Contouring and strobing, step aside, there is a new beauty buzzword in town, and this type of makeup-based face chiselling is called draping.
It was legendary makeup artist Way Bandy who first used colour as a way of shaping the face in the 70s, although for years the effect took a backseat to contouring, and most recently strobing, but is now enjoying a revival. The technique relies on colours, rather than traditional contouring and highlighting shades, to enhance facial features.
Put simply, it is a wash of a single hue, blended over the contours of your face, and was a popular choice of make-up style at the Spring Summer 2017 shows. While the intensity and tone of the blush varied from show to show, in most cases, the cheek colour was the focal point of the entire face, with little else going on, as often the blush itself doubled as an eye shadow, extending past the temples and over the eyelids.
This is looking like a comeback that will stay, because draping succeeds where other techniques fail. While contouring can look harsh, and strobing can appear waxy, draping is subtler, adding nothing but a healthy, youthful flush.
By Eliza Scarborough
