Both the dazzling appeal and the sinking horror of being a beauty editor is that a flood of shiny new products wash over your desk each day, free of charge. In spite of it all, you still somehow manage to find the Infallible, the Kryptonite, the Desert-Island-Can't-Live-Without, the One, the Undying.

You may have spent years studiously ignoring your mother's advice (and she was right about that guy in high school, admit it), but eventually all that bossing and nagging adds up to something truly useful. Here, Allure staffers share their mothers' wisest words about beauty.

I've always thought I had pretty soft hair, and when a new girl started working in our office with the shiniest hair I had ever seen, we were all fawning over it. When asked what her secret was, she simply said, "coconut oil!"

As a new resident of Marin County, it's my personal mission to banish this image of Marin County being the mecca of the unstylish, suburban mother who doesn't work, but only works out.