Last month I was asked by the editor of local senior newspaper, The Messenger, to write an article on makeup tips for seniors. With a love for writing, I couldn’t turn it down. Besides, there are no age limitations to using makeup. You just need to know how to achieve the best results. Here’s what  The Messenger published in their October 2014 newspaper:

Makeup tips by Celena Rubin

I view beauty makeup as a tool to enhance the natural beauty that we all possess, not as a way to disguise ourselves or make us appear different than who we really are. If you know how to use makeup right, just a little makeup can bring out those qualities that we love about ourselves.

When we realize it’s time to steer away from “young” fashions, it’s probably also the time that we might want to adjust which makeup products we use, and focus our attention on how to keep our skin looking as youthful and healthy as we feel. We may also want to use makeup to fake how youthful and healthy we want to feel! Here’s three tips to help:

Stay away from shimmer. Makeup is all about sculpting the way light reflects off the skin. As the texture of our eyelids change, we don’t want to draw attention to the unevenness that has replaced young taut skin. Shimmer or luminescent eye shadow highlights and reflects off of any object that is more forward, therefore drawing attention to an uneven skin texture. When choosing eye shadows, select matte shadows. You can still highlight the lid, but with a matte tone.

To keep skin looking healthy and sun kissed, there are a couple of options. The first one is to use a violet primer under your foundation. This will cancel out yellow in the skin, and create a more vibrant skin tone. The other option is to look for a foundation with a slightly pink tone, which will also help cancel out yellow and give the skin a healthy glow.

Stick with colors in the same color family. This will create color harmony. If you are planning on using a peach lipstick, then also use a peach blush and warm colored eye shadows such as warm reddish-browns or peach. If you are wearing a cool pastel pink lipstick, then choose cool colors for your blush and eyeshadows. This would include a similar colored blush, and eyeshadows that might be cool grays, blues, or plum.

Just these couple of tricks can make all the difference in your makeup application!

Celena Rubin is the owner of Art of Makeup School for Professional Makeup Artistry in Vancouver, WA. www.artofmakeup.com