Dark Circles

To cover the dark circles, you need two things: a soft synthetic bristle brush and a moist concealer in a specific shade. To find the right one, you need to determine the actual color that the discoloration appears to be. It’s simple color theory from there. Remember making a color wheel in High School Art class? You were given red, blue and yellow paint and from those three colors you were shown how to create a rainbow of colors that included green, violet and orange in addition to six tertiary colors. If you remember where each color lines up in the circle you can easily determine what color concealer will work best on you to camouflage dark circles. You can buy a color wheel at any art supply store or find one online and print it out. Opposite colors will cancel each other out when applied on top of each other.

Most commonly, under eye circles have a slightly bluish look which means an orange toned concealer will hide the blue. Some under eye circles have more of purple cast to them which needs a yellow toned concealer. Red-violet under eye circles should use olive (yellow-green). If you have a blue-violet discoloration, use peach (yellow-orange). Equally important as knowing the right color concealer to look for, make sure to select one that is close to the level of lightness or darkness of your overall skin tone. In other words, if you need an olive concealer, don’t use a dark olive if you have fair skin!

Not all concealers are the same. They can range from sheer and watery to drier formulas with heavier coverage. The best formulas to utilize color theory with are sheer to medium in coverage. Also look for a formula that is moist and not too dry since the eye area has no pores. The drier formulas that are best for facial blemishes are too dry and will appear cakey around the eyes.

If dark circles are a major concern for you, you should consider lessening the darkness in stead of just covering it up. I recommend that you invest in a good, daytime eye cream like Chantecallie’s Stress Repair Concentrate. Most women are under the impression that the skin around their eyes is actually a darker pigment which is not true in most cases. Because the skin around the eyes is seven times thinner then the rest of the face, the skin in this area is somewhat transparent. The vein and muscle tissue beneath the skin is the real culprit to your dark circles. The more hydrated the skin around they eye area becomes, the less dark your under eye area will appear. In addition to helping to eliminate the darkness, and as an even better bonus; eye cream will help to keep your delicate eye area firm and moist to prevent it from aging at the rate it would otherwise. Women should invest in an eye cream by the age of 19 or so and use it daily regardless if they wear makeup or not.