Eyeliner - This Season's Big News

Eyeliner was the surprise must have cosmetic item this autumn and looks set to continue to be big news throughout the winter.

But forget the heavy, painted line of the 1970s. Today's eyeliner today comes in easy to use pencils or pens. Some are pencils you have to sharpen or there are those that twist up and self-sharpen, some come complete with smudger to blend and tidy up. Some are gel based, some felt tipped. All give a softer more subtle look, are very easy to control and mistakes can be easily corrected.

Instead of the old choice of black or brown you will find that eyeliner is now available in a myriad of bright colours you can blend and smudge to create a variety of up to the minute looks. Bourjois, Maybelline, Max Factor and Lancome offer a gorgeous selection of colours in their ranges

We all gave a collective gasp when we saw Kate Moss wearing red eyeliner in the Rimmel Cosmetics TV ad. Who would have thought that could be such a good look? A word of warning though, for us lesser mortals red eyeliner is still likely to make us look like we are seriously hung-over.

A much safer option is to go for a lilac, mauve, purple shade, the colour spectrum tipped to be the in shades for this winter. To integrate your eyeliner into your usual make-up routine apply a pale lilac eye shadow to your whole eye area, use a darker mauve socket line shadow colour and then apply a thin pencil line, in a dark toning purple, close to your eye lashes. Try to imagine doing a child's dot to dot from eyelash to eyelash. You can either leave it as a defined line, especially if you have made a neat job of it or you can blend it into your eye shadow for a really dramatic look. This technique can be used with any colour combination, greens, blues, greys what ever you like. You can experiment and mix and match colours endlessly.

If you are feeling confident and have a steady hand a white line drawn on the inside of the lower lashes has an instant wide, open eye effect. A small white dot placed in each corner will also open up the eyes.

If you have seen any of the fashion mags or any catwalk footage recently you will have noticed that a favourite look amongst the Supermodels is very dramatic eyeliner as the predominant effect. Eyeliner, in dark blues, purples, greens or burgundies, is taken above and under the eyes and smudged out wide. The eyeliner is used against a "blank canvass" face. Foundation is single tone and matte with no blusher. Lips can be neutral glossed or bright glossy red. This is a very effective party look if you want to be noticed and have good bone structure but try it out first, as it won't suit everyone.

Black or brown mascara is still probably the best choice with this look and a good volumising product, using several coats, will be needed to be noticed against the strong liner. L'Oreal's Volume Shocking, a two step, or Maybelline's Volum' Express will both give a good result.

For party or clubbing glitz try adding sparkle with Rimmel's Crystal Tip Mascara, a clear base with glittery sparkle to use as a top coat over your mascara, on your eyebrows and through your hair.

Finally don't forget to remove all traces of eye make-up every night. If you think smudged mascara looks bad, smudged mascara and eyeliner together looks truly scary :)