It’s our patriotic duty to wear lipstick during a Zoom call

During the war applying make-up was considered to be a morale booster, so Christine Manby is considering whether to add a bit of lippy

Illustration by Tom Ford

Of the many news stories that have left me open-mouthed in horror since 23 March, the reports that over-zealous police officers were threatening to check people’s lockdown shopping trolleys for “non-essential items” were definitely the most gob-smacking. “What counts as non-essential items?” a nation worried and wondered. If you were in the toiletries aisle of Sainsbury’s, for example, could you buy soap but not shower gel? Shampoo but not conditioner? Where did the law stand on cotton wool pads? After all you could just scrub your mascara off with a dampened piece of rough toilet paper, as we used to when caught wearing make-up at school. If you had toilet paper, of course.

And what about make-up? Most supermarkets carry some. Would the police be fining anyone who snuck a concealer stick in with the margarine? Would the magistrates’ courts be full of people who bought mascara with their own-brand beans?

During the Second World War, a great many things were rationed to a degree that make our recent complaints about not being able to get the right kind of flour for focaccia seem very spoilt indeed. But one thing that the wartime government in Britain did not ration was lipstick. Wearing make-up was believed to be a valuable morale booster. At a time when everyone was expected to do their bit, it was even thought to be patriotic. Hitler’s Nazis liked their women well-scrubbed and free of artifice, so a slick of bright lipstick became a good way of sticking two fingers up at the pink-cheeked Aryan ideal.