Holiday Look #5: Deep Dark Pleather Plum

A very “noir” look focusing on glossy dark lips that works on any skintone! There are a few tips to wearing monochromatic looks like this.

• Conceal, conceal, conceal! Dark, monochromatic looks can make uneven skin tone and any redness more obvious.
• Keep the eyes a little softer if you don’t want to look too vampish. I used a soft taupe as the main lid shade and plum only in the outer corners.
• Wear a brighter blush. Dark monochromatic looks can really drain the face or make you look sallow, so the way to balance it out and stop everything from going completely goth is to use a soft pink blush to add a little sweetness and color to the face
• Be prepared to touch up! Like a glossy red lip, you will likely need to be careful when wearing a glossy dark lip. Smears, smudges, track marks from your hair getting caught in your lips, you name it.

Product used:

• Foundation - LANEIGE Snow BB Soothing Cushion SPF 50 No. 21
• Concealer - MAC Studiofinish concealer NW20
• Powder - ClearLast Powder in Medicated Ochre
• Brows - Shu Uemura Hard Formula 9 Pencil in Seal Brown
• Taupe shadow - MAC Satin Taupe
• Plum shadow - MAC Rich Core
• Silver shadow - Lancôme Hypnôse cream shadow in Diamant Argenté
• Brown/plum liner - Rimmel Exaggerate liner in Perfect Plum
• Mascara - Lancôme Hypnôse mascara
• Blush - Benefit Rockateur
• Plum Lipliner - Make Up Store Jazz
• Plum gloss - Givenchy Gloss Interdit in 15 Velvet Purple

Deep, dark juicy purple lips with Make Up Store Jazz lipliner and Givenchy Gloss Interdit in Velvet Purple.

Makeup 101: 3 Common Smoky Eye Shapes to Try!

Everyone can wear a smoky eye. It just takes a little experimentation to find out which shape suits you better.

These are just general guidelines, and you should remember that they will each appear different on different eye shapes. There are also more complicated ways to do smoky eyes. I'm just running you through the basics.

For demo purposes, I'm using black face paint (Snazaroo) and 2 brushes. One synthetic concealer brush to pack on the black, and one dry blending fluff brush (below) for smoking out the black.

For your own looks, you don't need to use black or a facepaint!  You can use black kajal, khol, gel liner, pencil or even a powder shadow. Anything that doesn't set too quickly, since you need time to smoke it out.

Romantic Contoured Lavender

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Lavender is a universally-flattering color for most eye and skin colors, and I always consider it one of those shades that functions like a neutral because it goes with everything and everyone. A contoured, pearlescent lavender eye like this one can look sultry and dreamy at the same time (as seen on Jessica Rabbit), AND you can change the entire look just by switching out your lip color.

Some tips:

• What you want to be careful of, if you have uneven skin tone or a lot of red/pink in your skin, is to pick purples that lean more silver or blue. 
• If you have mature lids, go with slightly less metallic/shimmery shadows than I used because a high-sheen can emphasize lines.
• If you have very dark skin, pick a purple that is richer and stronger as a soft pastel can look chalky
• If you are layering it over a grey/silver base like I did here (See below), remember that you need to go with a slightly more pink-toned shade than you want because the blue undertones in the grey base will make a purple look blue. 

I used the 88 Shimmer palette, but you can find soft pinks and purples EVERYWHERE so don't feel you need to purchase a brand new palette for this.

Step 1: Apply your base all over the lid up to the socket line, but don't wing it out at the outer corners. You want to keep the eye shape quite round and doe-like for this.

Then use a small brush to run the grey cream shadow along the outer half of the lower lash line as well. (I used Maybelline Color Tattoo in Audacious Asphalt.)

Step 2: From the 88 Shimmer palette, I picked a lavender and cool pink in the 2 center columns and mixed them together on a brush.

Then I applied this mixture onto the outer half of the lids, below. As you can see the mixture goes on a straight lavender because the grey cancels out the pink/red tones. If I'd used just the purple, my shadow would look almost blue.

 

Step 3: Next I picked a warm-toned paler pink and applied that onto the inner half of the lids, blending into the pink-purple from earlier. Bring this down the inner corners to the lower lid as well. This creates a brightness at the inner corners of your eye, and is great if you have close-set eyes.

Step 4: To finish the shadow, just apply a little charcoal or black shadow right to the outer corners. I did not bother to sweep it upwards along the socket line but if you have hooded or mono-lids and want to emphasize your socket a bit more, you can do that.

Step 5: For extra definition at the lash line, I applied a thin line of black pencil to the outer half of the lids and then used the same shadow brush from earlier to soften and blend it out.

Then I finished with black mascara.

Step 6: Because I'm going with a cooler toned lip for this look, I chose a raspberry pink blush. Try something like Nyx Pinky which looks like a super-bright fuchsia, but goes on quite pretty. If you want you can apply just a little matte bronzer around the edges of your face and temples, jawline to add some dimension back to your face.

Step 7: For the lips, you have the option of using a soft pastel blue-based pink like Revlon's Strawberry Shortcake Lip Butter, OR you can apply a deep dark liver-red (MAC Diva). The dark lip instantly turns the look into a rather "Noir" one, and I didn't touch the eyeshadow or the blush at all.