“We wanted to send really powerful girls down the catwalk,” says MAC Senior Artist Nicole ‘Pinky’ Thompson ahead of the Alice McCall show. ‘Power’ was, in fact, the backstage beauty buzzword this evening, with no shortcuts being taken to ensure the show’s intense, graphic liner look was as poweful as possible.
“We’ve layered pretty much every eyeliner that MAC have on top of each other to create this intense, matte black,” Nicole tells me.
“I really love straight liner- it’s a bit different to what we’re used to seeing with a girly flick. This has a toughness to it.”
When probed on exactly how we can master similarly precise liner from home, Nicole lets two tricks slip. “Always look straight ahead when you’re doing your eyeliner- never look down into the mirror or tilt your head.” Your tool kit is of equal importance, and it turns out the right brush can do the hard work for you. “You have to use an angled brush as it will help to create those angles for you. I create an angle from the lower lash line and use the brush to stamp it on, then I do the same thing from the upper lash line to join it up. You’re left with an open triangle and then all you have to do is colour that in. That way you can also find the shape that works best on your eyes, because it really is different for everybody.”
In order to keep the focus on the liner, Nicole felt it important to keep the rest of the look as fresh as possible. “When you have a liner like this, it’s good to tone everything else down so that the liner can jump out. If we had a really strong brow, a big lash or a bold lip, the liner just wouldn’t look as powerful.”
Foundation was treated as a sheer wash of colour, with the team applying MAC’s Face and Body Foundation with a light hand to ensure each girl’s skin and even their freckles could still be seen. “I also used one of my favourite products,” Nicole tells me. “The Glow With It Extra Dimension Skinfinish. It has more of a copper tone to it than most bronzers. There’s a whole section of the [Alice McCall] collection that features this very colour, so we wanted to really tie in that beautiful warm tone. We apply that using a big fluffy brush and taking it across the face. I don’t want to be contouring with it. It’s all about healthy looking girls- this is how we WANT to look. We want to look healthy, vibrant and beautiful.”
The Extra Dimension Skinfinish in Glow With It was also used on the eyes to give the lids a wash of warmth. “It looks good on every single girl we’ve used it on,” says Nicole. The eye look was finished with full, brushed up brows to keep everything looking as fresh and natural as possible. “We’ve used the False Lash Maximizer to keep the brows in place. It doubles the size of the lash before you’ve put mascara on, and it has the same effect on the brow, drying clear and giving it a really beautiful texture.”
The entire look was tied together with a nude lip, with Nicole creating a custom colour to suit each model’s complexion and enhance their natural lip tone. “I’ve been working from the Necessary Nudes Palette. I like to mix the colours together and apply using a soft, fluffy brush- this way, you can glaze the lips with the colour without any harsh lines. The eyeliner is hard enough, so we don’t want to look as though we’ve spent three hours on our lips as well.”
