Summer Makeup Event Entry #10: Leslie (Retro 50's Glam)

This past year, both my grandmothers passed away. Although those were sad times, I praise God they were both believers... I look forward to the day I can see them both again in heaven. When my PauPau (Mom's mom) passed away, one of my cousins was able to compile old photos of her to show during a slideshow at the memorial service. One of the photos stuck to me, and it was always easy to bring that image back up in my mind.

This last entry for the Makeup Event is special to me because she was my inspiration for this look.

All photos taken by Alex Chow, Pato Man, and Jennifer Quen

(* Excluding old photos of my grandma)

Here's my PauPau (Wasn't she beautiful?)

I knew I wanted to try this look on my cousin Leslie, but I didn't tell anyone WHO my inspiration was, I just mentioned the Retro 50's Glamour look. I guess I was somewhat intimidated and wasn't sure if I would be able to succeed with this look. I think sometimes, I'm my hardest critic, especially when it comes to things I really care about.

Before and After

Here's a black and white comparison with Leslie and my PauPau

To get this look, one of the most important features to get down was the eyebrows. Because Leslie's eyebrows were already pretty light, it was easy to change the shape of her brow with pencil and shading. I drew a much thinner straight line for her brows, pulling them out towards the temple instead of going down for that arched look that is more common for today.

Additional steps for creating this look included bigger bold red lips, super contouring, extreme lashes, and a fake mole added on with a dark brown eyeliner. For the eyeshadow, I used a bone and cork shade to enhance Leslie's eye shape.

I had asked Margaret to give Leslie that finger-wave 50's hairstyle. She came up with a perfect addition of adding the white flower.

What an experience! I loved every moment of it and was extremely pleased with the results. I'll leave this post today by sharing a couple more photos of my PauPau.

My granparents...when they were really, really young in China