The July 4th holiday festivities always seem to inspire such creative representations of the red, white, and blue. From decorations to clothing, people seem to love finding newer and more eye-thrilling ways to showcase their patriotic sides. We are encouraging that by presenting a couple of the creative uses of style and makeup we found to make Independence Day uniquely your own.

• Though she came up with the idea for the Inauguration, Emilita’s red, white, and blue nail design is just as chic for The Fourth of July. The best part about this design is that it’s creative and classy, so it’s the perfect patriotic experiment for those not necessarily looking to go the loud route with their celebration.

• When it comes to hairstyles that feature the red, white, and blue, you know it’s bound to be an experimental look. And eccentric is another appropriate word to describe these sculpture-like coiffures that TrendHunter magazine found. Daringly American!

• How about a French Manicure, American pride style? Femtalks features some avant garde French Manicures, including a version that you can copy for all of your 4th festivities. Big, solid stripes of red, white, and blue turn the old classic into a contemporary look.

• If you want to get back to basics for your holiday weekend, there’s an easy way to make a patriotic statement with your makeup: red lips, blue eyeshadow. It sounds a bit overwhelming, but try this trick: go with a bold red lip, and then use blue eyeshadow just to line your eyes. Or go with a very sheer wash of red on your lips, and layer a bold blue all over your lids. That way you attract the focus to either your eyes or lips, not both simultaneously.

Happy 4th of July from all of us here at The Body Shop! Be safe, have fun, and make sure the only smoking firecracker at the party is you!

Science has long ago proven the emotional connection that we have to scents. Smells have a powerful ability to trigger memories in our brains almost instantaneously. So is it any wonder that the smells of summer are capable of churning up all of our fond recollections of day camps and swim team?

Take a quick poll of your friends, and you’ll see a trend in some of the familiar summer scent associations: freshly-cut grass on a weekend morning, coconut suntan lotion on a beach, rain on a humid afternoon, and the bitter bite of chlorine poolside.

If you’re looking to create a new summer scent memory, try our new White Musk White Hot Summer Eau de Toilette. Its musky base notes of sandalwood and vanilla evoke summer sensuality, while the top notes of pink pepper and bergamot lend a spicy twist.

Don’t you want your summer scent to be memorable?

Every so often, we like to take some time to click around to other blogs and see what people are saying about The Body Shop and our products. We love customer feedback and reviews, because they help us to create and change products to give you exactly what you want! Here’s what we have to report on what others are saying about our Eye, Lip and Cheek Palette.

• Once upon a time, The Muse wasn’t such a big fan of palettes, but we’re proud to report that our newest palette has helped to sway her in a different direction. A little collection of treats at a fraction of the price is what catches her fancy most.

• A Mom In Red High Heels was wowed by the versatility of the products inside of our palette. Plus, everything in one place!

• And Chic Galleria points out that the palette snaps shut for easy and neat traveling, perfect for taking along on your summer vacation trip.

• Over at Beauty Junkies Unite, they seem to be quite partial to our lovely mini blush and eyeshadow brushes. Soft and synthetic, they’ve got it all.

Have you tried our Eye, Lip and Cheek Palette yet? What did you think?

With the temperatures getting out of control this summer, here are 30 easy (and fun!) ways to keep cool when the heat gets unbearable.

1. Drop a few flavored ice cubes in your water, or better yet, suck on them like little stick-less popsicles

2. Buy one of those plastic baby pools and fill it up with cold water. Then just add friends and stir.

3. When the nights are particularly unbearable, strip your sheets from your bed and stick them in the freezer for a bit. Then when you put them back on your bed, they’ll be nice and chilled.

4. Three little words: Slip-N-Slide. Turn your back yard into a blast from the past by just adding water.

5. For a midday pick-me-up, try blasting your feet with a few spritzes of Peppermint Cooling Foot Spray. It soothes and freshens those sandal-weary feet.

6. When things get hot, lay low. If you have a lower level or basement in your place, try hanging out there and letting the heat rise without you.

7. Rock a ponytail. Keeping your neck free to catch a breeze will help your natural AC kick in.

8. If you can’t stand the heat, go to the most air-conditioned point in town, the movie theater. Catch a breezy summer flick and partake in the chilly temps in front of the screen.

9. Planting trees and vegetation around your humble little abode will help in filtering out the intensity and heat of the summer rays. Plus, it helps save on cooling costs.

10. Kick off your shoes. A lot of heat escapes from your feet, so stuffing them into shoes all day gets unbearable. Set them free and go barefoot.

11. Keep your face cool by using this little trick to create an instant mister. All you need is a little fizzy water and a pinprick hole for relief.

12. It’s cool in your mouth when you pull it out of the fridge, plus Jello comes in dozens of summer-friendly flavors. Give this strawberry recipe a shot and air condition from the inside out.

13. Instead of hopping in the shower in the morning or at night, when it’s coolest, why not save it for midday or when you get off work in the early evening? It’ll help to bring your temp down when the day’s heat is peaking.

14. Take your bottle of Vitamin C Energizing Face Spritz and pop it in the fridge. Then mist across your face, neck, and chest when you’re overheating for an instant energizing cool down.

15. Do it the old-fashioned way and bum a ride from that friend with a classy convertible, top down. Easy breezy!

16. To protect your face from harmful UV rays and the intense heat, indulge in one of the season’s most popular accessories: a sun hat.

17. How to be cool and crafty? Make your own D.I.Y. fan out of a used CD and revel in your eco-friendly breeze.

18. Attempt a little creative visualization by closing your eyes and imagining yourself cool. Pick a book with a chilly setting or a favorite winter memory and engage in mind over matter.

19. Make like the Spaniards and take a siesta mid-day. That’s when the heat is at is most intense, and productivity is at its lowest, so use that time wisely: to nap!

20. Chinese menthol is the cooling ingredient that helps our Pure Detox Refreshing Body Moisturizer bring your temperature down from the outside in for instant relief.

21. Summer backs are some of the sexist body parts to flash, so pick backless and strapless tops for automatic access to the occasional breeze.

22. It may sound obvious, but cooking in the oven can really crank the temp up in your house, especially if you live in a small space. Take the hottest days as an opportunity to try out those no-bake recipes you’ve been eyeing.

23. When the heat is on, indulge in an adolescent water balloon fight. It’s good exercise and everyone winds up drenched. Keep your green intact by filling up these eco-friendly balloons, and take aim!

24. Though it’s slightly scandalous and will give you that naughty bit of a rush, late-night skinnydipping has always been a favorite summer activity for the daring among us.

25. Don’t sacrifice your tan while you’re hiding from the heat inside. Moisturize with our Cocoa Butter Everyday Summer Body Lotion to help build a gradual, natural tan. So you can get the look without suffering the heat stroke!

26. If you’ll be 9-to-5-ing it in an office all summer, don’t let it cramp your style. Simply snip the toes off your pantyhose for an instant leg vent.

27. It sounds intense, but putting both feet into an ice bath after a long day can help immediately bring your core temperature back under control.

28. Drink lots of delicious summer juices and cold teas. Not only will they help you to keep cool, but they’ll also stave off dehydration, which is the culprit in many summer headaches and sluggishness.

29. Spending a lot of time in the car? Then take that scorching leather seat and turn it into an air-conditioned cooler seat. Yes, really!

30. Summer heat can make you feel like you have no appetite, so be sure to pay attention to your stomach’s moods. The process of digestion raises your body temperature, so prepare lighter, fresher foods in the heat.

Summer can really do a number on your ability to fix your hair. Between the beach, the pool, and the windows rolled down in the car, your hair can look a mess pretty quickly. We’ve picked up a couple of really simple summer hairstyles that will work with the season, not against it. So take note before those locks go on a summer strike!

• Ponytails might make you think of your days in the sandbox, but when done correctly, they can be sleekly sophisticated or messy sexy. For a trendy retro throwback, rock a side pony, and remember to take a small piece of hair to wrap around the rubber band. It’s a quick way to make the look appear super polished.

• If your bangs refuse to be tamed, or you might be spending the evening on a windy beach, headbands are the way to go. Forget plastic and painful, these headbands are stylish and functional, and help pull together even a simple look. To give your band better grip, work a dime-sized amount of Wheatgrass Fixing Gel through your dry hair, and tease it just a bit with a fine tooth comb. It adds a bit of volume to the hair, plus creates a better grip between the headband and the hair.

• This look has been showing up all over the red carpet. It’s called the braided bun, which basically amounts to a section of loosely French-Braided hair at the front of your head, and pinning the rest up. It’s a simple look that will also keep hair out of your face and from getting knotted, if your hair tangles easily. Form and function!

• If you’ve spent the day at the beach, take advantage of the salt water and wind and use them as natural styling agents. Salt water gives hair texture, so just add a little Beeswax Texturizing Wax to smooth and help create that piecey look. Wrap strands of hair around your fingers and scrunch to get those loose, beachy waves.

Style, fashions, and makeup looks, like everything else, go in phases. What was once retro, is bound to be trendy again, given a little bit of time. We’ve noticed a lot of retro looks gracing the runways recently, so we’ve snagged a few of our favorite makeup looks from decades past.

It seems to be a universal issue. Women across America absolutely hate bathing suit shopping and feel self-conscious when they take those first steps out onto the beach. At The Body Shop, one of our Core Values has always been Activating Self-Esteem, because we believe that beauty is more than just how well you care for your skin.

If bathing suit shopping and wearing is on your summer agenda, then take these tips to heart to combat those “gasp!” moments in the dressing room.

• Mind Your Mouth – When looking at yourself in a dressing room mirror, be careful what you choose to say out loud. Expressing negative sentiments about your own body reinforces them. What’s worse is that you can be setting a bad self-image example if there are little ears around to hear you spew negativity about you own body.

• Nix Negativity – Speaking of young ears, teen girls often have a difficult time with bathing suits if they are struggling with their evolving body awareness. One tip that BlogMommas suggests in helping them develop a positive body image is to tell her siblings and other parent that teasing, comments, and name-calling is unacceptable. Though this tactic was mentioned for teen girls, it’s a good policy for all of us. Don’t let anyone, including yourself, make negative comments about your body. Self-deprecating humor has no place in the process of building a positive body image.

• Go Retro – Vintage bathing suits are cropping up in stores across the country this season. Vintage suits boast styles that are flattering on many different body types, because they were originally designed with the “real women” curves of the 1950’s. Select a vintage style that accentuates your best features, and then tuck a flower in your hair to do your best Marilyn Monroe impression (who was a size 12, by the way).

• Get Real – Your body has been your body for your whole life, you aren’t suddenly going to morph into a swimsuit model. iVillage suggests some helpful tips in gaining perspective on your body as-is, as well as making the bathing suit shopping process a bit less painful. One recommendation she gives: self tanner! Everyone feels better about their body with a hint of a golden glow.

We are all aware that our skin changes over time. Each stage in our lives represents a shift in the needs of our skin, which is why we’ve created several different skincare lines, each addressing different needs.

Our Wise Woman line is specifically formulated for mature skin. In addition to being super hydrating, Wise Woman products contain ingredients that help “fill in” fine lines, firm, and improve elasticity, something that the skin loses over time.

We’ve had some requests in our blog comments for makeup tips especially for mature skin. Here are a few tips and tricks to get you started in this tutorial video for mature skin done by Chase Aston, The Body Shop’s official makeup artist. You can find a list of the tools and products he used right below the video. Enjoy!

• Wise Woman Eye Cream
• Moisture Foundation as applied with our Professional Make-up Sponge
• Lightening Touch as blended in using a Lipstick/Concealer Brush
• Glow Enhancer as blended in using our Foundation Brush
• Eyebrow Definer with eyebrows set into place using Brow & Lash Gel
• Cheek Blush blended in using a Blusher Brush
• Shimmer Cubes applied using an Eyeshadow Blender Brush
• Eye Color applied using the Slanted Brush
• Eye Definer
• Sheer Lip Shine
• Define & Lengthen Mascara

With Father’s Day coming so quickly at the tail end of Mother’s Day, dads can sometimes get short shrifted in the attention department. Dads can give off that laid back air, but they secretly like the attention just as much as the mothers of the world, so don’t make dad make do with some lame gift this year. Try some of these ideas instead.

• Get Nostalgic – Venture up into your parents’ attic and go through some of those ancient boxes. See what kind of photos you can dig up of your father and his family when he was younger. Take the photos to a specialty shop to have them scanned and turned into a calendar, prints, or whatever you like. When you give it to your father, you can ask him about some of the stories associated with his family members and events in his life: what was his first car? First job? Favorite subject in school? You may find out some fact you never knew.

• Share the Great Outdoors – Most people spend the workweek inside at a desk, so what better way to celebrate dad than by accompanying him on a trek through the great outdoors. It’s relatively inexpensive to plot out a local hike and spend the day hitting the trail, but you can also indulge in some brand new activity that you’ve both wanted to try. Kayaking, archery lessons, and horseback riding are just a few thoughts on how you can bring your dad and nature together for a non-cheesy Father’s Day.

• Give Him His Pick – So maybe your dad is a closet Sci-Fi geek and can’t wait to hit up the local Comic Con. Or maybe he’s been dying to try a little improv training, but doesn’t want to go it alone. For his Father’s Day gift, why not let him choose and bring you along for companionship? And even if an afternoon at the local gem and rock museum isn’t your idea of a raging good time, you’ll be spending time with the guy you love, and that’s the most important part.

• Pamper Your Pop – It’s a fallacy that dads don’t care about their skin. They do. And they also like therapeutic treats like massages and the occasional man-icure to shape them up. Help dad indulge by treating him to a little spa therapy for the day. If that’s a little out of your price range, then give him the gift of soothing and great-smelling skincare for his right-at-home journey to smooth skin.

• Keep it Green – If your dad is more crunchy than smooth, then celebrate dad’s day by being keeping it green. Refurbishing can give some old favorite of his a new life, so have him help you select something old that he’d like to see new again. Then take the old armchair, stool, or fishing rod to be upgraded for a gift that uses fewer resources to give many more years of enjoyment.

Several of you have been leaving comments asking for a more natural, daytime look, and others were curious about the looks they were seeing in our store booklets. This is a variation on a look called “Bronze Bombshell,” but I’m also going to list the products for the original look from the store booklet at the bottom of this post.

The trick to this look is building. Go easy on the products for a natural, daytime look, and build up more bronze for an evening out.

Face

• Begin by dusting your face with your shade of Nature’s Minerals Foundation SPF 25 (mine is #04!). This gives medium coverage and is extremely lightweight, perfect for the summertime heat.

• Dot Glow Enhancer on the top of your cheekbones, just under your temples. I like to blend this in with a Foundation Brush to make it look more natural.

Eyes

• Begin by sweeping Eye Color Shade #12: Calico all the way across your lids. This will act as a neutral base for building the rest of your shades.

• Next, take an Eyeshadow Brush and pack Eye Color Shade #41: Gold on your lid. This is a soft, shimmery gold color, and it’s excellent for building into a more dramatic shade. I’ve kept it pretty subtle for a natural look in this tutorial, as you can see below, but feel free to go bolder!

• For your crease and outer V, use Eye Color Shade #05: Brown, which is a lovely summer brown. Use the Eyeshadow Blender Brush to work it into your crease and your outer V, blending thoroughly as you go along.

• Take Eye Shimmer Shade #02: Gold and use to highlight the area directly under your brows and the tear duct areas. This helps eyes stand out and look brighter and more awake.

• Now, take the Eyeshadow Blender Brush and blend all of the layers together until there are no harsh lines. That will make the whole look seem more natural.

• Finish with your favorite mascara. Mine is Divide & Multiply Mascara because I’m happy with the length of my eyelashes, I just want to define them. I also like to line my water line with Eye Definer in black.

Cheeks

• Using the Nature’s Minerals Blusher Brush, swirl and tap on a sufficient amount of the Nature’s Minerals Bronzing Powder in Shade #01 Warm Sandstone. Some of you had some questions about cheek definition in the comments, so I’m going to give you a quick rundown:

• Use a darker shade (like this bronzer) to define your cheekbones. Suck your cheeks in like a fish, and blend the bronzer in where your cheeks are hollowed out.

• Regular blush goes on the apples of your cheeks, which is the part that rounds out when you smile.

Lips

• Finish off with a coat of Liquid Lip Color Shade #02: Golden Coral.

Here we go, final look. For the list of products from the original Bronze Bombshell, see below the photos. You can visit your local Body Shop stores for a booklet with that look in it, as well.

Lid – Nature’s Minerals Eye Color Shade 05: Bronzed Amber

Crease - Nature’s Minerals Eye Color Shade 06: Molten Bronze

Highlight - Nature’s Minerals Eye Color Shade 03: Golden Emerald