Charlotte Tilbury
Makeup artist Charlotte Tilbury is renowned for creating gorgeous beauty looks for celebrities like Adele, Penelope Cruz, Kim Kardashian and Jennifer Aniston. She is best friends with Kate Moss, and did Amal Clooney's wedding day make-up when she married George Clooney in Venice.
Not quite content with her success as a make-up artist, Charlotte has recently launched her own make-up products. Her aim with the ‘Charlotte Tilbury’ range is to bring her famous red carpet looks to reality for women around the world. She is passionate about make-up, firm in the belief that it is “a woman’s secret weapon”, and wants to engage the 50% of British females who do not use beauty products to their advantage.
She has tried to simplify make-up by packaging her range into 10 carefully edited, signature looks which can be bought as a kit, meaning that you can’t go wrong when you recreate it at home. My personal favourite look is Uptown Girl which is “groomed, glossy, gorgeous perfection.” Having been raised in Ibiza, the glamorous bronzed look has become Charlotte’s signature style, which all her products reflect.
The range is sold nationwide in selected stores, including John Lewis Liverpool, as well as a flagship “beauty boudoir” in Covent Garden. It has had great success since its launch two years ago and is highly regarded within the beauty industry. The packaging, the range of colours and textures, but most importantly the quality, have catapulted the brand into an award winning bestseller which is loved by celebrities, models, makeup artists and editors. It’s no surprise that this week Charlotte has been nominated for the Veuve Clicquot Business Women Award 2016.
For Charlotte, the formula of her products is paramount. She has beavered away with her team in secret laboratories to perfect her magic lotions and potions for the past 5 years, until she was finally happy to release it to the public.
Having gained her expansive knowledge of beauty through working at top level for the past 20 years at the forefront of the industry, she has poured all her best-kept secrets into her make-up products.
She has a very refreshing stance on beauty, that women should not feel guilty for wearing make-up saying it can help make the best version of yourself, calling it “the incredible transformative power of make-up.”
I was fortunate enough to receive an invitation to attend an event earlier today to meet Charlotte at John Lewis in Liverpool to learn more about the range.
Before I arrived I visited the brands counter in the beauty hall of John Lewis. It’s very glamorous and buzzing with beautiful sales people. I was served by the lovely Jodie who applied the Filmstar Bronze and Glow.
Charlotte is a fan of contouring providing it is done correctly. This product does just that. There’s no awful orange or grey tones, just a clever blend of pearl and pigment to give a perfect sun-kissed complexion. Think J-Lo!
The product is also Paraben-free which is a huge plus for me and my sensitive skin. Jodie also applied a lip-pencil in Pillowtalk and a coating of Bitch Perfect lipstick which were both beautifully nude. Once my transformation was complete I was lead upstairs to a private room to meet the lady herself.
Charlotte was absolutely lovely, and spoke for over 90 minutes about her products with such passion. This isn’t just a brand she has put her name to, she has carefully selected each and every product and its formulation and knows her brand inside out.
During her talk she gave us an insight into her life as a make-up artist and was open and honest about herself and the industry. I have to say I was really impressed with how down to earth she was and how much time she spent talking through her products. She was really warm, absolutely hilarious and only too happy to answer questions and pose for photographs afterwards.
Equally her team were all lovely, each of them taking the time to demonstrate the products on us while Charlotte spoke. At the end of the talk we were all gifted a make-up bag containing a look for us to take home. I was given Uptown Girl and can’t wait to try the products.
I’ll post a follow up review once I have had a chance to try each product individually. In the meantime, here are some titbits about Charlotte:
- Her husband has never seen her without make-up, she takes her make-up off at night and then immediately reapplies it before bed
- Her favourite cocktails are Margaritas and Skinny Bitches (vodka, lime and soda)
- Her favourite place in Ibiza is La Paloma in San Lorenzo
- Her biggest inspirations are Coco Chanel, Estee Lauder and Helena Rubinstein, who famously said "There are no ugly women, only lazy ones”
- Kate Moss is godmother to both of her two young children
- Her father is an artist and she used his painting brushes as inspiration when designing her makeup brush collection
- She has over 220 black dresses and over 350 pairs of shoes in her Notting Hill home, only one set of which are flats
A huge thank you to Charlotte and her team for such a lovely day, and a big thanks to John Lewis for my invitation.