“We’ve been working on this line [Flower] for a year and a half. And nine months of that year-and-a-half—which is pretty much the majority of it—I was pregnant. So, it was very romantic in that way. I just kept thinking about, on one level, what women want. On another level, you know, I would love this to be a big company, if we could ever be successful enough to continue on, I wonder if my daughter would one day want to be involved. Not knowing who she’s going to be, or what she’ll want to do, I just liked the idea of a legacy. You know? I really admire these multi-generational companies that you have in fashion and beauty, so I was like, ‘I wonder if I’m building something like that, and that one day... could it ever be?’ It was a nice driving force.

From the beginning, there was a philosophy behind the brand of, what did we want to do that would be different? Because mass makeup is so great right now; it’s really at the top of its game. Prestige makeup has always been great, but there’s such a discrepancy, formula-wise and financially, between the high and the low. I was really out to see if we could build a bridge between the two. We have a different business model—we don’t spend millions and billions on marketing and advertising. Every penny we have actually goes into our formula and packaging. We’re an upstart company at Walmart, which sounds like an oxymoron, I know. We are at the largest retailer in the world, but we are a new business. It’s not unlike being a [film] producer, where you have to get creative about how you’re going to market and promote movies. And then coming from being a creative director at CoverGirl, knowing what is right for marketing in makeup, and being in a makeup chair since I was six years old, and that great aspirational, fun, playful world that I’ve just always loved—for me, it was perfect timing to put all of those things together.

I had saved all of my old-school makeup—like from forever and ever and ever ago—and put it in bins, hoping that one day, maybe... And now, I get to break it all out. I get to curate a line that’s full of the things I loved the most from different lines, from over the years, things that were discontinued… or just thinking, ‘What if this could actually be like this,’ or if I could combine those two things into one.

I'm dying to bring back the nineties. I love that Pop magazine shoot [from the November 2008 issue; photo 3]. It’s so fun, so nineties. I want that red hair color back, actually. And the lips—we actually have a color in the line that’s emblematic of that, Black Rose. I think [the nineties influence] definitely shows up in the line. First of all, you want a toffee lip liner. That and Black Rose are two colors I’ve been wearing a lot, to bring back the nineties. Our Plum lip liner is great for that, as well. I made all of the lip liners with our lab so that they wear really well as lipstick, too—which, again, is really nineties. That’s what we did in the nineties; we wore lip liner as our lipstick!

I am the biggest lover of makeup on the planet, but I love taking off my makeup and having a fresh face and letting my skin breathe. I don’t wear makeup all day long, every day. I love letting my skin breathe—you have to. But I love going out, and doing a little dot of concealer, and a kiss of something on my lip, and using the lip [product] on my cheek—just having those two items and running out the door. I actually always just double my lipstick as a cheek tint; it’s so great, so easy. I use concealer under my eyes, and then always a little on my chin, sometimes around my nose, and then wherever the red spots are that day. It’s like, ‘How are they moving around like that? Yesterday one was here, today it’s there.’ It’s like, constellations in the sky—I’m amazed.

For me, I need my time alone in my bathroom or my closet. I dance around and put makeup on, listen to music, and have these really free, fun, silly moments. I love the idea that girls are like that: we’re fun and silly, and expressive. Then we go out into the real world, outside of that very safe shell of ‘I get to do whatever I want, nobody’s looking at me,’ and kind of fight to protect that sweet, innocence and fearlessness. I like a sense of playfulness, and we shouldn’t lose that in business or in life. My motto for this whole thing [Flower] is, ‘You’re already beautiful, now let’s play.’ It’s much more about empowerment and playfulness, rather than, like, ‘Be a model, do this look, do that.’ You know? We are who we are—we should celebrate that. Stop fighting it, be silly, do what makes us feel beautiful. Happiness is the best makeup, period. When I’m a good person that day, that makes me feel happy. I feel attractive when I make my husband laugh. [Laughs] I really do. I’m like, zinga, I feel so sexy! And I’ll be in sweatpants and a scrunchie, and I’m like, ‘Oh man, I just made him laugh. That’s hot!’ I like to play. I mean, come on. We could get hit by a bus tomorrow, and we’re going to have played it safe and conservative? Forget it. I want to try every hair color, I want to paint my face crazy colors for an M.I.A. concert, I want to work with CoverGirl and everything in-between. I don’t care what people think or say, I want to live. I want to have fun! We worry so much in life; I want to worry less.

Skincare-wise, I’m obsessed with Dickinson’s Witch Hazel wipes. They’re like facials on-the-go; I buy them at the drugstore. They completely help keep my skin clear. They’re awesome. You want the individually packed ones—for some reason the other ones don’t work as well. And I can’t live without Aquaphor. I put it on my lips like it’s going out of style. I have the tiny tube, I have the industrial tube, I have the tub—I have all of it. I love Aquaphor. I love a Mason Pearson brush—I would die without my Mason Pearson. I never do anything with my hair except for brush it out, and hope for the best. Those three things I’m obsessed with.

I get my hair colored by Tracey Cunningham. I’m sure I’ll change the color soon; I can never sit still. But I think I told myself I wasn’t allowed to change it for one year, so I have to figure out exactly when I got this color. I was messing with it too much, and it was kind of disintegrating. I think that was from when I did blond hair and black tips around five years ago, for the Whip It press tour: Tracey and I dyed my hair white blond, cut it at the shoulders, used a ruler, put black dye on the ruler, and put Vaseline in the hair to the edge of the ruler so the color wouldn’t bleed up. As soon as I finished that tour, I had to go back to [shoot] CoverGirl, and the black tips were not very CoverGirl; I had to cut it all out. So, I’ve been growing my hair out since then, and it just took forever to grow out. I kept coloring it, but I just need to leave the poor follicle alone. ‘Give a guy a break,’ that’s what my hair is saying. I was using the Pureology line—their shampoo, conditioner, and the leave-in mask—to help it get better. But if you put too much protein on your hair, in the form of conditioners, creams, masks, then that’ll damage it, too, so there’s a limit.

In terms of my diet, I do a green drink every day; I’m obsessed with the green drink. [I do it at home] or go somewhere and buy one. It’s like my favorite thing in the world, my green drink. [Laughs] And then I eat a lot of vegetarian food, because I was a vegetarian for most of my life. But then I love a good steak. I’m all over the map. Consistency is not my strong suit—except for in work, and now with my family.

[My husband Will Kopelman] and I have fashion veto power. He came down in a t-shirt one day, and I was like, ‘That is awful. I hate that t-shirt!’ [Laughs] I don’t even know what it was! Apparently it was this skateboarding company. It was anything but cool. What did he veto of mine the other day? My rad eighties-style nameplate necklace—it said ‘Olive,’ our daughter's name. He was like, ‘No, please!’ He’s much more conservative than I am, and yet he is the guy who has some tattoos and is definitely more drawn to a woman who’s a bit edgier. Sometimes I don’t know how he ended up with me. Like, how are you not with some nice, thin, tall Upper East Side girl? Like, this doesn’t make any sense. Why are you with the girl in the scrunchie doing like, a ho-down dance in your bedroom making you laugh? But I’m so glad that that’s what he likes; he celebrates who I am.”

—as told to ITG

Drew Barrymore photographed by Emily Weiss in New York on January 14, 2013. 2: Drew at her Flower presentation; 3: Drew in Pop magazine, November 2008; 4: Flower makeup (including Luxury Lip Color in Chocolate Lily , Shine On Lip Gloss in In the Gardenia , Kiss Stick High-Shine Lip Color in Black Rose , and Line & Shine Lip Liner in Toffee).