Heading to the Shore

I'm heading to a friend's summer house for a week at the beach. I'm going to swim away my stress. See you all when I return.

Make-up Transforms

I often get emails from aspiring makeup artists asking how to achieve a certain look; or what products hold up best under lights. Sometimes the questions are about ethnicity: How do I match brown skin tones without making the model look ashy? These are the same questions I had when I was starting out.

I was blessed to have worked under makeup artists like Laura Mercier, Brigitte Reiss-Andersen and Bobbi Brown. These women had been working in the field for a decade when I came along as an assistant. Whatever I know now, it's because I mixed what I learned from them with my own talents to create something that was distinctly mine.

One thing I learned from Brigitte Reiss-Andersen was to have "new eyes" each time I looked at a model. What do I mean? When you work in the fashion/beauty industry, it's natural that you will work with a few star models over and over again.

It's tempting to fall into a rut and say, "Oh, I know her eyes look great lined like this. I did it for the cover of Elle." The challenge is to look at the same beautiful face twenty or thirty times and come up with a new way to interpret their features.

Desiree, in the picture above and the previous post (just scroll down the page) has already made rounds to many of the agents in New York and she has a portfolio and a composite card. In every single one of her portfolio shots her hair is straight and her lips are some hue of red.

Okay, I'll admit the first thing I saw when I looked at her was a Modern Spanish inspired look with straight hair and red lips. It's a given with her complexion and features. But I'm sorry. That's the lazy choice.

As a makeup artist, never go with the lazy choice. You'll never set yourself apart from the crowd that way. Even as a "regular" woman doing your own face, it's important to have new eyes when you look at yourself in the mirror.

My workshop clients tell me all the time, "I have used this pink lipstick from (fill in the brand) for the last 10 years."

What? Are you kidding me? With all the great colors and textures out there...With the changing color schemes based on the seasons and fashion's direction...the same pink lipstick has worked for 10 years. I don't believe you.

It's just simply the lazy choice. Push past the lazy choice to explore. It's not hard. It's actually fun. As an artist working on someone else's face or as an individual trying a new look for a big night out, challenge yourself.

With Desiree (who is only 16, by the way), I decided to skip the Modern Spanish girl look altogether. In this shot, I kept the modern but ditched the Spanish theme. I wanted something more "South Beach Socialite." The inspiration for that came from her bronzed skin and great accessories (the girl brought amazing clothes to the shoot!).

But when it came time for her second shot I wanted to go as far left from the South Beach theme as possible. As a model, it's important for her to be seen as having a very versatile look that could easily represent a myriad of ideas and products.

As a makeup artist, it's important for me to show that I can take a model and transform her into many different looks. I can see her with "new eyes" even 30 minutes after making her a South Beach hottie.

When I studied Desiree's face the second time, I imagined a romantic theme. I didn't want something too sweet or predictable. It may have come off as a caricature. So to give our romantic theme a twist, I gave her dark eyes and matte, skin toned lips (created by blending foundation over her lips).

But as you can see, everything else plays up the romantic theme - the hair, the clothes, even the wallpaper behind her. And Paul (our wonderful photographer) gave us completely different lighting for this shot than what we had in the South Beach shot.

Now this young model has two looks in her book that are completely different from anything else she has. I'd venture to say if we shot with her again and again, I could find other ways to show her versatility. One reason is because I really like her face. It's harder to do when you're not inspired by the model.

Or the model doesn't do her job well. Nothing's worst than working as a team to make a model a work of art and then she stares at the camera like a deer in head lights. But I'm going off the subject here.

So, my question for you is this: Will you look at your own face with "new eyes" now? Will you venture away from your favorite lipstick or eye shadow to create a new theme for yourself? If you're not sure where to start, buy a fashion magazine (Allure is great for this sort of stuff) and find a model who has the same hair and eye color as you do. Notice what colors were used on her and go to a department store and sample those colors on yourself.

One word of caution: I don't mean the weird, runway inspired looks with streaks of paint scrawled across a model's face. I mean the "pretty" makeup looks. Just wanted to clarify. LOL

If you take the challenge, please let me know. I'd love to see pictures!

Latest Model Shoot

This past Sunday I did another model shoot with Paul. We decided to push the envelope with how fashion inspired we could go with local models. The girl pictured above, Desiree, did a wonderful job giving us the looks and moves we needed to pull off the shoot.

And with her flawless skin and lovely complexion, she was the perfect canvas for my art work. Want to know what I did to achieve her look?

She's wearing Cover FX cream foundation in M50. It works double time as a foundation and under eye concealer. The shade matched her neck and chest, but looked flat when I took into consideration her tanned forehead and shoulders. Soooo, to give her face dimension, I brushed a sparkly bronzer all over the outer parameters of her face. Monave's Brandy #303 worked perfectly.

To get a glow that the light would catch at the top of her cheekbones, I used a dusting of Priia's Satin Complexion Enhancer in Celestial. It's applied with a fan brush.

Next I grabbed a generous amount of Willow (a silver/light blue) mineral eye shadow by Orglamix and applied it to her eyes from the lower lid to the crease.
I blended well with a fluffy blender brush.

I added black mascara and a black pencil liner just along her top lash line. She's wearing FACE Stockholm's #11 Pearl eye shadow as liner under the bottom lashes.

The final touch is a personal blend of several lip glosses to get the rosy pink color I was after.

Here's another take on the same shot.

Purple is the New Black

Walking through the (now) swanky Meat Packing District in Manhattan (it was far, far from swanky when I lived there and blood from the dead carcasses ran down the brick streets ), I wandered into several of the high end designer shops - from Stella McCartney to La Perla Black.

In several stores I noticed a large offering of purple pieces for fall, which suited me just fine. I am a purple fiend. I was actually swathed in my fave purple sundress as I shopped (see above picture). I felt so in-the-know.

And to accentuate my purple fetish, I decided to add a little of the color to my makeup for the day. I used a swipe of purple glitter shadow just on my lower lids to give my eyes a little bit of pop. I hope you can see it from this photo.



If you'd like to play in purple, check out Orglamix's Brown Eyes Play Collection. Your eyes will sparkle.

Organic Mascara Winner

Thank you to the ladies who entered the MiEssenence Mascara Giveaway. Our lucky winner is: Kado! over at Our Life in Perfect Cadence.

Congratulations!!! As soon as you send me your address, I'll mail that out to you.

I'm off to NYC for a the weekend to hang out with friends. See you all on Monday.

My NYC Trip

A few weeks ago I had a week long job in Manhattan, which is home for me. I always love when I book jobs that take me back there. After working with 12 models (yes, 12!) for this particular job, I needed to do something fun and off beat after the gig was done.

So I stayed in the city a few extra days and popped by a new youth hostel in Brooklyn with a friend. It was such a fun experience. The hostel is located in an industrial (warehouses like crazy) area at the end of nowhere.




But it was totally wonderful. The neighborhood had earthy, organic grocery stores and Internet cafes with funky attitude. The crowd mostly consisted of under 25 artist types with locs and enough tattoos to go around.

We made friends with a sleepy stray cat while we munched on healthy grub and drank fresh squeezed oj.



Check out the cool wall art in the background. I'm glad I did something spontanous.

Organic Mascara Giveaway

Hi there,

I'm dashing out the door for a little kayaking on the river today, but before I leave I want to give you all a chance to win a free tube of MiEssence Organics black mascara.

In the near future I will be doing a detailed post on the brand and my personal opinion on the products I've tried (skin care and makeup), but for now check out the video below on this remarkable company.

And enter my giveaway to win one of their free mascaras. It's completely natural and very light-weight. Perfect for the girl who prefers a soft flutter of lashes with a hint of color. This is not a drama mascara. Just saying.

To get it, just publicly follow this blog (see follow box to the right) and leave a comment after this post. That's it. I'll announce a winner by Friday, August 14, 2009.

See you soon.

Model Shoots

Remember I told y'all I'd be working in collaboration with my friend Paul to create test photos for model portfolios? We did our first shoot last weekend.

It was crazy how much fun we had with the girls. Sarah, pictured above, is negotiating with modeling agencies in New York City and will probably sign a contract by the end of summer. She does mostly fashion work, but she needed to get some commercial stuff in her book as well.

After all, advertising pays the big bucks. Here are some of the shots we did for her.


We'll be shooting pretty regularly throughout the summer. I'm handling makeup and wardrobe, while our friend, Rachel is doing her thing on the hair. And of course, Paul Emberger is making magic with the camera.

I think we're a good team.

Interested in getting shots for your portfolio or head shots for acting? Send me an email and I'll give you all the details.













I was trying to get out of the way before the picture was snapped.