. There’s red and blue in the collection so we’ve picked the colours that are on the face to mismatch the outfits,” said Nicole.

“The red we wanted to do is a sort of orangey-red.”
“We’ve used So Chaud lipstick, neon orange pigment and red lipliner so you get a really nice opaque lip. Kelly really wanted the lip to pop off so the only way to do that is to make it intense and patting on a powder does that. It doesn’t have to be heavy and uncomfortable, it can be wearable, it’s just a matter of how much you put on.”

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And the application trick? “It’s just about a little bit — you don’t have to do a lot — we like to just press it on. It always looks brighter but these neon matte pigments blend in really well. They go brighter when they touch the other colour so you just get this really nice intense red.”

Instead of Breton stripes and a brie-stuffed baguette, add a noir cat-eye and crisp Chablis and you’ll look the non-stereotypical part in no time.
 Bec  Bridge red lips half gif optimise

SHOP THE LOOK
M.A.C Cosmetics So Chaud Lipstick, $36. SHOP NOW 
M.A.C Cosmetics neon pigment in genuine orange $36. SHOP NOW
M.A.C Cosmetics lip pencil in redd, $36. SHOP NOW