Feel Like You’re About To Walk The Red Carpet With These Beauty Prep Tips

With the 83rd Annual Academy Awards airing on February 27th, we’re all anxious to see which Hollywood stars will shine the brightest during their strolls down the red carpet. And ,while it’s fun to live vicariously through these celebrities, there’s nothing like getting glammed up yourself, slithering into a festive cocktail dress or floor-length gown, styling your tresses like a silver screen star (be it Louise Brooks’ chin-length bob or Jennifer Lopez’s voluptuous mane), preparing your skin to look its most radiant, and accentuating your best features with a precise makeup application.

As one of QVC’s Red Carpet Q Correspondents, I’m thrilled to share some insights on the best beauty products, as well as makeup application techniques and tricks of the trade — all of which will help you look fabulous enough to attract your own flock of paparazzi.

Let the beauty lesson commence!

1. The Dark Knight should remain a movie title, not become a potential nickname for the area under your eyes. If those peepers are, in fact, the windows to your soul, you need to open the curtains and let the light pour in. Choose a potent concealer formulation that will easily camouflage dark circles. One of my top picks is Benefit’s Erase Paste, a creamy, brightening, blendable concealer available in three shades: Fair, Medium or Deep.

2. Crack is wack. And cracked lips are almost as bad, so keep your pout smooth and moisturized. Before worrying about lip color options, make sure the foundation is sound by keeping your lips hydrated with a fail-proof lip balm. After all, chapped and flaky lips will dim the wattage of that million-dollar smile, and we can’t have that! Two great lip balm options: Fresh’s Sugar Lip Treatment SPF 15, which relies on the humectant properties of sugar and features vitamins C and E to protect lips from free radicals; and Votre Vu’s Champagne Kisses, an emollient lip balm featuring hydrating and softening coconut oil, shea butter, and sweet almond oil.

3. Get the famous (and widely coveted) “J.Lo glow” with a shimmering body moisturizer that will make your skin look as if it were lit from within.  Lopez’s long-time makeup artist makes this task a cinch with his Body Bling Moisturizing Body Lotion, a washable, tinted, bronzing lotion that delivers a sun-kissed effect.

4. Accentuate and contour your strongest facial features, such as your cheekbones, with a shimmering face highlighter. We swear by NARS The Multiple (pictured above in Luxor), which is available in 13 sheer, shimmering shades ranging from pink champagne to rich bronze. These easy-to-use, retractable sticks can be applied to cheeks, lips, eyes, and décolletage. All you have to do is glide te stick over the desired area and blend in the color deposited until it looks like it’s melted onto the skin for a natural effect.

5. Whether you’re toying with shimmering metallic shadows or soft neutral shades, planning an ultra-glam, Joan Collins-worthy eye look, or lining peepers with a vivid kohl pencil, start by priming lids to ensure that any eye makeup applied will stay put throughout the evening without creasing, smudging, or melting under all those bright lights. I’d strongly suggest the Urban Decay Eyeshadow Primer Potion since it dries extremely fast and locks color in so that your makeup looks as fresh at the end of the evening as it did in the beginning. The UD Primer Potion is available in: Eden, a tawny matte shade; Sin, a shimmering champagne color; and Original, a white-ish nude.

6. Take a hands-on approach — literally — with a fresh manicure. Kate Winslet, Renée Zellwegger, and Penelope Cruz all flaunted manicures by Deborah Lippmann when they accepted their Oscars, so the nail expert does seem to have the magic touch. Her signature nail lacquer collection includes such gorgeous colors as Don’t Tell Mama, a shimmering emerald green with teal blue undertones, and Waking Up in Vegas, a creamy, grayish taupe sported by Lady Gaga on the cover of Vanity Fair magazine.

7. Whether your hair is styled into a demure chignon or left flowing, with loose, romantic curls draping your face, give the look hold with a top-notch hairspray that eliminates the dreaded, icky crunch factor. If you spritz the L’Oreal Elnett Hairspray onto your tresses, your hair will stay in place while remaining soft to the touch. Score!

 
8. Whether you go for an old Hollywood look with a scarlet red pout or keep the mouth understated with a creamy nude shade, choose a lipstick that is richly pigmented and that adheres nicely to lips, reducing the possibility of any feathering or streaking. Preferably, use lipgloss over lipstick to add a hint of sheen, rather than having it replace lipstick. There are tons of great lipstick options, but I swear by the Sephora.com lipstick range, which includes 50 shades ranging from a matte, flesh-toned hue to a blackcurrant purple, a satin coral, and a can-can red. Each lipstick is formulated with 50% more pigment than traditional lipsticks, and it will stay on your lips for hours and hours — even as you drink champagne, sip on water, and smile and gab the night away.

9. For your big night out, pack a purse-sized perfume atomizer inside your clutch so you can spritz it on as needed. Many fragrance houses have released refillable purse sprays of their best-selling scents. One of my favorite options: the Prada Infusion d’Iris Purse Spray, a sleek, stainless steel vaporizer with a chain and snap clip for added convenience.

10. After applying foundation, powder, blush, eyeshadow, and mascara, seal the deal with a makeup setting spray that will lock your look in place. The MAC Cosmetics Fix+ not only sets makeup, but it calms and hydrates skin with a mix of chamomile, green tea, and cucumber. If your skin is on the oily side, check out Urban Decay’s De-Slick Oil-Control Makeup Setting Spray, a lightweight mist that will keep your makeup in check and save your complexion from looking greasy or shiny.

Well, ladies, that’s just a few tips for you! How would you get red carpet ready? Share your secrets and tips in the comments section below!

For more guidance on how to get red carpet ready, check out QVC’s “Buzz on the Red Carpet – Live from LA” on Friday, February 25th at 9 p.m. ET and Saturday, February 26th at 8 p.m. ET. Both broadcasts will be filmed live from the prestigious Four Seasons Hotel Los Angeles at Beverly Hills.

Program highlights include the debut of Gossip Girl star Kelly Rutherford’s handbag line for QVC and appearances by designers like Isaac Mizrahi, Dennis Basso and the Kardashian sisters. Beauty lovers will also get the scoop on stars’ favorite products from brands like Kate Somerville, Josie Maran, Laura Geller, Smashbox, and Tarte Cosmetics.

For a special online preview of the weekend’s events, visit http://bit.ly/QVCWebcast

Also, check out more red carpet beauty tips from my fellow Q correspondents: Patrice Grell Yursik of Afrobella, Bailey Vincent Clark of Makeover Momma, Tammy Gibson of A Mom in Red High Heels, Emily Wagner of Groomed LA, and April Daniels Hussar of Betty Confidential.