Mountain Chic

{Philip B Russian Amber Imperial Shampoo}

I’m a beauty junkie.  That much is probably clear to you by now.  Why do you think I started this blog?  I’m on a mission to find equally crazy people.  Are you out there?  (Even if you’re not beauty-product-crazy, thanks for reading.)

I have quite the shampoo collection, much to my husband’s chagrin.  It’s kind of cluttery in our shower.  Example:

I am such a sucker for marketing.  I read an interview with Julia Restoin Roitfeld where she said, of beauty products, “I don’t really believe it—I don’t believe anything, but I’m a sucker for buying everything.” This is totally true for me, too.  I’ll try it all – but deep down I don’t really think it’s going to work.  And yet, I keep buying.  Now, the thing is, I keep most of these bottles for like, years – clinging to a collapsed promise?  I only have a few favorites I actually finish and promptly repurchase.

Philip B Russian Amber Imperial Shampoo is my holy grail of shampoos, and when I scoop the last bits from a jar I reorder a replacement on the double.  It’s my Special Occasion Shampoo. It smells heavenly; it gives my hair just the right amount of volume and manageability, sparkle and movement.  I love it.  So why do I save it for special occasions?  For one, it’s expensive ($50 for this tiny jar), so I’d never use it on the daily.  It’s a strange sort of dense gel that is scooped from the container.  Because of the texture, your hair needs to be pretty clean when you apply it – I suds up with a clarifying shampoo before I use this – otherwise, my hair just absorbs the stuff and doesn’t bubble, which I don’t trust.  Most interesting – you lather it up and then leave it on for about 5 minutes.  Who has time for that on a regular basis?

But wait.  You do have time when your hair needs to look spectacular.  And that’s why this is worth it.  Philip B. Russian Amber Imperial Shampoo is difficult to find, but I purchase it online from Net-a-Porter.com.