Beauty book

A few months ago I did all the makeup and hair for this Look Younger Naturally book from Health and Fitness magazine. This 130 pages thick book is your anti-age bible! With instant make-up tips, skincare secrets, top beauty superfoods and stay young yoga moves. Whats not to like! All photo's are taken by photographer Ian Hooton.

The book is in the shops now, have a look!

Fashion Coup

Last week at the Amsterdam fashion week one of the most brilliant marketing plans was spun into action.
In Holland there is a low budget textiles shop called Zeeman, they sell your basic fashion and textile products. Amazing value for money, they sell T shirts for 2 Euro, but so is also their image: cheap. When I was in school you didn't want to be seen with a Zeeman shopping bag, afraid it will harm you street cred and be branded seriously uncool.
Some brilliant marketing people were hired to do something about this and to show that looking good doesn't need to be expensive. In a very secret affair, only 7 people within the company knew about this, they set up a new brand, Frank. Frank was launched into the Dutch fashion industry as a new exciting fashion brand which would premier with a show on the Amsterdam Fashion Week.
The show was hyped by spreading fancy leaflets and seeding rumour around the brand.
All the fashion elite turned out to see the show witch was received very good. Although Bart Mausen of the Amsterdam fashion week commented that from a distance it looked ‘quite nice’, but giving it a closer look the quality proved ‘inferior’.
When the last model walked the catwalk big screens behind her showed the massage that Frank was indeed the low budget store Zeeman, shock horror!! If you watch the video have a look at the faces of the models and backstage people, they look horrified that they worked for the low budget chain. I couldn't stop laughing!
The brand is named after the Swiss designer Frank Kungl of whom 6 designs will be sold at Zeeman.
You can have a look at the Frank shop and how they pulled it off on frankfashion.nl
 Have a look at the video, the subtitles are in Dutch but even if you don't understand the language its definitely worth a look. If only to see the horrified faces of the stylists and makeup artists.

ByHester Etsy shop

Some of you might know that I make hair and home accessoires and I now sell those on Etsy.
Have a look at this link to see my shop!

BlogBlogBlog

There are a few blog that I check on a daily bases,

*The Craft department a blog from the clever people working on Martha Stewart's Living magazine
*The the Cut daily fashion update from New York magazine
*Wearing It Today fashion blog from my friend stylist Laura Fantacci
*Beauty Mecca beauty blog from one of my favourite authors Lindsey Kelk
*Vlijtig a great craft and lifestyle blog
*Bakerella amazing baking blog by the cake pop queen
*Clients from hell for a little giggle
*Fashiontography for beautiful fashion images
*What Katie ate a food blog with amazing photography

These are the blog that I check the most but there are many more like the Draw and cook blog, as the name suggest a cooking blog but then in amazing drawings. Have a look at this saltwater taffy recipe

Do you have favourite blogs?

Honey Honey

This multifunctional beauty product is lurking in your cupboard, don't just use it to sweeten your tea get it out this liquid gold and use it for your health benefits!

Honey has been used for centuries as a natural cure for a variety of ailments. Honey may be the perfect skincare product, it kills germs and reduces swelling and inflammation. A honey face mask will gently clean your skin, while keeping it healthy, supple and beautiful. Great for you sun worshipers, it also helps to protect the skin from damage of harm full sun rays. And did you know that locally sourced honey is a great hay fever fighter?
With a fancy name we call the use of honey in treatments: Apitherapy.

Honey comes in a lot of variates but one of the most effective is New Zealand's manuka honey, most honeys contain a naturally occurring active agent, which is thought to support good health but is easily destroyed when exposed to heat and light. Manuka honey contains an extra, naturally occurring active ingredient, which makes it distinct from other honeys. This additional component is stable and doesn't lose its potency when exposed to heat, light or dilution. Its special quality is known as UMF and the higher the UMF, the more potent the honey and its powers 

Two daily spoon full of (manuka) honey boosts your immune system and fight fatigue and is great when you have a soar throat or feel a cold coming up. Because of its unique antibacterial properties you can even use it on small wounds. In New Zealand and now also by the NHS extensive studies have been done to the health benefits of honey and in many hospitals honey is now being used for wounds that don't react to antibiotics.
Just that you know, the darker the honey the stronger the anti-oxidant effect

This is all lovely but how can you use all the goodness of honey in your beauty regime?
Lots of big brands are already using honey as a main ingredient in their products, think of Burt's bees, MAC, Jo Malone, Lush, Benefit and many more.But your own cupboards can be a good inspiration as well!
A great facial mask you make by mixing, 2 tbl spoons of slightly warmed honey with 1 tbl spoon of yogurt and 1/2 a teaspoon of olive oil.
The honey works antiseptic and antibacterial while the yogurt gently exfoliates and cleanses. The olive oil moisturizes your skin. You can add an egg yolk if you want the mask to be more creamy.
Apply the mask to clean skin and leave it on for about 15minutes before you wash it of with lukewarm water.

Add 2 tb spoons of honey to your bath for a nourished skin.
Or mix sugar,honey and a little olive oil for a soft but thorough body scrub.

Do you have dry hair? Adding honey in with any hair conditioner can increase the efficiency of the conditioning product, allowing it to better penetrate into the hair shaft to both moisturize and soften it.

Wow all of this from a product made by little buzzing bees! Its a good thing that rooftop bee keeping is an up and coming trend, keep us in the honey!

Heaven!

I love going to big bookshops as they mostly have massive magazine departments.

Its just heaven browsing trough all the different magazines: fashion, lifestyle, crafts, cooking, travel, foreign publications, its all good!

When I am in Rotterdam I always have to go to Selexyz Donner, a massive bookstore with an amazing magazine department.

What is your favourite magazine?

Bonnenboek

My friend J gave me this lovely book, a bonnenboek or for you English speaking folk a voucher book.

This quirky little book is full of coupons so you never have to hint at a breakfast in bed or a weekend away anymore! Or use one of the coupons to thank people for a lovely diner, or apologise for the forgotten birthday, this book is filled with vouchers for every possible moment and person.

The book is by publishers Uitgeverij Snor has beautiful illustrations by Sandra Isaksson and is also available in English under the title Dream vouchers for woman.

(translation: sorry that I burden you with my disturbed family)

Bathing in Bath

As said in a previous post my parents surprised me with a lovely spa break in Bath, how marvelous!!
I had been to Bath before and was dying to show it to my mum, this city is just full of charm and history. And being just 156 km east from London its very easy to reach by train.

The city was first established as a spa with the Latin name, Aquae Sulis by the Romans in AD 43, although verbal tradition suggests that Bath was known before then. They built baths and a temple on the surrounding hills of Bath in the valley of the River Avon around hot springs. Much later, it became popular as a spa town during the Georgian era, which led to a major expansion that left a heritage of exemplary Georgian architecture.

 If you are an Jane Austin fan then Bath is the place to go, Jane Austen lived in the city from 1801 and her later work Northanger Abbey and Persuasion are largely set in the city and feature descriptions of taking the waters, social life, and music recitals.

You can visit the old Roman baths build in AD 75, you will be one of the many tourist who daily visit this site but its definitely worth a look around. You can feel the history dripping of every stone.

 If you want to feel the healing power of water for yourself why not go to the  New Royal Bath, a stones trow away from the old site is this modern building with treatment rooms, aromatic steam rooms and a rooftop pool with views over the city and surrounding hills. I have been here a few years ago and for £25 you can enjoy all the pools, steam rooms etc for 2 hours.

For my birthday I was stying in the MacDonald Bath Spa, an absolutely beautiful hotel with its own spa. The treatment list is endless and I had a wonderful Decleor facial and massage. When you stay in the hotel you can use all the spa facilities, like the outdoor and indoor pool, steam rooms and sauna, absolute bliss!

For your next weekend away definitely consider going to Bath.

Vogue Bambini

Have a look in the August issue of Vogue Bambini for this story I've done with photographer Igor Borisov and stylist Kate van der Hage.

And what do you do when you cant find a baby with red hair? You book a gorgeous blond one and style her hair with bronzing creme, a bit of photoshop colour enhancing et voila!  :)

Location Look Book

While everybody is planning what dress and bikini to take with them on holiday the fashion industry is already busy with woolly knits and winter coats, the autumn/winter look book are out.
For those who don't know what a look book is, this is a brochure in witch a fashion brand shows their new collections, looks, to the media.
These shots are from the autumn winter Tesco F&F look book. I have the pleasure of working on their fashion and kids shoots, this year the kidswear has been shot in Richmond park and I've taken some backstage pics for you.

As the location van couldn't park close enough to the set I just plonked a stool in the middle of the forest and did hair and makeup al fresco, while being looked at by deer :)