How changing your makeup brush can radically change your look

It’s as easy as switching from hard to soft brushes.

That’s the advice of MAC senior artist Nicole Thompson, she of the pink hair and eyebrows. The strikingly hued makeup artist, who flew to Manila earlier this year to demonstrate the spring-summer 2012 trends, was the brains behind this week’s YStyle cover, which pays homage to this year’s biggest trends: soft pastel hues, creamy, buttery skin and muted shine.

Brushing beauty

To change up your look for the season, Thompson recommends simply changing your makeup brush. The most popular looks that stole the spotlight at the runways in New York, Paris and Milan boasted a luminous quality not achievable by the application of matte makeup, or jarring contouring.

“You get a totally different effect just by changing your makeup brush,” Thompson advises. “You get a different density. It changes things.’’

“It gives you a new lease on your makeup,” she observes.

Instead of applying a tangerine blush for example with a firm brush, float the hue along the anchors of your face that achieves a natural glow, resulting in a look that’s fresher, lighter  more seasonally appropriate for the sweat-inducing temperatures we’ve been enduring for the previous months.

What appeared harsh and finite can be luscious and incandescent in texture and finish. Instead of packing on foundation, Thompson lightly spread the formula evenly over model Chelsea Robato’s skin. “Her skin is so perfect, it would be a crime to cover it up.”

The solution is not to hide imperfections but to highlight your assets.

In this case, the model’s natural complexion shone through  a consequence of the delicate application.

One tip that changes the way your skin responds to makeup: Start with a moisturizer to prep skin, Thompson advises. “It makes skin more malleable. Any makeup you apply automatically glides on.”

Pink phenomenon: Oz-based MAC senior artist Nicole Thompson, here with model Chelsea Robato, bleaches her brows platinum and adds pink lipstick to color them in. “I like Barbie, I like the color pink,” she says with a laugh.

For a dewy effect, spray a light mist of water after applying foundation.

“Through circular motions, buff skin with a soft brush,” she says of her technique. “It results in skin looking like skin.”

An orange a day

Thompson’s take on the summer glow is to eschew the bronzer  only for now, kids  and take on the orange cause. Here, she utilizes three hero products to accomplish the new summer glow.

Instead of orange-toned powder, she applied Morange lipstick (though MAC’s new prolong lip creme Good To Go, a similarly hued creamy formula with a vibrant, almost-neon-like glow that adds a surprisingly peppy vibe, is another alternative) all over parts of the model’s face, tenderly pressing down bits of the lipstick all the way down to the skin for a finish that is both dewy yet concise. Thompson patted the hue all over the apples of the cheeks till the brow bone and above the eyebrows for a powerfully monochromatic effect that manages to straddle the bounds of wearability.

The application of Silver Dust, an iridescent powder which provides a lightweight sheen that blends without streaking, all over the face, touching lightly on prominent bones or parts that naturally gravitate towards light, offsets the monochromatic finish of the orange tones.

To finish, she highlights the eyes with Naked Lunch eyeshadow for a radiant luminescence that’s ethereal without being disco.

Welcome to the bold

Though the look is very editorial, Thompson believes that there’s no look that’s too “runway” for real life.

The idea is not to hold back. Finding a look that suits you  or your current mood  is as easy as trying on a new hue. Like fitting a dress you find on a rack in a boutique you discovered serendipitously, slipping on a new color or testing a new technique doesn’t require much  just a little leap, or hop really, of faith.

“Don’t be afraid to reinvent yourself like Madonna,” Thompson says.

“Makeup is easy to experiment with,” she remarks. “If anything goes wrong, there’s always makeup remover.”