Fusion Funk

While idly paging through a magazine at the salon the other week I came upon an ad for FusionBeauty, a line of beauty and skincare products that purports to be the non-injection version of Botox.

Stamped with the trusty, venerable Good Housekeeping magazine seal of approval (as opposed to, say, Interview magazine), these products seemed trustworthy and sans danger.

So, in a moment of fun, I ordered a vial of LiftFusion to see what wonders its contents might work on the creases in my brow that have been gently etched there from years of thinking, thinking, thinking about ideas.

LiftFusion arrived on Saturday; I put a dab on my lower brow. I soon felt gentle tingles on my forehead (so far so good) and soon after that felt like the inside corners of my eyes were stinging. Whether the stinging was imaginary or not (and my imagination is vivid indeed), I quickly washed off the product and reprimanded myself for trying to interfere with nature. LiftFusion was not meant to be.

Later that afternoon I was contentedly thinking about color—pink with red, turquoise with green, and was struck by the memory of a label I’d long forgotten: Monsoon.

Do you remember in the early nineties when all the “It” girls were wearing London’s Monsoon? If I recall correctly, the clothing was super-exclusive (when I was in London the shop was by appointment only), super-expensive, had a tremendous rock-star vibe a la Talitha Getty, and was desirable because of the wild, bohemian mixes of color and shape (ethnic fusion).

I had a quick search on the internet and was shocked to see that Monsoon, once the arbiter of all things cool, had become, well, pedestrian. There was a catalogue, as well as an online shop. I cheered when I saw a link to “Monsoon Fusion,” hoping to find some of that glorious color and decadent vibe of the last decade, but all I saw was rather mumsy-hippie wear. What happened?!
So “fusion” didn’t fuse this weekend.

At least I have my memories of Wagamama; perhaps culinary fusion is here to stay?