Backstage Beauty: Delpozo Fall 2015

It wouldn’t be New York Fashion Week without a reference to a noteworthy painter, and the artist of inspiration for Delpozo’s collection is Russian renaissance painter Andrey Remnev. The beauty result of this point of reference? Solid gold.

The gold ideal threads through most everything: MAC senior artist Victor Cembellin crafts a “beautiful washy makeup look … with a shot of gold metallic that matches the nails and the shots of gold throughout the collection,” he explains. The makeup look relies heavily on creamy texture, which he creates through various custom-blended cream concoctions, noting, “There’s a reality to creams.” Truly: Fashion week artists tend to prefer creams to powders expressly for this reason. For the eyelids, a blend of MAC Lipstick in Pervette, MAC Eye Shadow in Motif and MAC Pro Glitter in Reflects Gold appears like an iridescent abalone seashell. To conjure that shot of gold, Cembellin lines the inner corners of the eyes with a combination of MAC Pro Chromagraphic Pencil in Primary Yellow and MAC Reflects Gold glitter. To round out the look, he adds a girly flush by dabbing MAC Lipstick in Dare You on the cheeks and mutes the lips with a touch of MAC Studio Waterweight Foundation (available Fall 2015).

Rather than go full-blown gilded, Essie lead manicurist Julie Kandalec settles on a simple flash of gold for the nails, stressing that the designer “wanted it to look like the girls had just pulled their hands out of gold.” Kandalec first zeroes-out shine on the nail with a coat of Essie Matte About You—a textural touch that only works to make the gold elements shine more strongly. Now for that gold: Using a striping brush, she paints a lone line of bling-y polish down the middle of the nail. To achieve the perfect gold, Kandalec layers a solid gold (Essie Good As Gold) with gold glitter Rock at the Top, allowing the base gold to pump up the glitter and vice versa. To finish the design, she amps up the glitz by carefully applying Essie Second Shine Around exclusively on the auric stripe.

The final beauty element, the hair, skips out on the gold theme in favor of complementary simplicity. Antonio Corral Calero for Moroccanoil describes the style as “the simplest hairstyle we’ve done” thus far at Fashion Week. But what isn’t so simple are the intricate headpieces that he adds just prior to the girls hitting the runway—thick swathes of fabric that curve and twist into bows. To support these headpieces, Calero sticks to the staple sleek ponytail, which he pulls together by applying Moroccanoil Treatment and flat-ironing the hair before securing it into a low, side-part. He finishes the look with Moroccanoil Luminous Hairspray before carefully sliding the ponytail through the headpiece—easily said, but complicated to do.  —Kristin Oldham Giordani


[Images courtesy of Essie, Moroccanoil]