"I call this look: I am ready to PAR-TAY!"

Top Left: Before! The rest: After
Thursday was my friend, K's birthday. We had coffee at Whole Foods and hung out a bit that afternoon.That evening she had plans to go out for drinks to celebrate.
I've never quite met anyone like K. She is contradictory by nature. She gets good haircuts at a trendy salon by a hot rockabilly guy and owns more vintage clothes and more shoes that anyone I've ever met. Yet she doesn't seem to think she is pretty. She is afraid of pants and refuses to wear makeup most of the time. If I could get her to throw on some lipgloss for work I'd be thrilled. She has gorgeous hazel-y eyes, great cheekbones and full lips but you will never catch her advertising this fact. I have been waxing and tinting her brows for about a year now and it makes a huge difference, if I do say so myself. I agreed to do her makeup' if she came over to my house before hitting the town.
She showed up around 8 (only half an hour late which, for her is good) in a little black dress and a push-up bra. Excellent. She wanted a smoky eye, but only 'if I thought it would look good on her.' *sigh*
So I got to work taking her from the clean-faced-just-got-back-from-the-farmer's-market look to flat-out smokin' hot mama. Did I mention she has great features? She had a patch of breakouts along her right jawline that she's been battling but the rest of her skin was smooth and freshly moisturized.
I used Dr. Hauschka Puncto concealer #1 (which I used to think was horrible but that worked like a charm. I used a brush with it when before I just tested it from the tube. Now I love it but it's discontinued) and Mineral Fusion loose powder foundation to cover the breakouts and faint undereye shadows and slight redness around the nose then toned down shine and primed the eyelid area with Dr. Hauschka translucent loose powder.
I then applied Bare Escentuals blush in Lovely on her cheeks. I highlighted with the nude color in the Smashbox highlighting quad and applied Glominerals fawn shadow as a base color on her lids. I then heavily applied BeneFIT Bad Gal chunky black liner along her the upper and lower lashline on the outer corners of her eyes.
She took this inopportune moment to look in the mirror. I had already smudged the liner but not cleaned it up yet. She looked (as I told her) like 'Courtney Love on a bender' which coincidentally was NOT the look she was going for. There is a moment in every makeup job where if the client looks in the mirror they would run screaming. The key to good looking makeup is blending and I had not blended yet. After blending, blending, blending with a smudger I took a sharp black thin pencil and applied it along the lashline and the inner eye to add depth.
Then I applied black shimmery shadow to the crease and highlighted her brow bone and inner eye with Nude Beach by Bare Escentuals. I went over the inner eye with Glominerals Peach liner, filled in her brows with Glominerals brow pencil in Brunette and applied Blinc Kiss Me mascara in black concentrating on the lashes at the inner corners. I finished up with a nude pencil and neutral shimmery gloss on her lips.
My boys were being super-cute, running around trying to imitate me by 'blending' her arms with brushes and sponge wedges. Alex also crammed several sponges into her super-exposed birthday cleavage. I thought she got them all out but she found out otherwise when she was getting undressed later that night.
So, she was happy with her makeup and so was I. It was my intention to show her that it is possible for her to look glamorous and foxy.Now all she needs is the confidence to back it up. Unfortunately I can't give that to her, but hopefully the above pictures and all the compliments she received that night will help!
I have been doing makeup for a long time and I know that for someone who is unfamiliar with all the products and techniques it can seem overwhelming. But even for the biggest novice, there are quick and easy tricks that are great for casual, everyday makeup-- if you are willing.