Fashion

I Used Liquid Lipstick On My Entire Face

by Summer Arlexis

As of late, bizarre beauty challenges have taken over YouTube. Whether bloggers are putting on makeup with no mirror or stacking on 100 coats of nail polish, the videos just keep getting stranger. But the entire face of makeup using liquid lipsticks challenge has to be the icing on the cake for weird beauty tutorials — in other words, I'm totally into it.

As if blending eyeshadows to perfection and sculpting the fleekiest brow isn't already hard enough with regular products, makeup mavens have been upping the challenge by painting on full faces of liquid lipsticks. Don't get me wrong, I definitely think liquid to matte lipsticks are one of the greatest inventions of all time, but I would have never thought to slather them all over my face in places that they don't technically belong.

With top beauty influencers like Jeffree Star, Manny MUA, and Nikkie Tutorials making the liquid lipstick challenge a thing, I figured I had to hop on the bandwagon. I must admit that I was totally weirded out at the thought of covering my face with lipstick. It seemed like it would be an open invitation for clogged pores, not to mention I expected blending liquid lipsticks to require some major elbow grease. But with 41 liquid lippies in my beauty arsenal (yes, I'm a hoarder), I accepted the full face using liquid lipstick challenge anyway.

For my own face, I chose a handful of liquid lipsticks from Jeffree Star Cosmetics, Milani, NYX, Kat Von D, Dose of Colors, and Anastasia Beverly Hills. After seeing Nikkie Tutorials used many of the same brands in her version of the challenge, I figured I was off to a great start.

1. Brows

Jeffree Star Velour Liquid Lipstick in Dominatrix, $18, jefreestarcosmetics.com

Anastasia Beverly Hills Liquid Lipstick in Midnight, $20, Macys

I normally use a pomade and an angled brush to fill in my brows, so using lipstick to shape them didn't seem like it would make much of difference as far as application. The real trick was getting my brow color just right. I decided to use a combination of Jeffree Star's "Dominatrix" and Anastasia Beverly Hills' "Midnight" to make a deep brown shade. And I must say, the results were promising. In fact, sculpting my brows was so easy that I thought the rest of the challenge would be a breeze!

2. Eyes

Jeffree Star Velour Liquid Lipstick in Celebrity Skin, $18, Jeffree Star Cosmetics

NYX Liquid Suede in Sandstorm, $7, Ulta

For my eyeshadow, I started by smoothing a mix of Jeffree Star's "Celebrity Skin" and NYX's "Sandstorm" throughout my crease and onto my lid. These shades together gave me a great neutral base to begin with that had a decent gradient into my brow bone.

Dose of Colors Metallic Liquid Matte in Teddy, $30, Amazon

Kat Von D Everlasting Liquid Lipstick in Vampira, $20, Sephora

Next, I darkened the crease with Dose of Color's "Teddy," hoping that the metallic sheen of the shade would give my dull eyes a pop. But the more I blended it, the more it lost its metallic luster. So, I turned to Kat Von D's "Vampira" to liven up the neutral look I had by adding a hint of red.

Milani Amore Mattallic Lip Creme in Matte About You, $9, Milani Cosmetics

Milani Amore Mattallic Lip Creme in Chromatic Addict, $9, Milani Cosmetics

Kat Von D Everlasting Liquid Lipstick in "Damned", Sephora

Mixing Milani's Amore Mattallic liquid lipsticks in "Chromatic Addict" and "Matte About You", I dabbed both colors onto the center of my lid to create a halo eyeshadow effect. With just a tap of Kat Von D's "Damned" on the outer V of both lids, I gave the look a bit of dimension. By now, I was extremely impressed with my work. So far, so good!

Using, Anastasia Beverly Hills' "Midnight' again, I created a skinny wing. It's already a struggle to perfect a cat eye with the felt tip eyeliner pen I normally use, so there was no way I was going all out with a fat wing. I was extremely afraid to get daring considering liquid lipsticks dry so fast, and I wouldn't be able to use concealer to fix any mistakes.

3. Foundation

And here's where things went really wrong really quickly! I tried so hard to make a matching foundation shade for myself. But no matter how many combinations of nude lipsticks I combined on the back of my hand, I couldn't create my skin tone. White liquid lipstick would have definitely come in handy for mixing purposes, but that wasn't a shade I had in my stash.

The closest match I had was Milani's "Chromatic Addict," a metallic lipstick that truly had no business being all over my face. Initially I tried to use a beauty blender like I always do, but with the fast drying property of liquid lips, I realized I didn't have time to be super precise.

I switched to using my fingers to sweep the shade on instead, and I was literally shining like a trophy afterwards. I could barely take any photos of my face. Light reflected off of that metallic lipstick so much that almost every image I shot was blown out. There would be no need for a highlighter — with that "foundation," my glow was already turned all the way up. Even as much of a glow addict as I am, I was not happy about this metallic foundation. I seriously had to have a Tim Gunn moment with myself and "make it work."

4. Concealer

Jeffree Star Velour Liquid Lipstick in Mannequin, $18, Jeffree Star Cosmetics

Finding the right concealer shade was no easy feat either. I settled for Jeffree Star's "Mannequin" and used it to conceal my under eye, and highlight my forehead, chin, and bridge of my nose.

If there was anything I learned from this challenge, it was that liquid lipstick is a terrible concealer. The creasing under my eye was beyond tragic almost instantly!

5. Contour

Jeffree Star's "Dominatrix" came in handy once again. Using it for my contour, I patted on just a tap and worked it in using my fingers. This step definitely required the most blending efforts because the color was way too dark for my face. I managed to make it look somewhat normal, however.

6. Blush

Anastasia Beverly Hills Liquid Lipstick in Kathryn, $20, Anastasia Beverly Hills

Adding blush almost made this challenge a fail for me. I put on just a bit of Anastasia Beverly Hills' "Kathryn," but I couldn't for the life of me get the shade to blend down. I nearly rubbed my skin off trying to blend it into my contour seamlessly.

7. Lips

You would think adding lip color would be the easiest part of the challenge, since this is where lipstick actually goes. But after spending over an hour mixing shades to create the rest of my look, I couldn't decide on a lip shade. I played mixologist with a few color, before finally settling on Milani's "Raving Matte" Amore Mattallic lipstick. I figured why not go metallic on the lips since the rest of my face was already completely shiny.

Milani Amore Mattallic Lip Creme in Raving Matte, $9, Milani Cosmetics

The Final Look

To be completely honest, I did add falsies to finish my makeup. That may be cheating, but I stayed true to the challenge when it came to the rest of my face. Photographed, the entire look resembles my regular full face of makeup. I really can't tell a difference which must mean I did a decent job.

Would I paint my face in liquid lippies any time soon? Probably not! They're way too drying to use for a full face (although, for drugstore liquid lipsticks, the Milani ones felt very smooth, even after settling). I would consider using liquid lipsticks for a complete eye look again, however, since I didn't have any issues blending them together on my lids.

If you're hoping to take on the challenge yourself, my advice is to act fast. These lipsticks are no joke when it comes to blending so the quicker you spread it before it dries, the better your look will turn out.

Images: Summer Arlexis (13); Courtesy Brands (11)