Improperly blended blush is a pet peeve of ours, and we find that desi women in particular are offenders. We tend to go for brighter shades, often because more neutral tones tend not to show up or don’t do much for us. With bright hues, however, blending becomes even more crucial. We called on celebrity makeup artist Hillary Clark again and she showed us an indispensable trick to make sure our faces stay stripe-free. Read on and pass along!
If you don’t own a foundation brush, go out and get one ASAP (even if you don’t wear foundation — you’ll see why this tool is important to have in your bag of tricks). Any drugstore brand will do for this purpose. After applying your blush, use the foundation brush to blend away the edges. Tone down any excess on the apples of your cheeks using a gentle, stippling motion. Ideally, you don’t want to see a stark contrast where blush begins and ends. Continue to blend until blush blends seamlessly and imperceptibly into the surrounding skin.
How much blush is too much? Well, we find it’s easy to check with photos — if you can see your blush clearly in pictures, tone it down. It’s the sort of makeup you can see in the mirror or in person, but tends to be less obvious in photos, so chances are if it’s showing up in your snapshots, it can stand to be dialed back a bit.
In terms of desi-friendly shades, we are Nars junkies through and through. The blushes are highly pigmented yet sheer and buildable. For brights, we prefer Desire (matte pink) and Gilda or Torrid (peachy-coral — Gilda is matte while Torrid has a bit of shimmer). We like to layer these on top of a neutral ground color (such as Sin) for added depth.
Clockwise from top left: Desire, Gilda, Torrid, and Sin
If you’re looking for a cream blush, it’s hard to beat By Terry’s supremely blendable Blush Veloutee Velvet Cream Blush in Apple Glow.
Images: 1. www.gurugossip.com; 2-5. www.barneys.com; 6. www.spacenk.com
Desi Betty 