Breaking all the rules
Traditionally, beauty is bound by rules. Eat this, don’t eat that. Contour this, highlight that. Use this, ditch that. All these are a means to an end — a confined idea of perfection that is, by the grace of the beauty gods, on its way to becoming obsolete. At one point, women were either polished or natural, goth or glam, blonde or not blonde — how lucky are we to live in a time when hair can be any color imaginable, all on the same head. In the coming months, makeup will be headed in the same, free-spirited direction.
At Fashion Week’s spring/summer 2015 runways, MAC gave us a glimpse of trends to come: a riot of color on the eyes, brushed-up brows, graphic lines and maximum dewiness are in the mix. The most appealing part? All of them are achieved with a carefree manner of application that abandons most rules. Even the process of prepping the face for makeup is less rigid, for this coming season at least, giving us a much-deserved breather from overdone beauty and allowing us to have a little fun.
If you ask MAC director of makeup artistry Romero Jennings if you can, for example, use your fingers to apply concealer, he will recommend against it, but not for precision’s sake. At MAC’s Spring/Summer 2015 Trends Presentation held recently at Shangri-La Boracay, Jennings explained that the main reason it’s not advisable to use your fingers is because body heat melts makeup and when makeup melts you tend to apply more than you actually need. This makes perfect sense, especially with this season’s makeup trends being on the bold side — you will need to balance it off with skin and not a face full of cake.
In separate Foundation Session with Jennings, we were taught the MAC way of creating a flawless face: from gently exfoliating prior to priming, sparingly applying concealer so that the skin’s natural characteristics still come through, to dabbing on concealer last, so everything looks natural.
In a word, the idea is to make whichever trend you choose look “organic.” It’s a term that Jennings used a lot and it’s starting to be my favorite concept in relation to makeup — as if something odd and alien has bloomed on your face and it looks like it belongs there. Poetic stuff. It’s the one rule that governs MAC’s four major trends for spring/summer 2015: Re-view, Enlightened, Free Party, and No Makeup.
Re-view
“It’s all about framing the eyes in a painterly way, so that it almost looks futuristic,” said Jennings. It pulls the classic eyeliner apart and deconstructs standard methods of intensifying the eye. It’s more Factory Girl than Breakfast at Tiffany’s, less princess-y and more It-girl. Eyelashes are extreme, almost exaggerated. “My mother has this way of doing her lashes. She uses the tip of the brush (which collects the most product). I found myself doing the same backstage at Fashion Week,” he said. You’ll need MAC Studio Sculpt Superblack Lash to achieve the look — it gives really accurate root-to-tip coverage; and MAC Super Slick Liquid Eye Liner in Defiantly Feline for blacker-than-black lines.
Enlightened
“Enlightened is a face that’s almost colorless, but luminous — almost alien-like, plastic skin,” Jennings explained. It ditches shadows and contouring and bathes the skin in light. It is described as a look that “offers a more spiritually optimistic vision of how we’ll all look in the future. “Use oil and primers to make the skin look really luminous,” said Jennings. “Play with matte and shiny to not make it look greasy.” Use MAC Mineralize Skinfinish Perfect Topping in Lightscapade (light skin) or Global Glow (dark skin), a powder that imitates the look of a cream and adds a glow without shimmery shine.
Free Party
“She’s the girl at Coachella who did her makeup herself — a little bit disheveled, lived-in color,” said Jennings. Free party is about playing with color without lines. Here, color is not a precious detail that requires precise application. Be free with placement, embrace irony in picking shades. “Watermelon is a big trend for spring/summer,” Jennings shared. To make it look modern, ease up on foundation and conceal only where needed. Some colors to try are MAC Blue Forecast (powder blue), Super Fresh (pale mint), Pro Longwear Paint Pot in Perky, and Gold Pigment.
No Makeup
The three pillars of this look, according to Jennings, are concealer, highlighter and stain. The look is about the confidence to apparently not care, but as MAC makeup artist Val Garland puts it, “nothingness is not laziness.” The natural look actually requires more work. It is clean, hydrated skin, translucently groomed brows, no mascara, sheer highlights, a “surfer flush,” and lip conditioner (lipstick is a no-show this season). “It looks like you’ve blended everything with your fingers, no hard lines, everything should look very fleshy,” said Jennings. Get the look with Trend Forecase Spring 15 Lip and Cheek in Must Have Melon and Go Guava for the lips, Eye Brows in Lingering and Strut (you can also use it to add “freckles” for an extra dose of realness), and Studio Sculpt Defining Bronzer in Golden Rinse and Delicates.
