red) was the unofficial lipstick of the 2016 Women’s March. Elizabeth Arden herself handed out red lipsticks to women fighting for voting rights at the 1912 New York City Suffragette March. During World War II, red lipstick became patriotic (Hitler reportedly hated red lipstick) and women proudly wore their Victory Red as a big middle finger to the dictator.įast-forward about 75 years, and MAC Ruby Woo (another F.U. (She was wearing nearly a half-inch of it when she died.) America’s first-ever First Lady Martha Washington made her own red lip salve with a recipe including hogs’ lard, alkanet root, and raisins. But consider these other powerful ladies in red: Queen Victoria believed her red lipstick could work magic and even repel death. Sure, we can all rattle off the Hollywood bombshells that made the stuff a glamour-girl essential - Rita Hayworth, Marilyn Monroe, Audrey Hepburn, and Liz Taylor, to name a few. There's no denying it: Red lipstick is a power move.
