What do you do when you’re a 40-something celebrity looking so enviably ageless that half the world is speculating you’ve had a facelift? Take the compliment and bask in it? Issue a stern denial and legal letters? Or do you take the fresh (very fresh) angle offered by Anne Hathaway and serve up a plausible alternative explanation – the secret facelift braid?
The Devil Wears Prada star certainly looks like a woman who’s done a deal with Beelzebub, thanks to her flawless, poreless complexion and those astonishingly refined facial contours. If there’s any professional help behind that enviable jawline, she’s staying tight-lipped about it, neatly batting off journalistic enquiries about surgery as 'an extremely intimate question’.
But perhaps all the speculation is getting to her, because she recently chose to share the hidden inner workings of her Oscars red carpet hair, which included a secret braid to tug and pull her face upwards.
To which the world immediately nodded and issued a collective ‘Ohhhh.’ Yes, that explains it, agreed TikTok. Speculation ended. No further questions, m’lud. Because that’s the way the internet works.
Whatever the truth about Anne’s gorgeous face, my view on her 'facelift braid' as a 50-something beauty editor is: ‘got to be worth a try’. I’m at that age when I find myself cupping my budding jowls and tugging everything back to my ears and to my facial contours circa 2005. It can only be a matter of time until I’m like that scene in Hook when the Lost Boys yank back Robin William’s face and sigh, ‘There you are, Peter!’
Being a chronic catastrophiser, I do a quick risk assessment pre-braid, and ask a friend (and top trichologist) whether this short-term hack could cause me long-term hair problems. ‘From a trichologist point of view, yes you are putting strain on the roots,’ Mark Blake tells me.
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‘This could potentially lead to problems with traction alopecia if you kept doing it long term. But doing it just for a night out is not a problem – and if you look better go for it.’
I’m reassured and mildly offended in equal measure.
‘Just don’t get too drunk and leave the braid in when you go to bed,’ he adds. Okay, I hold my hands up, it's fair comment.
To find out whether a deep plane effect really is a strategic plait and tug away, my next step is to visit A-list celebrity hairdresser Michael Douglas. Surely he does this trick all the time? ‘Actually, I’ve never done it in my life… but I’m curious,’ he admits, as he sections my hair and begins an exploratory pull. My face obligingly follows the direction of travel. Gosh, Anne might just be onto something.
Once we’ve found the sweet spot (a section of hair big enough to create lift, small enough to hide away) he begins plaiting until I’m left with two weird braids poking out from the side of my head.
The good news: I look like a star! The bad news: it’s Jar Jar Binks.
The trickier part is to secure the two braids tightly enough so my face lifts up and stays put. ‘I just need to find the right thing,’ says Michael, scuttling off. What, a staple gun?
Actually, it’s just a couple of kirby grips but by the time Michael has twisted the braids together tightly and pinned my hair-plus-skin back, I’m thinking a staple gun might have been less painful. In fact, actual surgery might be, too.
The upper half of my face does look tighter, with lifted cheeks and tauter eyes, but it’s immediately uncomfortable and I have to assume that won't improve as the evening wears on. I have a fancy work event in the diary tonight, but my plan to bring the plait as a plus-one is feeling less appealing by the second.
Also, the laws of gravity and facial anatomy mean that the braid does zilch to tighten my jowls. Short of growing chin hair long enough to plait (not beyond the realms of possibility these days), I can’t see a work-around.
Overall? This hack works but the effect isn’t impressive enough to persuade me to keep those pinchy braids in place a moment longer than necessary to snap a few photos.
Cheers for the tip Anne, but I’ll pass. If I’m having a big night out, I’d rather have the headache the morning after, thanks.
