Style Analysis Makeup Philosophy?

Upcoming posts are going to explore some of the best makeup for all seven essences!

As an intro, I wanted to talk about why the style analysis perspective on makeup is so amazing.

Mainstream Makeup

In the modern world, makeup is often viewed as a way to cover perceived flaws or to make your features appear more trendy.

Makeup might even be seen as a mask, as a way of looking like something you aren’t.

Style Analysis and Makeup

But from a style analysis perspective, the opposite is true.

Rather than being a mask, makeup is meant to be like a spotlight (that can be subtle or intense or anywhere in between) that draws attention to what is already beautiful about your face.

And the coolest part of this approach is that it works.

People really do appear more harmonious (and, arguably, more aesthetically pleasing, or we could just go for it and say “more beautiful”) when instead of trying to use makeup to fight against or alter the shapes and vibes of their features, they instead apply makeup that mirrors those shapes and vibes.

For example, Romantic, Ethereal, or Ingenue faces often appear “soft,” with very curvy features. In mainstream beauty culture, people with these essences might be advised to use hairstyles or makeup to disguise the curves of certain features or to add angularity to others (such as going wild with the nose or cheek contour).

And importantly, contour can still have a place in Style Analysis, and can be especially useful for photos.

But, what’s really cool is that Romantics, Ethereals, and Ingenues overwhelmingly don’t tend to be flattered by adding artificial angularity to their features with makeup.

Instead, people with these essences tend to be most flattered by makeup with curving lines and soft textures (glow, shine, shimmer) that mirrors the softness of their inherent beauty.

That’s what creates gorgeous harmony: emphasizing what already exists in your face.

Conversely, trying to make your features appear falsely angular tends to detract from harmony.

Similarly, faces with mostly straight lines, like highly Dramatic, Natural, or Gamine faces, are often advised to use hair and makeup to “soften” the face.

But the style analysis perspective is that straight lines are beautiful, and that the best makeup for “yang” faces is makeup that mimics the face’s intensity, sharpness, or strength.

And, in my view, the style analysis perspective produces stunning results: matte, angular makeup is amazing on angular faces.

Conversely, using a lot of soft textures like gloss or shimmer, or trying to make the features appear artificially curvier, tends to detract from the face’s true beauty.

The Purpose of Makeup

The purpose of makeup, from a style essences view, is to enhance what’s already beautiful about your features, by applying makeup that mimics the qualities already in your face.

And the best part is that this works. You’ll achieve more aesthetically pleasing results when you honor your natural features, rather than fighting against them.

Change is Good, Too

The other cool thing is that if you do want to change up your look, even just occasionally, then style analysis gives you effective tools to do that, too.

This is because most people have at least two essences, and many have three or four.

So, if you know your essences, then it’s often possible to use makeup to emphasize one of your essences more than ordinarily—even if it’s not your dominant one.

In this way, style analysis can help you both to appreciate your real features and to change up your look in a way that appears authentic rather than costume-like.

Makeup vs. Fresh Face?

Ultimately, makeup is of course optional—wearing it doesn’t suit everyone’s preference, and that’s ok.

It’s true that makeup can help draw attention to your features, and that it might sometimes be harder to recognize a person’s real essences without makeup.

This might be most pertinent to Romantics, since arguably it’s much easier to exude a “glam” or “extravagant” vibe when wearing makeup.

But again—ultimately a matter of preference. Some people love fresh-faced beauty and might prefer little to no makeup on everyone, regardless of essences.

I also think part of why makeup can have such a negative reputation is because it’s sometimes seen as antagonistic to accepting your natural self.

But that’s almost like saying that wearing clothing is somehow incompatible with embracing your natural looks. Just like fashion, makeup can actually enhance and draw greater attention to a person’s inherent beauty, by mirroring the shapes and vibes that already exist in the face.

The Metaphor

Style analysis is powerful because it says that the yin and yang are both beautiful: a given quality can be beautiful, and the opposite of that quality can be beautiful, too.

Unfortunately, modern culture doesn’t always understand this. The beauty industry promotes celebrities with certain physical traits and can imply that those are the most objectively beautiful or only beautiful traits, without recognizing that opposite features can both be beautiful—like soft and angular faces; thin and full lips; thick and slender brows.

Interestingly, if we look across different cultures, we find that all of these traits are valued somewhere—it might be shocking to Hollywood, but some cultures do prefer thinner lips.

And of course, the same culture can prefer different traits at different times, like thick brows in one era and thin in another.

But, if we’re looking at what’s most represented in our own modern media, then it’s easy to conclude that people only find a narrow set of physical traits to be beautiful.

A metaphorical equivalent is that we also see cultural trends where certain personality traits or internal qualities are preferred.

And while there are some universally appealing traits—kindness typically being preferred to unkindness, etc.—the reality is that there are often pros and cons to having any given inner trait, such as being a quieter or louder person; or more whimsical or more practical; or more talented in some area vs. another.

The mainstream might try to make us choose, but we don’t have to. We can recognize beauty in variety, both in faces and inner traits.