How To Contour Your Face For Every Occasion
Every day more and more people are adding contouring into their makeup routine as all you need is an appropriate contour kit and a brush to define your face shape with the help of makeup.
What Is Face Contouring?
Face contouring is when you apply makeup that is darker than your natural skin tone. The idea is to create shadows and draw areas of your facial features. Then you can complement your contouring with highlighting.
A highlighter is, as the name suggests, a shade lighter than your skin tone, and it is used to enhance certain features forward.
With contouring, you can have more prominent cheekbones, a narrower nose, or a thinner face shape.
How To Pick Your Contour Product?
It is crucial to make contour as natural as possible. You need to pick your contour tones carefully and make sure your products are matte. Your contour product should be one or two shades darker and lighter than your skin tone to prevent a face mask look.
My favourite contour kit is TOO COOL FOR SCHOOL Art Class By Rodin Shading, a best seller in Korea, as it contains three shades making it suitable for paler to medium skin tones.
Besides, this contour kit is infused with vitamins to keep your skin moisturised and sculpted to perfection. It is easy to apply and is buildable and blendable. You can use it every day.
How To Contour Your Face?
Step 1 Apply Your Foundation
You need to apply a foundation of the same (or close) colour of your skin tone to provide a base you can use for your lightest and darkest shades.
Keep in mind that if you contour your face without applying a foundation such as MOONSHOT Micro Setting Fit Cushion, it will be more challenging to get the results you want. Your face could end up looking uneven instead of contoured.
To figure out what colour to get, try matching your foundation to the skin on your neck. By doing this, you will ensure your face does not end up looking darker when you finish doing your makeup.
Step 2 Highlight
Facial contouring is all about highlighting places you want to stand out and shading those you wish to hide.
For highlighting, you need a product that is about two shades lighter than your foundation. You can use a light concealer such as THE SAEM Cover Perfection Tip Concealer in place of the Art Class by Rodin Shading kit.
The most common places to apply highlighters are:
- Along the bridge of your nose
- On the apples of your cheeks
- In the centre of your chin
- In the centre of your forehead
- Along the top of your brow lines
Step 3 Shadows
Now it is time to use a darker tone to shade the part of your face that you want to hide. The key is to create shadows to make your cheekbones appear sharper and your nose narrower.
It is important not to go darker than two shades above your normal skin tone. If you do not follow this, your makeup will not look natural.
You can use a bronzer or a darker eyeshadow or darker concealer as well as a foundation if you do not have your contour kit. A good option is Ginger Honey Cookie from ETUDE HOUSE Lovely Cookie Blusher. This blusher comes in a range of colours and provides a high-quality matte finish. It is easy to blend and highly pigmented.
The most common places to apply shadows are:
- Allow your jawline on both sides
- In the hollows of your cheeks
- On the right and left sides of your forehead
- Right below your hairline
Step 4 Blend Everything
Now that you apply the foundation and contour your face is time to use your fingers or a brush and blend the colours for a natural finish.
Please do not spread the colours too much as you want them to stay where you apply them. You need to make sure there are no divisions between the lighter and darker products.
Finally, you can add some pink colour to the apples of your cheeks. Just make sure it looks natural with the other products on your face.
