Renowned celebrity makeup artist and Rescu. Beauty Expert, Napoleon Perdis reveals his top three modern ‘It’ Girls that are a constant source of inspiration and stimulation for a makeup artist.
Confession: I have a form of creative ADD. I need constant stimulation and inspiration as both a makeup artist and as a brand builder and retailer.
I’m always on the hunt for unique style statements, fresh faces, and pops of colour and movement. Which is just one of the reasons I love walking the streets of my favourite cities – Manhattan, downtown LA, Paris, Melbourne, and Athens – looking for flashes of fabulous. I love that the fashion world has really embraced a new breed of It Girl; a woman who isn’t a Hollywood glamazon but one who has cultivated her own sense of style and may just be a fabulous nobody. Though not for long!
So what makes an It Girl? To me it’s an indefinable something special that turns heads – an X factor. Many celebrities have a genuine X factor but many are manufactured creations of stylists, hair and makeup teams, producers, and agents. I’ve met and worked with quite a few who have zero personality and next to no personality.
A true It Girl works her own kind of magic and before you know it, she’s got tribes of followers on twitter, Facebook, and Instagram, and a posse of media chasing her. She’s not necessarily a conventional beauty, it’s more about style, charisma, and cut through.
Take Alexa Chung for instance; her Cool Britannia beauty and cute but boyish personal style have propelled her profile into the stratosphere, earning her ad campaigns, a fashion following, and countless media gigs.
Or the eccentric Anna Dello Russo: a fabulous-at-50 fashion editor for Vogue Japan who has become a global fashion favourite for her outrageous outfits and that Italian, I-don’t-give-a-damn-what-anyone-thinks-about-wearing-a-ball-gown-and-a-hat-full-of-cherries-at-10am! So popular has she become that H&M commissioned her to create her own accessories collaboration last month which sold out in London within hours of launching and hoardes of paparazzi follow her wherever she goes.
Closer to home is Vogue Australia’s own Christine Centenera whose It Girl status has been snowballing over the past few years. The Sydney-based fashion editor is renowned for working a monochromatic palette, a love of leather, and the way she switches between a razor-sharp silhouette to an apparently effortless, slouchy look. The common CC denominator: amazing, statement shoes! I also love Christine’s grooming signature of a slightly smudged black eye liner, her chestnut brown lob, and that impeccable, bronzed skin courtesy of her Filipino heritage. Designers and fashion brands queue up to work with her, she consults to Kanye West and Ksubi, and she is a regular on top fash blogs like The Sartorialist and Tommy Ton. Christine’s beauty is edgy and always interesting.
Another thing I love about the current It Girl movement is that it’s not necessarily about being young or blonde and blue eyed; anything goes and beauty has never been more global or democratic. One thing these women do have in common is personality – and confidence. A true It Girl makes her own style imprint, embraces and works her personal quirks, and isn’t afraid to experiment. A lesson to us all!
By Napoleon Perdis
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