Makeup

Got Freckles? You're Probably Making These Makeup Mistakes

Are you ruining your best asset with these makeup fails? Stop smearing on the wrong products with these pro tips

by Allie Flinn | COMMENT

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You're Wearing the Wrong Shade of Foundation If freckles cover most of your face, choose a shade of foundation that falls between the different shades of your freckles, says Los Angeles, California-based celebrity makeup artist Taylor Babaian. If you choose a shade that's too light (say, a shade that matches your jawline), it can turn your freckles a gray-ish color. If your freckles are mostly concentrated on your cheeks, Babaian says it's probably best to use two separate shades of foundation -- one for your freckled skin, and one for your non-freckled skin.

Just be sure to choose a foundation with a sheer texture, otherwise, your face will end up a couple shades darker than your chest. Babaian also likes sheer fluid foundation because they help even out your skin tone and let your freckles shine through. Nars Sheer Glow Foundation is a good option with buildable coverage (more on that later). Or, opt for a tinted moisturizer. Katie Jane Hughes, makeup artist and Global Colour Ambassador for Butter London, likes Laura Mercier because the line has a wide variety of tones and shades that makes it easy to match on anyone.

SEE NEXT PAGE: Your Bronzer Blends Into Your Freckles

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For anyone, finding the perfect foundation shade is about as easy as following a rainbow to its end. Add freckles to the mix and, well, you might as well be looking for a leprechaun and pot of gold, too. You're faced with issues like whether you should match your foundation to your freckles, to the rest of your face or to some shade halfway between the two.Then, there's the question of coverage: Should you completely cover them? If you don't want to conceal them, will your freckles look strangely muted? The list of questions goes on and on, making it easy to give up on makeup altogether. So we turned to Katie Jane Hughes, makeup artist and Global Colour Ambassador for Butter London, and Los Angeles-based celebrity makeup artist Taylor Babaian to answer all our questions about applying makeup to freckled skin.

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