The Eyes Have It {Eyeliner & False Lashes for People Who Suck At That Like I Do}

Confession time. I’m nearly 34 years old and I can’t do my eyeliner! I wore false lashes for the first time a couple of weeks ago. If you are anything like me you watch youtubes, read tutorials and then have a go at doing your liner and think this….

So, I’m going to try and share everything I’ve learned plus some youtubes from other people that illustrate my point well. No need for me to reinvent the wheel. Some of these products are less easy to find in Australia, so I will put a list of resources of places to buy at the end of the post. Once I know the brand/s and proper names of things I want to purchase, I always check eBay and have a little google to get the best prices, feel free to do the same if you wish.

 

Let’s start with what I’ve tried – pencils, liquid liner with brushes, liquid liners with felt tips, liquid liner with my own brush, gel liner and finally cake eyeliner. If I’m after a smudged liner, I can make pencils work, maybe smudging a little shadow over the line with a liner brush. But when it comes to crisp lines or winged liner, the one and only product I can get to work is cake liner with a bent angle brush!!! I am using Napoleon Perdis cake liner & sealer.  I know you may not have heard about cake liner but it’s perfect for beginners. This video from one of my favorite makeup youtubers Siobhan, tells you almost everything you need to know.

I will add that when you first use a cake liner, try it out on your hand to get the hang of how much liquid you need, how much to rub your brush on the cake and how far you can ‘draw’ before running out of product. Too little or too much can give you a lighter grey rather than a strong black. Some people use cake liner to create the line/wing and then go over it with liquid waterproof liner for longevity. I strongly recommend using a bent angle brush like I do. It means your hand doesn’t cover up the area you are trying to line and so you can see much more clearly. I am crap without the brush. In terms of technique to apply your liner, this video (again from Siobhan) has lots of useful tips.

I have also used the ‘scotch tape technique’ very successfully. In fact I also used tape along the eyelid, as well as for the wing and been very happy. The scotch tape technique has been questioned (in terms of if it’s a good thing to do to your face) but I recently asked a professional make up artist about it and she said it’s perfectly fine. In fact you can buy make up tape especially for this sort of use, although I’m pretty sure that a medical tape such as Micropore from the chemist would be just as good (but that’s just my opinion and I could be wrong).

Moving on to false lashes….. I always thought the sort of lashes that went from short at the tear duct end to very long at the outer corner would open and lift my eyes. But when I tried them that wasn’t true! The kind that are short at each end and long in the centre rocked it for me. In my pics I am wearing Ardell lashes in 109 but I also like the Ardell 110’s. Even though my pic has a small vial of eyelash glue pictured, I prefer the Duo glue in clear (too messy and unskilled with dark glue) but it does contain latex. There are non latex glues for those with allergies. I also love my little false lash tweezers. This video from another of my fave youtubers, Lisa Eldridge, gives you lots of false lash hints and tips.

The only thing I have to add to the info in this video is mirror angles. I’ve put on lashes in several mirrors (practice) and even though some of them tilted, I struggled. I find it easiest to sit on the floor in front of a full length mirror. That way I can angle my face almost every which way. It seems a small tip but when using a full length mirror, the falsies just pop themselves into place!

I really hope this has been helpful. It’s all the wisdom I gathered trying to get it right. If you have other hints or tips to add, please share them in the comments. If you try these techniques, I would love to hear how you went or even better, post a pic to my Facebook page! This is the first post in the Glam Week series, be sure to subscribe so you don’t miss out on Makeup Bootcamp, My Fave Vintage Inspired Lippies, DIY Vintage Inspired Hairpins & the Millionairess Cocktail . Go and get glam ma’am xxxx

Bent Liner Brush – Or search angled liner brushes on eBay and sort through. I have no good Australian resource for this. Personally, I would avoid the $1 ones though.

Ardell Lashes – Priceline or get bulk deals on eBay

Duo Eyelash Glue – Priceline or eBay

Eyelash Tweezers – eBay, search false eyelash tweezers