I don’t have big eyes. My sister does, which means she sometimes goes out without make-up and looks fine whereas I, in my own stupid head, feel like a blind vole.
Of course, having not-big eyes isn’t the bane of my life, and it shouldn’t be yours either. We should embrace our features – whatever they are – and live make-up free in a land of fairies and button moons and bits of lint. However, sometimes this dream doesn’t stop us wanting to look like Emma Stone at parties. Or another person with big eyes. Or a fit owl.
Unfortunately, as with most things in the beauty world, there are loads of tips and tricks (white eyeliner on the inner rim! Black eyeliner on the inner rim! Replacing your eye sockets with buckets!) to make your eyeballs look larger that are pretty suspect. I know they’re suspect, because I’ve tried them out and can attest to theit hit-and-miss nature.
To end the debate once and for all, I’ve taken my make-up free not-big eyes and vined all of these so-called tricks to see what worked, what didn’t, and what made me want to go to a party immediately to show everyone how big my eyes were.
White eyeliner on the inside rim
The tip: Put white eyeliner on the inner rim of your eyes and they’ll immediately look big!
What the tip should read: Put white eyeliner on the inner rim of your eyes and they’ll immediately look like there’s white eyeliner on them! And that you’ve unsuccessfully tried to make your eyes look bigger!
How to do this: Pull down your eye and put white eyeliner on the inner rim. I used Boots Natural Collection Eyeliner but other eyeliners are available.
Also, it’s really bad to put eyeliner on the inner rim of your eyes because it can cause irritation, infections and people saying, ‘What’s wrong with your eye, you’re crying blood?’. On top of this, if you’ve got really big eyes and you put white eyeliner on them you look like a dead person – my friend tried it and resembled a corpse.
Black eyeliner on the inside rim
The tip: Put black eyeliner on the inner rim of your eyes and they’ll immediately look big!
What the tip should read: Don’t put black eyeliner on the inner rim of your eye if you want them to look big!
How to do this: Pull your eye down and draw eyeliner on the inner rim. It’s uncomfortable. I used Avon SuperShock gel eyeliner to do this, because it’s really, really black. Like the night.
Seriously, this doesn’t work. I know this from vining it, and I also know this from a girl at school who had tiny mice eyes and used to do this technique. It made her look like her eyes were trying to get back inside her head.
Cream eyeliner as an outline
The tip: Outline your lash line in cream eyeliner to make your eyes look big!
What the tip should read: As above. It works.
How to do it: Line the top and bottom of your eyes in cream eyeliner (I used Maybelline Big Eyes Liner)
I don’t know how this works, or why this works, but it does. Subtly. It sort of pushes your eyes forwards in a gentle, illusionary way, rather than a ‘snail with eyes on the end of tentacles’ way. Your eyeballs won’t enter rooms before you, but they will look highlighted, and therefore a bit bigger.
Loads of mascara
The tip: Put loads of mascara on your eyes to make them look big!
What the tip should read: Put loads of good, expensive mascara in a specific way on your eyes and don’t go too far otherwise you’ll look like a squashed fly.
How to do it: You really do need a good mascara for this, because if you get one, you won’t even need eyeliner with it. If you use a shit mascara, the lashes will look crunchy, spiky and will clump together. I would swear my life on Benefit Roller Lash, also Benefit They’re Real (if you want to go all out) and have a look at these other absolute classics too, if you’re not as big a Benefit mascara fan as I am.
Make sure you get all the eye lashes, including the inner ones on the top and bottom, and also really go for the bottom lashes too. I used around three or four coats, and don’t wait for them to dry totally otherwise you’ll get clumps.
Cream eyeliner on the top and bottom outer lash rim after you’ve put loads of mascara on really works, too.
Black and cream eyeliner
This isn’t necessarily a tip I have read, it’s just something I’ve figured out works.
How to do it: Line your eyes in black on the outside lash line. I do a sweep-y cats eye line at the top, and a thinner line that starts very thin on the bottom then gets a bit thicker and joins up on the outside. You might be able to see that I leave a tiny gap below the outer side of my lower lash rim. This is intentional as it makes my eyes look bigger (TIP ALERT).
Once you’ve done this, go around it with cream eyeliner. Should make your eyes look way more dramatic and way bigger.
Contour your eye
The tip: Contour your eye to make it look bigger!
What the tip should read: This is a bit tricky and if you do it slightly wrong, you’ll look like you’ve been punched, but by all means have a practice and give it a go!
I do this whenever I go out, and it does make quite a difference. I didn’t actually learn it via any tips, but rather through 10 years of doing heavy eye make-up and learning through trial and error what looks excellent in photos and what looks like I’ve been de-eyed.
You need: An angled very thin eyeshadow brush and some dark brown, very pigmented eye shadow (I used Benefit Smokin’ Eyes kit (but any brown will do!). You also need white eye pencil (Natural Collection) and cream eye pencil (Maybelline Big Eyes). Liquid eyeliner (black –I use Collection Extreme 24 Hour felt-tip liner because it’s the best and really cheap) and loads of mascara (Benefit Roller Lash is a current fave), too.
How to do it: Draw a careful liquid line on the top lash that extends passed the eye. Don’t worry about a flick yet. Then draw a very thin line from the centre of the lower lash line to the end, but don’t join them. As you can see in the vine, the lower line sort of points pass the upper line.
Take the brown eyeshadow, and draw a line from the centre of your socket, following the socket line down and not meeting the upper eye liner line. Without the vine, these instructions sound mad, don’t they? Anyway, now take the angled brush and join the lower lash line to the upper eyeshadow (not eyeliner) line by extending it slightly using brown eyeshadow.
At this point I also go along the lower lash line and sort it out with the eyeshadow if it’s wonky, or needs thickening/blending. Now put white eyeliner on the inner corner of your eye and either online the whole thing with white eyeliner (if you’re feeling the drama) or cream (if you’re feeling a little bit less drama). Finish with a dickload of mascara.
See? Easy! Actually, no, it’s not that easy. But once you’ve mastered it you’ll look great in Instagram photos. Which is obviously all that matters.
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This article originally appeared on The Debrief.