I know, I still need to blog the last fortnight of Me Made May, but camera hiccups / wagon fallings-off / general busytimes mean that I'm running behind on pics. In the meantime, here's an alliterative alternative: some scans from the April edition of Maquia, my favourite Japanese beauty mag. (This issue I borrowed from my mother during a recent clothes swap / general girly session -- along with other randoms, including items of clothing and her foundation stash, so stay tuned for some NC10-15 base swatches, too.)
Anyway, this was another enjoyably geeky issue, with a particularly detailed feature on the new 'Reverse ULTRA-C Eye'. Don't worry, I boggled too :P The internets didn't help much either, but at least the makeup itself is very simple, both in execution and in terms of the effect it aims to achieve. Basically, it's a lower-lashline-led look, curving up into a soft 'C' at the outer corner, which opens up the eye as effectively as a traditional smokey gradation would, but requiring much less product/time. I'm always a fan of negative space in makeup (e.g. here) but this tutorial demonstrates how wearable/natural this kind of application can look if well-blended, and its lightness and spirit of simplification feels feels especially right for spring/summer.
KATE Colorcious Diamond Eyes SV-1 for a cooler spin; the main twist here is a horizontal / foreshortened-liner-like upper lid highlight (step 3) rather than the dot in the first demo, or the vertical oblong of the second.
Now some variations suggested for some different eyeshapes -- remember, these ideas aren't prescriptive, and you're free to borrow from the placement tweaks for any of these!
The other tutorial feature in this issue is blush-focussed, and bloody adorable: 'The LOVE Cheek'.
Not only do I LOVE gimmicky alphabetical makeup diagrams without exception, but I also really like the way the placement of these gimmicky shapes are guided by the entire face and other features, unlike the more usual blush application tutorials I'd come across previously, which often treat the cheek as a disconnected free-floating expanse of flesh in which various placements are guaranteed to create certain effects, differences in anatomy notwithstanding.
The L cheek creates a fun, healthy glow, and involves a peachy/orange base shade, topped with highlighter applied in an 'L' shape whose vertical stroke is as wide as the distance from the outer ring of your pupil to the end of your eye. The eye-relation ensures a properly centralised highlight for YOUR face, and is a much neater way of achieving this effect than fumbling around cheekbones / apples, blahblah. Fingers keep things soft and sheer.
The key products used are Lavshuca Dress Glow Cheek OR-1 (pre-numbered step) and RMK Glow Stick (steps 1-3); some alternative products are showcased at the bottom of the page -- please leave me a comment if you want any identified.
The O Cheek for that pure 'n' girly thing, in 'blood-beneath-the-skin' shades i.e. hyphenated reds. The blush circles are centred directly below the pupil and applied with a puff in light patting motions for a soft matte finish. Note that extra sheer circles are dotted onto the tips of the nose and chin, to unify/harmonise/clownify proceedings. Don't laugh, after one too many J tutes, I tried it out and found it could actually look sweetly pretty. Products: Élégance Slick Face (!) Cream Face Colour in RD301 as base (pre-numbered step), Majolica Majorca Puff de Cheek RD414 for the main colour (steps 1-3).
The V Cheek gives a youthful 'smiling' lift to the face without being quite as zomg!girly as the O. Brush-applied pinks -- a mid-tone warm shade and a cooler pale highlight. They used the Coffret D'Or Smile Up Cheeks limited-edition spring 2014 shade 13 Natural Rose [core shades 01 Pink or 03 Rose could both work depending on skintone] -- the blended coral-pink tone of the entire blush used as a base (pre-numbered step), the mid-tone pink at the centre for the lower V, and the cool pink-white edge of the blush for the upper. The V's / little hearts should be the same width as your eyes. and overlap the 'base' blush.
The E Cheek offers a a sculpted, dimensional look and unsurprisingly its placement is similar to the classic 3/E bronzer application, from temples down the jawline, though done in colour. First a 'my cheeks but better' shade of coral blush is swept horizontally from apples outwards (pre-numbered step), then a light contouring colour from down the temples, stopping at the outer edge of the cheekbone, and then curved out again along the jawline, stopping at the outside of the lip (steps 1-2). The upper edge of the cheekbone has a narrow highlight, starting below the outer corner of the eye and swept outwards (step 3) -- unlike the previous 3 looks, this placement uses the eyes and other features as a guide to avoid the centre of the face. Ipsa Face Colour Designing Palette 201OR used [which I do not recommend, btw; the 'contour' shades in this range are all shimmery for the luvva kittens]
Sick of diagrams yet? Here are some simple office-appropriate looks featuring various spring collection palettes. Amusingly pairing off industry/brand.
More OL (office lady) looks -- this time a feature on what some real women wear when they're on (at work) and off (at leisure).
I always enjoy seeing makeup being used, and some of these ladies hit pan even faster than I do :P
Cheek out the sliver of pan in this nurse's Coffret D'Or blush:
This lady (finance) clearly loves her Lunasol Beige Beige quad -- the no.1 best selling eyeshadow quad in Japan for the last 10 years, I believe.
I found it interesting how little most of these women's makeup varied between their on/off days, actually, considering the whole premise of this feature. However strong their 'baseline' look (some models and makeup artists featured favoured bolder makeup than the two women above) they all seemed to stick to one style of eye makeup, in particular, mostly just switching lip colours and base finishes:
Which I find a little puzzling. Of course time / longing for MOAR BED are an enormous constraining factor when doing one's slap in the mornings, but surely leisure time = more time for more elaborate looks? Or even noticeably less time for a more relaxed look? And some of the bolder looks featuring falsies ^^ surely already take long enough that changing up colour/placement wouldn't slow one down that much? Hmm. Maybe it's simply that I have time for non-uniform makeup because I spend none on hair. :P
To clarify, it's not that I think women are obligated to experiment. But when every woman (there were about 20, I think) in a feature focused specifically on the differences between on/off makeup all present with such a uniform, it tends to flag up the socially obligatory nature of makeup for women in Japan, who don't seem to be allowed to be 'off' much to my lazy English eye. Which obviously is why there's a market there to justify specialist-interest publications like Maquia and its competitors.... But still. Feminist niggler here just wants makeup to be totally voluntary and frivolous fun for everyone :(
More up my street: a fun, chalky-pastel liner look, set in among darker tonal powder shading.
:O So this is the correct way to use pastel pencils! And they say glossy mags are just fluff....
Anyway, this was another enjoyably geeky issue, with a particularly detailed feature on the new 'Reverse ULTRA-C Eye'. Don't worry, I boggled too :P The internets didn't help much either, but at least the makeup itself is very simple, both in execution and in terms of the effect it aims to achieve. Basically, it's a lower-lashline-led look, curving up into a soft 'C' at the outer corner, which opens up the eye as effectively as a traditional smokey gradation would, but requiring much less product/time. I'm always a fan of negative space in makeup (e.g. here) but this tutorial demonstrates how wearable/natural this kind of application can look if well-blended, and its lightness and spirit of simplification feels feels especially right for spring/summer.
Close-up of the tutorial, using KATE Spotlighting Eyes OR-1
A warm-toned variation, with Givenchy Le Prisme 86 Rose Attraction, darker tones calling for a more contained application:
KATE Colorcious Diamond Eyes SV-1 for a cooler spin; the main twist here is a horizontal / foreshortened-liner-like upper lid highlight (step 3) rather than the dot in the first demo, or the vertical oblong of the second.
Now some variations suggested for some different eyeshapes -- remember, these ideas aren't prescriptive, and you're free to borrow from the placement tweaks for any of these!
left: monolids | right: up-tilted eyes.
left: hooded / inner-double lids | right: small eyes
The other tutorial feature in this issue is blush-focussed, and bloody adorable: 'The LOVE Cheek'.
Not only do I LOVE gimmicky alphabetical makeup diagrams without exception, but I also really like the way the placement of these gimmicky shapes are guided by the entire face and other features, unlike the more usual blush application tutorials I'd come across previously, which often treat the cheek as a disconnected free-floating expanse of flesh in which various placements are guaranteed to create certain effects, differences in anatomy notwithstanding.
The L cheek creates a fun, healthy glow, and involves a peachy/orange base shade, topped with highlighter applied in an 'L' shape whose vertical stroke is as wide as the distance from the outer ring of your pupil to the end of your eye. The eye-relation ensures a properly centralised highlight for YOUR face, and is a much neater way of achieving this effect than fumbling around cheekbones / apples, blahblah. Fingers keep things soft and sheer.
The key products used are Lavshuca Dress Glow Cheek OR-1 (pre-numbered step) and RMK Glow Stick (steps 1-3); some alternative products are showcased at the bottom of the page -- please leave me a comment if you want any identified.
The O Cheek for that pure 'n' girly thing, in 'blood-beneath-the-skin' shades i.e. hyphenated reds. The blush circles are centred directly below the pupil and applied with a puff in light patting motions for a soft matte finish. Note that extra sheer circles are dotted onto the tips of the nose and chin, to unify/harmonise/clownify proceedings. Don't laugh, after one too many J tutes, I tried it out and found it could actually look sweetly pretty. Products: Élégance Slick Face (!) Cream Face Colour in RD301 as base (pre-numbered step), Majolica Majorca Puff de Cheek RD414 for the main colour (steps 1-3).
The V Cheek gives a youthful 'smiling' lift to the face without being quite as zomg!girly as the O. Brush-applied pinks -- a mid-tone warm shade and a cooler pale highlight. They used the Coffret D'Or Smile Up Cheeks limited-edition spring 2014 shade 13 Natural Rose [core shades 01 Pink or 03 Rose could both work depending on skintone] -- the blended coral-pink tone of the entire blush used as a base (pre-numbered step), the mid-tone pink at the centre for the lower V, and the cool pink-white edge of the blush for the upper. The V's / little hearts should be the same width as your eyes. and overlap the 'base' blush.
The E Cheek offers a a sculpted, dimensional look and unsurprisingly its placement is similar to the classic 3/E bronzer application, from temples down the jawline, though done in colour. First a 'my cheeks but better' shade of coral blush is swept horizontally from apples outwards (pre-numbered step), then a light contouring colour from down the temples, stopping at the outer edge of the cheekbone, and then curved out again along the jawline, stopping at the outside of the lip (steps 1-2). The upper edge of the cheekbone has a narrow highlight, starting below the outer corner of the eye and swept outwards (step 3) -- unlike the previous 3 looks, this placement uses the eyes and other features as a guide to avoid the centre of the face. Ipsa Face Colour Designing Palette 201OR used [which I do not recommend, btw; the 'contour' shades in this range are all shimmery for the luvva kittens]
Sick of diagrams yet? Here are some simple office-appropriate looks featuring various spring collection palettes. Amusingly pairing off industry/brand.
e.g. Agency = Maquillage True Eyeshadow PK-232
The second 'Trend' look apparently involves GLITTER ALL DOWN YO FACE. I actually recently met a literary agent working(?) this look; now I'm glad I didn't take her aside discretely to point out her shadow fallout and proffer a q-tip *phew*
Work at a startup? You'd better be wearing Lunasol Sand Natural Eyes 04 (okay, I legit like the placements in this one, too -- looks 1 and 3 make nice use of negative space again).
More OL (office lady) looks -- this time a feature on what some real women wear when they're on (at work) and off (at leisure).
I always enjoy seeing makeup being used, and some of these ladies hit pan even faster than I do :P
Cheek out the sliver of pan in this nurse's Coffret D'Or blush:
This lady (finance) clearly loves her Lunasol Beige Beige quad -- the no.1 best selling eyeshadow quad in Japan for the last 10 years, I believe.
I found it interesting how little most of these women's makeup varied between their on/off days, actually, considering the whole premise of this feature. However strong their 'baseline' look (some models and makeup artists featured favoured bolder makeup than the two women above) they all seemed to stick to one style of eye makeup, in particular, mostly just switching lip colours and base finishes:
Which I find a little puzzling. Of course time / longing for MOAR BED are an enormous constraining factor when doing one's slap in the mornings, but surely leisure time = more time for more elaborate looks? Or even noticeably less time for a more relaxed look? And some of the bolder looks featuring falsies ^^ surely already take long enough that changing up colour/placement wouldn't slow one down that much? Hmm. Maybe it's simply that I have time for non-uniform makeup because I spend none on hair. :P
To clarify, it's not that I think women are obligated to experiment. But when every woman (there were about 20, I think) in a feature focused specifically on the differences between on/off makeup all present with such a uniform, it tends to flag up the socially obligatory nature of makeup for women in Japan, who don't seem to be allowed to be 'off' much to my lazy English eye. Which obviously is why there's a market there to justify specialist-interest publications like Maquia and its competitors.... But still. Feminist niggler here just wants makeup to be totally voluntary and frivolous fun for everyone :(
More up my street: a fun, chalky-pastel liner look, set in among darker tonal powder shading.
:O So this is the correct way to use pastel pencils! And they say glossy mags are just fluff....