Are you man enough for make-up? (From The Northern Echo)

Are you man enough for make-up?

9:59am Tuesday 25th November 2008 in Search

Real men don’t wear make-up, right? Wrong. As the male makeup business booms, Owen Amos tries a touch of lippy.

JOURNALISTS aren’t unfamiliar with make-up. Except it usually comes in the following form: Editor: Did you make that story up?

Journalist: Yes.

I’m kidding, of course. But when we got the offer to try on men’s makeup, the editor and I had another conversation, except this one was real.

He walked to my desk grinning, which is usually bad news.

Editor: Have you ever worn makeup?

Me: No.

Editor: Why not?

Me. I am not a transsexual.

He looked at me quizzically – as if he wasn’t sure – then made the big sell. It will be a good piece, he said. It will be different. You’ll look good.

Yes, I said. Every 24-year-old male wants to look like Danny la Rue.

Women, of course, need make-up.

Not because it makes them look better – it rarely does – but because it gives the poor dears something to do.

After all, women’s number one pastime?

“Getting ready”.

I know one woman – seriously – who starts getting ready for a Saturday night out at midday, as if it’s the end, rather than the means. Face mask, cucumber on the eyes, the lot.

By 4pm, she’ll be whacking on the slap like a three-year-old with poster paint. Without make-up, her day would be an endless stream of Ryvita (28 calories a slice, you know) and the Hollyoaks omnibus.

Men, on the other hand, have hobbies, and diversions, and interests.

Well, they have football, but it’s much the same thing. We don’t need make-up, because our time is taken up by working out who’ll be in the relegation zone if Sunderland win by one, Newcastle lose by two, and West Brom draw two-all at Fulham.

But I was intrigued. After all – which man hasn’t wondered how he’d look with a little help? If I could just cover those bags…or that scar…or that double chin. At the moment, I look like a cross between John Hartson, the former Wales striker, and Ben Roberts, who played Chief Inspector Derek Conway in The Bill.

Maybe, with a little lippy, I’d become Brad Pitt? Or, at worst, PC George Garfield.

So off I went to Saks in Northallerton, hoping it would transform me into Freddie Ljungberg, not Lily Savage.

I was asked to sit on a chair that looked like a dentist’s. Hopefully this would be less painful.

The first step was foundation, applied by Siobhan Caffery, the fantastic beautician. (Translation for men: foundation is the skin-coloured stuff you smooth over your face, like plaster on a cracked wall). Apparently, I didn’t need much as my complexion – whatever that is – is quite good.

Still, it added a touch of colour to my cheeks, which, seeing as there are snowmen with better tans, is no bad thing.

Next was concealer. “Can you conceal my shame at being in a makeup studio?” I asked. Not really, but they did remove the dark, drooping bags under my eyes, which was just as good. Lipstick added a touch more colour – I was like Narnia, coming to life after an eternal winter – and then, finally, the big one: eyeliner and mascara.

My pale lashes were brushed back and coloured, my eyes were, apparently, “framed”. “I hope you’re not going to stick a nail through them and hang them on the wall!” I joked. Again, not really. Making- up is on my brain.

I sat up and looked in the mirror, blinking like a new-born vole. Did I look like Brad Pitt? Or David Beckham?

No. I looked like John Hartson at a Russell Brand lookalike contest.

Still – can’t win them all.

But – eye make-up aside – I didn’t look bad. Well, not as bad as usual. I had more colour, and, for the first time in five years, I wasn’t carrying bags under my eyes. All I needed was a full head of hair for the first time in five years, too, and I was laughing.

The make-up was provided by Aston Mitchell, the new Bowesbased company who specialise in men’s skin care products. They’re sending out around 30 orders a day – all via Bowes post office in Teesdale – to everywhere from Birmingham to Brazil, though more to the south of England than the north.

“In England there’s a social stigma attached to men’s make-up,” says marketing director Claire Mitchell, who started the business with longtime friend Kate Jones.

“But ten years ago not many men would admit to wearing moisturiser, or exfoliating. My husband was in the Army for 22 years and he’s got more facial products than I do.”

And how do women react to men’s make-up?

“When you say to a woman ‘Would you like your husband to wear makeup?’ they say no. But if you show them a photo of the wearing it they probably wouldn’t be able to spot it,”

says Claire.

In Italy and Germany, apparently, make-up is popular. (Which might explain why they lost the war.) It’s also big in Japan, and India. But, as Claire says: “There’s no reason men here shouldn’t look their best as well.” Now all I need is to work out how to scrub this mascara off. I think I preferred the Derek Conway look to Jessica Rabbit.

■ Aston Mitchell – www.astonmitchell.co.uk – are looking for a male model. For more information, apply online.

■ Saks, 10 Thirsk Road, Northallerton. Tel: 01609-771477.