Jamie Genevieve is a growing force in the beauty industry. Already a well-respected name – as a make-up artist, an informative content producer on YouTube, and on social media as an influencer – Genevieve has also created her own cosmetics brand, Vieve. So, it’s fair to say Genevieve knows a lot about make-up.

So when the Stylist beauty team had the chance to attend a Zoom make-up masterclass with Genevieve herself, we couldn’t say no.

Here, we share all of the tips and tricks we learned from the make-up expert, from the vital step you should take before applying your foundation to how to make your eyeshadow pop and last longer.

“With my base, it’s so important to make sure that you’re using your skincare first so that it’s hydrated and smooth. Ingredients that I love are niacinamide and hyaluronic acid. If you go backstage [at a fashion show], the make-up artists will spend most of their time prepping the skin. Doing that also means you can use less foundation, too.

“What I love to do now is mix a pump of foundation with a sticky moisturiser or a tacky primer. It means I can infuse that hydration with my foundation and do it in one step, saving time as well.

“I also love using a setting spray – they really work. I cake my face in them and my favourite is the Urban Decay All Nighter Setting Spray, £20.80.

“I spray it after I’ve done my entire base, so powder, blush, bronzer and highlighter. Actually, it’s really nice to use your setting spray before applying highlighter – it just makes your skin slightly damp, giving it more of a sticky texture. So when you’re putting your highlighter on, it really grabs onto your skin.”

“The easiest way to start your eye make-up is to use a base colour that is the same colour as the rest of your face. You can use the Vieve Eye Wands, £21 each, but concealer also works really well – as long as you’ve got something that’s going to blank out your lid. Though, if it’s a slightly oilier concealer, you can sometimes get a little bit of creasing.

“I’ve got some veins on my lid and a bit of discolouration. Sometimes, I’ll play on that and leave my lid free of product and it’ll look like I’ve got eyeshadow on when it’s just the natural tones in my lid. When creating this specific look, what I like to do is cancel that right out and then go in with my eyeshadow to create my own tones. That’s when you can have fun with different colours and textures.

“I’ve gone for a brightened eye, using the Vieve Eye Wand in Vanilla, £21. They were formulated in Korea and they’re so pigmented. So, if I was to use colourful eyeshadow on top of this, it would really pop. One of my favourite tricks is to go in with a shade like Hazelnut and buff that all over my lid and then go in with a smoky eye. It’s like most of the work is done for me.

“If you use a concealer to blank out your lids, it’s important to set it and take away any tackiness. I’ve got quite oily eyelids, so by using a concealer and then setting it, it gives me a really even blank canvas. Also, when you go in with your darker eyeshadow shades, it’s not going to stick to one area and you’re not going to struggle to blend out.”

“Once my eyelid is one colour, I like to build up colour in my crease using Buff from the Vieve The Essential Eye Palette, £43. It depends on how you like to do make-up, but I think the easiest way is to start with your lighter shades and get darker.

“I think that when it comes to make-up, my biggest tip is how you pick up the product. I’m quite gentle: I like to tap the brush twice and then I’ve got this habit of hitting my brush on my pinky finger to get any excess off the brush.

“Also, when working on my crease, I love to hold my mirror just slightly down in front of my face. Then, you can see where the crease naturally falls, as you’ve got a little bit of a shadow there. That’s where I would pop Buff for a little bit of definition. You can take your eyeshadow all the way across your crease but I prefer taking it upwards to meet the brow because if I was going to go downward into my inner corner, it would close up my eyes.

“It really does depend on how you want to make your eyes look. It’s all about using shading and light and to achieve the effect that you want. For example, my eyes are quite close together so I would get Glimmer [from The Essential Eye Palette] on my finger and pat it on my inner corners. By creating that light in the inner corner, I’ve immediately made my eyes look like they are set further apart. I also always keep my smoky eye halfway across the eye. So, the outer half is the darkest area – this makes my eyes appear larger.

“Another trick I like doing is taking a larger brush, like a powder brush, and sweeping that from my outer corner up towards my hairline. It creates a shadow and also lifts my face. It makes everything look super blended as well and it’s a great trick if you’re going darker with your eyes. It also works well with hooded eyes.

“To darken the edges, I use the shade Delicious, which is like a chocolate brown, and focus it on the outer corners. Here, I could put on mascara and be done.

“But another thing I love to do is deepening my lash line. I take a flat, dense eyeshadow brush or an angled brush and tap it into the shade Goodnight, a blend-able black. I gently wiggle that on the outer corners. This adds a tiny bit more thickness to the lash line and a little bit more depth.

“To flick it, I take the black to the end of my lashline and then I take my finger and just swipe it. What I love about it is it doesn’t need to be perfect. It’s shadow so it does have a bit of a blendability to it – you can manipulate it, blend it, wipe it away. I think using shadow is an easy way to play with your liner and define your eyes.”

“When I was younger, I thought blusher involved applying it to the apples of your cheeks and that was it – but that’s not the case at all. There are really flattering ways you can wear blush.

“The way I personally do my blush placement is all about my face shape. I dab my brush into the formula with two little taps and, again, hit it off my pinky finger to get rid of any excess.

“A great way to use a darker blush, if you’re scared of it coming out really strong, is circling the brush onto your hand first. What that does is, it gets rid of any excess product but also pushes the product into the brush, so when I start to apply, it’s so sheer that you can’t go wrong.

“For my application, I start at the back of my face – almost where you bronze – and bring that down onto the cheek. Instead of smiling, I like to apply my blush when my face is relaxed so I can see exactly what it’ll look like.

“In terms of the amount, I tend to pull back on my blush when my eyes get heavier. It’s all down to preference.”

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