ENE NATURALS

Hi guys, how you doin’?

I recently decided to give myself a complete makeover after my skin had been badly irritated by tea tree oil. For months now, I have been carrying my hair natural so I opted for a look that was completely different from my natural look.

For this look, while I did the makeup myself, my stylist at my salon made a wig for me out of my natural human hair weave-on that I had used in the past. She styled the wig into the desired spiral curls I so love. So here is my journey to this:

Step 1: To begin, I cleansed my face, moisturized and used Zaron gel primer. Other tools include: Flori Roberts ‘Hazelnut’ foundation, Flori Roberts ‘Spice’ pressed powder, HD powder, Sleek contour kit and blush; eyeshadows and lipstick from my 17 makeup kit and more.

As you can see from my ‘Before’ picture, I have blackhead and acne.

Step 2: To cover the spots, I used Black Opal Spots and scar eraser in shade of Beautiful Bronze. I applied the creamy, full coverage concealer on individual spots with my finger. Because this concealer is thick, I do not use it under my eye as thick concealers tend to be caky and false looking. So for under eye concealing, I went for medium coverage, light weight Flori Roberts concealer which I applied under my eyes and T-Zone for highlighting. Highlighting helps to accentuate our face and give a more slimmer look when combined with the right contouring. So go for concealer a shade lighter like I have done. Once it is well blended, use an HD powder, or translucent powder or any oil absorbing powder – all of which are setting powders – and apply on the concealer. This holds the concealer in place by fortifying it so that when foundation comes over it, it will not wipe off.

Step 3: Apply foundation and pressed powder evenly on your face, making sure to blend into hair line, into the ears and under the chin and jaw lines. Go easy on the foundation and powder as you do not want to appear caky.

Step 4: Fill your brows. Your eye brow begins in proportion to the inner corner of the eye and ends at the outer corner. Dark skinned and medium complexion use dark brown to medium brown brow pencils or powder while fair skinned people use light brown pencils or powder for filling eye brows.
Eye brow tutorial here: http://enenaturals.wordpress.com/2011/03/07/frame-your-face/

Step 5: Eye shadow application. Always begin with an eye shadow base which you apply on the eye lids. Next, to create a clean canvass, use a natural shade of eyeshadow that is closest to your skin and apply all over your eyes, all the way to your brow bone. This is so that all shine is eliminated from around your eyes.
Next, pick one or two colors you like. I chose purple for this look. It is wise to begin by applying a lighter eyeshadow shade at the inner corner of the eye before applying the purple because eyeshadow application transcends from light to deep shadows. You must not use my exact colors but always begin with a light shade like so:

And progress to this:

Don’t be afraid to create a soft smokey eye by applying the purple shadow on the lower eye lid after lining both eyes with black pencil or gel liner. This creates the necessary drama and definition your eyes need.

Step 6: Blush and Contouring.
The easiest way to begin is by applying blush the good old fashion way. Smile and blush by extending the blush stroke into your ear area.

To contour, sink in your cheeks, and apply the contour shadow along the sunken cheek line or just along the bottom line of the blush. Blush usually stops just after your cheek bone so naturally, it is along this line where the blush stops that you apply contour powder. You can get a contour kit from any beauty store. I use Sleek contour kit and it comes in dark, medium and light shades.

To contour your nose, you will have to take the highlighter shade of your contour kit and apply on the ridge of your nose while the darker, contour shade is what you apply on the side of the nose and into the top corners of the brow.

Step 7: Lips. I wanted my lips to be glossed and near natural so I used Zaron Red Brick lip pencil to line my lip half way and used a pale pink glossy lipstick from my 17 makeup kit all over my lips to create smaller lips.

Step 8: Lastly, I wore my wig for the complete look.