Meredith Duxbury On Her “More Is More” Approach to Makeup Application

The content material creator has amassed a staggering 21 million followers throughout her social media platforms by showcasing a stunning method to make-up utility.

Each nook of social media has key gamers who’ve mastered the artwork of the shock issue. On #BeautyTok, nobody does it higher than Meredith Duxbury.

Her movies are laborious to overlook, even tougher to scroll previous, and are centred on her signature makeup-application method: a really heavy-handed method — and that’s placing it flippantly — that has helped her rack up over 18.5 million followers on TikTok (and three million on Instagram and YouTube mixed).

She applies no fewer than 10 pumps of foundation throughout her face (together with her eyelids and lips) after which, utilizing a round movement, rubs within the thick coat of make-up along with her arms as if it have been probably the most hydrating moisturizer on the earth. After which comes concealer, contour, forehead gel, blush, eyeshadow and mascara — the works. She usually lip-synchs to a well-liked music all through the video. Even for those who’re not on #BeautyTok, that is in all probability beginning to ring a bell.

“I in all probability use 25 to 30 merchandise every time,” says Duxbury over the cellphone from New York Metropolis. “It will depend on how intricate the look is.” Ah, sure, the look — the ultimate outcome after a small mountain of merchandise have been utilized and blended. In any case is claimed and achieved, Duxbury’s make-up appears to be like, nicely, regular. The truth is, it appears to be like nice.

Does it appear like a full face of make-up? Positive. But it surely’s definitely no extra excessive than the total beat that’s standard on TikTok.

So why the handfuls of steps if the ultimate product might in all probability be achieved with far much less? Duxbury insists she’s been doing her make-up like this for years; she started sporting heavy, full-coverage basis to cowl her freckles, a former insecurity of hers. “I began noticing that my magnificence sponge was absorbing lots of product,” she says. “Once I’d use my arms, the inspiration would soften actually properly into my pores and skin.”

The method bought her seen on TikTok, and she or he shortly skyrocketed. By December 2020, she had constructed up a following of 1 million. That month, she began #TheFoundationChallenge, inviting others on TikTok to attempt her method. By January 2021, she had grown her following to a whopping seven million. Immediately, she is the second-most-followed TikTok magnificence content material creator, and her most-watched video at present has greater than 135 million views.

With this in a single day virality got here an obsession with creating her subsequent hit. “On the time, I used to be actually careworn,” Duxbury confesses. “I put a lot strain on myself, and I’d be so upset if I made a video that didn’t get, like, 30 million views. I’d be up all evening checking my numbers; I couldn’t sleep.”

Lately, she says, she doesn’t get sucked into the cycle: “The important thing to going viral just isn’t doing one thing simply since you assume it’s gonna go viral; you need to actually like it. The beauty of TikTok’s algorithm is that it provides all people a good likelihood. You don’t need to have connections or a ton of current followers to go viral.”

One more reason she prefers the video app over others is as a result of it aligns along with her model of working and speaking. “I’ve ADHD, and the best way I work may be very fast-paced,” she says. “I lose curiosity in issues except they’re fast and to the purpose, so with TikTok being such short-form content material, it permits me to get out what I have to say in 15 to 30 seconds.”

Duxbury’s most up-to-date challenge is a limited-edition collaboration with Morphe (that includes two palettes, a multi-purpose gloss, a lip liner and lip glaze duo and a forehead gel and brush), though she hopes to launch her personal stand-alone model at some point and grow to be a everlasting fixture within the magnificence world — an trade she says has been “very welcoming” to her and her controversial method.

“That’s the great thing about make-up and why I believe folks get into the trade — there aren’t any guidelines or limits; everyone feels free to do what they want,” she says. However when that day comes, don’t count on a minimalist no-makeup make-up providing. Duxbury says that doing pure make-up doesn’t problem her mind. “With these advanced, intricate looks, you want a gradual hand, the traces need to be crisp and there’s mixing — there’s only a lot to consider,” she explains. “I might do pure make-up with my eyes closed, however with full glam, you need to actually listen.”

Take a look at Meredith’s must-have magnificence necessities:

This text first appeared in FASHION’s November 2023 difficulty. Find out more here.

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