Woman pouting her lips | Picture: iStock
Hidden away behind face masks, we haven’t seen them for months, but lips are increasingly back on the makeup agenda as a focus of attention.
And the hottest trend is for a voluminous pout – so much so that many specialists around the world are noting an uptick in requests to make lips fuller.
However, thanks to TikTok, there’s no need for fillers or injections to get the look, a mere dash of lip pencil is all you need. Here’s how it works.
On social media, self-administered injections of hyaluronic acid and other dermal fillers to plump up lips seem to be everywhere. Such is the popularity of these procedures that the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) issued a warning in October against the use of needle-free devices for injecting dermal fillers – such as the Hyaluron Pen – which can cause serious side effects.
While it may seem obvious that you should always consult a qualified professional when in search of procedures to make your lips more luscious, some simple makeup tips can also save you a trip to the doctor or plastic surgeon.
After posting a bunch of videos featuring the controversial Hyaluron Pen, TikTokers are now being more cautious, with viral videos recreating a makeup tip that makes lips fuller in an instant. And while it’s obviously just an illusion, it also happens to be safe, helping to address what for some people could be complex in a low-risk way.
And unlike many tips spotted on the social network, this one comes directly from a beauty professional – Mario Dedivanovic, Kim Kardashian’s makeup artist of choice, who is also behind the world-famous Makeup By Mario brand.
With almost 10 million followers on Instagram, the makeup artist is clearly an authority on the subject. Not content to have contributed to the contouring craze – now a distant memory – the makeup pro has now treated his fans to another signature technique, the “Lip Lift,” designed to create the illusion of voluminous lips, he explains on the social network. And it didn’t take long for TikTokers to adopt this new beauty trick, which has given rise to dozens of videos on the social network. The hashtag #lipliftbymario even counts more than 600,000 views on TikTok.
And the good news is that Mario’s botox-free “Lip Lift” only requires lip liner, lipstick and a bit of dexterity. One of the most popular videos featuring this beauty trick was made by the user @carsynnlovee, from Texas, and boasts more than 430,000 views. In it, the young woman tries Mario’s technique, which involves drawing quite a thick line on the upper lip, overlining the lip on the Cupid’s bow, before bringing the liner in along the lip line as you work down to the corners.
Then, again, overline the bottom lip in the center only, then follow the natural line of the lip up to the corners. Nothing too complex, in short. Finally, fill in with a lipstick of the same shade, or a lighter shade, for optimal effect.
Some may think that there’s nothing revolutionary about this method. After all, many professional makeup artists play on contrasts and light to create this type of illusion.
But if this trick can replace the home fillers that proliferated at high speed on the social network recently, it can only be a good thing. And if you want to reproduce the original trick by Mario Dedivanovic, you’ll need to momentarily ditch TikTok for Instagram… A sacrilege.