Going the glamorous way

Makeup has become a necessity of any woman be it a teenager, a working professional, homemaker or rather an experienced lady. It has not only satisfied the need of these women but also gave a glamour's touch to their appearance.

While we talk about make up as one of the essential needs of women let us check out the one of its kind make up solution called the Indo- Western look.

What exactly is the Indo-western look?

This style has progressed from simply outfits and clothing attire, to jewellery, and now to make up. It is much more than pairing an Indian item of clothing with western jewellery or vice-versa.

Makeup has taken over and is now an integral part of every outfit. It leaves nobody untouched, whether it means simply putting on a little lipstick, or some eyeliner.

Makeup has transcended to the world of video making, specifically YouTube, where makeup tutorials are rampant. Adjacently, you can find several videos for how to apply Indo-western make up and master the look.

But that is a lot of hard work, since most of the beauty gurus on YouTube as makeup professionals already. For beginners, it can be hard to follow up or keep up with them, and even harder to catch up. So here we are, about to break down the look for you.

It is hard to go to a posh event dressed normally. Apart from the social pressure to look good, obviously you would want to pull off the perfect look.

So, you will choose to try many different looks, until you find the perfect one. The Indo-western look is by far the most perfect for an Indian bride. It gives a chic yet elegant and classy vibe.

Makeup's hard. How can you get this look right?

Eyes

The Indo-western make up look is mostly characterised by a bold statement eye. A suitable one would be a smokey eye. If you want to switch things up a bit, you can use eye shadow with a glittery base.

Pair this with a bold eyebrow look too, by shading in your eyebrows. Try to use some white eye shadow below your eyebrow to make the rest of the makeup stand out.

For the rest of the eye makeup, you can go with smokey eyes, but make sure to use the white eye shadow trick. Use some in the inner corner of your eyes too, this will make them appear brighter and stand out.

If smokey eyes are not your drift, you can go for something a little less extravagant – a little more subtle and mellowed down look.

You can wear colours of the neutral palette – beige, cream, and off white. Or you can go to the other spectrum and choose a colour that complements your skin tone.

Eyeliner is almost vital though, to pull this off! Go big on it, like most actresses did in the 70s. This was a trend seen not only in western movies, but more commonly a lot more in Indian cinema.

Actresses from down south to up north never appeared on screen without a dramatic winged liner that widened their eyes.

With this much focus on the eyes, it would be unsatisfactory if the entire eye region did not seem like it gave off looks that could kill.

Before you apply mascara, try putting on some fake lashes. They make the whole look appear bolder and more significant, and mascara can blend your real lashes with the fake ones.

Lips

For the lips, go for colours based on your skin tone. Stick to a neutral or nude shade if you are on the fairer side. You can also experiment with a bold red lip. If your complexion is dark skinned, a darker shade of lipstick can always make a statement since they are bolder.

Choosing a light colour can flush you out but choosing a nude suited for dark skinned people can make your heavy look appear a little lighter. For fairer people, light coloured lipstick is a good idea, for both low-key, classy looks and heavy, wedding styled looks.

Nose and cheeks

Highlighter is your next best friend. It makes your cheekbones and nose bridge stand out but accentuating the cut of the bones.

Using a light tone of blush on your cheeks can make the rest of the look stand out as well. Use bronzer to give it more of an ethnic look, since gold and copper colour tones are usually associated with India.

Try to steer clear of silvers for areas other than the eyes, since that gives it more of a western appearance as opposed to Indo-western.

Contouring is as important as the eye makeup. Good contouring can go hand in hand along with the highlighter and really make your features pop out.

For square cut face, contouring the jaw area is important since it gives your face structure more shape, and reduces the point by making it blend in more.

Now that you've got that down, here are some tips:

♦ Since Indians usually have a tanned skin tone, the key tones for the perfect Indo-western make up look are bronze, copper, and gold shades. No matter your complexion, there is always a chance that you have a tanned hue to it.

♦ Pulling off Indo-western style makeup can be so significant that you can sport your outfit sans any accessories.

♦ An inspiration for this look to draw from would be the Bengali method of dressing up. They have a lot of fusions in their culture in terms of clothing, at least in recent times. A lot of their clothing items and styles as of this year have advanced to amalgamations of Indian and western looks. Their style of dressing mixed with an Indo-western make up look could be the ultimate Indo-western look.

♦ As Indians, we are honestly blessed to have this middle ground olive skin tone, since most tones complement our colour and we do not have to struggle to find one. But for Indo-western looks – whether you are thinking about donning it for a wedding or doing your makeup for a simple day out, choosing warm coloured tones are the best bet. Even better, it's totally trending right now. Seeing how time is going by, there is a very high chance that it is going to be trending for a while, since our cultures are continuously being influenced by each other.