Festival season is fast approaching and whether you're heading to Body & Soul, Electric Picnic, All Together Now or Sea Sessions, you’re probably wondering how you can possibly look human while camping in a field in (quite possibly) torrential rain.
Thankfully, Alexa Chung has come to the rescue with a festival-friendly make-up tutorial that promises to keep you looking fresh, even though the closest thing you’ve seen to a shower is roll-on deoderant.
"This video came about from being about from being at Glastonbury," Chung explains in the tutorial.
"It’s rainy and it’s muddy and you’re on day three, you’re wearing a jumper that someone’s spilled cider on already and you’ve lost one wellington boot – so you’ve got probably a plastic bag around one foot."
She continues: "In this context, I like to sometimes pick myself back up again by creating perfect make-up – which is trying to make the head region look as nice as possible so that everyone else doesn’t focus on the rest of it."
If you’re heading to Glastonbury, or any other festival for that matter, here are just a few of Chung’s holy grail make-up products for looking your best. So even if you’re smelly, greasy and covered in stale beer, there’s still hope…
1. Augustinus Bader The Cream, £205 (approx €230)
After a few days at a festival, your skin can take a knock from drinking too much booze* and not enough water. "Hydration is very important," says Chung, who relies on Augustinus Bader’s cult moisturiser to provide some much-needed luminosity. "It’s very expensive so I act like it’s little pieces of gold. It’s very good though," she says.
2. Tinted Moisturiser in Nude by Laura Mercier, €48, Brown Thomas
Chung says that years of wearing thick make-up as a model has stopped her from wearing a full coverage base layer. "I don’t really like foundation," she says. "In real life I like to keep it pretty plain Jane."
She uses Laura Mercier’s tinted moisturiser to even out any redness. As a bonus, it also has SPF 20 to keep your skin protected from UV damage.
3. "Un" Cover-Up Concealer in Shade 11 by RMS, $36 (approx €32)
Dark circles are unavoidable at festivals. After a few days partying into the early hours and then getting woken up at 7am by the sun beating down on your tent, fatigue can really start to show.
Chung uses RMS’ "Un" Cover-Up concealer to hide the damage. As well as having a really natural finish, it’s clean of any parabens.
4. Framing Eyebrow Liquid Pen in Khaki by Suqqu, $48 (approx €42 ), Amazon
If all else fails, a good brow can distract from whatever else is going on with your skin. "The only thing I’m happy with my face is my eyebrows," says Chung, who flicks Suqqu’s liquid brow pen through her brows for a more defined arch.
5. Carpates Eyeliner Stylo by NARS, €27, Brown Thomas
It wouldn’t be an Alexa Chung make-up look without a Sixties cat-eye. She uses Nars’ eyeliner stylo to achieve the perfect flick on the lash line.
As well as being easy to apply, this formulation is smudge-proof, so your eye make-up thankfully won’t melt away into a grubby mess when you’re 10 songs deep into The Chemical Brothers’ set.
