Black Coffee and Red Lipstick

Hardcover / ISBN-13: 9781846017780

Price: £20

ON SALE: 1st October 2026

Genre: Literary Essays / Memoirs / Prose: Non-fiction

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Praise for Alexandra Shulman:

‘Self-deprecating and stylish, this is sure to become a classic.’ – Vanity Fair

‘Alexandra Shulman’s style is unaffected, immediate and hilariously dry. She’s brilliant at observing everyday feelings in a joy-sparking turn of phrase.’ – Helena Bonham Carter

Black Coffee and Red Lipstick is a collection of essays that weave ideas about our domestic and daily life – hence the black coffee – with thoughts on style and the way we present ourselves – hence the red lipstick.

It combines anecdotes and observations from Alexandra Shulman’s 25 years spent editing British Vogue and her current life as a freelance writer and commentator. She draws on her experiences as a magazine editor but also a mother, daughter, sibling, girlfriend, housekeeper and lover of shopping.

Alexandra left her job at Vogue in 2017 to embark on a different way of life and while this is in no way a book of self-discovery it does touch on the question of things or patterns of behaviour that make us who we are?

The essays will be a mixture of ideas from her quest for the perfect eyeliner, to why picnics are so delightful. How it is that men and women see different things in the home – is there male pattern blindness? – to why our hair matters so much to us. Friendship, siblings, gardening and grey hair will also be explored with Alexandra’s characteristic wit and incisiveness.