By Laura Medina
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=io8ao7c7rC8
While Los Angeles Fashion Week was attempting to find its footing, unofficial "Beauty Week", solidly anchored by The Makeup Show, ruled that same week.
Influential beauty, health, and well-being fore-runners led the charge.
Of course, let's start with Sephora's best-selling brand, Kat Von D.
Here are snippets from her Q&A at The Makeup Show...
What caused her to start a beauty line? How did it all start?
"Part of it was luck." When she was starring in Miami Ink, her fans were begging Sephora to do a makeup with her because they like her makeup style and her graphic, tattoo drawing. They kept commenting on her signature red lipstick; and they wanted her signature red lips. Kat didn't care what season it was or what it is, it's her red."
This got Sephora executives wondering and inquiring who's this "Kat Girl?"
"So, they set up this creative meeting to see if she knows about makeup." Lo and behold to their pleasant surprise, Kat has been a Beauty Insider, Sephora's loyalty shopper program, for years.
They asked her to come on board then the first thing they asked is to create the four perfect shades of red lipsticks.
"Oh my god! Four! That's crazy! I thought I was only going to make one."
Now, today, her SKU is out of this world. So everyday, for this girl who used to run barefoot in Mexico, is blessed and gratitude.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pUgFY98sTFI
How does Kat Von D balance it all?
Surprisingly for this reality tv break-out star, she doesn't have a whole lot of technology. She has a lot of pianos because she was a dirt poor, barefooted classical musician. She has a crafting room where she generates her ideas. For someone who used to date the infamous Nikki Sixx, Kat doesn't have much of a social life.
But, she likes because that's her structure.
She lives and breathes creating. That's who she's in love with now.
Trivia now, her "Bachlorette" Lipstick is not named after the tv show nor an homage to brides but it's her favorite Bjork song.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TgZtC5WephA
Kat may comment she sucks at being her own commercial but there isn't one product that she doesn't use herself. Therefore yes, she uses her own products that she creates, hands-on, with her team.
Sorry fans, Kat gets more validation from professional makeup artists than the everyday fan because professional makeup artists understand the properties and the technology that goes into quality makeup. Getting thumbs up from pros is a real kicker for her.
Kat is the biggest fan of professional makeup artists, "I hope you like me."
She compares makeup artists to tattoo artists. What used to be fringe is now a respected mainstream.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iDUyXRBdRWc
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EDE137hnt5M&ebc=ANyPxKq1v3QeH7Misja65gNnxVNusEATHtthaiVXXbY2IHwGSLoCR_eBRdd7YwrW_YLs8fUrOM1wdZdX-WGE2JaFxMsmtyhazQ
Kat never thought of "transition" when she added and expanded from tattooing to makeup. She wanted to do everything.
Using Surrealist artist, Salvador Dali, "That man did everything. If people tell you to be an one-trick pony, tell them to "Shut the Fuck Up." As a true creative, you have every right to expand, evolve, and morph.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rg6ZmFBwYNA
Referring Dali, this man did everything. Using him as a role model, Kat doesn't have any excuses to be creative and expand and widen the horizon.
She's not a makeup artist. She's just an huge fan of makeup.
Humbly said, Kat doesn't call herself a tattoo artist, she just do tattoo.
She wouldn't call herself a fashion designer. Kat just sew clothes on the sewing machine.
Everything except cooking. Other than that, she's totally down with everything.
She's okay with people going to formal schooling for particular fields but it don't settle and be trapped into one thing, one thing only. You'll be surprised with what you can do when you expand your horizon.
It's called growth.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kwczovLevpc
This video segment is very important.
In this segment, this is where she officially announce her collaboration with Too Faced Cosmetics then she explains how this collaborated happened.
At a cosmetic convention, she was blew off by this makeup artist that she admired then Jerrod Blandino, from Too Faced Cosmetics, came rushing at her, yelling "Kat" because he's a fan of her. Mutual respect and admiration.
This sudden but pleasant fan shock from a makeup industry veteran was enough for Kat to get over her rejection from that makeup artist that she used to admire, "That makeup artist who blew me off, was a total dick."
At first, Kat didn't know Too Faced Cosmetics or Jerrod. They were just a rising brand, just like she was.
As a fan, Jerrod exclaimed, "The makeup world needs you. I own Too Faced." Then, he pulls out the Too Faced CandleLight Compact, saying he's a big fan of her.
They've been friends ever since. Now, they, one of Sephora's biggest seller and rising brand, are now working together on a potential hit for Sephora.
Like anything glam and girly, Kat commented people have a very hard time being happy for each other.
"I like it when my friends' band gets big. I think it's fucking awesome."
"If my friends' band bring me up with them or I bring them up with me. That's so cool."
There shouldn't be this sense of competition or snobbery because she thinks that's counter-productive. Being competitive and being elitist are very consuming, especially for a creative mind.
She's aware her friendship and collaboration with Too Faced is rare.
The message of her working with Too Faced is bigger than lipstick or eyeshadow. Creating with a brand that shares the same mentality is rare. "We're all in the same boat."
To Kat, that mutual support, respect, and work is more inspiring to her than slapping on a celebrity to sell more units. Having emotional investment in product development and collaboration is very important to her. This is what makes her an artist, not a business person.
She rather lead by example.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K7TO13NvOVI
What's Kat Von D's everyday makeup routine?
At this point in her life where she is constantly testing formulas and new products, she doesn't know.
"What color are you wearing? I don't fucking remember right now."
It normally doesn't take her that long.
It depends. If that potential product-in-development is working, then it's a good day. If that product is not working, then it's a bad day.
This how Kat Von D the brand succeeds. It her products works for her then they work for everyone.
The unofficial "Beauty Week" launched on the previous Tuesday at Wanderlust, a holistic cafe/shop/yoga wellness studio and event venue, in the heart of a revitalizing Hollywood.
These
true influentials are leading the charge in what's going on the horizon
and what are the real next nutritional trends, as in "what you put
inside affects the outside."
What
these influential panelists missed yet is very much the key in their
success is the advance distillation and extraction science technology
that enables them to extract oils from raspberries and broccoli and
plant stem cells from apples to promote and improve collagen and using
molecular anti-oxidants to repair environmental/sun damage from free
radicals.
The ironically named Amanda Chantal Bacon, yes that infamous "Moon Juice" lady, discussed the current trend...or backlash...against the Eighties/Nineties trend of "Zero Fat" highly processed food, where the original, real fat (the fat that satisfies and fills the stomach) is replaced with more "sneaky" sugar that is spiking up today's diabetic rates.
From the woman who lives on juices and raw food and makes rarefied powdered supplements for Gwyneth Paltrow's infamously expensive $200 morning smoothie, the audience was surprised that this former assistant chef to Chef Suzanne Goin at Lucques and at Chez Panisse and Outstanding in the Field and former assistant food and wine editor for the Los Angeles Times Magazine and former food journalist for L.A. Times, discussed the importance of using real fat and real oils on our faces and in our bodies.
In contradicting her fat-free, raw juice image, Amanda talked about the importance to re-incorporating age-old oils on our faces to nourish so our pores wouldn't over-produce oils when the skin is dry.
Then, she further shock her raw juice fans and audience when she recommended eating more real fat to lower sugar levels, to satisfy the stomach and appetite, and for easier digestion.
Wanderlust's Well + Good goes beyond skin deep and it's not "raw."
James Walker of the Aloe Vera-based, wholesome version alternative to NARS, W3LL People, with organic nail salon owner, Sarah Gibson Tuttle of Olive + June and Blair Lawson, head of beauty at goop, talk about the challenges of trying to keep the integrity of "Being Green and Wholesome" with the demands of busy, modern yet health-conscious women who demands that their organic makeup and nail polishes be long-lasting as they be all-natural.
With help from advanced extraction technology, James broke the news that W3LL People are broccoli seed extract as an oil-free moisturizer and a dimethicone silicon replacement for their new tinted moisturizing foundation with sunscreen.
Well + Good Beauty Influencers are busting the "granola vegan" cliche with science and healthy fats.
Last but not least, all of Beverly Hills' best plastic surgeons had banded together underneath one roof, The Roxbury Institute, a comprehensive aesthetic medical center in Beverly Hills.
Dr. 90210, aka, Dr. Robert Rey, and Dr. Jason Diamond and the rest of the cast of Netflix’ “Celebrity Plastic Surgeons of Beverly Hills,”were there at the opening of their new complex at 450 North Roxbury Drive.
The real L.A. Fashion Week is "Beauty Week."
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