CUSTOM-BLENDED FOUNDATION

November 29, 2007

Foundation mistakes are the most obvious

Foundation is the most critical makeup item and the most difficult to buy. These are the stumbling blocks:

1. The time it takes to find a perfect color.
2. The confidence you have in the advice of the woman at the counter who sells by commission, under department store lights.
3. Buying discontinued colors or products so you have to start all over again.
4. Wishing you could get a certain color but in a more sheer consistency.
5. Getting something so right that you’ll use it till the bottle is empty.

What if everyone of these problems were solved for you, in a single step?

2 essential features of custom-blended color

This service has to come through in 2 major ways to make it worth your money:

1. The color has to be precisely the same as your skin color. It has to be so good that if you stopped at the jawline and forgot to blend, nobody would notice.
2. The product has to be of a great texture and wearability. If the product is heavy, or too sheer, or has too much slip, who cares how good the color match is?

You are at the mercy not only of the makeup artist’s skill at blending pigments but also of the makeup line she chooses to use. What are the odds of success in all these aspects at the same time?

I had given up. I tried it out once at a local esthetics salon, but I didn’t feel good about the color match. Three years ago, in Toronto, I had the saleswoman at the Prescriptives counter suggest a color in their regular line of foundations, but again, I wasn’t comfortable enough with the color advice to have her mix a foundation.

Jenepher Reynolds

I vacationed in PEI last summer and saw the foundation that Jenepher Reynolds, a makeup artist who works in an esthetics salon in Charlottetown, had blended for a friend. The match was uncanny. Like everyone, I have my limitations, but the ability to see makeup on a woman’s face is not one of them. Believe me, I could not see this product, so exactly did the makeup correspond with the skin color. You can guess where I was the following day.

Jenepher is a Toronto-trained makeup artist who now lives in Charlottetown. She has worked for Style, Flare, and Canadian Living, as well as TV commercials and music videos. I found it interesting that she has also taught camouflage makeup techniques to cosmetic surgery patients at Toronto’s famous Spamedica clinic.

Though she’s a great makeup artist, what I like best about Jenepher is that she is a realistic and open-minded about her craft. She understands that everyone is trying to achieve a different look, and every woman has her own taste, time, and comfort level with makeup. She makes it easy to tell her that you don’t care for something. There is absolutely no sales pressure ever. There is never any drama or ridiculous suggestions.

She might stretch my comfort zones a little, but that’s why I see her. I don’t want to duplicate my own tastes. I want to see myself through the eyes of someone more objective, whom I trust to respect my securities and anxieties with makeup. When I go into her studio these days, she has set aside a lip color or an eyeshadow that she felt might be particularly suitable, and she hasn’t been wrong yet. She will do the same for you. A personal makeup shopper! What a find!

Bonus : Jenepher teaches fitness classes, and if you would like to work your muscles in a serious way, attend one of these sessions. Getting an awesome workout while on holiday is a treat because you’re not rushed, so you can really get into it. But how do you find the great instructors in a new town? This is one to write on your list.

One perfect foundation

After trying a few combinations, and looking at them indoors and outdoors, we finally settled on a mixture of pigments. The color has proven itself to remain exactly the same since I bought it in July.
The texture is simply great. It may seem a little sheer at first if you’re used to a product with heavier coverage, but you’ll find that it just blends away into the skin with minimal effort.

In fact, the thinner texture has become what I like most about the product. Lines under the eyes are only accentuated by heavy products. I’ve yet to find a cream compact foundation that doesn’t make the lines frighteningly obvious. This one just disappears in a single swipe and is so light that it can be used under the eyes without making things worse. For women over 40, that’s a very difficult thing to find in a foundation.

Once you have it on your whole face, you have all the coverage you need but the effect is still very natural. Too much coverage just looks like a mask. A sheer foundation like this one and judicious use of concealer is so much more flattering to mature skin. The product dries to a very natural finish. You’ll also be impressed with how easily and completely it washes off.

One perfect concealer

If you had time to read the article on the dark concealer , you’ll remember that I think companies that make foundations should provide a matching concealer automatically, to cover sunspots, veins, or other imperfections.

Jenepher made me a pot of concealer of the exact color of my foundation. I use it every day. It’s easy, it’s fast, it works perfectly, and I don’t have to fuss over blending and matching.

No refills. Must be re-blended. So it should be.

There are no automatic refills, which I believe is a testament to how well Jenepher understands skin. The natural pigmentation of skin changes with age, with season, with illness or health, and a thousand other factors. Custom-blended color allows you to take account of your skin’s most subtle color changes so that you are always wearing your perfect color.

Jenepher will provide a 30ml bottle of custom blended foundation for about $40 (at this writing), mixing artistry included. You can reach her by calling The Cocoon Esthetic Clinic at 902-569-2256. You will not regret this either.

Posted by Christine Scaman | Filed Under Makeup