My meeting with Ellis Faas at Wills Lifestyle India Fashion Week

Ellis Faas is a Celebrity Makeup Artist who has worked with the world's most pre-eminent fashion designers, photographers, stylists, hairdressers and models & has been featured in top magazines in the world. Ellis has worked for make-up brands, such as Clinique, Lancôme and MAC Cosmetics – and she was asked by L'Oréal to create a make-up line for their skin care brand, Biotherm. 

Ellis Flaunts her Makeup arsenal

Ellis did the makeup for the show "Dutch Fashion Here & Now India presents *DIED* & Rohit Gandhi + Rahul Khanna / Suneet Varma & Jan Taminiau" at the Wills Lifestyle India Fashion Week.

Check out Ellis's prolific portfolio here 

 
Ellis Faas as a brand with its avant garde makeup looks always seemed inaccessible to me,like something you would expect to see only on a Karl Lagerfield,Giorgio Armani, Chanel, Dolce & Gabbana, Fendi, Jean-Paul Gaultier, show or on the cover of Vogue photo shoot, but never in real life.

The first thing you notice about Ellis upon meeting her is how statuesque she is,she is extremely tall & graceful. In a free wheeling chat spanning over 1.5 hours Ellis showed a great sense of humor and a very real and instinctive approach to makeup.

I never expected that an iconic make-up artist whom Vogue Paris has called "one of the most influential make-up artists of her generation" to be so down to earth, warm & friendly.

I was very curious on how a Makeup artist actually envisages a shade or a concept for a makeup line and translate that at production stage in the labs.
Ellis told me she spent 5 years as Designer for Biotherm (owned by L'Oreal) and her experience proved invaluable when she developed her own line.Ellis actually mixes her own colors at home and then gets the same replicated in the lab. She also shared the technical issues that are faced in lab manufacturing the products that would work on almost everybody.Ellis's makeup is absolutely against animal testing and the tagline of the brand is 'Tested on Supermodels'

Ellis swatched the products & discussed the idea behind her product's color palette and textures.The shades are inspired by the colors you'd find on human body-her Reds are inspired by blood, and deeper hues by the veins & bruises.All the shades Ellis swatches looked extremely natural and wearable and something that would work on a vast spectrum of skin tones.

Ellis felt the vast variety of packaging in different shapes and sizes meant inconvenience for both the MUAs and the end consumers.She wanted a very sleek & compact casing for her makeup items.Ellis's concept behind the unique and iconic bullet shaped packaging for almost all her products (barring foundation & powder compact) was militaristic designs.The concept was converted in to bullet shaped pen packaging by Industrial designer Arnout Visser.

Another very interesting Military inspired product in Ellis Faas portfolio is the holder which can hold 6 bullet shaped products and the round top can hold powder compact with mirror and puff.

A very interesting product I spotted in Ellis's arsenal was this plastic Clip,which is a very clever little piece of packaging.The plastic clips allow you to literally clip multiple makeup bullets/pens together and make it extremely travel friendly, clip 5-6 of these together an you have your entire range of makeup ready to go!

I swatched Ellis's foundation and they give off the most luminous sheer coverage and the shade actually seemed to adapt to your skin tone.In case you are wondering for dusky Indian skin (MAC NC 45) your corresponding shade in Ellis Faas would be S106L

 Who moved my cheese? ;)

Here are some samples Ellis Shared with me, there are some eye shadows,lip glaze,lip cream,concealers and mascara in the stash.

The iconic bullet shaped packaging looks sleek and distinctive.

Meeting Ellis today was highly inspirational for me,She has spent 30 years on her craft and her passion and skills are par excellence`.
Ellis understood my passion for makeup and how difficult it is juggling blogging as a hobby with a full time career.She shared some very interesting makeup tricks which have always intrigued me ,I hope to try out in some of them in my future looks.

Don't miss Ellis's Bio here
Also Check out Ellis Faas makeup products available at her site www.ellisfaas.com. They have just started accepting payment in Indian rupees and offer free International shipping.

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