BET BEAUTY LOUNGE - QUEEN BEE BEAUTY
BET Beauty Lounge: Get tips on contouring like the Queen Bee with makeup artist BP Carmouche!
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Queen Bee Beauty - BP Carmouche is the makeup artist behind the face of hip-hop’s first lady, Lil Kim. We asked the makeup guru to guide us in showing you how to apply a little swipe here and a little smear there, to radically enhance and contour your natural features.
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The Artist - Along with painting the face of the Queen Bee, Carmouche’s editorial work has graced the pages of many magazines including <i>Seventeen</i>, along with work on fashion shows for designers like Betsey Johnson.
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Signature Style - Point blank, Kim loves cheeks and dark, smoky eyes. If you can give her smoky eyes and strong, colorful cheeks, that completes her look.
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Get Cheeky - You can do a light contour using a powder or foundation... Sweep your brush in the crease of the cheek. By shadowing and contouring the face, you’re creating a high cheekbone. <i>Black Radiance</i> makes an amazing <i>Shimmy Shimmer Illuminating Powder</i> that comes in several colors.
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Eye Recovery Pt.1 - You want to use an eye primer. It’s great to set the eye. I like <i>Urban Decay’s Eyeshadow Primer Potion</i>.
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Eye Recovery Pt.2 - Because I’m working with a dark color (smoky eye), I like to use a translucent powder. I love <i>Temptu Retouch Powder</i> because they have it in three different shades - light, medium and dark.
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Eyes That Sting - I go in with a smudge applicator which has a pencil on the other side. You start by lining, and then you use the sponge tip to blend and smoke it up. I always describe to my clients, it should be like a fire. Go in with your eye shadow. Use a fluffy brush and blend upward…
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Highlighting - You can start highlighting with your concealer, using one to two shades lighter than your actual complexion. Start at the center of your forehead, down the bridge of the nose to the ball of the nose tip. Continue on the balls of the cheeks, going upward just a little bit past the crack of your eye. You can also highlight right under your lips at the point of your chin and along your jawline.
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Luscious Lips - Find a lip pencil that’s one to two shades darker than your skin tone. Shade in the outer portion and around the top and along the bottom of the lip. Keep the center portion clear of the liner. Take the color that you’re going to use and put it over the entire lip. After that, take a lighter color, like a frosty white or a golden tone, and pop it right in the center.
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Luscious Lips - I call this the Mary J. Blige lip. Missy Elliott rocks it well too... Doing this creates this dimensional look that makes the lips look more luscious and vibrant.
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Beauty Brains - The most detailed books that I want to give amazing props to are Kevyn Aucoin’s “Face Forward” and Iman’s “The Beauty of Color.” They’re both really inexpensive books.
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Face Forward, $15 - Kevyn focuses on every type of complexion and every type of woman. Kevyn is more on the natural and artistic side of beauty. He’s also good for people interested in becoming makeup artists.
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The Beauty of Color, $17 - Iman is just a natural, everyday woman. She’s all about women’s empowerment and learning how to take care of your skin and your face.
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Queen for a Day - If you want to be Lil Kim for Halloween, I would say focus on sexy, smoky eyes with extended lashes. Luscious, long pronounced lashes are a must! Kim also loves defined brows. Go for warm, peachy cheeks and neutral lips with a high-shine gloss. You’ll definitely want to have long, flowing hair. Either wavy or straight. Black hair, of course.