To tan or not to tan...?

cbmonstra

Hi All,

I have a friend's wedding coming up, and have tried on a few dresses for it this weekend. My mam and sister seem insistent that whatever dress I go for, regardless of colour or length, I should get a tan done.

I am really pale with very dark hair. I hate the way that tan looks on me. I've tried both professional, and DIY, sprays and lotions. I hate them all, I always think it looks unnatural on me.

I want to know if the general consensus is that you should tan for a wedding, or do you think it's ok to leave it? If I was to forget about the tan is there any thing that I can buy to even out skin tone on legs and arms, or give a kind of glow, without looking like I got tangoed?:D

Thanks for any replies.

Toto Wolfcastle

If you don't like the way tan looks on you then don't use it. Pale skin is beautiful.

dee_mc

The lightest shade of Sally Hansen airbrush legs would give a very slight glow and even out your skin tone; i know people who use it on arms, chest etc and it blends fairly well without looking like a fake fake fake tan. It's on offer at e9.99 in Supervalu right now. Having said that i would just embrace the pale, exfoliate the day before and slather on some nice body lotion and you'll look far healthier and more natural, an orange glow just doesn't suit most irish people

stargazer 68

My sis is getting married next year and has said under no circumstances are we (bridesmaids) being fake tanned! I have yet to see anyone with fake tan on that doesnt look like its fake! Im sure you are all going to say there are plenty of products that look natural but there is always that brown line no matter how well its applied!
Go with the natural look op

Dovies

If you don't like tan, then don't tan.

Feck what other people are telling you - I don't get that at all.

Dovies wrote: »

MI have yet to see anyone with fake tan on that doesnt look like its fake!

Or, more likely, that you don't notice well applied tan - because it is, well applied.

cbmonstra

Deleted User wrote: »

If you don't like tan, then don't tan.

Feck what other people are telling you - I don't get that at all.

Yeah, I wouldn't do it just cos they said so... it hadn't really entered my head to get one until they said it. They were just so insistent that I must wear tan, like it was a pre-requisite to going to a wedding, like wearing your best clothes, that I just wanted to see what others thought about it. Ye have put my mind to rest on it now, so thanks!

cbmonstra

cbmonstra wrote: »

Yeah, I wouldn't do it just cos they said so... it hadn't really entered my head to get one until they said it. They were just so insistent that I must wear tan, like it was a pre-requisite to going to a wedding, like wearing your best clothes, that I just wanted to see what others thought about it. Ye have put my mind to rest on it now, so thanks!

My friend got this about her own wedding day - she actually had to go and get a spray tan done a couple of weeks before to prove how ridiculous it looked on her. She got the whole "it's your wedding day you have to wear tan" from her bridesmaids and sisters. Thankfully she stood her ground and stuck with her lovely pale skin and red hair!

WhatNowForUs?

No tan please. Not that I know you but you will look amazing without it.

I'm pale as well and my grandmother of all people had an obsession with wanting me to get tan done. I went to a family wedding and there was never any chance I was getting it done, nevermind what anyone said. Years later she finally admits I'm right :P
Stick to your guns

fussyonion

Let me tell you a little story about me and fake tan, shall I?

I'm pale. Really quite pale. I also have fair hair. I possess freckles.
I've tried all the tans going, in the hope I'd be like others-sporting a healthy glow and not being milk bottle white..so white I'd scare small children.
But, you see, me and fake tans were never meant to be friends.

I've tried one called Rockstar Tan, which was meant to make me, typical Irish girl, look healthy and it promised, nay SWORE, it wouldn't leave me all streaky.
So I applied it.

Didn't help that it went on DARK BROWN and streaky and dried invisble.
I was left thinking "Well that's after disappearing....so what happens now?"
Well!

The next day I almost broke the mirror in the bathroom with my banshee-esque screams, for the mysterious tan had resurfaced, mocking me "Hello! You thought I'd melted in, didn't you? But here I am!"

I look all over and I'm as brown as a shoite.
I look like I've purposely blacked up (you know that makeup white people put on to make themselves look black?).
I've COVERED in streaks and at my wrists, it's like someone's been giving me Chinese burns.

I'm patchy and streaky and God knows what else and my hands are white but the backs are orange.
Eventually, after much exfoliating and a dozen showers, I got the stuff off. I might also have worn a polo neck for two months, can't remember.
So I vowed never to use tan again.
The pales of the pale tans STILL look orange on me.

I did use Sally Hansen on my arms and by Jesus, what a mistake.
I was going to a party that night and I had a lovely dress to wear. It showed off my arms and legs so I set to work applying the Sally Hansen stuff. (Gave myself plenty of time, too...about two hours)

The very action of me rubbing the stuff onto my arms left me with big red paw marks, where I'd been rubbing and I looked like I was in the early stages of some sort of skin disease.
I rubbed and rubbed and rubbed and swore and swore and all the while my perfectly applied makeup was dripping onto the floor because I was sweating like a pig.

All around my decollatege (can't spell it), I was as red as a baboon's bum and you could barely see the tan because of the redness.
Eventually, after sitting down for an hour to calm down, it did sort of blend in OK, but later that night, someone took a photo of me (not in a stalkery way, more like a family snapshot) and when I looked at the photo on the digital camera, my face was like a GHOST and my arms and neck were brown.

I felt like crying.

I looked ridiculous.

Sally Hansen is fine on legs though..maybe the skin on the pins is different..it always blends OK............unless you misjudge the application around your heels and it rains and you look like the top of a well-forked Shepherd's Pie.

The upshot of it is.......don't bother with the mental anguish that is fake tan.

Be pale and interesting and laugh at the clowns going around with their Tango-d fizzogs and rejoice in your whiteness.

fussyonion

fussyonion wrote: »

Be pale and interesting and laugh at the clowns going around with their Tango-d fizzogs and rejoice in your whiteness.

I liked your fake tan story until I got to this part which was fairly bitchy. How about - not laughing at anyone, and just letting people be what/who they want to be. Whether that be tanless or tanned or anything else for that matter. No need to slag anyone off, it just makes the person doing the slagging look worse.

fussyonion

Deleted User wrote: »

I liked your fake tan story until I got to this part which was fairly bitchy. How about - not laughing at anyone, and just letting people be what/who they want to be. Whether that be tanless or tanned or anything else for that matter. No need to slag anyone off, it just makes the person doing the slagging look worse.

I wasn't being bitchy! I was talking about the girls going round with the orange faces and arms!

Obviously the girls who know how to apply it have mastered it, but you know the ones I mean-the ones with the Tango faces and white necks.
Maybe I should have explained that a bit more....

If you can apply fake tan properly, then great!

fussyonion

fussyonion wrote: »

I was talking about the girls going round with the orange faces and arms!

So what though? why laugh at anyone? It's just nasty and there's really no need for it.

Sorry for going off topic.

fussyonion

Deleted User wrote: »

So what though? why laugh at anyone? It's just nasty and there's really no need for it.

Sorry for going off topic.

Oh fgs, chill out. I was trying to make the OP feel that she doesn't HAVE to conform to the norm; that she doesn't HAVE to be tanned. Don't be so serious.

fussyonion

Deleted User wrote: »

My friend got this about her own wedding day - she actually had to go and get a spray tan done a couple of weeks before to prove how ridiculous it looked on her. She got the whole "it's your wedding day you have to wear tan" from her bridesmaids and sisters. Thankfully she stood her ground and stuck with her lovely pale skin and red hair!

Who's being nasty now?

shalalala

Natural skin tone is lovely. I am pale and proud! Just put time and effort into making it soft and blemish free leading up to the wedding and you will glow on the day.

fussyonion

fussyonion wrote: »

Who's being nasty now?

um, still you actually.

I never saw her with tan, this is what she herself told me!!!

dee_mc

To be fair, being orange and streaky has never been a norm
although the use of fake tan by pretty well every woman was a norm in Ireland for a long time, there have always been women who have realised the stuff just doesn't complement their skin tone and so steered clear.
Thankfully the non-use of fake tan by those it doesn't suit seems to be on the increase; at the end of the day it's a personal choice, and while i would never tease someone JUST for choosing to use fake tan i see nothing wrong with acknowledging that some people insist on lashing on the streaky cresote-like stuff with no regard for whether it looks vaguely realistic or indeed attractive! I'm not talking about being nasty or laughing at anyone, just making an observation:
also, don't these women have a friend, a mother, a daughter, whatever, who could do them a favour by telling them they look a bit silly?!

kilkenny12

Mac face and body foundation has loads of shades so you could use that for evening out your skintone.

dudara

OK posters - that's enough of it.

OP - go with your instinct. If you don' think tan suits, then you won't be comfortable.

Electric Sheep

dee_mc wrote: »

To be fair, being orange and streaky has never been a norm
although the use of fake tan by pretty well every woman was a norm in Ireland for a long time, there have always been women who have realised the stuff just doesn't complement their skin tone and so steered clear.
Thankfully the non-use of fake tan by those it doesn't suit seems to be on the increase; at the end of the day it's a personal choice, and while i would never tease someone JUST for choosing to use fake tan i see nothing wrong with acknowledging that some people insist on lashing on the streaky cresote-like stuff with no regard for whether it looks vaguely realistic or indeed attractive! I'm not talking about being nasty or laughing at anyone, just making an observation:
also, don't these women have a friend, a mother, a daughter, whatever, who could do them a favour by telling them they look a bit silly?!

I have to agree - the fake tans and extremely heavy makeup that have become the norm in Ireleand make me wonder if there is a shortage of accurate mirrors.

Ziegfeldgirl27

I used to have a phobia of fake tan. I used to think my pale skin was beautiful, until I realised it wasn't that beautiful porcelain, snow white complexion I thought I had. My skin is a horrible grey/blue/purple, kind of like corned beef. I wear a tiny amount of Baby B. Browne which is a brilliant tan and I think I look a whole lot better wearing it especially for special occasions like weddings.

I'm not saying you have to get a tan for the wedding OP but I do think that a little bit of tan would make a great difference.

chickenbutt

Ziegfeldgirl27 wrote: »

I used to have a phobia of fake tan. I used to think my pale skin was beautiful, until I realised it wasn't that beautiful porcelain, snow white complexion I thought I had. My skin is a horrible grey/blue/purple, kind of like corned beef. I wear a tiny amount of Baby B. Browne which is a brilliant tan and I think I look a whole lot better wearing it especially for special occasions like weddings.

I'm not saying you have to get a tan for the wedding OP but I do think that a little bit of tan would make a great difference.

Haha! :pac: I have the same type of skin - looks better with a bit of a tan/glow.