Inglot Seminar with James Vincent

I was lucky enough to be invited to a seminar with makeup artist James Vincent at Inglot in Westfield London today. As I work in Westfield it was pretty easy for me to say yes. It was my first ever ‘event,’ so I was a bit nervous and didn’t know what to expect.

James has literally worked with everyone…. Lady Gaga, Pink, TLC, Joan Jett, Blondie, Reese Witherspoon, Rose McGowan, The Black Eyed Peas, Marilyn Manson, Pamela Anderson and even Barack Obama! James also helped launched MAC in a lot of the States and Urban Decay as well.

So after a glass of wine and a play with all the lovely Inglot products, he sat a  - rather lovely – model down for us and showed us a few simple tricks which were actually all really, really helpful!

-We got talked through how to fill in brows using pencil, powder and gel liner to draw in individual hairs. He also talked us through the importance of not getting stuck in your ways with your brows (as an MUA) as they change a lot with fashion. And he also bemoaned the ‘angry MAC brow.’ Ha ha!



-He talked us through using matte shadows and told us buying a good palette of matte shadows is a great purchase as you can contour with them too. I just bought a mostly matte neutral Inglot palette so I felt pretty smug at that point.

-He showed us where and how to use illuminating concealers, as well as where to not! He also talked about using powder on the face – he applies it with a very small fluffy brush, if he has to at all, as he says powder doesn’t look natural. James powders women more than men, as it looks very un-natural indeed on a man! He spoke a lot about men's makeup which was cool.

-He showed us how to properly prep lips – including colour correction – and how to properly apply gloss over the lip to emphasise it. Just in the middle of the inner lips, as all gloss can actually look quite flat – if it’s all reflecting light, there’s no focal point. Makes sense, right?

-He then used the same bright pink lip colour on the apples of the cheeks and blended it out with a peach blush, and talked us through basic facial contouring.

-He then talked about highlighting with a contrasting colour on the lips – so for example, if you do a blue-based red lip, you can used an orange based red in the centre to give it a bit more oomph! Cool, huh?

I could literally write an essay on everything he spoke about, but I learned some fabulous tricks and he also gave us a really great pep talk - as there were a lot of MUAs who are just starting and trying to break into the business - which was wonderful.

I’m definitely going to be using some of his tricks so I’ll explain them all if I use them in upcoming FOTDs but here are a few:

-Milk of Magnesia is great to stop sweating. Never powder over sweat – prevent it and use a foundation that won’t budge in water so people can sweat through it

-If your model has pigmented lips, a green colour corrector can work wonders. I never would have thought to colour correct the lips!

-Always work in the same direction on the eyes – either toward the nose on both eyes, or away from the nose on both eyes, and make sure you always place your brush down in the same spot on both eye so colour is deposited evenly.

Seem like obvious tricks but there are just some things I’d never thought of.

I had a wicked night, I learnt a lot and I got my pro Inglot card! Hurrah!