Get The Gloss | How to get fuller lips without filler
From skincare and makeup to professional procedures, these are the expert-approved ways to enhance your natural lips.
FOR LIP DEFINITION AND A COLOUR BOOST: LIP BLUSHING.
This demurely-named procedure is in fact the next generation of semi-permanent makeup. A cosmetic tattooing machine is used to inject water-based ink to add pigmentation to the skin in order to create more definition and thus the illusion of fullness.
Makeup artist Nathalie Eleni is a fan of the Gloss and Go Lip Blushing at Tracie Giles: “I like the fact that Lip Blushing enhances my lip shape and adds a really nice flush of colour. It makes my lips look bigger and when I wake up I have more definition straight away. From a confidence point of view, it’s really helped me.”
The main difference between Lip Blushing and old-fashioned lip liner tattoos is in the inks used, as practitioner Tracie Giles explains “Tattoo inks penetrate deeper into the skin so will last longer and may change colour over time,” she says, “whereas injectable makeup pigments are designed to fade gradually over time without colour change.” The machine used for Lip Blushing is much gentler than old school tattoo guns, which means that the artist can be much more delicate with their application so the results are more natural-looking.
Lip Blushing is suitable for all ages and skin types, however, Giles recommends that clients with darker skin tones, hyper-pigmentation or melanin-rich lips undergo a Melanin-Rich Lips Correction treatment. This is a separate semi-permanent tattoo procedure given two to four weeks before a Lip Blush treatment. It helps to neutralise the lips, and create a great base for the Gloss & Go Lip Blush. The correction treatment does cost an additional £395 but you’ll be able to get 20 per cent off your Lip Blush treatment.
Lip Blushing takes around two hours, it’s a fairly gentle procedure and numbing cream is applied. Eleni reported that her treatment didn’t hurt and that there was minimal downtime. Any swelling or redness you do experience should subside after 24 hours and you let it dry heal, much like a regular tattoo, this means there’s some slight scabbing that you leave to fall off naturally.
Clients return for a top-up session two to 12 weeks later. Results can last for up to two years, although most makeup artists recommend a colour refresh every six months. Prices start at £595 at Tracie Giles Clinics.