Mascara is one of those makeup products where you’d think that application technique wouldn’t differ much from person to person, but when you actually get down to seeing other people do it for themselves, you realise that many people come up with their own special application techniques that work best on their own lashes.
YouTube star, Alyona, or Aly for short, is a Russian beauty guru behind the channel Aly Art. She specialises in makeup tutorials, transformations and general beauty-related videos. She is loved by fans for the no-frills way she does her videos, and how she’s honest and direct with her viewers.
She has also come up with a way to apply mascara that produces dramatically different results from the usual. Aly tells the story of how she gave her mom a mascara, and the next time she saw her, she asked her why she wasn’t wearing it because she knows that her mom’s eyelashes can look longer than it did.
Her mom said that she was using the mascara that Aly had given her, and that’s when Aly realised that her mascara application technique really made a huge difference to how your lashes can look, no matter what mascara you’re using. In this video, Aly uses the L’Oreal Paris Miss Hippie Mega Volume mascara.
The usual way
Aly starts off the video by applying mascara on her left eyelashes in the same way as most people usually do. Starting from the root of her lashes, she combs the mascara wand through to the tips.
Aly’s way
Before she begins, Aly does note that she uses a lash primer for her right eyelashes, a step that she skipped for her left eyelashes. Since a lash primer does provide a tacky coat around each eyelash for more mascara to adhere to, we’re wondering if this might have made all the difference in her finished comparison.
However, she notes that she is using a “cheap” lash primer, so there is a possibility it did not affect the comparison as much.
Now here’s the kicker. Aly pulls out the mascara wand while pushing it against the side of the tube. You can see that one half of the wand still has a ton of product, but the other half is almost empty, and this difference is important in the following steps.
Aly then uses the side loaded with mascara to very gently comb through only the very tips of her top and bottom eyelashes. You can see in the following screenshot how the mascara is deliberately distributed unevenly on the right eyelashes, compared to the one with normal mascara application on the left.
Aly then uses the side of the wand without much product to comb through her eyelashes, spreading out the mascara she had previously deposited on the tips of her eyelashes. She also goes on to repeat the step again to add a second coat.
Just look at the dramatic difference between both eyes! Even if you discount the fact that she used 2 coats of mascara on her right lashes and only 1 coat on her left, her eyelashes on the right still look much more lifted and curled compared to the left.
What do we think?
Aly’s mascara application technique and the results she has shown in her video are certainly very appealing. Luckily, this is a fairly simple technique that you can certainly try, experiment and play around with in your own free time. Just make sure you take care when pushing the mascara wand against the tube, as we can imagine that the snap back of the wand might fling specks of mascara everywhere and make a mess!
It has long been known, however, that applying a thicker coat of mascara on the roots of your lashes is a better way, in theory, to make your lashes stay curled for a longer period of time. When the mascara dries into a more solid texture at the root of your lashes, it basically acts like a glue that fixes the curl of your lashes in place.
Because of this, we aren’t super sure how long curls might last if you try Aly’s method with mascara application. It is worthy to note as well that Aly has naturally curled lashes in the first place, which might play a part in the way her lashes looked after the application. Applying mascara to the tips of your lashes might weigh it down and make it un-curl even faster.
However, the comments section of her video is generally positive. Some have also said that they have heard of this tip from their own friends or family members, and that it really did make a huge positive difference to the way their eyelashes look.
Although we can’t tell for sure if this tip would work just as well on us, especially if you have stick-straight lashes as many Asians do, but we definitely think it’s worth experimenting with and seeing if it works for you!
The video
Watch Aly in action here!
