If you follow me on social media, you may have heard me say that people’s experiences directly affect how they react in certain situations. Well the same applies when it comes to clients and their Makeup Artists.

I met a young lady through a referral, unfortunately we didn’t meet face to face right away due to COVID-19. Her wedding had to be postponed due to unrelated COVID issues, but we would soon meet for her bridal makeup preview.

The day finally came for us to get together to test out a makeup look for her special day. Luckily we were able to meet a few times prior. My clients sometimes become good friends, acquaintances and business connects; I love that. Your makeup artist (especially your bridal MUA should be someone that you can trust and feel comfortable with). We had a blast but I quickly learned that I needed to be on guard.

They usually say don’t mess with a black woman’s hair, well you may not want to mess with a woman’s eyes. One might ask, how are you to do eye makeup then?

Welllllllll, this is how it all went down.

Now when I do makeup, I start with the eyes so if there is any fallout, there’s less to clean up and I don’t waste product; however, that may have been to my advantage in this case. So we moisturized her skin, added primer, moved on to the brows and started working on her eyes. We were doing good, laughing and talking, and keeping it moving. I added a liquid eyeliner and some natural looking eyelashes.

Disclaimer: I love a good lash, however I’m not big on the Snuffleupagus looking lashes. I like lashes to look very natural. Most of my clients are everyday women, who don’t wear a lot of makeup (if any) and have found the love of their life and wanting to add a little extra glam on wedding day. We want everyone to see this whole package when the doors open, not just her eyelashes flapping. Her fiancé wants to recognize his/her fiancee walking down the aisle and we aim to make that happen. I digress…

Once my client got used to the eyelashes and being sure she could see clearly, I was ready to move on to eyeliner for the bottom waterline and mascara. If you’ve sat in my chair, I try to get in and get out when it comes to that bottom waterline. No one likes it and that’s when we learn how strong your tear ducts are. I always give a warning that I’m about to go there so that my client can prepare themselves. Sometimes the trick of looking up and the opposite way of the eye I’m working on works, but sometimes it doesn’t. My client almost grabbed my hands as I got up to her eye. She said it was a reflex, I just didn’t want to poke her in her eye. We had a couple tries and gut busting laughs.

Y’all listen, when I tell y’all she had to sit on her hands and we had to count to 3 to get the eyeliner on that bottom waterline. I wish I had a picture but I can’t put her out there like that. I am glad I lived to tell the tale.

Every tip and trick doesn’t work for everybody and you are constantly learning from each experience. Not everyone is okay with things coming towards their eyes. Sometimes you have to get creative, sometimes that area may take longer than for others, sometimes people will cry puddles just at the thought of anything being that close to their eye. My point is I AM CONSTANTLY LEARNING no matter how long I’ve been doing makeup.

Just know, when it was wedding day; we still had to count to 3 but those hands had to be put away first. We had a good laugh and she looked amazing; I just didn’t want a black eye from simply trying to make her comfortably flawless.

Want to hear more about my life as a Makeup Artist? Let me know in the comments below and ask whatever questions you may have.

Always with a Brush,

NiSi