Get ready to rock the eye makeup you’ve been dreaming of …

Contacts + Eye
Makeup

Have you ever seen those pictures of crying girls with mascara running down their cheeks? Now imagine if that happened to you, all the time, and you weren’t even sad!

That can often be a problem for dry eye sufferers and also occasionally be a reality for contact lens wearers. But, fear not my watery eyed sisters! We can teach you the tips and tricks to keep your mascara and eye makeup on point without affecting your contact lenses.

Here are our best tips on contacts and makeup.

Eye Makeup and Contacts: Less is More

Make sure you keep eye makeup to a minimum while you are wearing contacts. This doesn’t mean you can’t rock sultry cat eyes or smokey eyes. However, leaving the inner corner and tear ducts free of makeup will make everything much easier. Avoid using too much under eye makeup. Better yet, don’t use any at all! You don’t want any makeup on the meibomian glands. These are a row of oil glands behind the eyelashes on the lid margin. If you run eyeliner on this area, those glands clog and then they create evaporative dry eye issues. Meibomian glands secrete oil and with no oil in the tear film, tears evaporate faster and this creates dry eye. Lid liner on the lower lid definitely clogs up these glands and stops them from working efficiently. Instead put eyeliner on under behind the lash line, not on the lid margins at all. So best to focus on your upper eyelids.

Invest in your Mascara

Quality waterproof mascara is going to be your best bet with contacts and making sure that you regularly change over your mascara every 3 months to avoid any build up in bacteria in your wand is important. A waterproof mascara will keep the pigment on your lashes and out of your eyes when they tear-up because of the lenses. Try your best not to cake it on. Use light, even strokes while applying the mascara. Instead of going over your lashes a lot of times in the same way, you can try layering. Apply one layer, let it dry, and then go in for a second layer. This provides less chance for you to get mascara in your eye and irritate the lens. Skip the bottom lashes. Your eyes can tear up much more often when wearing contacts. Avoiding the bottom mascara skips a lot of streaky drama later in the day. A personal go to choice of mascara is PONI – the holy grail of smudge-proof, volumising, tubing mascara.

Use Brushes to Apply your Makeup

The trick to wearing makeup with contacts is precision. You’re not going to get precision from your finger or cotton swab. Invest in some nice precision-makeup brushes. These are made for eye makeup and will make your life much easier. These brushes are designed to fit well with the different parts of your eye. You will get an even application with less fallout and less risk of disturbing your lenses. Don’t forget to wash your makeup brushes after every use to prevent bacteria build up on brushes to limit infection risk.

Bye Bye Glasses, Hello Contacts and Gorgeous Eye Makeup

Contact lens wearers need to be more aware of their makeup throughout the day. Make sure to carry some touch-up stock and makeup remover wipes in case of emergency. We hope our tips on wearing mascara for contact lens wearers have been helpful. Remember to keep your look on point:

• use a waterproof base
• apply in layers, and
• use as little as possible.

Ready to jump all in and ditch the glasses that block your beautiful upper eye blending? Be courageous and curious! Get yourself a  pair of contact lenses to open up your face and gorgeous eyes today!