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Enjoy this curated selection of theme-related dances for celebrations and holidays, or find a dance associated with a special calendar day, or EVEN your own birthday!
Jul 29
Lipstick Day
Lipstick on my Knee
Other Scottish Country Dances for this Day
Today's Musings, History & Folklore
"If you're sad, add more lipstick and attack."
~ Coco Channel (1883-1971)
Have you ever had—or witnessed—an unusual mishap while dancing? Lost a slip or petticoat? Careened into another set? Fallen through a stage floor because the boards were rotten? Had your ghillies soften, separate, or even begin to melt on a scorching dance floor? These very real incidents prove that "🎶 The best things happen while you're dancing!" ...and sometimes the most unusual things happen too!
The only Scottish Country Dance devoted to lipstick, "Lipstick on the Knee" is a 32-bar jig for 3 couples in a 4-couple set, devised by Sue McKinnell. The title was inspired when one helpful dancer bent down to check something on another dancer's special costume leggings for a historical reenactment at the exact moment he raised his knee. Fortunately, the only casualty was a lipstick smear!
This incident-inspired dance offers plenty of opportunities for close encounters, with quick mirror reels, 3-couple set and links, and numerous exchanges of places. Blot that lipstick, ladies!
If you're a lipstick enthusiast, you may recognize some of the classic Revlon shades from the 1950s that are still available today. Love That Red, Cherries in the Snow, and the famous Fire and Ice became iconic colors of the post-war "New Look" and were considered cosmetic essentials for fashionable women.
Although today's lipstick on the knee is more likely the result of a beauty or dancing mishap, the knees themselves once received cosmetic attention on purpose. During the 1920s, fashionable flappers sometimes dusted their kneecaps with rouge to draw attention to them. Rather than relying on cumbersome garters high on the thigh, younger women often rolled their stockings to just below the knee, creating a distinctive rolled band beneath their daringly shorter skirts. A touch of rouge on the exposed knee further emphasized the look. It was considered positively "the bee's knees," reflecting the era's growing embrace of everyday makeup—especially lipstick. 23 Skidoo!
Have you ever experienced—or witnessed—an unforgettable dancing mishap of your own? Grab those ghillies (and your lipstick, if you're so inclined), take your chances, and attack! 🕺 💃 ❤️ ❤️ ❤️ 💄 💄 💄 👄 🤪
Lipstick on my Knee
Whether sheer and light or dark or bright, today is the day for all shades of lipstick.
Throughout the ages, controversy has surrounded lipstick. The actress Sarah Bernhardt created an epic scandal by applying lip rouge in public, and Queen Victoria considered makeup hugely impolite. Yet, Winston Churchill found lipstick to be a wonderful morale booster and refused to limit its production during WW II.
Though used from ancient times, lip colouring only started to gain wide popularity in 16th-century England. During the time of Queen Elizabeth I bright red lips and a stark white face became fashionable. At that time, lipstick was made from a blend of beeswax and red stains from plants. Only upper class women and male actors wore makeup.
After this period, however, the acceptance of lip rouge waxed and waned.
British Parliament banned it in 1770, calling it a devilish attempt to trick men into marriage. They likened it to witchcraft.
In 1915, a bill was introduced into Kansas legislature that would have made it a misdemeanor for a woman under 44 to wear makeup because it “created a false impression.”
Dark red was one of the most popular shade throughout the 19th and 20th centuries. Popular in the 1920s, flappers wore lipstick to symbolize their independence. At that time, it was acceptable to apply lipstick in public and during lunch, but never at dinner!
In the 1940s, a more natural look was stressed with books and magazines warning girls that wearing cosmetics could ruin their chances of popularity and a career.
But by the 1950s, lipstick had regained its popularity, particularly red shades popularized by Marilyn Monroe and Elizabeth Taylor. Queen Elizabeth II even commissioned her own lipstick shade to match her coronation robes at the 1952 ceremony, a soft red-blue dubbed “The Balmoral Lipstick,” named after her Scottish country home.
In the mid-2000s, a poll found that 80 percent of American women wore lipstick, about ten percent more than French women.
The "lipstick effect" is an economic theory stating that when facing an economic crisis, consumers are more willing to buy less costly luxury goods. That is, instead of buying expensive fur coats, for example, people will buy expensive lipstick!
To learn more about this effect, click the 1917 illustration by Jacques Julien Leclerc titled "L'Arsenal Feminin" with the caption, "Desarmer? Jamais!"
Whatever the color, wear your lipstick with pride today.
Click the dance cribs or description below to link to a printable version of the dance!
