A couple of years ago I discovered the wonders of the sugar skulls. These amazing full face make up looks with a simple base look - that of a skull - and various designs and embellishments. All you need to do is google the term 'sugar skull make up' to get a plethora of incredible looks. Needless to say I was instantly inspired. So now, every Halloween - or Día de Muertos - I paint my face like a bright, beautiful skull.
This Blue Skull was the first I ever did. Blue is one of my favourite colours, and seemed suitably dark for a skull, so I chose to use it as my main theme. I started very simply, with only a little sparkle, and a very simple forehead design. This look was heavily inspired by the first google image I saw. I've branched out a little since then.
I believe I did this look a week after the Blue Skull. This incredibly creatively named Red Skull was my first try at branching out a little. I chose a different main colour and decided the design of hearts would give a cool effect. I promise you the little red sparkles surrounding my eyes were supposed to be hearts. Rather than having the petals surrounding the deep pits posing as my eyes, I decided to blend out the black with the red, creating an all around softer (more romantic?) look.
I did this look a year ago and am rather fond of it. Halloween is irrevocably tied up with Autumn and I felt that would be a rather lovely theme for a Sugar Skull. Autumn in a picture for me would be a golden leaved tree, so I used this in my look. Rather than the traditional petals surrounding the eyes, I decided to use Autumn leaves. And then I couldn't resist but to add some rhinestones, because, well, I really love rhinestones. The rest of this look is rather minimalist, which I feel works well (I could have been lazy, however).
And lastly we have the Jewelled Skull that I currently have on my face. I just wanted something utterly opulent. In the past I've done skulls with fairly natural themes, this year I wanted something utterly artificial. I also felt like playing around with doing full fledged teeth, rather than the simpler plain lines that look like stitches. For the actual skull features, I put in a little more effort, actually following the look of a skull, with the more prominent cheekbones and deeper temples. And more rhinestones, of course.
As a little touch of advice for doing a look like this, an eye-liner pen is a massive help. I generally dislike eye-liner pens, they tend to be more grey than black, I can never get the sharp point I want, they dry out so quickly and in my experience, they really don't hug the lash line (I've tried three different brands and been heavily disappointed with all of them). Regardless, they're really great for this kind of look. You don't need too precise lines, but you want something a little more precise than a pencil (I realise a pencil can be precise, but it's a massive friggen pain). I've found liquid liner and gel liner a bit awkward too. Pen liners just make it so easy. I use the pen to sketch out the lines, I then fill it in with a pencil liner (typically a Nyx Jumbo Eye Pencil, I use Black Bean), I then set this with a black eye shadow. Parfait.
