My search for a new base began by accident. After years of loyally using Giorgio Armani’s Luminous Silk Foundation in shade No 9, something began to change. The favourite that once left me with a lit-from-within glow came up flat after my dermatologist prescribed new medicine that left my skin drier than usual. Suddenly I found little patches collecting at the sides of my nose, and my pores seemed to soak up every ounce of product I placed onto them. I was willing to let this go, to ignore any issues or combat them by becoming more diligent about midday touch-ups—until I heard the dreaded O word.
“You look a little orange,” a salesgirl at Sephora told me as I was sifting through a display filled with eyeshadow palettes and blush. Ill-timed beauty commentary is a sport for some salespeople, so I wanted to believe she was fooling me with the aim of getting me to buy more, but her glitter-covered face looked more concerned than judgmental. And she was right: A glance in the mirror revealed that my skin had in fact oxidised into the colour of Cheetos dust. Like Coco Montrese on RuPaul’s Drag Race, my pumpkin-tinted makeup was a source of personal shame. I could almost hear Alyssa Edwards whispering, “Do you know how orange you look right now, girl?!” I grabbed a micellar water wipe and discreetly scrubbed my face before exiting in a mild huff, vowing never to look like a jack-o’-lantern again.
So began my search for a foundation that would match my skin tone and leave me with the healthy looking complexion of my dreams. As a woman of colour, I knew this wouldn’t be an easy task. Post Fenty Beauty, many brands have expanded their ranges, but capturing the nuances of deeper skin remains an uphill battle. The hue may be right, but the undertone is wrong, the texture or finish might also need work, and since many brands still refuse to stock their full array of shades, even getting ahold of the right options would take time. Of course, I didn’t expect it to take an entire year of my life. Entering the Vogue beauty closet, I was overwhelmed by the number of foundations on the market, and the limited range of what actually was sent through by PR companies. I’d grown accustomed to YouTube videos in which content creators swatch every shade within a line, so I felt a degree of surprise upon realising the approach to publication samples was entirely different. I grabbed what I could, hoping that I’d be able to make the best of things. After years of tweaking the darkest shades at Sephora or mixing three different colours to match, I was used to putting in a little extra work.
I started with the luxury behemoths. Bougie as I am, I wanted to see what Chanel, Dior, and their ilk had to offer. Once the purveyor of my first holy grail foundation, Teint Innocence, a barely there luminous blend that was discontinued back in 2011, I had high hopes for Chanel but found the undertones in their lineup too tangerine for my liking—the ironically named Les Beiges left me looking like an Oompa Loompa even after a lengthy consultation with a makeup artist. Dior’s Face and Body fared better; the sheer, buildable coverage came closer to my liking, but I still needed to mix shades to get a perfect match. As someone who has hyperpigmentation and several different shades present on my face, I expected that I’d have to do some blending. In the past, I’ve used one bottle for my slightly darker forehead, another for the lighter area around my cheeks. This, plus a colour corrector—around my mouth area where there is a patch of unruly skin—and a concealer to tackle any spots. While I didn’t mind the amount of effort it took to merely look normal, I didn’t always have the extra 10 minutes needed to make sure my face was in order. The idea of relying on a single colour, or at least a single formula, became something of an obsession. Why should I have to set up the beauty equivalent of a chemistry lab to have something that matched?
I tried 70 foundations in more than 52 weeks, attempting to find one, or some, that would tackle all my issues. Many I bought myself—thank you VIB Rouge points—others I pulled from the closet, still more I happened upon after the recommendations of friends, family, and YouTube gurus. I began an organisation system complete with colour coding: pink stickers for the best matches, green for those that just didn’t work, orange… well, that’s self-explanatory. Throughout it all, there were good days—the sheer oil-based tint from Kosas picked up at Violet Grey that made me feel like a glowing goddess despite the Los Angeles heat, and bad days—that same product melting down my face on a humid March day in New York.
I picked up new options as I traveled. A pitstop in Korea meant delving into the world of cushion products, with a creamy-yet-utterly wrong-for-me compact from Laneige. In Japan, I perused the counters at Mitsukoshi in Ginza and developed a new appreciation for the number of colour options I had access to in the States. Every brand on the cosmetics floor had multiple foundations, ranging only from palest beige to slightly darker. Only Shu Uemura’s freshly launched Unlimited range offered a shade close enough to be considered a match. I attempted to purchase a bottle in the darkest hue available, then quickly discovered it was only sold in their flagship store.
Back home, I went high-tech with Lancôme’s Le Teint Particulier, a computerised match system that employed sensors to read the tone and texture of my skin in multiple places, then brewed up a custom blend with the texture of a tinted moisturiser. While the process was highly entertaining—the machine calls to mind a souped-up paint mixer—I found myself preferring the feel of the brand’s ready-made Teint Idole, which offered fuller coverage and a robust 88 shades. At times, finish proved a more significant hurdle than shade options. From the moment I began the project, people suggested I try Fenty Beauty’s game-changing foundation, but the full matte coverage was too much for my day to day. “Are you wearing stage makeup now?” One friend asked, her face accusatory. “It would be nice if I could see your skin and not the makeup.” Until Rihanna blesses us with something more sheer, I have to reserve her signature product for special occasions.
Clearly, it was time to check in with the experts. I enlisted the help of Sir John, L’Oréal’s brand ambassador and Beyoncé’s makeup maestro who advised against seeking out a one-size-fits-all solution. “When going to pick a foundation, I always advise my clients to opt for an ‘everyday shade’ and a ‘summer shade.’ This allows you to always have your proper shade on hand, no matter the season,” he shared via email. “When picking out a foundation, you should always shop for a foundation that fits your skin type, rather than buying something because it is the ‘hottest new launch.’ One foundation I recommend for all skin types is the True Match Foundation. It is one of the ‘OG’ foundations we’ve all used, and the shades are tailored to your undertones to really match your skin.” If it was good enough for Beyoncé, I figured it was good enough for me. I headed to the drugstore to pick up True Match, Milani’s Conceal and Perfect, and Physician’s Formula’s Healthy foundation. The prices were right but finding the right colour in glass bottles without readily available testers took a leap of faith. The liberal return policy at Duane Reade was helpful, but it took three tries to identify what worked and what didn’t, using Sir John’s technique of matching the hairline and perimeter of the face. “The inner-circle is typically a little lighter and where you don’t have to go in with a heavy hand for application,” he explained. “You don’t always need to lather foundation all over your face. Sometimes it is better to spot treat where you feel you need it. Or, as I mentioned about the perimeter of the face, use your foundation there and on darker spots, then opt for a tinted moisturiser or lighter concealer in other spots.”
Armed with this new perspective, I began to approach my quest differently. This wasn’t the search for a singular holy grail, it was an attempt to curate a group of products that could work in tandem. A primer to curb the worst of my oiliness (Cover FX’s Gripping Primer), a powder that offered luminosity instead of cake face (Hourglass Translucent Setting), and a match that didn’t cover my skin but enhanced it. The change in outlook coincided with the discovery of several viable options: Mented’s dewy sheer foundation sticks; NARS’s cult favourite Sheer Glow in the tan, Syracuse; Beauty Blender’s Bounce in a neutral with olive undertones; and Too Face’s Born this Way in Praline, one of the new colours created by YouTube guru Jackie Aina during its shade extension earlier this year; and La Mer’s ultra-extravagant miracle broth–infused brew. Even my drugstore finds, the aforementioned True Match and Conceal and Perfect looked flawless.
These days when I put on my foundation, it’s done with an extra level of care. Now that I no longer have to mix several formulas to find something that works, my routine takes significantly less time. I still have to make sure every product I use is complementary, but I’m starting to embrace a less-is-more philosophy. Rather than covering my entire face with a thick base, I use a sheer layer and let my skin shine through—something that’s much easier to do now that I’ve settled on several versions of the perfect match.
This story was originally featured on Vogue.com
Also read:
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Finding your foundation match lies in this weird part of your face
7 foundations that Bollywood’s best makeup artists can’t get enough of
The post This Vogue writer took a full year to find her perfect foundation shade appeared first on VOGUE India.
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