Where do I begin?
Back in May 2007, I was a relatively stress-free Senior in high school who had already accepted a place at Skidmore College, was desperately looking forward to graduating, and not so much desperately looking forward to the AP exams. While just a few months ago, my friends and I were frantically answering college application essay prompts, or hysterically trying to boost our GPA’s at the eleventh hour, now we leisurely sat around the common area, some of us sleeping across rolling chairs and others at computers hacking into blocked websites like Facebook and YouTube. Ahhh…those were the days.
I was one of the hooligans breaking into YouTube. At first, it was for David Choi, who at the time I thought was my destiny. His determination to never crack a smile as he crooned his original songs was (to my artsy, emo, indie soul) just oh-so-dreamy. But somehow, I fell down that YouTube rabbit hole and stumbled across someone named ricebunny (better known as Michelle Phan).
YouTube was only 2 years old at the time and wasn’t as oversaturated with content as it is today. So going from an Asian crooner to an Asian makeup artist wasn’t so unheard of. From the minute I started watching one of Michelle Phan’s videos, I was instantly hooked.
Though Michelle was only a few years older, I was in awe of how artfully she could apply eyeshadow, of how she knew what color was best suited to fill in her brows (btw, it was ABH Brow Wiz in Medium Ash), of how she could pull off essentially any look. Most importantly, I felt connected to her.
On the most immediate level, I too loved makeup. From the moment my mom dolled me up for a dance recital at the age of five, to sixth grade when my mom permitted me to wear eyeliner and clear brow gel daily, to high school when my friends and I went into the city and spent our lunch money on eyeshadow and lip glosses at Missha, makeup was something I had to look forward to the minute I opened my eyes every morning. I played with each product and along the way learned the curves and contours of my face. What did I need to hide? And what did I need to accentuate? It was exciting, explorative, creative, and just fun.
On a slightly deeper level however, it was an outlet. In one of her none voice over videos, she had mentioned that creating YouTube videos was just a fun outlet while she was in art school, that this was a project for her outside of assignments, something that she could get carried away with – or not. (Correct me if I’m wrong and I’m getting my Beauty Gurus mixed up.)
It made so much sense.
Growing up, my mom instilled in me the habit of reading and writing from the moment I could. I know her intention was to make me as smart and scholarly as possible, but that’s not what happened. What once was forced became habit, and habit ultimately my greatest source of release. I’d always had some form of creative release – whether it was writing, or singing, or dancing, or playing with my clothes. There was something there for me to step outside of reality and into a playland where I could be my happiest self, or my moodiest self, or whatever form of self I wanted to be.
During the summer between senior year of high school and freshman year of college, makeup became my outlet and watching Michelle Phan’s videos became a religious hobby. I continued to watch in awe, just studying and learning, mentally taking notes of techniques. Then, when my mind signaled that I had the techniques down pat, the urge to put them to the test overtook me. I started digging around my meager makeup stash of one Revlon smokey eye eyeshadow quad, a few Victoria Secret lip glosses, a Misha bb cream and pressed powder. It wasn’t enough.
One Saturday, I went into my parents room and started opening my mother’s drawers; I looked for her Loreal lipsticks and her Shisedo compacts. I knew she had a few Avon products but where was she keeping them. Alas, I opened the cupboard under her bathroom sink and there was what I considered gold – a eyeshadow palette. And not just any eyeshadow palette, a Shisedo palette of at least 54 colors ranging from Bone to Black, covering every color of the rainbow and the shades that hid between.
This was it. The minute I arrived in my Freshman dorm, I immediately punched in the number of my brand-new debit card and purchased the Coastal Scent 88 palette along with a brush set and contour kit But for that summer, this stolen Shisedo palette would have to do.
All of a sudden, I was a different person. My face was framed with full brows, my eyes popped with a very subtle grey and brown smokey eye, the perimeter of my face was chiseled out with a combination of the ‘3’ technique and pressed countour. Who was I? Anyone I wanted to be.
So why, after more than ten years, am I launching a blog now?
I read somewhere that the more and more you focus on what you are lacking or the negative parts of your life, the more they consume you and the more difficult it is to find your way out. That’s where I found myself the past year. I hit a rocky patch of bad timing and wrong turns. I couldn’t see the light.
But it’s truly amazing how the smallest and most random things can turn that around. Out from under the overshadowing clouds of neutral and warm tone palettes, colorful eyeshadow palettes crept back into the scene. It started slowly with a single blue eyeshadow look and then blew up to Rihanna’s Fenty Beauty Killawatt Foils and the latest - ABH’s Norvina palette.
Suddenly my Instagram feed was being flooded with bold, colorful looks and something within me was awakened. I was excited, I was curious, I wanted in. My mind starting flicking back to when I was in college and I not only signed up but dove in to any creative endeavor my heart craved. To the late-night rehearsals for student run musical productions to staining my hands indigo for 3 months during Textile Surface Design, I landed on one moment - sewing into my nail at 3 in the morning just to finish my first collection for the annual non-profit fashion show. It’s a strange memory (and maybe one that is NSFW) but I remember the shock when the needle punctured my nail and the machine locked.
I shut off the sewing machine, took my foot off the pedal, and unscrewed the needle from its place. The needle was stuck in my nail and the thread had already begun to pull through. Through my delirium came a moment of clarity. I reached for my scissors and cut the thread as closely to my cracked nail as possible before pulling the needle and thread out of my nail. A few seconds passed before the blood started flowing out.
I reached for a piece of scrap fabric, wrapped and tied it around my finger, replaced the machine with a new needle and told myself “Finish this one hem, then go home.” The show was less than 12 hours away and I had to finish hemming the remaining tiers of my finale piece, steam all the garments, and be awake enough to do hair and makeup on all my friends who had agreed to be my runway models.
And though the waves of anxiety and frustration ran their course, I was happy. Because how many people didn’t have the opportunity to have these kinds of moments? That through anguish, hard times, uncontrollable emotions, that they still felt at peace because they belonged to a space that they themselves created.
I have missed belonging to my own creative space. Something that I had always had to fall back on since my mom forced me to keep a diary as a young girl. It sounds odd but when you are stressed, when you are angry, when you are ecstatic over a project you create for yourself, that stress, anger, and ecstasy are transformed to completely different, unique emotions. And I miss that. I forgot that that was even a possibility.
So here I am. Still riding out the storm of bad timing and wrong turns, more than ten years since I watched my first makeup tutorial, rediscovering who I am and what is essential to my life. Or to render everything I’ve written thus far futile (lol) – here is my passion project!
Somewhere in the past few years, I let go of all my creative outlets in order to get in a few more hours of work. Staying up late to catch China or waking up early to dial in to Italy, work has consumed my life. The sad truth is that I allowed it to. But I’ve learned the hard way that when work is the only thing you do in your day, life becomes quite depressing. You begin to feel like a shell of a person, just coasting through life, going through the motions.
But with all the new summer launches, the left side of my brain awoke, shook off the dust, and (unfortunately for my already decrepit bank account) starting swiping my credit card, all while screaming “LET’S GOOOOOOOO.”
This blog (in conjunction with my Instagram) will be beauty focused, but hopefully beauty will just be the vehicle in which you and I connect. Just the first step. Because what is most important is more than just what's on the surface. It’s also not just the lessons you learn or how much you continue to evolve and grow. It’s about the growing pains that get you there and how things that are not just skin-deep inform our lives, but also those that are soul-deep.
Hopefully, you’ll come for the looks and reviews, but you’ll stay for the stories. I promise you some laughs. ;)