Makeup

Makeup was my first love in the beauty world. I would always buy cheap lipglosses and put vaseline on my eyelids since I was a little girl. My first actual makeup product was an old blush set given to me by my grandma during my sixth grade year. There were only three shades, so I would endlessly recreate the same makeup look on the weekends. I found myself looking up makeup tutorials on YouTube, which quickly became an obsession of mine. I loved seeing the transformation of a natural being to someone who expressed his or her artwork on his or her face with makeup. I too wanted to be able to to transform, so I practiced and practiced and practiced some more. I can say after a few years I finally got the basic makeup applications down pact and I can’t wait to share my knowledge with all my readers.

Before we can begin to apply makeup, we want to make sure our faces are clean and moisturized. This ensures a better application prevents the spread of bacteria to the makeup brushes.

The first step is to apply a primer. Primers set a barrier between the face and makeup. It also creates a smooth base that gives the foundation and eyeshadow something to adhere to, making the products last all day. There are a number of different primers that help mattify, add a glow, smooth, or color correct the skin. The trick in choosing a primer is knowing how you want your makeup to look after application. Many brands have a number of primers designed for different skin types and finishes.

One of my favorite steps is doing my eyebrows. Everyone wants fleeky brows because they are the feature that frames the face. The wrong brow can either make or break the whole application. The problem most people have with brows is creating dramatic shapes and filling in too heavily with the wrong color. When doing brows, you need to pick a color that is a little brighter that your brow hairs, but will still show up on the skin. This will give color to the brow area, but won’t look too dark when used to fill in.

Next consider the natural shape of your brows; it is most likely fine the way it is. Often times, people try to create a new shape that isn’t suiting for their eyes or the rest of their face. We want to keep our natural shape and just worry about filling in the sparse areas. Did you read that correctly? Yes, I think you did. JUST FILL IN THE SPARSE AREAS! Don’t try to overfill the spaces that have more than enough hair. Remember we want fleeky brows, not boxy brows.

When we are ready to fill our eyebrows in, we want to brush our hairs in place with a spooly so that each hair is in perfect position. Use a brow pencil, powder, pomade, or gel to start outlining the ends of the brow. Make the lines lighter as you work your way to the front of the brow. Fill in the middle and ends with hair-like strokes. Do the same for the head, but use extremely light pressure and less product. This creates the gradient look that natural brows have. After filling in, we can use a concealer which is 1-2 shades lighter than our normal complexion to highlight and correct any mistakes we made when filling in. Make sure to blend the concealer with your fingers or a brush, it really doesn’t matter.

With the help of the Eyebrow Gods, our brows are finally slayed. It is now time to apply foundation. I like to use a beauty blender sponge, but you can use a natural or synthetic hair brush that is fluffy and dense to blend out the foundation. Start of applying a little foundation at a time then adding more layers for the desired coverage. Adding on is always better than having too much makeup to start with. Besides, once you finish the rest of your face application, you realize you didn’t need as much foundation as you originally thought. Make sure you blend the foundation on your eyes and down your neck. This way other people won’t be able to see where the makeup starts or stops.

After foundation, our faces look flat with only one color. We need to add some dimension back into our skin. This is where highlighting and contouring comes into play. Highlighters are used to brighten the face where the light naturally hits while contours are meant to create shadows and depth. To highlight, place the concealer we used underneath the brows under the eyes, on the bridge of the nose, and a little on the forehead. Blend this out with a beauty blender or blending brush similar to the foundation brush. We need to set these areas with a translucent powder so that the concealer doesn’t crease. To contour use a powder that is 1-2 shades darker than our normal skin color. Use a color that
is neutral instead of warm, which can make you look like an oompa loompa, or cool, which can create unnatural grey shadows. Apply the powder with a tapered fluffy blending brush to the hairline, sides of the nose, cheekbones, and jawline.

Now that we have some depth, we need some color. Blushes of all different shades can be added to the cheeks to give the face a pop. To apply, use a fluffy brush and sweep the product to the apples of the cheeks. Above the blush, at the highest part of the cheekbone, a highlighter is often applied. This adds a glow that is either subtle or seen from Mars- you decide. Either way we want to pick a highlighter that is shimmery and apply it with a fan brush.

Now that the face is done, we can focus on the eyes. Because eye makeup is done in many different ways to express different styles, we’re going to skip out on this step. I know it’s so sad because eyeshadow is so fun, but it is the application that can never be clearly defined. Instead we want to make the eyes pop in a different way. We will do this by mascara. Adding mascara to the top and bottom lashes will automatically make the eyes more defined by giving them a flirty look.

The final and last step is applying a lip color. Lips can be enhanced through lipstick, gloss, liquid lipsticks, lip balms, lip tints, and so much more. Lip colors are the makeup accessory that immediately adds color to the face, especially when eye makeup isn’t applied. The countless colors that can be created is the reason why lipstick can be worn on the daily basis. Pick a color and finish that matches your personality, style, or mood for the day. I promise once you get into lip combinations, you’ll become a lipstick junky forever.

And that’s it! You are able to tweak any of the tips I gave that will make your routine perfect for you. That’s the great thing about makeup, there are no rules that constrain you. You are allowed to express yourself in any way you want. So do you, and own your new beat face.