IT’S HARD to get a hold of Bobbi Brown Asia Pacific artistry manager Felix Nguyen. He travels all over the globe for Fashion Week and educates the brand’s top makeup artists, as well as ordinary women all over, on how to look beautiful.
The Hong Kong native worked his way up from the beauty counter and has been doing makeup professionally for nearly 15 years. He’s been with Bobbi Brown for almost five years.
“Bobbi Brown is an education brand, he says. “We want to teach women how to be their own makeup artists. We don’t want women to spend hours and hours doing their own makeup. We want them to find the perfect colors and products that work with their lifestyle. When customers walk to our counter, we give them makeup lessons that are a great way to learn what’s best for your face.”
Nguyen was recently in the Philippines to show us the creative possibilities of luminous makeup via Bobbi Brown.
To use moisturizer… just use the right amount. If you have dry skin, apply a generous amount of moisturizer all over the face. If you are oily, put some on your cheeks but lessen the amount on your T-zone. As oils come out from your pores throughout the day, your makeup isn’t going to last in that T-zone. Hydrate only where you need, so it balances the rest of the face.
The secret to perfect-looking skin… is to start putting makeup using a corrector concealer, first, before foundation. You want to take out what makes you look tired first. When you take away that blue under eye, you’ll look brighter and fresher. You’ll end up putting less makeup because now you need less color on your face.
My dream person to do makeup for is… Bobbi, and I already got to do it. I started off at the counter and I’m very lucky to get to where I am. One day she came to Hong Kong and asked me to do her makeup. It just blew my mind because Bobbi is so down-to-earth and very real.
The trend these days is… all about illuminated skin, as in New York Fashion week last month. A couple of seasons ago, it was glowy, dewy skin. Illuminated skin pulls back on all that moisture and puts more shimmery products on the skin. If you are a matte makeup kind of girl, you will be converted when you see it.
A holiday trend coming up is… red lips and burgundy lips. It’s coming back with a vengeance.
The way to apply blush is to… smile. Start from the apples of the cheeks and blend up to the temples. Never use blush as a contour. It will brighten up your face. Remember to match the color of the lip with the cheek so it looks very fluid. Coral lip, coral cheek; pink lip, pink cheek—so your look won’t look too detached.
To use foundation… just put it in places where you need it. Everyone should just look like they have skin, not foundation. Makeup is there to imitate skin, so if you have great skin, don’t put foundation all over your face. Don’t cover skin that already looks great. But do put a little foundation around the nose because everyone has darkness or redness around the nose. It’s good to even that out.
The key to using powder is… to wear it just where you need it. Don’t just spread it all over your face. I would put it just right in the T-zone.
My top products for a globetrotter are… eye cream, extra repair serum, lip balm, cleanser, illuminating moisture balm or hydrating mask.
Top tip
To remove makeup, you need to use a hardworking cleanser. Hot in the market now is Glamglow Super Cleanse, a mud-to-foam cleanser that turns the mud into an effective foaming cleanser that sinks into your skin to help rid it of dirt, oil and other impurities.
Super Cleanse is based on the top-selling Super Mud mask, which is the next step for problematic skin. It’s designed to rid the skin of all the gunk and create a clean, mattified appearance.
To use: Pump content once or twice into your hand and apply to a dry face. Add water to your hands and start massaging the product into your face to create a foaming lather. Rinse thoroughly and pat dry. Use morning and night. Glamglow Super Cleanse is available in SM Makati, Megamall, MOA and North Edsa and Fresh store Eastwood and Century City.
Bobbi Brown is available at Rustan’s Makati (te. 8122507), Rustan’s Shangri-La Mall (6334636 loc. 114), Essenses Rockwell (8229400), Rustan’s Ayala Center Cebu (+6332 2315633), SM Mall of Asia and SM Megamall