Under-eye concealment: Holy Grail or Urban Legend?

Welcome to my most Sisyphus-ian beauty battle.  The under-eye dark circle.

A while back, I was released from a quest of years and dollars spent in search of coverage that wouldn’t end up in the lines under my eyes.  A professional make-up artist finally said to me, “There is no such thing as a concealer that won’t crease”.   Now, she may very well have meant, “There is no such thing as a concealer that won’t crease under your eyes”.  But either way … Hallelujah!  Now I can stop searching for it, and figure out how to work with what I have!

And what might that be?

Well, as you can tell, my dark circles are the envy of all the raccoons in the neighborhood.  I also have somewhat deep set eyes, which creates an actual shadow between my eye and my cheek-bone.  On top of that, I have several smile lines under my eyes that products run to faster than I do to a shoe sale.  I find it extremely aging, on me, to put powder over crème products under my eyes.  It seems to make them look dry and crepey.  So, I have to choose my battles, and I’d rather have a little more darkness showing through than lots of creasing or powdering.  I do sometimes dab a bit of eyes primer or face primer into this area too, which I do find helps with both creasing and longevity.

Correctors versus Concealers

The aforementioned professional makeup artist also taught me the difference between correctors and concealers: Correctors are to neutralize the darkness and brighten, whereas concealers match skin tone. I’ve read and heard that pink correctors are for blue- toned darkness and that peach correctors are for brown/green-toned darkness. I own two books written by professional makeup artists that discuss/illustrate this topic, Bobbi Brown Makeup Manual: For Everyone from Beginner to Pro, by Bobbi Brown, and Plastic Surgery without the Surgery: The Miracle of Makeup Techniques, by Eve Pearl.

Lucky me, my jackpot of darkness has both blue and brownish tones, so I tend to use the salmon correctors that have a bit of both pink and peach combined.

A few more words before we get to the good stuff, the before and afters!  All photos were taken with the “scene intelligent auto” mode of my camera, i.e., the camera made all of the decisions for me, and all of them ended up needing the flash.  Distance and angle will vary.  In all photos, I’ve used my ring finger to apply the product, with light tapping (not rubbing) motions, concentrating on the inner corners (near my nose).

Now for the goodies, in no particular order…

You’ll notice that once the products are on, there’s a lightening and brightening effect, and you don’t really perceive the color of the product itself.  I rotate through all of these products and like them all.  It’s really individual which texture you prefer, which tone works best for you, and how (and how much) you apply.

Let me know what works for you and also if you’d like to see a companion post featuring skin-tone concealers!

*These are only my opinions, formed through my personal experience as a consumer.  I am not a doctor, an aesthetician or a professional makeup artist.  I cannot guarantee what effect, positive or negative, these products may have on anyone else.

**All products were purchased by me from brands that, to the best of my knowledge, are cruelty-free.