Here are the top 36 never-fail tips from the experts for a perfect, neutral makeup. It’s a no-fuss, goof-proof way to look good. With the right techniques, you can achieve a groomed look that’s great for work or a special event, but that can also be played down to achieve a casual visage that’s great with jeans and a T-shirt. These professional hints will fast-track you to the best natural makeup.

The basics for great daily makeup

1. Sydney makeup artist Victoria Baron says, “It sounds like a cliche but good skin comes from within so it’s essential to have a healthy diet with lots of water.”

2. Start with a sunscreen. Victoria says, “The worst canvas is sun-damaged skin.” It’s essential to protect your face from the sun.

3. In times when budget is an issue, it’s good to know you don’t need to spend a fortune on makeup to create a great look. There are plenty of budget-conscious brands on the market and you’ll find products such as eye and brow liners have a shelf life of years, not months. Mascaras should be discarded after no longer than six months and you may find lipsticks go off after six months, too. Keeping products in the fridge will extend their life. Invest in a few key items such as a good foundation, mascara and blush and only splurge on non-essentials such as fashionable colour products when the budget will stretch.

4. “Don’t use heavy makeup in places where there are fine lines, under eyes and around the mouth,” says Victoria.

5. Invest in a good exfoliator to clear away any dry skin. “Buffing the skin creates a clean, clear and even canvas for the application of foundation,” says Victoria.

6. Affirm your individual Beauty every time you look at yourself in the mirror. Don’t focus on small imperfections and flaws. Try this affirmation: “I love and accept myself just the way I am. I am beautiful and perfect because I’m me.”

7. In her book Bobbi Brown Beauty (published by Ebury Press), international makeup expert Bobbi Brown says, “Accentuate the positive — accept the features that you have and learn to feel good about them and start to play them up.”

8. Bronzing powders are a great alternative to loose powder if you want a natural, healthy skin tone. Brush a light dusting of bronzing powder over your eyelids, cheeks, nose and chin. Keep the colour natural all over your body by adding a touch of colour to your décolletage and shoulders, too.

Foundation

9. Before applying foundation, spritz your face with an essential oil spray. Mix up 5 drops of pure lavender or rose oil into a 50mL spray container of mineral water. An essential oil spray will not only smell wonderful but will also have an immediate calming effect on your nervous system.

10. “It’s important to have a good-quality brush,” says Victoria. “It’s worth investing in something you will put on your face at least twice a day. A good brush will cost between $50 and $120 dollars but will last a lifetime.”

11. When buying foundation, check the colour match on your face, not the back of your hand. It’s easy to make a mistake in department stores with fluorescent or halogen lighting. The best way is to take a mirror outside into the daylight to check it.

12. Mineral makeup, with its advanced mineral complexes and natural mineral powders, is the latest word in foundation. The skin-loving formulas are gentle and sheer but take a little time to master. Victoria says, “The trick to mineral makeup is layering. You start with a thin veil of coverage and gently build up the pigment to create a more opaque finish.” A good brush is crucial here: “You need a brush that can collect the particles and buff them into the skin in circular motions. This action crushes the mineral particles and allows them to spread evenly over the skin.”

13. Victoria says, “Great skin doesn’t need a lot of foundation. Just use a very light dusting of mineral makeup to even out the skin tone. Don’t worry about wrinkles and fine lines — they’re part of life.” 

14. Once upon a time, it was difficult to find the perfect foundation shade for your skin, but the good news is cosmetic companies have gone to great lengths to change that. Some brands offer a custom blending service, while others encourage you to mix your own. Mineral powders allow you to blend your own shade very easily by layering two different colours. And you can do the same with liquid foundation. You simply put two dabs of each foundation onto the back of your hand and blend them with a sponge or brush and apply.

The big cover-up

15. Use concealers sparingly. They can make the face look pasty. If you have blemishes or under-eye circles, get a flat makeup brush and moisten it. Dab the brush into a cover stick and lightly brush the area with pigment. Allow it to dry and set it with powder.

16. One of the biggest mistakes people with freckles make is to apply too much concealer, which can make the skin look dull and mask-like. The trick with freckles is to use concealer only on blemishes, pigmentation or broken capillaries — not on the freckles themselves. A sheer foundation will allow the freckles to show, but in a subtle and fresh way.

17. If you have a ruddy complexion or broken capillaries, try a green cover stick, or alternatively try an old makeup artist’s trick and dab a small amount of witch-hazel toner onto the capillaries, which temporarily reduces the redness.

Cheeks

18. “I like to see skin, not a lot of powdery blush,” says Victoria. For a natural look, try using a creamy blush and dip your fingers into the pot and paint a few short stripes on the centre of your cheek (the part that sticks out the furthest when you smile and is in line with your iris, commonly known as the “apple”). Then blend and spread the colour using circular movements, making sure it fades at the edges.

19. “Your perfect blush shade is the colour of your cheeks when you are flushed or exercising,” says Bobbi. “I prefer shades that are rose-toned, pink-toned or tawny brown. It follows that the lighter your skin is, the lighter your blush shade should be. The darker your skin, the deeper the blush.”

20. If you like mineral makeup, Victoria’s tips are: “Tap the brush gently into the lid of the mineral makeup pot and shake out any loose pigment. Layer the colour, sweeping in the direction from the hairline over the apples of the cheek and back again – try not to get too much product in one area. Also try not to apply colour too low on your cheeks — this can give the illusion that your face has sagged! Again, layer, layer, layer!”

Eyes

21. The general rule of thumb is that light stands out, while dark recedes. Light colours “open” the eyes and dark colours make them look deeper, more recessed. If you have small eyes, the way to make them appear larger and more seductive is to contour them. Using a neutral shade such as cream or peach, cover the entire eye socket. Take a mid-toned natural hue such as caramel and draw an arch around the crease in the centre of the eye and blend it, using small strokes. Next, take a darker shade such as chocolate and etch it from the centre of the lash line towards the outer edge of the eye, blending as you go. To give the look a more polished glamour, take the chocolate shade underneath the eye from the centre to the outside edge of the eye. Finish with black mascara.

22. In using colour, Bobbi suggests choosing shades according to your hair colour. If you’re blonde, your eyes will really “pop” if you go for bone, ash brown, pink and smoky black shades. Brunette girls will flatter their eyes if they go for brown, mahogany, mocha and cream shades. Redheads will achieve a great look with mossy green, taupe, red-brown and stone hues. Grey- or white-haired women will bring out their eyes with white, slate, grey and navy shades.

23. For large eyes, a lick of mascara and a rim of brown kohl around the eyes will be enough for a perfectly natural eye makeup.

24. To camouflage dark circles and bags, use a dab of concealer under the eyes, set it with loose powder and apply foundation. Subtly draw attention to the eyes, not the discolouration or bags, by sweeping a natural shade of mid-tone eyeshadow over the entire lid and rimming the eye with charcoal eyeliner. Finish with glossy black mascara.

25. To create a natural look without the heaviness of eyeliner, moisten an eyeliner brush and dip it into charcoal, brown or caramel eyeshadow, then stroke it across the natural line of the lid.

26. “l like to use a damp brush to apply eyeshadow. Make sure the tip of the brush is facing down into the pigment so you can apply a sharp line of colour right into the lash line and then blend it over the entire lid,” explains Victoria.

27. Don’t be afraid of shimmer, the trick is to apply it to the right spots. Victoria recommends a tiny dab of bright white or gold to the corner of the inner eye and the brow bone. Covering the entire lid with shimmer looks great on fresh, young skin, but it can also call attention to fine lines and winkles.

28. For night, try rimming the upper and lower lids with a liquid eyeliner that has been formulated to give a glossy, reflective black.

Eyebrows

29. Victoria says, “Brows are back!” Don’t pluck your eyebrows to within an inch of their lives. Follow the natural curve of the brow and pluck only the strays.

30. If your eyebrows are blonde, colour and shape them with a light pencil in a shade such as chestnut or light brown.

31. Victoria says, “The eyebrows are the hardest thing to get right.” When they’re wrong, it can change your whole face. Thin eyebrows age a person — bushy eyebrows make you look younger and arched eyebrows give the face a sophisticated look. “My best advice is to get a professional to shape them for you if you’re unsure.”

32. Matt eyeshadow or eyebrow pigment used with a slant-tipped brush works very well to shape and define the eyebrows.

33. Bobbi says, “Extending the ends of the brows will frame the eyes and give the face an elegant finish.”

Lips

34. “If the eyes are the windows of the soul, lips are the mirrors of our moods,” says Bobbi. “Changing lip colour is the quickest way to change your entire look,” she adds. Bobbi’s rule for a natural mouth is to go for a colour that’s just a shade lighter or darker than your natural lip colour.

35. Bobbi’s lip-colour system works like this: Blondes should reach for pink, beige and taupe shades; brunettes should opt for brown/pink, plum, sheer red and taupe shades; redheads look good in peach, light brown, brown/pink and chocolate shades; and grey- or white-haired women should select pale pink, coral, bright pink and medium pink shades.

36. If your lips are thin, go for a dense application of colour. Define the lips with a pencil first, then apply a rich, opaque lipstick colour and coat with lip gloss. Denser pigments will fill out and plump the lips, giving the appearance of fuller lips. If your lips are already on the lush side, you may like to use a natural pink, gold or peach shade of lip gloss.

 

Mineral makeup For thousands of years, people have been using natural pigments from the earth to colour, cover and adorn their skin. Today’s version of earth-based pigments is mineral makeup and it’s being touted as the most natural, healthiest makeup on the market. Formulated with minerals such as iron, potassium, magnesium and sun-protecting titanium dioxide, these powdered products claim to help the skin “breathe”. They contain no fillers or toxic chemicals, have a high water-resistance rating and provide the skin with some UV protection. The most sophisticated formulas include skin boosters such as green tea extract, vitamins A, C and E, pomegranate extract and other antioxidants. Unlike conventional makeup products, which simply sit on the surface of the skin, mineral makeup is designed to treat and protect the skin at the same time as providing flawless coverage and radiant colour. To achieve an invisible finish, the pigments must be “pushed” into the skin, which is achieved by gently brushing layers of fine powder over the face. Follow Victoria Baron’s tips to achieve a gorgeous, natural look with mineral makeup.

 

 

Nikki Goldstein is an author and journalist who has written 10 award-winning books including the acclaimed GirlForce series. She has contributed to Notebook, The Sydney Morning Herald, Vogue, The Financial Review Magazine and Body & Soul.