For women, compact mirrors have two charged uses: looking at your vulva in private or doing your makeup in public.
The sight of a woman applying makeup on crowded public transport is a daily reflective shard of Fleabag’s “Hair matters!” speech, Gone Girl’s “cool girl” voiceover and Barbie’s America Ferrera soliloquy. A reminder, in short, that we are expected to appear pleasing, but never let slip that we’ve made an attempt to do so. When 2004 US vice presidential nominee John Edwards was caught doing his hair before an interview, wags set the footage to I Feel Pretty and it killed his career. Of course he cared about his appearance – he literally wanted to be electable. It was a rare male equivalent to the crime women are accused of when they apply makeup publicly.
While the naysayers would paint you as Narcissus, I see train makeup as a small act of resistance; a daily affirmation that you, a mortal woman, have better balance than a character from Greek mythology. Take the negative judgments of commuters and make them your daily affirmation, be it the vulnerability of “I want to be admired” or the punk spit of “I don’t give a f***.”
The reverse camera on your phone means you always have a mirror – but it’s not glamorous and can feel sneaky or apologetic. Go all the way and invest in a vintage compact or give it as a Valentine/Christmas/birthday gift to the woman in your life. It says, unashamedly, “I enjoy looking at you and you should get to enjoy looking at yourself, too.” On Etsy, I like Totally Turkish, a small business whose compacts have a regular and magnifying mirror in a beautiful enamel case for only £7.45. On 1stDibs, though, there are many art deco compacts for sale. Art nouveau is the biggest trove as it was an inherently feminine movement. There, you’ll find a £1,259 topaz necklace with a locket mirror of dreams.
Compacts have double uses if you’re a mother. The best way to calm a toddler who is tantrum-ing on a bus is to hand them a compact so they can watch themselves cry. They are always soothed by the sight and calm down.
A good red-flag test is how a romantic interest responds if you do public makeup. This is different from a performance in private, making up just for their eyes. I think this generally turns lovers on because they know you’re getting ready to go into real life; but, until you do, the world beyond the two of you doesn’t exist.
Checking your makeup in public should feel erotic when you’re in the thralls of attraction: your lipstick in the reflection of your knife on a dinner date, looking in a hall mirror on the way to your hotel room, or in the elevator mirror on your exit to see if you’re still you.
As a commuter, I prefer to do very specific slivers of public makeup – a lip or an eye – feeling a full face is dragging people into your life who maybe want to remain their own main character. For this, I recommend mirrors integrated into the makeup itself. Bourjois Volume Reveal Mascara has a rectangle of mirror on its side. Guerlain makes a mirrored lipstick with the same design. I’d be withholding consumer choice if I didn’t share that Isamaya lipstick is encased in a reflective silver erect penis.
The only times I’d do a full face from scratch in public is in gallery gift shops. The V&A and National Portrait Gallery sell great mirrors in theirs and, given the context, your fellow shoppers can simply pretend you’re a performance piece.