Following in the footsteps of one of the hottest trends for the Autum/Winter 09 season, I decided to try my hand at being vicious, Lid Vicious that is.

After attending the M.A.C Autum/Winter Trend Presentation, I couldnt help but drool over the images and demonstration by Gregory Arlt. I definitely picked up a couple of tips from watching the master at work.

Looking to the runway, here is an example of what it’s like to be Lid Vicious. Various fashion brands including Dsquared2 turned to the dark side for their runway shows.

The girls look like they lived in their makeup overnight! The smokey, smudged effect is something I personally think is wearable on the streets. Very apt when we want to invoke the rock chick in us.

The trick is to line the bottom lids with eyeliner AND then BLEND the line out with a dark eyeshadow in a similar colour.

My take on it.

Face
Rare Minerals SPF 30++ in Medium

Eyes
Kate Gel Eyeliner in Black (must have!)
NARS Eyeshadow Duo in Pandora (shimmer white/matt black) (must have!)
Top lash: Maybelline Define-a-lash mascara
Bottom lash: Maybelline XXL Waterproof mascara
Falsies

Lips
DuWop Lip Venom

My second attempt at underlining my bottom eyelids and hey, I’m liking it! Remember, do keep the rest of the face clean if you’re sporting strong eyes.

We’re taking a break from reviewing mascaras for a bit and moving on to other exciting stuff like GEL EYELINERS! There isnt much of an abundance of gel eyeliners available here in Singapore save for the 2 major makeup brands that I know about. Maybelline just hopped on the bandwagon and introduced their gel eyeliner here, and I couldnt help but feel that it took a stab at the Kate eyeliner packaging and concept by also packing the brush together. Can you believe my incredulity when I saw their gel eyeliner several days after I came back from BKK on a high?

Anyway, the Kate Gel Eyeliner wasnt readily available in Singapore but I still managed to get my hands on it! Ever since my excitement at finding them in MBK Watson, I have been looking for the perfect excuse opportunity to open my gel eyeliner and use it. Then came the chance.

Now, remembering that I’ve always been using pencil eyeliners and/or liquid liners, I surmised gel eyeliners to be the in-between. If I could “rank” them, I’d say that pencil eyeliners are for beginners because you can draw lightly (ie. sketch) before deciding to apply more pressure to your desired line, while liquid liners should be handled by users who generally have better control over their brush/tool. Thus, gel eyeliners are for people like me who arent exactly new to eyelining, yet arent as skilled and still sometimes make mistakes when it comes to drawing the perfect line.

I judged the gel eyeliner on its ease of application and it’s staying power. My problem with pencil liners was that it would transfer to my upper eyelids owing to my naturally oily eyelids AND hidden double eyelids, thus leaving me at the end of the the day with well, hardly any eyeliner left.

Kate Gel Eyeliner’s staying power, despite also having this transfer problem, was very much bearable as compared to using a pencil. At the end of a long day, the line was still visible, though not that much fainter, and someone most likely would still be able to notice that you took the trouble to line your eyes.

Ease of application was such a breeze. Just dip the accompanying brush into the pot, brush out a little bit of eyeliner, touch the brush head to your lids, draw and go. The line was precise, consistent and there was no worry about dragging/pulling your eyelids. You know what they say about applying too much mechanical stress to your delicate eye area. It takes me about 2 minutes to draw both my eyes and this amount of time I can afford when in a hurry to get to work early wanting to beat the morning peak period traffic. If you have the extra time, wiggle on some mascara and your eyes are pretty much dressed up for a casual day at work.

For gel eyeliner noobs like me, you may want to consider this gel eyeliner if you’re graduating from your pencil liner. It definitely helps that the brush is a square flat brush instead of them long skinny types. Say hello to eyelined eyes from now on.