Fall 2011 Lipstick Recommendations and Swatches

L-to-R: NYX Iced Honey, Make Up Store Magic, and NYX Chic Red lipstick

Some of the shades that have been showing up for the Fall fashion season include a mixture of soft, dark, and strong shades. Here are some of my favorites.

SOFT:

Gone are the concealer lips of last season. The new "nude" lipsticks are kittenish (they make your lips look much more pouty) with a warm peachy undertone so they give your face some color without grabbing too much attention. These lips will go with pretty much any look.

Swatches (L-to-R): NYX Iced Honey (Round) Lipstick, and MAC Kinda Sexy (Matte) lipstick.

NYX Iced Honey lip swatch

STRONG:

Strong shades make your lips the focal point of your face. This season, the liner has been jazzed up, but the lips remain strong. Just keep the eye color neutral for the day, and any of these shades would look fantastic as a pop of color when you're wearing a whole suit of dark colored clothes.

Swatch (L-to-R): NYX Chic Red (Round), and MAC Up the Amp (Amplified) lipstick

Lip swatch: MAC Up the Amp is a creamy, strong purple mauve.

VAMPY:

Super-dark lipsticks have been popping up in many collections. The common variations are those that are brown based, red based, and purple based. The tricky bit is avoiding looking too Goth when wearing these lip colors, but you don't have to pair it with pale eye shadows either. Just keep the lids a soft smoky shade for a more modern touch.

Swatches (L-to-R): MAC Prince Noir (matte) lipstick, and Make Up Store Magic lipstick.

Lip swatch: Make Up Store Magic lipstick gives an interesting metallic purple twist on the dark vamp lip.

Fall Look: Gilded Antique Lids with Kitten Lips (Coastal Scents Antique Gold Mica with MAC Kinda Sexy Matte Lipstick)

Metallic textures can play up very muted or deep colors for Fall.

Fall doesn't need to be a time of monochromatic shades. As you start to deepen up the colors, look out for stronger textures like metallics, that can give a lush and gilded finish to very jewel-toned and neutral shades.

Step 1: Apply MAC Blooz pencil or any soft metallic navy pencil along the upper lash line and the outer half of the lower lashes. It should be thicker on the outer halves of the upper lids, as it would be if you were applying winged liner.

Step 2: With a short bristled smudger brush, pack a dark navy blue  shadow over the navy pencil. Don't smoke out the color too much. I'm using Poison by Stage Makeup, but you can use MAC Deep Truth as well. Just avoid anything too black or you won't get the beautiful deep blue sheen.

Step 3: Pack a deep tarnished antique-bronze over the entire lids, above the blue. You can over lap the blue JUST a little, but not too much or you will muddy the colors. Blend towards the outer corners, following the downward curve of your socket line towards the navy flick. Run along the inner half of lower lashes as well. I used Coastal Scents Antique Gold mica here.
If you find pigments hard to control and messy to use, try MAC Sumptuous Olive.

Step 4: To keep the lash line blue, apply navy mascara. I don't own colored mascara so I applied black mascara and then picked up navy blue shadow with a fluffy brush and wiggled it gently over my top and bottom lashes to coat them with a little blue.

Finished Looks with flash; Coastal Scents Antique Gold mica pigment with MAC Blooz pencil and  Stage Makeup Poison eyeshadow

 To finish off, I wanted muted cheeks and lips but not to erase the color altogether, so I used MAC Mineralize Skinfinish Natural in Dark as a subtle bronzer on the cheeks, and MAC Kinda Sexy Matte Lipstick for a kittenish lip.