A large proportion of our makeup customers are in a 50+ demographic, and they are always so much fun to interact with. A common theme that comes up is that many of these customers are not used to buying makeup online, and we are often asked to provide some help or tips to point them in the right direction.
This guide here will hopefully be a brief but succinct primer to differentiate what to look for, how to shop, and how best to select makeup for mature skin along with some descriptions as to why our products work beautifully on mature skin.
How Is Mature Skin Different?
In order to help our mature customers pick makeup products, it is important to first list the most prevalent differences compared to other demographic groups.
Thinning Skin & Loss of Elasticity: as we age, our skin becomes thinner over time, with decreasing elasticity. Picking products that have some slip & glide will make application easiest, vs. products like eyeshadow crayons that may potentially tug on the skin and lead to patchy and uneven application.
Fine Lines & Wrinkles: while beautiful and full of character, makeup can gather in lines, leading to their accentuation and making the face to look more textured. Try to find cream products that set down on the skin, as some can slide around the face and into lines if they are too creamy. With powders, ones that are finely milled and apply in thin layers will be key to avoiding looking cakey or too dry.
Loss Of Skin Moisture: oil production decreases over time, which can lead to skin drying out more easily. Applying makeup on dry skin will never lead to skin like or seamless results, and will often cause uneven or heavy application. Ensuring that skin is properly moisturized is key to ensure you have the perfect canvas to accept makeup.
Our Tips & Product Suggestions
Skin Prep
The most important step to making sure makeup applies, settles, and wears beautifully throughout the day is using proper skincare underneath it all. This helps ensure that dry areas are moisturized so product can glide over it, and that things blend and mesh well together. Our moisturizer Verdant Forcefield has been a cult classic product amongst our customers not only for its wonderful soothing & moisturizing capabilities, but for its ability to create a beautiful canvas for makeup.
When used as your moisturizer underneath makeup, the stretchy and elastic nature of the moisturizer really transforms any cream and powder products on top and turns them into the most skin like face of makeup you'll have ever seen.
Cream Makeup For Mature Skin
We are all about cream products here at Phytosurgence, but they're not all created the same across all brands. Too wet and they will not want to layer well, and can even dissolve and melt off your face. Too thick and they can make the skin look heavy and textured. Ideally, you'll want cream products that apply very thin, blend easily, aren't too oily, and set down on the skin.
We're well known for the fact that our cream products have completely unique textures compared to their counterparts in the beauty industry. So in a very biased statement, we think our products check all these marks above haha.
Blush
This is our bread and butter. We have customers from teenagers to grandmothers in their 70's who use and love our blush. Our formula has this incredible chocolate truffle texture that melts against the warmth of the skin to become a silky gel like texture that blends seamlessly for a watercolour finish. You get ample time to blend and buff, and then the product will gently set down to a very natural skin like finish with a very subtle glow that isn't oily.
With 15 shades to choose from, there will surely be something for you. We have 3 different blush collections, but we'll link just one of them down below.
Eyeshadow
Our cream eyeshadows are not like the typical ones you see out there. They're not a thick goopy cream you have to carefully dip into to make sure you don't pick up too much, or ones that seem to never want to set down and just slide around your eyes all day.
They are stiff potted creams that pick up in extremely thin layers, with a texture that glides over skin (fine lines included) that one might describe as "an eye polish". Once they set down, they do not move. They come in a variety of finishes and textures, so you can choose to sparkle all day, or to go with something a bid more subdued like an even wash of a pearly soft bronze.
Here is a little demo clip of Lunar Lightwave, which is a super sparkly shadow with a sheer base. Just adds a beautiful twinkle of light to the eyes, without weighing it down.
Bronzer
When it comes to makeup for mature skin, bronzer is a category to be a bit more careful with. If the colour is too dark or grey, or if the texture is too thick or heavy, it can make the face look more gaunt, sunken, or hollow.
Our bronzers are unlike anything else out there. They are a cream, but feel more like an invisible powder on the skin. Once applied, you do not see "bronzer" on the skin. It tints the skin with a bronze tone, without leaving any trace of texture or making the skin look heavy. It also comes in 12 shades in various undertones, so that you can find a match that looks so believably you, no one will think you're even wearing bronzer.
Here's a demo of Rosy Daybreak (Shade 2) being applied. Perfect colour for very light to light skintones with pink undertones. Just a super natural, soft tan colour for the face.
Highlighter
A lack of glow & luster is a common complaint amongst our mature customers. While we personally think that skincare is the greatest thing to combat and address this, highlighters are often asked about for an extra glow boost when it comes to makeup.
This said, many highlighters on the market, while look good in photos and far away, tend to have larger shimmer particles that can lead skin to look chalky and textured up close and in real life. Also, many of our customers don't enjoy the super stark metallic reflect many highlighters provide.
Now ours though, you can barely call a highlighter because they're so unique. Instead of reflecting light, they are much more subtle and rather "balance" light. They create a soft focus effect on the skin that smooths, blurs, and diffuses the look of texture. I know many brands say this, but I can say with 1000% certainty you will never find a product like this out there. It is a little more difficult to use as there is a learning curve to it, but trust when I say it is a special lighting filter x highlighter x finishing powder x blurring primer all in one. It is a very stiff cream that doesn't melt, and you really need to work a finger and brush into the product to pick it up. However, the benefit is worth the time investment into getting to know and understand this product.
So that just about sums up our little breakdown as to why we think our makeup products are so well suited for mature skin. Of course everybody has difference preferences, but we think that there is surely something in our offerings you'll love. Our entire makeup ethos is to make skin look fresh, realistic, and refined but again, that's what everyone says nowadays haha.
As always, you're so very welcome to email or DM us on Instagram for any personalized/specific questions or product recommendation requests. PS. Big shout out to our beautiful mum who modelled these products for us!