Everyone Is Wearing Coloured Eye Make-Up Right Now
How to wear the on-trend look with sophistication
From the red carpet to the Fashion Week runways, coloured eye make-up is everywhere at the moment and it looks set to be the one of biggest make-up trends of the second half of 2019.
The look is arguably a progression from the monochromatic make-up trend seen earlier in the year, which saw A-list celebrities, like Priyanka Chopra and Rihanna, coordinate their eye, lip and cheek colour – often using pretty-in-pink hues.
Cara Delevingne (with the help of the make-up artist Lisa Eldridge), Lucy Boynton and Margot Robbie, among others, then added a little more rainbow to the colourful trend with multi-toned eye make-up for the red carpet.
To recreate that look, choose two or three of your favourite eyeshadow shades (keeping them within the same matte or shimmer finish) and apply them with a shading brush to blur the colours into a soft, seamless gradient. Bazaar recommends Dior’s Diorshow Mono Eyeshadow range and the YSL Eye Shader Brush.
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Then, as New York Fashion Week launched the spring/summer 2020 shows, designers including Jeremy Scott, Jason Wu, Jonathan Cohen and Pyer Moss all embraced the colourful trend.
From soft washes to creative liner and indents, here’s Bazaar’s guide to wearing coloured eye make-up with confidence.
Watercolour Feeling
Colourful make-up seems most sophisticated when applied with a considered hand, so take Jason Wu’s show as your inspiration and apply your eyeshadow as a wash.
The aim is to apply a veil of colour rather than thick blocks, so while fingers aren’t banished, we’d suggest using a fluffy brush to blend your eyeshadow across your eyelids and up along your brow bone. Try Mac’s Tapered Blending Brush.
Skin-warming pinks, oranges and yellows that have us dreaming of sunsets work particularly well when applied in this manner and, as powder is preferred to cream textures, you could even apply your favourite bronzer or blusher – Bazaar recommends Nars’ Blush in Orgasm – across your eyelids as well as your cheeks.
Corner Highlights
At Jonathan Cohen, the eye make-up was creative and placed at the outer corners of the eyes, for an eye-defining yet carefree finish that is very simple to recreate.
The make-up artist Yuki Hayashi achieved the look using limited-edition Inika Cosmetics’ eyeshadows curated especially for the show, which were applied thickly with the fingers to achieve a texture not unlike oil paints.
To recreate it at home, press your finger into a cream-based eyeshadow, like Clinique’s Chubby Stick Shadow Stick or Nails Inc’s Lid Slick. Then, swipe the colour gently out from the very edge of your eye and tidy the edges into triangular shape with a eyeliner brush, like Charlotte Tilbury’s. Just ensure the shapes are even on both sides – a little precision will make your eyes look bigger and brighter.
Lovely Liner
If you look past the colourful wigs, the eye make-up at Jeremy Scott is more wearable than you might think; all you need is to team your traditional eye-defining liner with a pop of neon colour.
The look, which was inspired by Jem and the Holograms’ graphic pink make-up, was created by the make-up artist Kabuki. It involved graphic black eyeliner flicks – created using Mac’s Eyes Dual Dare All Waterproof Liner in Dare Black (try the brand’s Liquid Liner in Boot Black until it is available in October) – teamed with soft washes of colour and shimmer in the inner corners of the eyes.
For the particularly pretty pop of pink shade, use Mac’s Paintstick in Process Magenta topped with Reflects Red Eye Art Library in It’s Designer.
Or, for a pared-down version of the look, replace your traditional black eyeliner with a colourful version, such as L”Oreal’s Infallible Gel Crayon Eyeliner or Nars’ High Pigment Eyeliner. This technique is a particular favourite at Bazaar as it’s very appropriate for the daytime, as a fun yet effective way to define your eyes.
From Harper’s Bazaar UK