Two weeks ago, I hired a professional to do my makeup for my 29th birthday party. My reaction to the results inspired this essay.
A heads up: this essay briefly talks about weight loss and disordered eating.
I’m in first grade, and unbeknownst to me, Sephora has just opened its first U.S. store. My mom and I are making a quick pit-stop at the grocery store when I see it, hanging from a rack near the checkout line: an eyeshadow palette. Hot pink case, three pearlescent shadows nestled under a rectangular mirror. It’s the first thing I remember coveting. Even at six, I know that palette will transform me. And even at six, I believe transformation is necessary — that I’m not beautiful, but I should be.
My mom, who usually shops at crunchy kids boutiques for our toys and would infinitely prefer, say, a kit for junior scientists or a picture book about the Egyptians, eventually succumbs to my multi-week persuasion campaign. In return for excellent behavior, I get the palette.
It’s the first thing I remember coveting. Even at six, I know that palette will transform me.
It’s the first thing I remember being disillusioned by. I gently pry open the case, run my finger through each sparkly shadow, and pat the blended color onto both eyelids. I peer into its mirror. My face peers back at me — now with awkward smears of color over my eyes. I do not look beautiful.
The palette is promptly tossed into a junk drawer and forgotten, occasionally cracking open while hands rustle past it, shaking its increasingly grainy and gray dust over the rest of the drawer’s contents.
I’m in sixth grade, and Sephora has just opened its hundredth store. My friend’s mom takes us to see The Devil Wears Prada. My favorite part of the movie, the one that to this day I will always stop flicking through channels to watch, is the montage of Andy’s transformation. Andy’s much chicer coworkers are discussing her ignorance of eyelash curlers when she strolls in, now dazzling — her thick fringed lashes displaying clear fluency with the tool. Post-makeover, she becomes extremely competent at her job: the makeup and clothes giving her power, presence, a voice.
When my friend and I get home from the theater, we’re giddy. We immediately put on our most “New York” clothes, apply lipstick from an expired tube my grandmother gave me, and do a photoshoot in the backyard. “You look hot!” my friend says, parroting the movie, and I feel it.
I’m in ninth grade, and a mini Sephora has opened within the JCPenney a few miles from my house. Every time we pull into the JCPenney parking lot, my heart starts to beat a little faster. I’m in an awkward stage — if you can call a stage something that’s already lasted four years and will continue for another three — and while I don’t know what makeup routine or high-tech product will compel boys to text me, I’m certain it’s in there.
My closest friends at the time, Ella and Grace, are skilled in both makeup and romance. Grace can execute an exquisite winged eyeliner and knows exactly which lip gloss to wear on a date; Ella has perfected a mascara and shadow combo that makes her large eyes even more doe-like and successfully bats her lashes for seemingly anything she wants. Their phones are constantly vibrating with texts. Everywhere they go, they meet guys: at church, the park, after cheerleading practice. My phone doesn’t buzz, except when a classmate needs to check a deadline or wants to carpool.
By the time I get to college, Sephora has opened its three hundredth store. I’ve broken up with my boyfriend after discovering he slept with Ella. In an effort to distract and empower myself, I then lost thirty pounds. The distraction has become debilitating; you cannot lose that much weight without losing yourself.
And so while I look quite different, I don’t feel beautiful — and I can’t summon the energy to care. There’s a full-size Sephora in my college town, aisle after gleaming aisle of products. I never go in. Instead, I spend countless afternoons slowly walking through the grocery store, examining cookies and chips and frozen pizzas, things I know I won’t buy even before I pick them up and turn them over to read the nutrition label. Trying to remember college now is like listening for rhythm in white noise.
The distraction has become debilitating; you cannot lose that much weight without losing yourself.
I move to Boston after I graduate, shortly after Sephora opens its four hundredth store, and I realize: It’s my Devil Wears Prada moment. There’s a Sephora three minutes from my new office. I gamely plunge inside and attempt to conjure up lessons from old YouTube tutorials and afternoons watching Grace: a light foundation to “even me out,” concealer to “cover up my dark circles,” white eyeliner to “brighten my eyes.” I wake up every morning at 5 A.M., go to the gym, return home, shower, do my makeup, and rush out the door to arrive at work by 8:45, hair dripping. When I look in the mirror, I can tell I’m still getting it wrong, somehow — the elements not playing together as they should, the colors a little off — but in my personal hierarchy of needs, exercise trumps everything else. As long as I’ve worked out that morning, I shrug.
A year ago, around when Sephora opens its thousandth U.S. store, I stop wearing makeup. It feels transgressive and then deeply cool. As though I’ve evolved into a higher-order woman — one who’s uninterested in Sephora because she doesn’t need its miracle balms to make her feel worthy. This is not the case.
Unintentionally — or at least, not in pursuit of any holistic makeover, rather a series of adjustments catalyzed whack-a-mole style by my insecurities — I have changed my face. I traded glasses for contacts, did a round of Invisalign, and started tinting my lashes and brows. I cut back on drinking, and the adult acne that’s plagued me has disappeared. While looking at some before and after photos, I realize my bare face now looks very close to my made-up one. I stop feeling proud.
I’m planning my 29th birthday party, and I still have no idea how to use makeup to look beautiful. I worry I’ll hate all the pictures we take, that a plain face will look silly with the all-velvet outfit I’ve chosen. On a whim, I decide I want a professional to do my makeup for me. I download Glamsquad, make an appointment, and find a few photos on Pinterest to show the artist. When she arrives, ninety minutes before guests are set to show up, one of the first things she asks me is, “What makeup do you normally wear?”
“None,” I say. “I’m clueless. That’s why I booked you!”
This must be an alien answer, because, as she proceeds to prime my face, fill in my eyebrows, and apply fake lashes, she asks, “And what brands are your go-tos?” “What do you typically use for foundation?” “How do you do your lips?”
“Would it surprise you,” I say, in response to the last question, “I don’t?”
I worry I’ll hate all the pictures we take, that a plain face will look silly with the all-velvet outfit I’ve chosen.
Finally, she finishes, handing me an old-fashioned circular hand mirror to evaluate her work. I blink. This time, the face staring back at me is unrecognizable. Huge, Disney-princess eyes, bright cheeks, a lush pink smile.
I think I hate it.
As she packs up her supplies, I sidle up to Sam. His eyes widen. “Woah.”
“Is it horrible?” I ask. The question is moot; she’s leaving and the party’s about to begin.
“No!” Sam says. “It’s just, uh, a lot to take in.”
I open a seltzer and tell myself I’ll get used to it.
The woman in the pictures from that night looks glam, but I don’t get used to it, and I don’t feel beautiful. Her face is too transformed; I can’t reconcile it with the one I know. The one I don’t love but at least feel familiar with and possessive of. At the end of the night, I peel off the false eyelashes with a sense of relief, scrape a towel over my face and watch ribbons of foundation peel away.
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, a newsletter covering what the beauty industry won’t tell you from a reporter dedicated to reforming it. DeFino’s essays have profoundly changed the way I think about makeup, beauty, and my own face (and have definitely influenced this piece!) I recommend starting with:How The '5-Minute Face' Became The $5,000 Face: the essay that helped me realize my “make-up-free” face wasn’t the rebellion I’d thought it was.
Barbie Has Cellulite (But You Don't Have To): teasing apart the Barbie/beauty industrial complex. I brought this essay up to at least six friends.
“Look Like You Slept 8 Hours!”: how the makeup industry sells tired women on skincare rather than the real cure (rest.)
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See you then,
Aja ♥️
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Such a fascinating and honest account of your relationship to beauty and society's expectations of how we should look. Thank you for writing it Aja ❤️
Beautiful transformation story!