Hello! I'm Hannah, and I used to loooooveee makeup.
Because I haven't worn much makeup in a while, I thought it would be fun to check in on the current makeup trends — and also throw it back to what they used to be. Now, back in the day, I used to follow juicystar07's makeup tutorials.
But because I feel that this was such a viral makeup video at the time, for this post I'm going to go with Jaclyn Hill's iconic smoky eye video from 2012.
View this video on YouTube
I also feel like smoky eyes are pretty representative of the early 2010s.
So Jaclyn starts with her eyes, which is already VERY retro to me. I don't know why makeup gurus always started with their eyes. I feel like once you put foundation on, that just ruins your eye makeup. So...I did cheat and put foundation on first because I don't hate myself. But then I put concealer on my eyes, as Jaclyn did!
Next, Jaclyn put tape on the sides of her eyes to help her create the cat eye, which was also very retro, but hey, I'm here for anything that makes my job easier.
She then created a cat eye with gray eyeshadow...
...blended it with MAC's Wedge (TBT), went over the gray with black eyeshadow, and just blended the heck out of that over the outer corner of the eye and into the crease.
Here's what my eyes looked like after that.
I really don't know the point of this, but Jaclyn then put black shadow on as if it were liner, then put gel liner over it. I don't own gel liner, since it's not 2012, so I just used a pencil that had about the same consistency.
Next, I took the tape off, which I have to say was pretty damn satisfying.
Jaclyn then moves onto her lower lids. Now, this was the part I was most nervous about, because she immediately goes into her waterline, which I have not done in a decade.
She did it kind of messily, then blended it out with a brush under her eyes. At this point I'm feeling like Miley Cyrus in that pic. You know the one I'm talking about.
No baking or heavy contour here, folks — Jaclyn slathered on under-eye concealer, did a light powder contour and blush, then put on some nude lipstick.
Next come the brows. I was a bit worried that she'd either leave them alone or make them aggressively shaped, based on my memory of past trends, but she actually just filled them in with a little bit of powder, which was fine by me. She then put on false lashes. And here is the final look!
And here's me looking down so you can see how badly I blended!
On to 2021: I decided to go with this viral video from Ashley Quiroz because it used trends I've seen on TikTok and felt like the most representative viral makeup video of this year.
View this video on YouTube
Ashley started out with foundation — thank god — then concealer and then a brightening concealer. She applied it in an interesting way, too: in a little triangle by the inner corners of her eyes, and then below where a cat eye would be on her outer eye.
I followed suit, but to be honest, after I blended it, I felt that it wasn't that different from just putting concealer in a circle. She also put concealer on her smile lines, which I did too.
She then got going with the cream contour, which I have legitimately never used and had to buy for this post. She actually recommended putting the contour basically on your cheek rather than below, and I have to say, I liked the way this looked!
Here is how I looked before I blended the contour. I felt like a clown.
On to brows! Now, I have had a loooooong brow journey (see below)...and my brows are now microbladed, so I couldn't really do much here cuz there's not much hair to work with. But I went ahead and put on some clear brow gel and a tiny bit of colored gel.
Ashley then finally gets started on her eyes, creating a cat-eye liner from the center of her eye out with a dark-brown pencil. She also went into the inner corners and kind of continued the line.
I skipped lashes because I wanted to do them last and went on to lips. Ashley lined/contoured below and above her lips, which is a tip I've used before, then filled them in with some gloss. I didn't have colored gloss, so I settled for some lipstick, then clear gloss.
Last came mascara and lashes* — and here's the final look!
And that's it, folks! Here are my final thoughts:
