My MUA Journey pt.1 - Where It All Began

I absolutely love where I am in my career and I'm so proud of getting myself here. I still have so far to go but I wanted to share my journey so far. As I've discovered from typing this, it's a long story so it will be broken up into parts to be uploaded through the week. Enjoy ☕️...

As a child, makeup and beauty was a big interest of mine. My very patient dad would lie on the couch or bed and let me put clips in his hair and paint his face with children's makeup. My mom would sometimes let me get my hands in her makeup box, and that was the holy grail!

It was always something I played with growing up, but of course just in the house. I do remember when I started to sneak on a lipgloss and a grey eyeliner in my waterline before school, when I was in 5th class. In 6th class I distinctly remember using a Glitter Babes pot of frosty pink lip cream (🤭) and a cream blush pot that came free with a "Sabrina The Teenage Witch" magazine.

This is nearly exactly the makeup I had in primary school! 👇🏽

Did anyone else get these magazines?👇🏽

In the first few years of secondary school then came the liquid liner, glitter and two tone lids (pink and blue next to one another with zero blending). In the later years of secondary school I discovered that people started uploading makeup videos to YouTube - we're talking around 2007/8. Panacea81, xSparkage and monreomisfitmakeup became my makeup teachers.

After secondary school I went to UCC to do Arts with the goal of going on to do Psychology. While I was at college I decided to do a makeup course as a hobby for myself. I took "Makeup and Beauty Consultancy" at American Beauty Academy in 2010 and fell in love. Makeup was not the industry that it is today so meeting girls with a similar love for makeup and who knew what setting spray or a 217 brush was, was just amazing! I had so much fun, and suddenly I had this notion that maybe this could be a career path for me. So, in 2011, I continued to do some more courses - "Award in the Art of Photographic Makeup", "Bridal Makeup", and "Airbrush Makeup". I put the idea of studying psychology on the back burner and wanted to see where this makeup train would take me.

Some of my practice pics from those days 👇🏼

Once I completed those courses I started to build up my portfolio and CV by doing TFP shoots (Time For Print - meaning working in exchange for the images) and assisting other makeup artists. I then began freelancing when and where I could. Freelance was quite slow to build up, particularly as social media was not at all what it is today, and "getting your name out there" was much more of a hustle - involving building a website from scratch, homemade direct mail, handing out business cards etc etc. I was also working a day job so that took from my time too.

During this time I also started my YouTube channel and this very blog. After being an avid consumer of makeup channels and blogs, I was so excited to get on the other side of it and have one of my own. Makeup isn't just my job it's also still very much my hobby. So while my job as an MUA definitely takes precedence in my life, I have great passion for my online presence. My partner sometimes can't believe that after a long day of working doing makeup, to unwind and enjoy myself I'll sit down...and do makeup! So creating YouTube videos and blogposts like this is another creative outlet that I love.

In 2014 I saw that Inglot was coming to Cork. This was a brand I had read about on blogs and seen featured in YouTube videos. I was super excited as a consumer, but also for the first time considered applying for a job "on counter". Up until this point I had no interest in working at a makeup counter as I once heard Sam from Pixiwoo describe it as "soul destroying". Not only did I not want my makeup passion to be "destroyed" by retail but, as an introvert, being a salesperson was pretty much my nightmare. However I was excited by the brand, and I also felt I needed something to help boost my makeup experience and career path.

To Be Continued...
See Part 2