From the red carpet to the formal, a date night to a Sunday morning breakfast with friends, no makeup look is complete without the perfect lips. If you’re interested in playing up your eyes, think of your lips as complementing and drawing attention to the overall look.
Trying to find the perfect nude lipstick? There’s nothing to say you can’t create your own. Treat your lips as you would any other part of your face: the lips need to be primed and prepped. If your eyes are smoky, rub some foundation lightly over the top of your lips – this will stop the natural pink of your skin seeping through. Once it has dried, lightly brush on some clear gloss for perfectly nude lips that draw eyes up towards your statement-setting eyes.
For a less intense nude lipstick, lightly brush foundation over your lips and add a sheer lipgloss lightly over. This does a couple of things: firstly, it gives your lipgloss something to hold onto, so it doesn’t fade away quickly, and secondly, the benefit of using liquid foundation instead of lip primer is that it allows the lipgloss pigments to show up clearly instead of competing with the natural pinkness of lips.
To make your lipgloss last even longer, take an eyeshadow or blush with a similar shade to the lipgloss, and lightly pat down onto your lips using your fingers.
Another great way to get long-lasting lip colour is to line your lips with your favourite lipliner and then smudge inwards, coating all your lips. This works best with lipliners that have a hard, and not creamy, formulation. Finish off your look with a slick of lipgloss or clear lipstick.
Sheer lipsticks are trendy. While they condition your lips with essential oils and some contain beeswax, they also give you just a tiny hint of colour that works perfectly if you’re going for the all-natural look.
We can’t all pull off the intense red lipstick look, but that doesn’t mean you can’t wear red lipstick! Instead of brushing on the lipstick, rub some on your finger and then use your finger to apply the lipgloss. “Staining” your lips this way gives them a hint of the colour but the pigment doesn’t come out as intense. Finish off your look by adding some clear gloss to reflect the stained pigment.
Worried about your lips being too small or too big? For large lips, line on the inside. With smaller lips, take your lipliner just to the outside of your lips. Use two different lipsticks to achieve your look: rub the darker lipstick on the bottom of your lips and the sides of the upperlip, and use the lighter colour of the cupid’s bow and the part underneath. Finally, apply lipgloss only to the center of your lips and put your lips together to spread the gloss. This makes your pout much brighter and bigger.
