Sunday, July 28, 2013

On being a recovering goth; alternatives to black.

My friends always joke about how I'm the "goth" one. I have tons of black clothes, I love death metal, Dracula is my favorite thing ever, I'm see through and my hair has been dyed black since I was 17.

Holy hell that was a shit idea.

does this look "soft natural black" to YOU, Revlon?!

...That's me before going to my quaint senior homecoming in what could very loosely be defined as a "dress".

I looked pretty damn good. I was also REALLY getting into makeup around this time, which of course meant the thickest layer of foundation humanly possible and the blackest eyeliner and mascara I could find.

Ultimately, I began to associate my black hair with a part of my life I really did not like. I had to change it. But........too late. Nothing I tried would make it budge (damn you color oops!). So I admitted defeat and chopped off my hair, settling for that as the change I wanted.

A few months ago I bit the bullet and got my hair professionally stripped. I told her I wanted a very rich, dark brown that was just a few drops above black. And........I couldn't see a difference. I waited it out, through many washings, and I began to notice a very brown/red tint to my hair I didn't care for. I dyed my whole head with a "medium ash brown", hoping to get some sort of dark brown color with NO red.

It kinda worked! This is taken in front of sunlight. My hair isn't uneven!
...I happen to wear this Black Sabbath shirt every time I do pictures here. I have a lot more shirts, promise!

Well, I'm rambling, but what I'm trying to get at is if you have dyed black hair, don't bother with drugstore shit. Black dye is very different than other box dyes. You need to just go to a pro. Saves you a lot of trouble. 

I started looking for other alternatives to black eye makeup recently. I still love the darkest blacks I can find (Urban Decay Perversion, MAC Feline, L'Oreal Carbon Black...) but I just don't use them daily. 

I found some keepers. 


MAC Teddy: I love this more than I was planning to! I love the shimmer in it that keeps it from being the plain boring brown I was afraid of. Smudging this into my lashlines and slightly thicker on the top one, it has that Audrey Hepburn/Keira Knightly effect I always wanted. It makes my brown eyes look bigger and browner. I can't be without this one!

Onto my mini Urban Decay collection:


Smoke, Sabbath, and Perversion

Smoke is a dark slate gray, obviously much softer than the stark black of Perversion.

Sabbath is gorgeous! It's a deep but vibrant navy, and very glossy. Still dark but interesting.

Perversion is the blackest black eyeliner I've been able to get my nubby hands on, other than MAC Feline (which I lost....ah well. Same color, really). It doesn't have the same staying power the other UD liners have, though.

And, my newest favorite, Chanel le Volume Mascara in Prune (I see more burgundy than purple, though.) It doesn't build very well, so I slap on a few coats and go through it with a lash comb and it's perfection. I've batted my eyes in everyone's face going "Notice anything different about my eyelashes?!" "Uh...they're..long? A little lighter? I dunno." 

I've tried to photograph it and it just doesn't show up, haaha. It's subtle but effective. With MAC Teddy, it gives perfect eye definition without ever being too much, or too subtle. My new favorite combo!