5 Must-Haves from 10+ Years of Beauty Writing

Nora Zelevansky
5 min readOct 19, 2022
Photo by ian dooley on Unsplash

I have spent many years in the beauty trenches. More than I — as a beauty writer driven by vanity — can be expected to own.

I’ve weathered trends from gold leaf and caviar to snail mucin and snake venom, experienced facial massages in LA and vitamin A peels in NYC. I’ve sat under red lights, blue lights, white lights and highlights. Been scarred by bad extractions and misused lasers — and been saved by the same.

In short, my skin has seen a lot. And, in that time, many a great product has come and gone, some inciting panic attacks when they were discontinued. (I’m still mourning Lili Mineni’s A and C serums, which I just discovered are gone while writing this story. At least, she’s still available for the world’s best facials if you’re ever in LA.)

Fortunately, some of the greats have endured. A tiny portion of the bazillions of products I’ve sampled (and continue to cycle through) have risen above and become solid keepers for me — more experiences than simply skincare.

These are my ride-or-die besties, my must-haves, my desert island picks (if that desert island came equipped with a porcelain sink and a sanitized washcloth). These are the lotions and potions that, after I tried them gratis, I started buying for myself — a beauty writer’s ultimate compliment. These have transcended fads.

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Nora Zelevansky
Nora Zelevansky

Written by Nora Zelevansky

New novel: COMPETITIVE GRIEVING (Blackstone). New nonfiction: ROLL RED ROLL (Hachette ). Bylines: NY Times, T&C, WSJ etc. https://norazelevansky.com/