Label Conscious

No beauty addict worth her salt purchases products based on their packaging. Slick marketing campaigns and chic little gifts-with-purchase? Strictly amateur hour. We all know those sleek tubes and shiny new boxes are only as good as the products inside – that their beauty is, in fact, much more than skin deep.

There is one area where you always read the fine print, however. Testing beauty products on animals? So not okay. After all, if you wouldn’t want to see it happen to your little sister, how could you condone the same thing being done to your six-week-old kitten, Minx?

It may not always be easy, but you make every effort to ensure that your purchases are cruelty-free. And, thanks to organizations like Leaping Bunny and PETA -- and oh-so-helpful daily digests from green e-newsletter Ideal Bite -- it’s becoming easier than ever to make sure your makeup charms, but never harms.

Click here for a list of companies that never test on animals.

Beauty Loves Sephora loves: Dermalogica, Alba, Too Faced, Pureology, and, of course, the ubiquitous Burt’s Bees

Can you keep a secret?

Admit it. You spent most of Benjamin Button wondering how anyone could possibly have skin so luminous, so inhumanly perfect. When she graced the cover of Vanity Fair, you lusted after her complexion, rather than that fabulous Ralph Lauren dress. And when you learned that Cate Blanchett, she of the flawless ivory skin and equally flawless, incredibly nuanced performances, credited her outer beauty to SK-II, you happily forked over more money than you thought possible for that timelessly elegant glass bottle.

I know. Because I did too.

Like Button, SK-II was born under unusual circumstances. Although it sounds more geek than chic, the line traces its roots not to a laboratory but to a humble sake factory in Japan. After noticing the youthful appearance of the workers’ hands, scientists spent years identifying the ingredients that would produce the same effect. Pitera – the resulting combination of vitamins, amino acids, minerals and organic acids that is the company’s Secret Key to Beautiful Skin – is the proprietary complex included in all SKI-II products, including the cornerstone of this line: Facial Treatment Essence.

The colorless, clear liquid more than keeps its promises. Absorbing almost instantly into skin, it moisturizes, smoothes and brightens, helping to “restore vital balance by promoting the skin’s natural 28-day surface renewal process.” Try it, and you’ll never look at skincare – or aging – the same way.

Go ahead. Treat yourself to the one product that may actually help you age backward.

I’ll never tell.