Flat shader brush

A flat shader is the eye brush that paints. Its head is a small, flat bundle of firm fibres, gathered in a pinched metal collar and rounded or tapered at the tip, like a painter’s flat cut down to fit an eyelid. Where a fluffy brush sweeps shadow on and spreads it thin, a shader picks up a dense load and presses it onto the lid, so the colour arrives as it looked in the pan: opaque, even and exactly where it was put. That makes it the brush for the lid shade, for shimmers and metallics, and for cream shadow and eye base, which it spreads in a smooth, thin coat.

Its neighbours share part of the work. A sponge-tip applicator presses colour on too, but carries less and blends badly. A domed blending brush places colour and softens it; a crease brush lays a line of shadow in the socket. Most eye looks use a shader first, for the colour, and one of the others afterwards, for the edge.

Start with size. A shader about the width of a fingernail covers most lids in two or three presses; a large paddle lays a base shade or a cream wash quickly; a small one works along the lower lash line, in the inner corner and on hooded lids, where there is little lid to work with. Then firmness. A firm, dense shader deposits the most colour and holds a clean edge, which suits shimmer and pressed pigment; a softer, springier one lays a sheerer layer and blends a little as it goes.

Fibre follows the formula. Synthetic fibre is not porous, so it is the choice for cream shadow, eye primer, glitter and anything used wet, and it rinses clean. Hair grips powder: Hakuhodo, in Japan, makes its J5523 in goat hair, and the same shape in horse hair and in blends of the two. Look at the ferrule, too. On a flat brush the metal collar is pinched to hold the fibres in a plane, and a shader whose head has begun to splay has lost the very thing it is for.

The edge decides the line it leaves. A rounded edge, the commonest, blends a little as it goes and leaves no corner; a tapered flat reaches into the inner corner and runs along the lashes; an oval or a filbert, flat with a curved tip, does both at a larger size. Choose the edge that matches the line you want on the lid.

Press, don’t sweep. Touch the flat of the brush to the pan, tap off the excess and pat the colour onto the centre of the lid, working outward in small presses; a sweep lifts nearly as much colour as it lays. Build intensity with a second thin layer rather than one heavy one, and keep the shader to the mobile lid: its clean edge is a line, and the crease above it wants a softer brush to blur it.

For the most intense shimmer, use the brush damp. Mist it with water or setting spray, or press it on a damp sponge, then pick up the shadow and pat it on; many pressed shimmers used this way go on like foil. Leave the pan open to dry before closing it. The shader also lays primer or concealer across the lid before colour, and presses loose pigment or glitter onto a tacky base, where a fluffy brush would scatter it.

Two habits account for most patchy lids: too much shadow on the brush, which falls onto the cheek as it is pressed, and a shader carried up into the crease, where it leaves a hard stripe. Tap off before every press, and do the lower lash line last, once any fallout has been dusted away. Wash the brush after cream, glitter or wet use, and once a week otherwise, and dry it lying flat, so that water does not run back into the ferrule and loosen the glue that holds the head.

Eye colour came with a brush from early on. When Helena Rubinstein added eye make-up to her range in 1907, her Valaze Tablette Indienne was a cake to be “applied with a soft brush”, meant to extend the arch of the brows and “delicately darken the eyelids and eyelashes”; its companion, Kohol Jet Grains, came with an ivory stick.^[1]

The wet brush came later, and it looks like a painter’s habit. Mary Quant, whose make-up was launched in 1966, claimed to have experimented with artists’ materials, paint brushes and water-colour paint boxes among them.^[2] Max Factor’s Water Power Eye Shadow of 1969 needed water to mix it,^[3] and a Revlon patent granted in 1976 describes a pressed eye shadow to be put on the lids by finger, brush or sponge, or with a wet applicator, the cake drying out afterwards to be used again wet or dry.^[4]

The sponge tip, which has a page of its own, stayed in the compact. The flat brush left it: every shader in the carousel is sold on its own, and it remains the one eye brush meant to be used as readily wet as dry, for shadow laid down in a single dense stroke rather than built up in veils.