Remember your Juicy Tubes lip gloss, your Body Shop bronzing balls and your Charlie body spray? How about your pearlised lip balm from Nivea that you compulsively applied hourly, your matte nude Bon Bon lipstick or your turquoise eyeliner?
Well, hold on to your Miss 60 bra top (jokes), because it’s time to revisit the murky depths of your make-up bag circa 2002. The noughties have been slowly encroaching upon us for a while now: gelled baby hair (very chola), low-rise flared denim, pointed stilettos – they’re alive and well. And while the idea of dusting down your crimping tongs and reconnecting with lip-liner might cause your throat to close up, the new-noughties face is much fresher.
Make-up artist Lucy Pearson is excited to welcome back ‘glitter and gloss, icy metallics and blues’ and sites the ‘Gucci, Anna Sui and Jason Wu SS14 shows’ as catalysts for the move towards millennial beauty.
MAC senior artist Debbie Finnegan is equally enthusiastic about noughties beauty, reduxed. ‘The brilliance of the noughties was the sense of newness. It was the year 2000 and life took a deep breath. Make-up was stripped back and raw, with an underground edge. This time round the technology has improved, giving us a futuristic finish.’
So how do you do it? An internet-stalk of the 2000’s poster girls is a good place to start. Our pick? Charlotte from Lost in Translation. You know – that scene, where alone in her hotel room, she applies pink lipstick to her otherwise (almost) bare face? That’s the moment we’re talking about. Keira Knightley in Bend It Like Beckham is another – girl was definitely using her quota of clear mascara on set.
The millennial make-up bag’s foundation is ruddily healthy skin, glossy brows and lips and flashes of colour. Time to renew your Superdrug card, blow up your inflatable chair, get T4 on and dance around to some Daniel Bedingfield.
And buy some of these, too.
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The Cleanser
Annoyingly, great skin is the place to begin. So we might as well give it our best shot. Thankfully, we have progressed from Oxy and toothpaste over spots (unless we’re pissed) and are now attempting to be in possession of real-life adult face-washy stuff.
Theresa Davies, make up-artist and advocate of ‘the thousand’s face’ picks Avène Gentle Gel Cleanser £10.99 at Good Skin Days as the beauty product she couldn’t live without. 'Good skin means you can accentuate your features and never mask them’, she points out.
Clear Eyebrow Gel
The ultimate Alka Seltzer to the Scouse-brow hangover we’ve all been suffering silently through. Lucy Pearson suggests buying some clear mascara à la Collection 2000 (from when your mum wouldn’t let you wear mascara that wasn’t invisible) like this Brow & Lash Gel, £11.50 Illamasqua to groom ‘Cara inspired brows into place.’ Put the powder down and remember the days of Vaseline on your eyebrows to make them shiny for the school disco.
Clear Lip Gloss
That opening shot of Christina Aguilera’s Dirrty video: those sticky lips, that quivering lip piercing... Who didn’t own a Juicy Tube? With names like ‘caramel gospel’, what’s not to love? A friend recalls wearing so much lip gloss to a cinema date that her freshly straightened ginger hair stuck to her face threatening to suffocate her and almost scuppered her chances of pulling (for the record, it didn’t). MAC Clear Lip Glass, £14.50 is non-sticky and gives a satisfyingly reflective and modern finish.
Lip Liner
Lil Kim’s lip liner fail at the 1999 VMAs is legendary, and was, in our books, more shocking than the nipple pasty. The unnecessarily dark shade made her mouth look like her plus-one for the evening. But, don’t be afraid of lip pencil. Just make sure your liner closely matches your natural lip colour or the colour of your lipstick.
Try this Lip Pencil in Stone, £12.50 MAC. Apply, then soften the line with your fingertip to blur. Defining your cupid’s bow is a small but very effective way of plumping your mouth. It also stops your lipstick bleeding. (Change colour depending on your shade of lipstick. Two-tone lips look downright odd, mate.)
Coloured Mascara
I recall a boy telling me it looked like I had pink eye at a house party because I had attempted to copy Anna from The OC’s experimental make-up and was wearing pink mascara on both my lashes and ’do. When I got home, I updated my MSN name to dramatic song lyrics as a subtle rebuke (definitely Frankee’s F.U.R.B). Ten years later and I’ve repurchased violet mascara (try False Lash Flutter Mascara Midnight, £10 L’Oréal Paris at Boots.) Great for brunettes in particular (blondes and redheads may suit blue better.) Just brush on a single coat after your usual mascara for a subtle but effective zing of colour.
Bronzer Balls
It’s 2003 and Body Shop bronzing balls cover your bedroom carpet. Back then we applied with a brush so large it could have doubled up as a doorstep. Some things are classics for a reason, so we’re suggesting the continued use of your Brush On Bronze, £14, The Body Shop (yes, you can still buy it) but with a smaller brush. Lightly sweep over your face, concentrating on your T-zone and temples for a genuine looking bronze à la Keira in BILB.
Blue Eye Shadow
We can’t talk millennial make-up without referencing both Brit and Ri Ri. Both gave strong blue eye (see: I’m A Slave 4 U). Lucy says this time it’s all a lot ‘more grown up’. ‘This season we saw blue have a resurgence,’ says Debbie, ‘Giles had an aqua-blue lash line which is a super-cool feature against a fresh natural groomed face.’
Lucy suggests opting for ‘metallic shades – just sweep onto your lids with your finger without being too fussy about the finish’ and we suggest going old school with your budget and hitting up Boots’ range of £1.99 eyeshadows.So cheap you can buy 10.
White Eye Liner
Scar-Jo’s 2,000andsomething years were all about the white-eye liner. We’ve stopped trying to work out why. However, in 2014 it’s not about cakey liner on the lids. White liner should be lightly added to the inner parts of your eyes. Try Kohl’s Eye Liner, £4.49, Gosh at Superdrug but NB: the key to this is to avoid build up. Conjunctivitis ain’t what we’re going for. Advances in this arena have been the clever introduction of eyeliners in skin tones for a more natural finish. The result is eye-widening and brightening.
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Picture: Jason Lloyd-Evans
This article originally appeared on The Debrief.