Why red lipstick is for you – even if you don't think it is

I wore the same shade of lipstick for three years in a row. It was my makeup safety blanket; a shade, I thought, that worked with everything. An inoffensive, muted mauvey pink, there was never a risk I'd look silly wearing it. I had four in rotation at once: in my handbag, car and makeup bag. Knowing this, how would you feel if I told you I'd never, ever wear it now? The shift happened when I was working on a beauty counter in a department store after a conversation with a colleague. 'That lipstick makes you look dead,' she said. 'You need some colour on your face.'Consider me flummoxed. The lighting in a beauty hall, white and clinical, does nobody any favours, but dead? I was wearing blusher! And bronzer! 'Try this,' she said, handing me a new lipstick. It was an orange-toned red so bright I could see it in my periphery before I looked down. Armed with a micellar soaked cotton pad and my new lipstick, I had nothing to lose. I assumed for years that these shades of orange reds existed...