Some of us have spent most of our lives relying on bright lipsticks and avoiding learning how to do fancy eye-makeup. Perhaps you also have hooded eyelids that make it a struggle to do creative eyeshadow masterpieces and graphic eyeliner looks, or maybe eye makeup is not your forte. Either way, the worldwide pandemic made lipstick pointless (no one will see it under the mask, or it will just smear all over the place). If you’re also lost as to how to express yourself through makeup in current conditions, we might have a solution for you — ear makeup. Yes, you read that right. It’s a thing and it’s becoming quite popular.
Weirdly enough, this isn’t something that was invented during the pandemic, ear makeup has been around for the past couple of years, but the wide use of masks and face coverings definitely urged this unusual trend closer to being mainstream.
It makes perfect sense if you think about it. With half of your face covered for your own safety and virus protection, you might as well find other ways to express yourself. Many chose the classic route of cutting and coloring their hair and wearing brighter eyeshadows, but the true creatives chose to do ear makeup and we’re kind of loving it. It’s fresh, it’s fun, it’s creative and it’s something new to try. We’re loving all the unique takes on this trend and we can only hope you’ll get inspired by these and try some of them out.
We can’t talk about ear makeup and not mention Martha Butterworth, it seems like she was one of the first makeup artists to venture into ear makeup. She’s not afraid to use not only makeup but also various little accessories and even tiny figurines to create little works of art on her ears. Her themes range from floral designs to bizarre but romantic scenes. Sometimes her ear makeup creations are creepy and sometimes they even touch upon religious symbolism.
Some people on TikTok and Instagram have attempted to emulate the looks Martha was creating, others created their own visions. It seems like even the fashion industry is ready to hop onto this trend, but with a more minimalistic approach of solid colors and geometric shapes.
We love it all, be it just some dots, dashes, and lines, colored in earlobes, gold accents, or just glitter, sequins, crystals, and stars all over the ear. Match your ear makeup to your eye makeup or make it a pop of color in contrast to a nude everyday look. The more unique the better, after all, it’s all about expressing yourself and when the medium of self-expression is so strange, you might as well go all out.
