Liquid concealer

Liquid concealer is foundation’s more concentrated relative: much the same pigments in a similar fluid base, with more of the white that does the covering. The rest of the formula decides whether it dries to a soft-matte film or stays supple and slightly luminous. It comes in a slim tube with a wand — most often a doe-foot sponge tip, sometimes a brush or a cushioned nib — so that it can be laid exactly where it is needed and nowhere else.

That precision, and its fluidity, are what separate it from its neighbours. A cream concealer in a pot is thicker and covers more at a touch, but sits more heavily; a stick is firmer still, made for pressing onto a single spot. A liquid thins out at its edges, moves with the skin and can be built in layers, which is why it is the form most people reach for under the eyes, where the skin is thin and creases every time you smile.

The first decision is what the concealer is for, because its two main jobs pull in opposite directions. Under the eyes the problem is shadow rather than colour: the skin is thin, it moves constantly, and a heavy or very matte formula settles into the lines within an hour. A hydrating, medium-coverage liquid with a satin or radiant finish, used thinly, suits it best. On a spot or a patch of redness the problem is contrast, and the skin there hardly moves, so a thicker, fuller-coverage matte formula stays put and hides more.

Many people end up owning two: a softer one for the eyes and a fuller, drier one for the face. If you own only one, choose it for the under-eye, where the wrong texture shows most, and build it up in a second thin layer on a blemish.

On the face, match concealer exactly to your foundation or your skin: anything lighter draws a pale halo round the very spot you meant to hide. Under the eyes, go no more than one shade lighter than your foundation, and choose the undertone with care. Shadows there are usually blue or purple, so a concealer with a slightly peach or golden cast cancels them better than a pink or neutral one of the same depth, which can turn grey over the darkness.

A concealer much lighter than the skin around it does not brighten; it outlines. On deeper skin especially, a too-light shade reads as ashy rather than lifted. Test on the cheekbone and under the eye together, in daylight, and give it a minute to dry before you judge it: many long-wear liquids deepen slightly as they set.

Apply concealer after foundation, not before, so you use only as much as the foundation has left undone. Dot it where the shadow is darkest — usually the inner corner and the hollow just above the cheek — rather than painting a triangle down to the cheekbone, then pat the edges out with a fingertip, a damp teardrop sponge or a small buffing brush. Patting presses the fluid into the skin; wiping moves it off the place it was meant to cover.

Creasing is mostly a matter of quantity. Use less than you think, wait a minute for it to set, and add a second thin layer only where the shadow still shows. If it still gathers in the lines, look upward while you apply, smooth the crease with a fingertip after a few minutes, and set it with the lightest pressed dusting of fine powder. A moisturised under-eye helps too: concealer grips dry skin and cracks along it.

Concealer began as a liquid brushed on like paint. Until Covermark, the cosmetics historian James Bennett writes, the only commercial makeup that would cover a serious blemish was greasepaint, although in the 1920s women with marked suntan lines could hide them with a liquid powder.^[1] Lydia O’Leary, who had a port-wine stain across half of one side of her face, developed Covermark as a lotion by 1928 and was selling it from 1931. Bennett points to its relatives: Wet White, a nineteenth-century stage makeup for whitening the neck and arms, and calamine lotion, both liquids made mainly of zinc, glycerine and water.^[2] Her patent, filed on 31 December 1930 and granted in 1932, describes those three ingredients mixed to a thin paste approximating a liquid and laid on with a camel’s-hair brush.^[3] She soon replaced the lotion with a cream, which covered better.^[2]

The record of the modern liquid is thin: the trade histories cited here follow creams and sticks through the 1950s, when most concealers came in only four to six shades, and say little about fluids.^[1] One later marker comes from a makeup artist’s memory. When Terry de Gunzburg was developing a new product at Yves Saint Laurent Beauté around 1992, the usual concealer a supplier sent was, as Air Mail tells it, a tube with a sponge tip — much like the wands sold today.^[4] What has changed most since is the shade range, which in many lines now runs to dozens.