KEY POINTS:
It's been 2007 for only a couple of weeks but already a new crop of skincare and beauty products has landed, or soon will, to help us in our quest for a flawless face.
1. Chanel Precision Micro Solutions Refining Peel Program
$369 for 21 1ml tubes
Opening
the pristine white multi-level box needs a soundtrack - something suitably futuristic. This is the advanced version of the Refining Peel that's so 2006. The glycolic acid content is increased from 8 to 10 per cent, but the formula remains gentle for this DIY peel. After 21 days of using one of the cute single-dose tubes daily, resurfaced skin looks pretty good.
* From selected department stores and pharmacies.
2. Estee Lauder Projectionist High Definition Mascara
$54
The beauty industry seems obsessed with inventing the perfect mascara - one that manages to make lashes longer and thicker while keeping each lash separated and not weighed down. Something called VolumAire means hollow spherical polymers behave like inflated balloons giving body without weight. Really does feel like you're not wearing mascara but the effect is one of gorgeous long lashes. Brilliant.
* From selected department stores and pharmacies from February.
3. Elizabeth Arden Eight Hour Cream Intensive Moisturizing Body Treatment
$45 for 200ml
Eight Hour Cream is arguably the most famous and versatile skincare product around. Created in 1930 it's still going strong today with beauties such as Gisele Bundchen and Cate Blanchett swearing by it. So, it's rather exciting to think there will be another incarnation of the sticky apricot balm. It may be white but don't let that deter you from its deep hydrating ability. Skin is well looked after for eight hours.
* From selected department stores and pharmacies from February 12.
4. M.A.C Mineralize Skinfinish Lightscapade
$52
This velvet-soft powder comes from the lovely new colour story Danse, which takes its cue from ballet. It looks like marble with veins of soft yellow, pastel pink, muted orange and soft blue running through it. The idea is to get a luminous look to skin and eyes - and you do. Beautiful stuff.
* From M.A.C Chancery and Smith & Caughey's Newmarket.
5. Lancome Absolue Premium Bx Advanced Replenishing Cream SPF15
$210 for 50ml
Anti-ageing creams are what most of us over the age of 21 get excited by. Here's one for 50-plus women. The scientific explanation for why this can help skin feel denser, plumped-up and more radiant after 28 days is as complex as The Matrix. Suffice to say, a special molecule called Pro-Xylane along with wild yam, soya, sea algae and barley work on the skin's underlying matrix to synthesise "the extra-cellular matrix's primary components". And no, that line wasn't from the movie.
* From selected department stores and pharmacies from January 22.