Can I get away with wearing matte baby pink eyeshadow?

I’m very firmly in the soft neutral eye, black mascara and pinky-nude lip camp. So would I be able for matte pink eyeshadow? Or is that a step too cool?

I would never usually pick up a matte pink eyeshadow. Just like with my clothing, I’m not terribly adventurous when it comes to my eye make-up. Give me all the skincare adventures you want, but for me, a simple warm-toned smoky eye look works, and I stick to it.

But then I saw a totally gorgeous matte baby pink eyeshadow. This one just here.

Clarins Ombre Velvet Mono Eyeshadow, €24

I loved the look of it as soon as I saw it. So I tried it out. And while I didn’t quite live up to the Insta-famous versions, I think I gave it a good go.

Katie Jane Hughes, for example…

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A post shared by Katie Jane Hughes (@katiejanehughes) on Aug 9, 2019 at 9:17am PDT

Katie Jane Hughes, as I say regularly, could put any shade, texture or effect on her lids and it would work effortlessly. She just has that type of face, and the skill set to match. I, unfortunately, do not.

And as for Linda Hallberg…

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A post shared by Linda Hallberg (@lindahallberg) on Jun 22, 2019 at 12:26pm PDT

She added a jet black winged liner to hers, and with that, her blonde hair, brows and super cool piercings, she kills it. Alas, I will never be that cool. But as for wearing matte pink? I embraced it.

How I made it work

I paired it with luminous skin – to contrast the matte effect, I used Charlotte Tilbury’s Hollywood Flawless Filter mixed with my Make Up For Ever Ultra HD foundation to give a dewy, lit-from-within glow. I piled on the mascara – black on pink looks good, I reasoned, and I made my lashes as spidery as possible. I left off blush – honestly, because I just didn’t know how or what to pair with it. I used a neutral coloured lip balm on my lips so as not to take away from the pink eyeshadow.

Bottom line, I didn’t think I could get away with it, but when I bit the bullet and wore matte pink on my eyes, I got far more compliments than I did funny looks.

Photography by Jason Lloyd Evans.

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