Two very different philosophies guide choices in coloured cosmetics for the eyes. One school of thought suggests matching eye colour closely with shadow and liner, creating an overall strong impact with tone-on-tone hues. The other way of thinking holds that opposites attract; surrounding eyes with contrasting colours draws attention to their beautiful colour. Read on to find tips for both exciting possibilities for every eye colour.
Make-up for Blue Eyes
Create a rhapsody in blue with eyeliner in navy, midnight or peacock. A darker blue adds emphasis and widens eyes more than a pale liner. Are the contacts more of a true sapphire blue or a green-tinged aquamarine? Match the shadow as closely as possible to the hue of the contact lenses to give an overall impression of monochromatic colour. It's possible to clash, so choose carefully.
For a study in contrasts, choose orange-touched browns and coppers. Orange lies opposite blue on the colour wheel, so a blue iris looks more striking surrounded with high-contrast makeup. Too much red can look a bit sickly, so aim for copper and tan shades.
Matching Make-up with Green Eyes
The human eye perceives thousands of shades of green, so matching green coloured contact lenses precisely is difficult. Picking shades that are a few shades darker or lighter than the lenses can hide any colour mismatches, so pair dark forest greens with pale jade contacts and look for minty hues with dark lenses.
The opposite of green on the colour wheel is red, a devilishly difficult shade to wear near eyes. Choose plums, lilacs and grapes to take green eyes to the next level of contrast. Brighter purples and fuchsias are daring, but they have a tremendous wow factor.
Selecting Make-up for Brown and Amber Eyes
Almost all skin tones have a touch of brown in them, so finding warm brown eye shadows to highlight brown or amber contacts is a cinch. Think of luscious foods as inspiration and choose everything from dark chocolate and espresso to pale champagne to give brown lenses a soft, natural look. Amber contacts look especially striking with dark colours surrounding them, so stick to the darker shades of brown to emphasise them.
Brown contains so many other colours that it has no real opposite. However, its warmth plays beautifully against cool hues, so surround brown eyes with charcoal, navy or black to make them luminous. Brown irises look exceptionally lovely with a smoky eye treatment, so play with darker matte hues to create the smouldering drama that comes so naturally to brown eyes of every shade.
Violet, Red and Other Special Effects
The beauty of coloured contact lenses is that the wearer isn't constrained to natural hues. For would-be vampires, cosplayers and "Game of Thrones" fans, special-effect lenses make a statement. Choose neutral grey and black eye makeup to showcase an unusual colour to its best advantage.
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