There's nothing worse than when I get clients that have been given misguided information and it results in their face looking like they let a child colour on their face. We'll call her Jane Q. Citizen. Jane comes to me with her makeup done stating she wants to look "more polished." I often ask clients to bring a photo that captures the look (not the model) they're going for. For instance, is polished, natural as in little make up or clean as is minimal but bold blips? "Like this girl" she says pointing to a well known Instagram makeup poster. "Huh.... so you want to look like you're wearing makeup?" She looks perplexed so she shows the video that she followed to obtain the look she's currently wearing. As we watch, I hand her a makeup wipe to remove the Spackle so we can start fresh faced.
I ask her if she brought her products which she did and we start. What people say isn't always what we hear. Jane didn't realise that many terms aren't synonymous. For instance, if you are concealing something, you never get a shade two lighter than your own complexion. You want your complexion and depending on what you are concealing you will have a peach tint if it's a dark spot. The only time you want to get any foundation that is lighter than your skin tone is to HIGHLIGHT!!!! Most people walking around don't need a highlight. If you want your features to stand out, you can play them up but you don't need a highlight to accent your eyes, lips or any feature. Great brows? Leave them alone a la Cara Delivigne. Nice Lips? Exfoliate and moisturise and experiment with lip colours. Nice eyes? Mascara! Nice eyes, no lashes, demi lashes and a kitten flick!
I understand the trends but they are simply that. Trends! The only time contouring and highlighting makes much difference is in photographs or low lights. Having dinner with someone special? Of course the highlight will look major when it's reflecting from candle or dim lights. Taking a head shot? Highlight will look like the sun just kissed you there, but if you don't know what you're doing, you're going to have a face full of streaks.
Take what they say online like you would a rumour. There may be truth to it, but don't count it as fact or a scholarly source depending on the person. There are a lot of things like, "clean up my brow" or "conceal my eye bags with a concealer two shades lighter than my face" You clean your brows when you pluck the hair that's stray or you conceal your bags by using a salmon based concealer and then applying your regular foundation. When a person says anything and it ends with "like a pro" don't be fooled. All the "pros" do things differently and it's based on skin tone, texture, elasticity and purpose. You can watch "How to get a flawless face" all day every day but no one has a flawless face, so if you want a one dimensional face with no textures or tone, be my guest.
Just because people have a large following, does not mean they have what it takes to make you look your best. They don't know your skin, your undertones, your trouble spots so the most they can do is give general direction.
Jane and I spent a long time working on her look. Not because she was in need, I rarely advocate the need for makeup as opposed to the love for experiment. It's not good or healthy to feel one needs makeup to be attractive. Jane simply needed to learn about her face so she could have more knowledge when selecting products to enhance her natural features. Cool undertones with warm makeup shades can make her look dirty. Her hair is too warm for the pink in her porcelain skin so that's the beauty of makeup. You experiment, and by that you learn. What didn't work today, a few tweaks and tomorrow she can wear that colour but effortless is always the goal.
If you have beauty questions, aren't sure about a product, drop me a line, I love to help!!

xo
The beauty world didn't seem fun. I went from a starving student, a working professional, and now just starving.
I used to love coming home and wasting time watching people enjoy the same things I enjoyed on YouTube. Makeup, fashion, hair, dating the whole lot. Then things changed. It wasn't just money and sponsorship but a lot of information I didn't want to know but partook in.
It was tempting to get gossip from forums about social media personalities. But now it's making looking and feeling good a source of negative.
Back to just having fun, making mistakes and living.

Back to Basics

by on 11:40 AM
The beauty world didn't seem fun. I went from a starving student, a working professional, and now just starving. I used to love comin...