Best of Beauty at 30: Allure’s Pizza-Fueled Anniversary

Allure’s Best of Beauty arrived at its thirtieth anniversary this month with a celebration that blended beauty industry prestige with New York City food culture. The publication partnered with Mama’s TOO!, a West Village pizzeria, commemorating three decades of product curation through an unexpected collaboration that included custom branded pizza boxes and hand-delivered pies.

Since its 1996 debut, Best of Beauty has functioned as Allure’s annual designation of products meeting rigorous editorial standards. The program launched with 73 categories and has since expanded dramatically, reflecting how the beauty industry itself has grown in complexity, specialization, and product availability. According to Allure, the awards have evolved into a meaningful purchasing guide for readers navigating retail environments—a role that predated social media and the influencer-driven beauty landscape of recent years.

The Thirtieth-Year Milestone

From Concept to Cultural Authority

When Best of Beauty launched in 1996, the beauty category encompassed fewer product types and less segmentation than today’s market. The initial 73 categories represented the major product families of the 1990s. Three decades later, the expansion of categories reflects not only industry growth but also how consumers and brands have specialized within beauty, creating subcategories that scarcely existed when the program began.

Jessica Cruel, Allure’s editor in chief, articulated the program’s significance: “Best of Beauty has become synonymous with our red seal.” This statement encapsulates how the publication’s annual exercise in product evaluation transformed into an industry marker carrying real influence over consumer purchasing decisions.

Beyond the Beauty Counter

The thirtieth-year edition made an unexpected expansion: the awards included a category for the best pizza in New York City. This divergence from conventional beauty product categories became the conceptual anchor for how Allure would mark the milestone, signaling that the publication’s credibility extended beyond skincare and cosmetics into lifestyle and cultural territories.

The Mama’s TOO! Celebration

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Allure partnered with Mama’s TOO!, a pizzeria situated in Manhattan’s West Village, to execute the thirtieth-anniversary celebration. The partnership extended beyond a single promotional event; it created a branded experience through custom pizza box design and a delivery program that reached approximately 20 recipients across Allure’s network.

The Branded Execution

The pizza boxes themselves became the primary communication vehicle. Each box featured Allure’s logo and signature tagline—”The Beauty Expert”—displayed prominently on both the interior and exterior surfaces. This design choice transformed a functional food delivery container into editorial branding, turning pizza consumption itself into a touchpoint for the publication’s message.

Partnership Perspective

Frank Tuttolomondo, founder of Mama’s TOO!, explained the collaboration’s appeal: “We’ve done numerous partnerships in the past as they help to broaden our exposure and potentially reach new audiences. It’s always fun to see ways in which brands get creative.” His comments indicated that partnerships of this nature aligned with the pizzeria’s broader strategy for building brand visibility within New York’s food culture.

October carries particular significance for this celebration. The month marks Best of Beauty’s anniversary, and it is also designated as National Pizza Month in the United States. Katie Gunderman, Allure’s associate social media manager, documented the West Village celebration for distribution across the publication’s social channels.

Product Recommendations for the Occasion

Allure’s editorial team selected specific products appropriate for readers marking the anniversary, with particular attention to the practical challenge of maintaining makeup while consuming pizza—a scenario that tested product durability and longevity.

Lip Color That Resists Eating

The featured lip recommendation was Violette_FR Lip Nectar in the shade Bêtise, a pinky-red formula that earned favor throughout Allure’s offices. The product choice addressed a functional consideration: pizza consumption inevitably compromises lip color through contact with food and napkins. A formula designed to provide lasting color meets this real-world need.

Maintaining Makeup Integrity

Maintaining overall makeup integrity presented a second concern. Allure recommended the Morphe Lifeproof Continuous Setting Mist as a practical addition to the beauty routine. This spray functions as a seal for makeup, designed to extend wear time and resist the displacement that occurs during eating and natural movement.

The Touchland Hand Sanitizer completed the trio of recommendations, addressing the intermediate step between sanitizing hands before consuming food and maintaining makeup throughout the process.

What the Celebration Signifies

The anniversary event demonstrates how established beauty publications translate editorial authority into experiential moments for their audiences. Rather than hosting a traditional awards ceremony or exhibition, Allure selected a food-focused partnership that maintained accessibility while celebrating a significant milestone.

The collaboration signals that a publication’s credibility can extend beyond its core editorial category when executed with intentionality. For a brand that spent thirty years becoming synonymous with beauty product evaluation, adding pizza expertise to its credentials offered an unconventional but effective way to mark the moment. The celebration underscored that Best of Beauty’s authority—built across three decades—could venture into unexpected cultural territories.

Source: Allure