Spray Tanning Is So Much Deeper Than I Thought

It’s dawning on me that I have missed out on approximately six years of perfect television by not watching Vanderpump Rules, a show I have skipped only because I already watch too much other television and I must somehow make time to like, have a life.

This realization comes only now, despite having worked with many Vanderstans for the last five years, because Page Six has interviewed the professional who gives the Vanderpumpers their spray tans, and it is much more profound than I would have ever anticipated.

Her name is Brittany Bennett, she is the proprietor of “Be Bronze Spray Tanning Studio,” and one must not be skeptical when Page Six refers to her as a “celebrity artist,” because what she does involves a modicum of planning, skill, and client anticipation:

“When I spray tan anybody — famous or not — I always start off the conversation with, ‘What are you doing? Where are you going?’” Bennett explained. “That really does matter because I’m able to customize it off that. Are you going to be on a red carpet with that flash? Then we want to make sure that the undertone can handle the flash. Are you wearing white? Are you just going to a photo shoot where the photographer wants you to be a little less dark?”

Where are you going? What are you doing? The level of existential philosophy involved in fake bronzing one’s obviously fit bod is unexpected, and the attention to detail when it comes to shades and hues—can the undertone handle the flash?—is simply breathtaking. I did not know that spray tanning was such a deep endeavor, and feel foolish for presuming otherwise. I’ll be thinking about this interview for a long, long time to come.