The Makeup Box

Color Overload: Jewel-toned Dramatic Eyes

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This is a dark and dramatic look that’s at the same time very bright and punchy. You have the option of wearing it 2 ways; one more of a traditional colored smoky look, and the other an all-out color-fest.

You’ll need:

A black base or eye liner

• A shimmery purple shadow or pigment (I used MAC Cornflower)
• A shimmery golden green (I used MAC Golden Olive)
• [Optional] Gold liquid liner (I used Lime Crime’s Rhyme)
• [Optional] Bright fuchsia lipstick (I used Barry M Punky Pink)

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Step 1: First smear the black pencil or base all over your lid, along the lower lash lines, and also the inner rims of your lids.

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Step 2: With a flat brush, gently smudge out the edges of the liner so you get a softer smoky look and look less like you walked out of Kungfu Panda.

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Step 3: The fun part is always applying shimmer on top of the black. I chose a violet-blue and packed it gently over the black. Do not rub back and forth as you might smear your liner. You can use any colors you want but remember the shades will tend to appear deeper and richer than usual, so choose brighter, more vibrant ones.

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Step 3: On the inner portion of the lids, pack the bright golden-green shimmer and let it fade slightly into the violet earlier.

Remember to run your brush along your lower lash line as well, so the color is there.

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Step 4: This is where it’s optional. Use the black liner from earlier and draw just the tail-end of a flick from the outer corner of your eye outwards. 

Then follow by running bright gold liquid liner along the entire upper lash line, meeting and stacking right on top of the black at the outer ends. Then add a bit to the inner corners of the lower lash line as well.

Finish with mascara and that’s all there is to it.

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Step 5: For the lips, you can choose either to go with a nude lip so the look stays focused on the eyes, or you can opt to just go crazy with a brighter lip like I did.

Evening Sky: Easy Neutral - but not Neutral - look!

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Looking at the pictures, you wouldn’t think this look is based all around a brown base. In fact, it can look pretty subtle until the light hits it, and then the violet and copper sparkles just shine.

You want to look for:

A good dark brown matte shadow (Revlon’s Matte Shadow in Rich Sable is one of the best basic browns

2 loose or baked mineral shadows that are very sparkly:

• a pale pale violet
• a rich copper

Brown liner/pencil. (Black will do as well, but brown gives a softer effect.

Black mascara.

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Step 1: First, make sure you apply a good base to your lids. You can use either BB Cream (Yes, my secret trick; I use a mattifying BB cream as eye primer very often. Cheap and good alternative to shadow primers if your lids are not particularly oily.)

Then use a soft brush to pack on a thick coat of brown shadow over the entire lid up to the socket line, and along the lower lash line. Use a looping motion to buff the shadow in as this gets you the most even and opaque coverage.

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Step 2: Flip to the clean side of the brush and pick up a little of the pale violet/lavender sparkly shadow (a sample costs only $1 and lasts a LONG time). I find loose shadows easier to work with but if you have a sparkly pressed or baked shadow, there’s really no reason to go out and buy anything else.

Press it gently onto the inner half of the lids. Don’t buff or sweep your brush around because all the violet will get muddied up with the dark brown beneath, and also end up on your cheeks.

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Step 3: On the outer half of the lids, using the same pressing motion, pack on a sparkly copper. I used MAC’s Copper Sparkle pigment, but if you find that a little expensive or hard to get hold of, you can actually use any shimmery copper-brown shadow. 

With what remains on the brush, sweep lightly inwards along the socket line and also spread the color lightly above the socket line for a smoky effect. (If you have dry or more mature lids, I recommend using a softer satin shadow instead of something too metallic.)

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Winter Starburst (Wearing Glitter Without Sealing Liquid or Lash Glue!)

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Most of the time when we want to wear glitter on the lids WITH eye shadow, we need to fiddle with:

1. Eyelash glue - too gloopy and doesn’t allow a light dusting of glitter
2. Liner sealant - Hard to apply over the entire lid without shifting the shadow underneath
3. No setting medium - Glitter just falls right off when you try to apply them over shadow

Here’s an easy way to apply glitter without having to run out to buy glitter glue, brow gel, sealant, etc: Apply it right over your base or primer BEFORE your shadow. If you’re careful, you won’t dust off too much of it when you apply powder shadow over it, and the glitter will stay on a lot better than if you applied the glitter last, over your powder shadow.

The effect I chose was a bright shadow in the center, fading into a glittery wing, like a trail of stardust. Fantastic for a party because it almost looks like regular shadow from the front, but as you turn your head, the light will catch the flecks of glitter and produce a rather dramatic sparkling effect at the outer corners of your eyes.

Tip: You can be as subtle (green-on-green) or as dramatic (gold-on-violet) as you want when it comes to colors! Experiment with whatever you have.

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Step 1: I applied a generous coat of black pencil to the lids. Don’t worry about it being messy looking.

I don’t recommend using gel shadow or any fast-setting primer because you need a slightly tacky surface.

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Step 2: Using a flat brush or synthetic brush, gently smoke out the edges of the pencil, moving outwards always. Follow the hollow of your eye socket. (If you move your brush back and forth, you are likely to mess up the inner corners where it should be clean.)

On the outer ends, extend into a soft wing.

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Step 3: Now for the glitter. Just use the same flat brush to pick up a little glitter, and then PACK/PAT gently onto the outer portion of the lids. I angled it diagonally (see dotted line above) but you don’t need to.

Go over twice or more times, just to really pack on more glitter, since some will dust off later. 

Try a translucent, fine-grained glitter like MAC Reflects Transparent Teal or Blue.

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Step 4: Now is the time you apply the shadow. I’ve reversed the order of application as you can see. Begin with the inner 1/3 of the lids and you can just buff/rub your brush over this area to get intense color. I used MAC Tilt shadow. Coastal Scents Hot Pot in Niagara is a similar duochrome marine shade but with a more intense gold sheen instead of aqua. 

On the center portion of the eye, your shadow is going to overlap the glitter. This is where you want to be gentle and just pat-pat-pat the shadow on with your brush, rather than sweep it back and forth. This makes sure most of the glitter doesn’t get dusted off, but is pressed into the base. 

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As a final step, simply run the black pencil along the inner rims of your upper lids and apply plenty of black mascara. That’s it! It’s quite dramatic but isn’t hard to do at all. What’s fun is the combination of a black base, which transforms and really brings out the color in translucent blue glitter and duochrome blue-gold shadow. 

Baroque Flower-Girl Shimmer: Smoky Eye Makeup with a Pastel Twist

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One more queued tutorial for those who are doing any floral or candy-themed looks this Halloween! This is a hazy, colorful look grounding colorful pastels with the strength of a dark shimmery wood-brown so you get the rich sexiness of a smoky eye look, but paired with bright and soft colors so it’s complex but soft.

You just need

• lid shade: a bronze-brown shadow (e.g. MAC Tempting)
• defining shade: a rich purple (I used MAC Satellite Dreams)
• highlight shade: a pale pink (L’oreal Forever Pink)
• pencils: 1 matching the lid shade (brown) and 1 matching the defining shade (I used Bourjois pencils and it might be hard to find for those of you in the US, so just go with NYX or any brand you can get hold of with lots of colorful metallic pencils!)

P.S. You should know that you can actually choose different colors for your look. E.g. grey on the lid, green on the socket and pale blue as highlights. Experiment!

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Step 1: First, apply a dark eye shadow base over your lids. You can use a grey/black pencil and blend it out, or something like MAC Blackground Paint Pot or the dark primer from the Kat von D line. Just blend it up towards the socket line in a rounded shape. (Don’t wing it out.)

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Step 2: In the center, on the lid itself, apply the medium brown shade. The dark base below will make it look more intense and also give it a richness.

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Step 3: Now using a smaller brush and the defining shade, which should be the most colorful and strong of the 3 you choose, run it along the otuer perimeters of your socket, covering the last bits of the dark base you applied earlier. 

Run it along the lower lash line as well so when you close your eyes, it looks like a ring of color surrounding the neutral shade in the center. DO NOT blend the 2 shades into each other! You will get a messy, muddy look.

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Step 4: Using a soft brush again, pick up some of the pale pink and then apply it to the inner corners of the eyes, fading in an arc above the purple but keeping it strongest at the inner corners.

Then do the same from the outer corners of the lower lid, inwards. Blend it outwards over the tops of your cheekbones if you’re using this for a Halloween look. It’s very “pixie-ish”.

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Colorburst: Yellow-Gold and Sultry-Blue Eye Makeup

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This is bright eye makeup look with an intense twist of contrasting color. The star product of the show is Make Up For Ever Aqua Cream #11, which is a gorgeous platinum-yellow gold shade that might be a good item to keep on your Xmas wish-list if you like this type of finishes!

Other than this, you will need:

• Black liner or kajal
• Shimmery brown shadow (I used MAC Sable)
• Deep blue shadow (try MAC Deep Truth)
• Pale blue or silvery shimmer (I used L’oreal 
• Mascara

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Step 1: Apply the Aqua Cream over the lid, going up close to the brow. If you have dryer lids or just more lines there, keep the color only within the socket line instead of going all the way up, or skip it all together. Bright metallic cream finishes can accentuate and CREATE a lot of “lines”.

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Step 2: This is a 2-step approach because I wanted a very intense metallic brown line. I lined my eyes with black pencil first, creating a short, thick flick at the end. Then using a flat brush, I coated that black pencil with a metallic brown pencil (MAC Sable). This gives you a more intense chocolate-brown than you’d get if you just used a regular metallic brown liner.

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Step 3: Using a soft blending brush, pick up the same brown and apply this gently along your socket line. Don’t over-apply as the color should be hazy and soft. If you have a small lid space or more lines on your lids (and skipped step 1), then the brown will not cut across the yellow like I did. It should be on top of the yellow.

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Step 4: Using a tiny brush and black kajal, I lined my lower waterline. Get it all thick and dark and don’t worry about it looking neat because you’ll be covering it up later.

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Step 5: Using a flat brush, I ran a navy blue along the lower lash line. NOTE! The blue doesn’t go on the waterline. It goes on the lash line, overlapping the black liner, but slightly below it. If you have a slightly dropping eye shape, don’t overdo this bit as it can drag your eye shape down further. Just trace a tiny bit of the blue along your lashes; enough that you can see the color intensity.

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Step 6: The fun step. I’m using L’oreal’s Infallible Shadow Marshmallow from the Miss Candy Collection earlier this year. (It’s still available in many places, but if you can’t get it anyore, just use any pale silver-blue.)

Using a fluffy blending brush, I just applied the shade a little under the darker blue earlier, going from a thin line and spreading into a bigger area at the cheekbones. This actually extends it into a highlighter, for that extra “shine” whenever the light catches it. 

Reverse-Color Lid (88 Matte Palette)

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I did a look a year ago inspired by the Queen of Blending. This year, I’m revisiting the look using different, stronger colors. Do note that you don’t need to use the exact shades I did. Just look for 3 colors that are sort of complementary, and line them up from light to dark.

Just make sure to apply an eye primer so the shadow goes on with maximum intensity.

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Step 1: Imagine an invisible line along your socket. Below the line, you want to pack the palest shadow onto the inner portions of your lid, and along the inner corners of the lower lid. Apply the same color ABOVE the socket line on the outer portions.

Just remember not to pull the color too far out at the outsides or your lids could look droopy.

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Step 2: I accidentally deleted the image I took when I applied the center shade (rich blue), so bear with me and look at the portion I marked out right down the center of the lid.

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Step 3: Using the darkest shade (purple), I applied the color in the opposite areas to the teal at the start. Above the socket on the inner corners and below the socket, on the lid at the outer corners. The color on the lower lids should match what is on your upper lid as well.

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Step 4: Using a fluffy brush, I blended out the inner corners. This is the tricky portion as a dark shade above the socket line at the inner corners can look very tacky and messy if not softened out.

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Step 5: I finished by using a fine brush to apply black kajal along the waterline, and then thickly along the upper lash line. Then curl lashes and apply mascara to finish.