Ground Control to Kat Von D. We love this brow.

For the artist at heart, who likes to experiment; paint, trace and spool this way. Add an artful flick here. A Ziggy bolt there. Even a star, for a little magic. This is all about being creative and experimental; play dress-ups with diamantés, stickers and jewels and get lost in the magic of makeup.

Care of Tara Buenrostro – the graffiti-loving, eyeliner-obsessed member of Kat Von D’s Artistry Collective – it’s a look crafted to wow. The brow is clean and well-manicured, but with an element of surprise – a painterly splash on one side, a beautiful electrostatic discharge thanks to the meticulous handiwork of Buenrostro. An inspired take on Bowie’s bolt from eras past, this souped-up Ziggy is both bold and arresting, whilst the teeny, tiny star adds some sparkle.

BROW TALK WITH Tara Buenrostro
@juscallmetara

can you tell us about the brow look…
I wanted to incorporate Super Brow Long-Wear Pomade in a more defined way. I used Super Brow in Medium Brown and Dark Brown to really carve out and sculpt her eyebrows. I used the #70 Pomade Brow Brush and picked up product to create the brow and create false hair strokes in the front because she was missing some, and I wanted to make sure it paired up really nicely with her eye shape. I really love Super Brow for this look because it gives it a little bit more contrast, you can use a little more pigment, and it gives you really great colour pay off, but you could also use it really lightly, too. I used a pretty healthy amount to make sure we sculpted the eyebrows.

You said the brow matched her eye shape, is there a trick when it comes to different eye shapes and different brows?
The eyebrows are pretty much the frame for the entire face. So, correctively there is a way to get the perfect eyebrow, but again it’s all based off preference. If you liked your eyebrows to be all across your face like Frida, then that’s totally up to you. But the correct way to enhance your eye shape as well as your face shape is to take a pen or pencil to the side of the edge of the nose, and drag it straight upright, and that’s correctively where your brow should start. Then from the edge of the nose, hugging the outside of the outer edge of the eye straight, is where the tail should be. Then for the arch, look straight and give it a 45-degree angle, which should be angled out the side of the nose to the pupil. You always want to start filling in your brow at the arch because that’s your initial point of intensity, so that’s where the majority of the product will sit.

So for Tatiana, I started at the arch, sculpted out the eyebrow and had her look straight to make sure I had her arch dead on, and then I dragged the tail to where it correctively should end for her eye shape, then took whatever remaining product I had left in my brush and lightly filled in the front part before I drew in the fake hairs.

How did you create the bolt feature?
I used Tattoo Liner, which I am absolutely obsessed with and I think it needs to be in everybody’s makeup bag, but that doesn’t mean everyone has to have a lighting bolt on their eye! It’s inspired by Kat’s tattoo needle, so if you see her portraits, she has to have the thinnest, finest lines for the detail work she creates. That’s why I chose to work with Tattoo Liner because it allows me to get really clean, solid lines, as well as filling in super sloppily the brushes, it’s absolutely insane. I used that to create this lightning bolt look. I did a star in the negative space on the inside of the bolt, just because I feel like it really represents the brand, and so I wanted people to not only be attracted to the brow, but also to the bolted liner because I feel like it speaks for Kat Von D Beauty.

What does Kat Von D Beauty stand for?
When people look at the brand initially, they might think it’s for the goth girl, but for me, Kat Von D Beauty represents all of us. Whether you’re male or female, or a 98-year-old grandma or a 15-year-old girl playing with makeup for the first time. My grandma is 78-years-old and she just went through chemotherapy and lost all her hair and needed product to fill in her brows, so we got Super Brow, and she absolutely loves it and can do it by herself now. I think that’s what is so special about Kat Von D Beauty, is that it is the perfect brand for any and everyone, and the product speaks for itself – they’re full coverage, high-pigmented, waterproof-wear. Being vegan and cruelty-free is really important to me, too, and I’m really proud to represent a brand that has the same morals and beliefs that I do.

In terms of Kat Von D’s aesthetic, it is quite conceptual and Avant Garde and skews towards the dramatic. Is there a way the everyday girl can apply it?
I feel like the gateway product would always be a red lipstick. A red lip is the perfect way to dress up any outfit. If you’re somebody who doesn’t really wear any makeup at all but you want to spice up something, I feel just throwing on a red lip is the gateway to trying new products. Then you might want to try deeper tone colours or fun, funky colours. Another example would be eyebrows. Obviously we just launched a complete brow collection. In the 24-Hour Super Brow collection there’s 16 colours and 9 creative shades. So for beautiful light eyes for example, if we were to throw on a little bit of the burgundy shade in the brow collection, Aubergine, just take a mascara wand through your eyebrows very lightly, it doesn’t have to be this crazy purple, but it would totally enhance your eye colour because you’re playing with complementary colour theory. I think that’s another fun trick or way that people can get excited about trying fun, funky things.

You talk a lot about texture, and that you’re quite tactile with your beauty. What’s a good way to apply texture and what do you mean by texture in beauty?
For me, I always like to find beauty in weird places or small things. Even walking into this awesome studio today, all the graffiti outside, I was so stoked on. Another way you can look at it is gloss instead of a matte lip, or glossy eyelids, or where you’re putting highlight, shimmer products vs. more matte colours. When you’re contouring you always want to work with something more matte because it’s going to push that area back, it’s going to recede. If you’re working with textures like metallic or shimmers, that is going to bring an area forward. I think that is really important in beauty, too, that when you’re doing your own makeup, it might not necessarily be what your favourite YouTube artist is doing. You don’t want to replicate that because your face shape might be totally different. So looking at texture that way, too, and recognising that shimmer products, metallic products and glitters are all going to be the first thing that walks into the room, where everything else kind of trails second.

you’re inspired by graffiti art. how do you translate that to beauty?
I am super inspired by graffiti art. I just really love it because it makes me looks at colours differently and it helps me create specific colour stories in my makeup that I might not necessarily have thought of. There’s this really cool piece outside that’s blue, orange, red, and has a little bit of green to it. Those colours look so bright and vibrant and really cool together, but I wouldn’t necessarily think to put them together in the beginning. And that doesn’t mean I have to do this really crazy blurred out, funky, weird, crazy graffiti eye. I could do a navy blue eye shadow all over my lid, a brick red through my crease, and maybe a tiny little pop of olive green in my inner corner and underneath to smoke it out, and that could be a really cool everyday look as well or going out on the town.

what’s the best piece of beauty advice you’ve ever received?
Some of the best advice I’ve ever been given is to master the art of restraint and to know when to take a step back, look at your work, and stop. Because sometime you want to do the liner, and do the smoky eye, and you want to do this glitter lip, then you want to throw stars on your face. Then you’re like wait a second, if I had just left it at the clean, classic look it would’ve looked like a million bucks as opposed to looking cheesy. The girl who I was really inspired by always told me, “If you look at a souped-up Honda and it’s got all the bells and whistles, but then there’s a Lamborghini next to it, you’re always going to go with the Lamborghini’. I look at that in my makeup looks, even if I do crazy body painting or Avant Garde type, editorial looks, that’s when I really need to take a step back and evaluate the makeup that I just did and know when to stop. It’s probably been the most challenging thing I’ve had to deal with as a makeup artist, but I still practice it every single day whenever I create my makeup looks.

if you could only pick one kat von d product, what would it be? and could you do an entire face with it?
I would probably say for every and anyone it would be Studded Kiss Creme Lipstick in Lolita. It’s not my personal favourite, I love Ludwig, but I couldn’t really put that on my cheeks and eyes. I think Lolita would be perfect for pretty much every skin tone to use as a blush or the lip colour, or, if you need a bit of colour on the eyes. You could definitely use that colour any and everywhere.

Is there one unique trick that you do that not many people know about?
I always use liquid lipsticks on my eyes for fun, funky eyeliner colours. There’s an Everlasting Liquid Lipstick colour called Dreamer that’s a really pretty sky-blue, kind of a teal-ish shade, and I love that as a really cool, clean colour to do an eyeliner look with and give a pop of colour. The liquid lipsticks make really good eyeliners.

Credits: 
PHOTOGRAPHER & Videography: E. Michael Wolf
Talent: Tatiana Rose

Makeup: Tara Buenrostro for Kat Von D beauty
Hair: Peter Beckett
content Direction: Justine O’Donnell