To New Fresh Beginings and Glamour Magazine

Happy New Year everyone!

2012 was filled with highs and lows for me, and I feel it was a turning point in my life.

I carry endless supply of gratitude for even most painful moments and cherish them as much as I do happy ones. Each one a feather in my new wings, dusting the ash away.  I am looking forward seeing what this year has to offer.
I wish you all, most beautiful, inspiring New Year, filled with love and creativity.

To start fresh and sparkly, I am sharing new editorial just published in Mexican edition of Glamour Magazine by photographer Michael David Adams.

We had pleasure working with delightful twins from Lithuania Aida & Ieva Aniulyte. They were such joy to have around, amazing models and great comedians as well. They had us in stitches most of the time and synergy they had with each other was inspiring and effortless.
Lets start with behind the scenes photo, from one of the looks.
I can't thank talented manicurist Eri Handa enough for her sweet energy and her talent, she so graciously lands us on our shoots. Linh Nguyen for beautiful hair and Don West for amazing styling.

 Shall we begin......

I have been on minimalist kick lately, so much more about the skin, freshness accompanied by accents of color.

I have bleached their brows in order to provide extra minimalistic palette, that will accent pops of color even further. I love bleaching brows, I think endless supply of Jolen cream bleach is in order!
This obsession probably stems from the fact that I am painter as well.
I love creating story, characters and symphony of colors....
I LOVE my job!!!







I wanted to touch on trends that are happening right now, like purple lips, or beetle colored eyes, but still keeping it simple and approachable.
Naturally I  know that everyday woman is not bleaching her brows any time soon (well, unless they are me, in my goth period) but certainly can take elements of these lush, rich colors in everyday life.
One product that I am loving right now for that wide eyed, rested look is Le Blanc lightening corrector by CHANEL

This magic wand, helped with dark spots, and dark under eye circles and gave me amazing prep to achieve that luminous skin I was going after. It has metal ball that is cooling, de-puffing, kind of like high tech ball of cucumbers. So yay for peeps at Chanel!!!
I loved how all came together, perfect blend of different minds, creating singular image. I could have not started my year any better...
Without further ado....here is the editorial with delicious twins!

Santigold, art and awesome music

I have meant to write about this forever, but being busy, traveling, working, painting my heart out,
I always forget, but TODAY I do it.
My beautiful talented Santi has come out with a new AMAZING album "Master of My Make-Believe" for which I had pleasure doing her make up for the painting that is behind her.

That was fun day, we played dress up, even I donned some costumes too :). We took series of portraits for the painter, so he has photo reference to work from. Result is stunning!! It was painted by super talented Kehinde Wiley.
Being painting enthusiast myself, this was my dream project. Here are some behind the scenes photos.

 This ended up being final outfit that was used in the painting, and it was my fave!

 As you can see we had true costume party and it was lots of fun. I kept Santi's make up pretty natural and simple, she has most beautiful skin, so no heavy coverage needed for this lady.

 And the final pose! Ready to be painted

Being the part of this project was truly exciting, and I am always excited and happy when I work with Santi. 
Few months ago, I did her make up for music video, which I will post as it comes out.
In the meanwhile check out her new album! She is truly fascinating, beautiful and inspiring artist to work with. I feel privileged. I LOVE my job!!

Snow White and the Huntsman by Benefit Cosmetics

When I first saw the trailer for the movie "Snow White and the Huntsman" and Charlize just dissolved into the cluster of crows my heart skipped the beat.
Visuals of that movie make me little paranoid that someone is spying on me and knows what is in my head EXACTLY!!
Needless to say, I can't wait to feast my eyes on that visual buffet, but in the meanwhile, imagine my delight when my beloved Benefit came out with special edition make up bag to celebrate the film.
Take a look at this baby

 It was made for me! Its purple, it has silhouettes of tiny little fairies and I am not parting with it.

Inside it holds my fave matte cream POREfessional, Bad gal lash, Benefit classic BENEtint and illuminiting moon beam. All aready part of my kit but now with most gorge bag to hold them in!
This rare beauty can be found in Sephora!

My not so secret life

As some of you know, besides being in love with my job as a make up artist, I lead double life as a painter.
When I started I could only do paintings based on photographs, but my wish to create original art has come trough a while ago with "Alice in Wonderland" painting.
Recently I took my love for painting even further and discovered new medium (to me, I only worked in oils prior to this).
Enter Watercolor. I love it's flowing nature, it gives me ability to let go and allow paint to guide me.

I am so happy with final outcome, and feel as finally things that have been locked inside of me are coming to life.
Yesterday I had my first sale in Etay where I sell giclee prints of my artwork. Feeling of accomplishment and pride was incredible.
I love the feeling that someone liked my work so much to buy it and that fraction of my soul will be part of their story now.
Priceless

Pretty Little Liars: Troian Bellisario for Good Morning America

This is my second time to have privilege to do makeup for beautiful young actress Troian Bellisario.
Yesterday we visited Good Morning America set, where Troian and her castmates discussed season finale of Pretty little liars.
It was fun seeing young fans adoration and grace in which Troian and the girls showed to them.
She is beauty inside out!

I have used mostly neutral palette of warm browns to give Troian soft smokey eyes and highlighted her skin with illuminizer to give her nice glow.
Afterwards, for ABC Upfront event Troian was attending, I have added little bit of loose gold/pink shimmer on the center of the eye, to warm up the make up, since she was wearing neutral assemble.
In both instances I kept her lips neutral color.
What a fun day!

Beauty fundamentals: Foundation

As some of you know, I really obsess over foundation and correct matching. One thing I hate seeing is floaty head (mismatched foundation).

Brides magazine has asked me to re-create some of my techniques for them. So here it is, step by step on foundation rules.
Hope you like and feel free to ask questions in comment section.
xoxo
V.

Beauty breakdown: Elle STYLE360 Theia F/W 2012

Cherry on the top! I finish beauty breakdowns from F/W 2012 with the show that is very close to my heart.
I love my job, I am grateful for every opportunity, every exciting moment I receive,  as they shape me profoundly to who I am as an artist, as well as a person.
There are few moments in my career however, that will be permanently etched in my memory as incredible out of the body experiences. This show is one of those moments.

I can say, for the rest of my time, that this was the show that made me dissolve into river of tears and I am proud to say it.

There are so many elements to reason why and I will get to them, but sheer talent and craftsmanship of the design, made by hands of truly truly beautiful soul, Theia designer Don O'Neill is most important one.

 I have written about people like him before in my posts The Messengers and Cover that started it all.
People whose messages leave me breathless and inspires me to create and keep communicating to the universe.
Beauty of his art work is truly complemented by who this man is as a person.
From the moment I met him he (and his partner Pascal) permeated by warmth and love that is sometimes lacking in our industry.

No matter how hectic it got, no matter how many people had opinion around him, no matter the fact that this is the most important show of his life, his very first, this man wore grace and kindness like most beautiful crown.
That is why, his success, his talent and beauty he creates is extra special. Because it is happening to truly good person and it gives you re assurance that you can be successful artist without loosing your beautiful compassionate humanity.

All of you who know me, know how much I love mystical, dark but beautiful esthetic (I secretly call myself Morgana Le Fay for god sake lol), so creating this look was extra special for me.

I was raised reading Greek Mythology, so when Don told us, at our test, that his inspiration comes from Athena, the warrior goddess of wisdom and art, my nerd goth kid got awaken and my ears perked up.

We have created strong eye fitting the warrior goddess, linear and dark. But there was so much feminine grace to the whole collection and I wanted to convey that somehow with make up as well.

That is why after framing models eyes with Drama Queen palette and mixing purple from Tropicana (all by our sponsor Beauti Control) I added special silver cream in the center of their eyelid.
I wanted it to catch the light, play off the elements of design and expose light center of a strong woman, like pulsing heart underneath the warrior's armor.
The look was so beautifully accompanied by amazing shiny tails created by talented Linh Nguyen and his team of hairstylists.

  
We kept the rest of their look fresh and minimal, so nothing competes with the eyes. Shiny highlight was added to their cheeks to shimmer, like water.  Lips were finished by BC lip balm and their whole body was moisturized by BC Ultra Rich Body Moisturizer.


 

 As always, at showtime, I go in front of the runway and position myself with photographers, phone in my hand.
That is how I  communicate with my first assistant back stage, in case something needs to be fixed. Little did I know I was about to be taken to an emotional journey.
Light went down and in the rhythm of the most beautiful music, I saw ghosts of warrior goddesses gliding down the runway wearing designs spun with love and vision of a beautiful man.
As tears streamed down my face, overwhelmed by pride and realization that I am part of this, that I have worked so hard in my own career to be part of such beautiful vision, I felt my hand squeezed hard.
I turned around to see teary face of Don's partner Pascal looking at me and like in some movie moment we hugged each other watching the show and crying together.
When it was over, applause echoed like thunder trough out the venue and people stood up to greet the final line up and designer himself. When the light came on, I saw that my face was not the only face wet with tears.
It is truly one of the moments I will never forget. I witnessed a triumph of hard work and talent that belonged to most deserving of persons. I was there.

TAKE A LOOK AT THE VIDEO OF THE SHOW (make sure your volume is up)