Drawing The Line.

I recently received a few fabbo emails inquiring about lip liners and whether or not they were necessary or a thing of the past? My short answer to this is: Yes and No. The long answer, on the other hand, is: It depends… Lip liner done well is a sure fire way to create a wonderfully sculpted lip that will wear well, look great, and more than likely hold on to the colour applied a lot truer. Lip liners done, let’s say, a little less than well can leave you, if unintentional, looking like a preserved beauty from a bygone era. Lip liners are also not strictly necessary when you’re after a more relaxed, whimsical look like on your gloss days or when a more deconstructed lip is the aim. Personally, I only tend to wear lip liners when I am wearing a “tricky” lip colour, like a bold red or an uber vibrant pink or orange, perhaps. Professionally, when colouring up the lips of my clients, I will go with a liner, more often than not, to increase the longevity of my client’s lipstick wear, to even out or create their lip line or to prevent bleeding into any fine lines they may have. Even when using just gloss on clients, I will, on occasion, finish up with a matching lip liner to add definition to the lip and to act as a preventative barrier to lip colour feathering. I’m not really convinced this last step is 100% necessary, in all circumstances, but maybe a case of my “old school” ways sneaking through. Well, it can’t hurt to be sure to be sure, now, can it?

When lining lips, line and totally fill in the lip area with liner. Not only will a complete line and fill smooth the surface of the lip and fill in any fine lines, lay a moisturizing foundation for your lippie, but when your lipstick starts to head off to greener pastures, it will leave you with an even fade of colour, not a patchy one that leaves you with an exposed lip outline. Oh, the shame. *wink* When choosing a colour to line your lip with, should you decide liner is the way to go, be sure to pick a suitable liner colour. Red and other bold coloured lips are best lined with the closest matching bold coloured lip liner. When wearing nude lipsticks, a nude liner of the same colour is good or a liner that matches your natural lip colour will also work a treat. There are colourless liners also, but they are generally used in conjunction with your coloured liner and lippie and best used to line just outside of your natural lip line. Colourless liner’s fort� is to act as a physical waxy barrier to prevent your lip colour from breeching the perimeter. They are handy, that’s for sure. Especially, if you have a mouth like mine, that has this uncanny knack of depositing a little bit of lippie just under my bottom lip. *throws hands in air* I don’t know how I manage it, but I do. Just lucky I guess.

The long and short of it is, really…that lined and totally filled in lips absolutely have a place in your makeup repertoire, should you wish, but unlined lips can also look pretty spesh too, if that’s what you’re feeling on the day. As always, it should be about whatever works for you.