THE notebook…
advice, ideas and musings…
My Top Bridal Looks of 2022 - Part One
This is the look we created - perfected skin, nude glossy lips, matte neutral browns over the lids, a lifted soft smokey wing, layered individual lashes and lots of definition to the face.
Demi, Barns & Yard, Malvern - April 30th 2022
I mean - will you just look at her?!!
Demi was just a dream bride
The first of my top bridal looks of last year is beautiful Demi. Modern, polished, romantic - just picture perfect.
Demi has been my beautician for the best part of a decade so when she asked me to be her makeup artist for her Barns & Yard wedding back in April 2022 I was over the moon.
a) because I adore her
b) because she knows her stuff so it was a real compliment to be chosen by her
and c) that face!!
As I saw Demi most months in the run up to the big day we had a lot of time to chat about her ideas for her perfect bridal makeup look. She knew that she wanted natural looking, velvety skin, to keep the eye matte, maybe have a smokey wing and she knew that she wanted to really define her features. So we were on the look out for inspiration for a while.
When I shared this work of the wonderful makeup artist Hung Vanngo on my Instagram stories I knew that it pulled all those elements that Demi wanted into one inspiration image. She agreed. It was the one!
This is the look we created - perfected skin, nude glossy lips, matte neutral browns over the lids, a lifted soft smokey wing, layered individual lashes and lots of definition to the face.
Key Products:
Tom Ford Moonlight Highlighter
Pat McGrath Divine Rose/ Desert Rose blush
Just breathtakingly gorgeous…
photos Imogen Eve Photography
venue Barns & Yard
dress Sophie Wynne Owen Bridal
hair Angelica Hair
Makeup Amy Laney Makeup
Link to HungVanngo YouTube
Finding Your Bridal Style - Preparing for your Bridal Makeup Trial
Some brides have a very clear makeup style and have a strong vision in their minds of how they see their wedding day makeup and hair from the moment they have found their dream dress. Some stumble across an image somewhere and know immediately that they want that look recreated for their wedding day. Some brides, particularly the more natural kind struggle to articulate their vision and some struggle to find it at all. If you’re a low key girl who wears very little makeup day to day where do you go to search for your bridal makeup inspiration?
What should I do to prepare for my Bridal Trial?
Some brides have a very clear makeup style and have a strong vision in their minds of how they see their wedding day makeup and hair from the moment they have found their dream dress. Some stumble across an image somewhere and know immediately that they want that look recreated for their wedding day. Some brides, particularly the more natural kind struggle to articulate their vision and some struggle to find it at all. If you’re a low key girl who wears very little makeup day to day where do you go to search for your bridal makeup inspiration?
‘Well, Pinterest obviously’ you say. Umm, while I love a bit of Pinterest for home and fashion and makeup to an extent, have you searched ‘Bridal makeup’ on Pinterest lately?
Image search from Pinterest
First of all can we just quash the notion that there is a style of makeup called ‘Bridal Makeup’. Bridal makeup is whatever a particular bride wants her makeup to be in order for her to feel her most beautiful. Secondly, these are not natural makeup looks. And as beautifully applied as some of the makeup may well be, there is so much filtering and editing of these images that it doesn’t give you a clear indication of it. Thirdly, glamorous they undoubtedly are, but if you want a modern bridal look these are not going to help you.
Last week, I had a bridal trial with a really beautiful natural bride and she had done her pre-trial homework and taken to Pinterest so that she could have some images to show me. As she handed me her phone she said ‘none of these are really me - they’re all a bit heavy’ at which point I handed her phone back to her and picked up my own. I never want to create a look for a client that doesn’t feel like them - a look that they feel they should have because it is ‘bridal’. I would rather that you come to your trial with no images to show leaving us to work out what you want from talking about your likes and dislikes and looking through some of my past work and other images I may have saved over time .
I rarely look to Pinterest or even studio shoots for inspiration for bridal makeup looks. I follow the work of some of the best ‘celebrity’ makeup artists in the World and for me their behind the scenes and red carpet images are the ones I pin the most. So, my advice is: look to Hollywood for the best in beautiful, understated, expensive looking modern glamour.
Which celebrities are you often told you look like? Which actresses have similar colouring to yours? Who do you see on the red carpet or in interviews and always think ‘they look AMAZING’? Google their names plus ‘red carpet’ and you can find dozens of gorgeous, realistically photographed looks that are perfect for any event - your own wedding included. This particular bride has fair skin, dark hair and amazing full eyebrows - more than a touch of the Lily Collins about her. And so I pulled up her makeup artist Fiona Styles’ Instagram profile to find some of her recent looks. Every one of them she felt was what she was looking for - pared back, lightweight, beautifying modern makeup.
What do actresses need from their red carpet looks? They need it to make them feel beautiful and confident obviously; they need it to last all day and often into the night (ditto your wedding makeup); it needs to photograph beautifully from all angles and under all lighting states (there’s no controlling what direction that paparazzi lens is coming from and your Auntie Jean’s iPhone camera as you walk back down the aisle can be just as unpredictable!) and as well as that it needs to look beautiful and natural in real life too.
Here are just a few examples of the amazing, inspiring looks I have recently saved. Compare them to that Pinterest search. I know hands down which ones I would rather be wearing. And while you’re at it, why not head over to Instagram and follow the incredible artists who created them: Lisa Eldridge, George Eisdell, Hung Vanngo, Pati Dubroff, Fiona Stiles and Alex Babsky. You’ll find square after square of gorgeous, wearable makeup.
Are you looking for natural, modern bridal makeup in Worcester, Worcestershire, Herefordshire, Shropshire, The Cotswolds and beyond? Get in touch here