Category Archives: Culture

This is a post about female friendship, and the value of true friends both old and new.

There are times in life when we need new friends to help us evolve and progress. A change in job or circumstance, a shift into marriage or motherhood – it’s amazing how at times of real change, it can often be newer friends who identify with our emotions, and support without judging.

And there are times when the endurance of decades-old friendships reminds you of who you really are and allows you to look back in laughter, and to make sense of what’s ahead.

Last Sunday one of us had lunch with old schoolfriends (pictured above, lunch and pic courtesy of @talktoteens Charlotte Berry, centre) and one of us dined with someone new who extended the hand of friendship and invited her over for lunch.

Both were exciting, entertaining and enriching experiences, and it meant we spent a lot of our non-work time together this week debating the significance of female friends.

So much tripe is written about female friendship that it’s almost difficult to put the negative connotations to one side – and focus unashamedly on the fact that, to our minds, female friendship is one of the great and enduring joys in life. Reading and watching certain forms of media may almost lead you to believe that female friendship is either i) a hotbed of backstabbing, bad-mouthing and betrayal or ii) an endless cocktail-infused light dialogue about shoes, sex and suntans – but we all know that these comprise the outer, rare, peripheral moments. True female friendship is more than this – although we’re as happy as the rest to indulge in the light, that’s not the stuff that binds us. And, as we move further through our 40s, and life’s less fluffy side is increasingly prone to jump up and bite us on the bum (near-death experiences, legal battles and other such high points), it’s the unwavering support of old friends, and the kindness of new ones, that we are eternally grateful for.

So with one of us spending more time than ever with oldest and dearest friends and rediscovering what we love about each other, and the other having moved to a completely new area and busy forging ahead with a new female friendship group, we’re experiencing the best of both the old and the new.

It’s made us think about how and why we’re friends with our friends, what we give and what we offer in return. And this reflection was brought even further into focus last week when I went to see the BRILLIANT new play Di and Viv and Rose at the Hampstead Theatre.

More than any trite chick lit novel or overblown movie plot, this was a deeply moving and poignant exploration of female friendship through the decades – the initial flirtations and hesitant approaches, the giddiness of getting to know each other, the euphoric first experiences that cement your relationships – and the many, many subsequent years of high points and low ones that inextricably bind you with certain people and ensure that you measure out your life in their company.

It’s the sort of play that makes you think deeply about friendship, and whose themes remain with you long after you’ve left the theatre, because they ring so true. It made one of my friends leave the theatre in a sombre mood “I’m just a shit friend, I never pick up the phone and call”) It made me send an ‘I love you’ message to a friend as soon as I got home (although on reflection I really should have called her instead.)

But the point here is not guilt, but celebration. Female friends touch your life in a way that’s totally different to partners, families, children and any of life’s other most enjoyable things. And yet some days, thinking about the amazing women in my life, and how complex ‘real life’ can be, it seems as if the comfort and company of female friends is almost the most enjoyable thing there is…

Posted by Kath

Shock news this week of yet another beauty brand being taken to task by the ASA, this time for claims that their tummy tuck product doesn’t, it seems (brace yourselves here) give the effect of an actual tummy tuck.

I could name names but frankly, that’s not really the point. That particular ad may have been canned, but we won’t be surprised or shocked when another few spring up to replace it, especially as we approach the summer holiday season, when even the most intellectually ample among us have been known to stockpile any product with a transformational claim, in the hope that it will work a little bit of magic.

And it’s the size of the gap between fact and fiction that’s crucial here – as well as the price we’re paying. We’re all willing to involve ourselves in a little suspension of disbelief (I’m unlikely to lose sleep over the fact that my prawn cocktail-flavoured crisps don’t taste much like that much-maligned 70s starter, for example). I’m happy to buy a cream that hints at relaxing or moisturising properties, or a fragrance that classes itself as fresh and youthful. But it does rankle when products are only bought (and for an inflated price) on the basis of a statement that’s misleading, unsubstantiated, or falsely represented by an image that has nothing to do with the stuff that it’s advertising.

It also rankles that expressions such as ‘tummy tuck’ are becoming normalised, as if we should simply accept cosmetic procedures as a natural part of our maintenance and grooming. Don’t get me wrong; it’s up to each and every one of us where we draw the line, and I’d fight until my last breath for any women to choose to do anything she wants as long as it does no harm to others. But in my magazine Editor days, I was very careful not to blur the boundaries by featuring surgical procedures on our ‘beauty’ pages, and making women feel as if it was the next logical step.

Wouldn’t it be better to promote a product by pinpointing exactly what it is that we want to know about it, and then sharing it with us? If you’ve spent years in a laboratory creating the perfect conditioner for frizzy hair, or a great waterproof mascara that actually did the job, wouldn’t it be an idea to tell us about it, and show us how best to use it – with real language, using real women or real body parts? Instead, though, we’re served up hair extensions and false eyelashes to seduce us into buying haircare and mascara. Don’t brands want us to truly understand the benefits of their products? Or is it that many are not even listening hard enough to develop the products that we actually want?

More and more, it seems as if the genuinely engaging and enlightening brand conversations are happening outside of the old-school advertising budgets. If Lauren Luke and her many imitators can show us how to put on mascara, why have the mascara brands been so slow to cotton on? If TV production companies understand the power of a makeover, why isn’t this reflected in many advertising concepts aimed at women.

The truth is, it’s easy to get women to bond over shared experiences and the pooling of knowledge. There’s nothing we like better than passing on information, tips and recommendations (and we’re also quick to do the opposite if something doesn’t live up to expectations or promises). So why do we see so few facts – and so many half-baked truths, in advertising that’s aimed squarely at us?

And don’t try telling us that buying a new shampoo is a form of escape, and that we don’t really expect to look as glossy-haired as the gal in the ads after using it. We want results, not spin. We welcome information and knowledge, not disclaimers in the small print (if that). Frankly, we reckon we’re worth a bit more thought.
Kath