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As bare-bones beauty dominates the runways, a few holdouts are making sure fantasy lives on.

It was a casual remark, meant to highlight the exceptional craftsmanship behind the Old Hollywood-inspired, ultra-glamorous sets he devised for the Armani Privé Fall 2013 Couture show. But hairstylist Orlando Pita’s words backstage in Paris last summer offered an astute commentary on the state of runway beauty as a whole: “Now that John Galliano and Alexander McQueen are gone from the business, a new guard has created a kind of couture that relates to the street,” he said. “It was always about fantasy; that’s gone for now.”

The role of the backstage beauty team is to complete the full translation from the designer’s mind; it helps refine the woman, or the character, who would wear the clothes. Certain designers stuck to their fantasy-driven existence for spring, with all the over-the-top beauty fanfare that goes with it (Gareth Pugh’s alien-inspired eyebrow discs; Thom Browne’s frizzy-haired, smudged-makeup insane asylum patients; Vivienne Westwood’s similarly unnerved walking dead iteration). However, if you take a look at some of the most anticipated shows of the past few seasons, the resonance of Pita’s statement becomes much louder. From Proenza Schouler, Alexander Wang and The Row to Burberry Prorsum, Christopher Kane, Balmain and Isabel Marant, there has been an overwhelming reliance on minimal makeup and easy, undone hair that was most certainly not in the phrasebooks of Galliano or McQueen—or Thierry Mugler and Azzedine Alaïa, for that matter.

One of the best things about going backstage at New York fashion week is seeing what the top makeup artists and hairstylists are using in their kits. It’s often a sneak peek at products not yet on shelves, or uncommon tools they’ve found on their travels. Here, five of the best products we’ve spied backstage this week at the Fall 2013 shows:

“You’ll have to stretch this into a story,” said makeup artist Dick Page by way of explaining the extremely simple beauty look he created for Marc by Marc Jacobs Spring 2014. But simple in this case didn’t mean neutral or natural; it meant one big swoop (Page called it a “half-moon”) of bright blue shadow, a blend of Shiseido Shimmering Cream Eye Color in “Ice” and a blue powder shadow from Shiseido’s limited edition Eye Color Bar. And that was it: no cheek, no lip, no brow. “She’s lazy or high or both. It’s kind of like, homemade glam.”

The hair also shared that languid, DIY feeling. Guido Palau for Redken gave the models a grungy, but natural look. He used a barrel iron to give super-straight hair a nice bend at the neck and some movement at the ends, and worked in Redken Diamond Oil near the roots to give it a lanky quality. “It’s a little rock and roll, but not in a beachy way, more in a nighttime way. The flatness to the head and off-centeredness are the keys to the look.”

New bristle technology and ergonomically designed brushes are changing the way we put on makeup. Time to toss those sponge-tip applicators.

There’s a plastic skull at the offices of British makeup brand Illamasqua. It’s neither paperweight nor homage to Alexander McQueen: It belongs to David Horne, the director of product development, who studies the model cranium when he’s designing makeup brushes to help him determine what shapes fit best with the bone structure of the face. “That’s where I start,” he says. “I think, ‘Where is this brush going to go?’” Most recently, Horne used the anatomy class teaching aid while developing the Blush Up Brush ($50, thebay.com), focusing on the spot “where the mandible connects with the zygomatic.” The result: densely packed bristles arranged in an oval shape that deposit and blend pigment better than the traditional lollipop silhouette, he says, because they fit in the natural groove below the cheekbone. “If you change the tools, you change the application by default.”

See the top ’90s-inspired beauty products in Diane and Dick’s tool kit »

By Celia Ellenberg

About halfway through the spring 2013 shows in New York, one thing became clear: Contours, not colour, were set to define the season. Gone were the deep wine-stained lips and tinted lashes from fall; in their place was, well, very little to speak of.

“It is a reaction to the economic times we are in. Huge, glamorous, overdone hair and makeup don’t make sense,” says makeup artist Diane Kendal, who had a big hand in this sea change. Over the past few seasons, Kendal has made boyish, raw but beautiful faces something of a calling card as the backstage go-to for cool designers like Proenza Schouler, Alexander Wang and, more recently, Victoria Beckham. “Their point of view is what I translate,” Kendal humbly insists, pointing out that there was a ’90s-era lens on the collective perspective for spring.

“The look seems to have a modern feel,” she says, explaining why designers requested the decade’s sparse style en masse. “People like the simplicity—the pureness of design. It’s clean.” It’s also significantly less undone than it was 20 years ago. “It’s less grungy this time around.” The new minimalism is about subtly accentuating features rather than cultivating a full-on “look.” The irony, of course, is that a full-on look is actually easier to pull off than the “nothing” makeup that Kendal and fellow face-painters such as Shiseido artistic director Dick Page pioneered.

See the full beauty gallery from Marc by Marc Jacobs Fall 2013 »

Makeup inspiration at Marc by Marc Jacobs Fall 2013:
“Marc [Jacobs] wanted to do something very sophisticated and chic. There’s quite demented hair going on, so what I’m doing is very classical. Everyone has their little reference: Someone said it looks like a [Michael] Fassbender woman, someone else said a Guy Bourdin [photograph], but I was thinking more along the lines of Fanny Ardant, the French actress.” – Dick Page, Shiseido artistic director

Get the look:
On the eyes, Page used two cream shadows. He blended a shimmery taupe from the lower lash line up to the crease and brushed it along the lower lash line. He applied black shadow to the upper part of the lid, diffusing the colour. He also used some black mascara and did “a light groom.” And just before the models hit the runway, Page patted one of his favourite products—Shiseido Benefiance Full Correction Lip Treatment—on lids for a glossy finish. To achieve the “very glossy, wet-looking lip” Page mixed two Shiseido Lacquer Rouge shades: “Sanguine” and “Drama.”

“I always love a greasy eye,” said Dick Page, backstage at Marc By Marc Jacobs describing the punked-out makeup for the show. “I guess [for this look] I’m pre-empting the morning after, because if it’s pre-destroyed it can’t go bad, you already know it looks like shit,” he further explained. His greasy-eye-making product of choice? “I use a stupid-expensive lip balm from Shiseido. What I like about it is that it’s got a little pink in it.” There’s a worn-in tube of Shiseido Benefiance Full Correction Lip Treatment ($38, at department stores) on his makeup table that verifies his love for the product. For Marc by Marc Jacobs, Dick Page layered the slick balm over top of beige and black cream eye shadows on lids and upper and lower lash lines.

What felt like a week-long whirlwind at the time (and realistically, actually was!) has now come to a close. From wind-tunnel hair to blue cat eyes, a Harper Beckham cameo, and one awesome T-shirt, here’s our top 10 backstage moments from New York Fashion Week.

Let’s count ’em down! »

“It’s Michael’s default bronze position,” said Dick Page of the tawny faces he was creating backstage at Kors to underscore the designer’s safari-themed collection. His team paired the glowing umber with a strong signature Page brow, little bits of gold highlights around the eyes, a touch of brown mascara, and lip colour provided by Shiseido Perfect Rouge in “Caramel” to “unify the tone across the board.” Each girl was brought to Page for any additional bronzing, which he called “the final toast.”

The chunky, matted thick braid created by Orlando Pita had a bit more of a narrative. “These people are on a trip through Africa,” he said. “They have nothing with them to groom themselves with so they take their shoelaces and tie their hair up in braids in the back. Then they try to neaten themselves up, so in the front, they scrape their hair back.” Using a combination of Bumble and Bumble Surf Spray, T3 Refresh Volumizing Dry Shampoo, and American Crew Defining Paste to build piece-y texture, he wove hair into two fishtail braids, intertwining leather strings into the plaits, and then joined them together to look like one. “It’s not easy to achieve at home but that’s always my goal, always,” he said. “I don’t want somebody to do these hairdos at home and then I’m out of job.”

View the photo gallery »

Beauty editor Lesa Hannah goes backstage at New York Fashion Week to chat with beauty pro Dick Page about rehabilitating brows and the outdoorsy beauty at Michael Kors. Watch more backstage beauty videos from New York Fashion Week» Read more of our coverage from the Spring 2011 shows»

The post Video: Dick Page takes us to the eyebrow hospital at Michael Kors appeared first on FASHION Magazine.

When you’re based in Toronto, it’s not often that you get the privilege of encountering your idolized beauty rock stars in person, since so few of the major ones ever cross our border. Please, Pat McGrath or Guido Palau in our city? Never happening. The only way you’ll get face time with these power players is by going to New York, where I was lucky enough interview the almighty Dick Page at a Shiseido event back in May, about eyeshadows he designed for the brand. I’ve spoken before of my admiration for him, but this launch was a chance to interview him for more than the few minutes you get backstage at New York Fashion Week, where you’re expected to clear out as soon as you have your quotes. I’m already giddily anxious in his presence, but what elevated the night to a whole other level was the fact that the president of Shiseido Canada invited Dick for drinks with us afterwards—and he accepted! We ended up at some random champagne bar, and while I didn’t get to sit next to him (that honour went to an editor from Montreal), I learned a few things about him that have nothing to do with makeup:

Beauty editor Lesa Hannah went backstage at New York Fashion Week to chat with the top hair, makeup and nail pros about the looks they created for Marc Jacobs, Alexander Wang, Narciso Rodriguez, Rodarte and more. See all her reports on our New York Fashion Week video channel. Above, she chats with makeup artist Dick […]

The post Go backstage with the beauty pros on our New York Fashion Week video channel appeared first on FASHION Magazine.