Makeup

12 Gorgeous Asian Eye Makeup Looks

Ditch your frustration about applying eye makeup by embracing these looks that'll play up your specific eye shape

by Sharon J. Yi

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What's the most frustrating task for Asian women? Hint: It happens in the bathroom. Yup, you guessed it — applying eye makeup. Each and every time we meticulously pile it on, we open our eyes and... it's totally gone — not a speck of color in sight. The monolid is to blame and is one of the most common complaints amongst Asian women. It's also the reason why blepharoplasty (or double eyelid surgery) is the second most requested cosmetic procedure among Asian-Americans. Couple that with stubbornly sparse, straight eyelashes and you have the reason why many Asian women give up on applying eye makeup and mascara altogether.

See the 12 Asian eye makeup looks now.

But before you run off, convinced you need to go under the scalpel, check out these tips from Taylor Chang-Babaian, celebrity makeup artist and author of "Asian Faces: The Essential Beauty and Makeup Guide for Asian Women" and "Style Eyes." She shares 12 specific makeup looks and techniques that not only allow eye makeup to show on monolids but also help emphasize the ever elusive Asian eye shape.

She also gives application tips and techniques along with common mistakes to avoid. For example, if you don't have a crease, don't buy the pre-made strips of tape and stick them onto your eyelids (we're not in junior high — it's not cute anymore), and definitely don't create a faux-crease with eyeshadow... you're not fooling anyone. Babaian goes on to stress that we should all remember that there are many varying eye shapes and great Asian makeup looks exist for all of them. So, without further ado, here are the celebrities we'll show wearing these copy-worthy eye makeup looks: Grace Park, Maggie Q, Michelle Kwan, Sandra Oh, Ming Na, Lindsay Price, Zhang Ziyi, Jarah Mariano, Kelly Hu, Lucy Liu and Margaret Cho.

Check out the 12 Asian eye makeup looks now.

Image via Imaxtree

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Older comments

How come Bingbing Fan's eye makeups are not included at all? She has some of the most diverse and AWESOME ones. Guys should look her up.

by Hannahpiao Friday, April 26, 2013 at 04:55AM Report as inappropriate

It's hard to find a good article on Asian eye make-up, so I really appreciate this. The last two looks are my favorite. However, when I returned to Total Beauty to find this article, I couldn't get past the first page. The new search has been tripping me up in other ways too. I ended up using Google to locate this and other Total Beauty articles.

by kittymarmalade Sunday, February 24, 2013 at 01:59AM Report as inappropriate

This is a great article, but I would of liked some more variety in the asian looks. I am asian, also I am fair skin, i wish there were more suggestions for asians with fair skin because I feel like it is hard to use colors on my skin tone. These looks are very pretty, and I feel like this article was very helpful. I do hope for more articles relating to Asian Americans. Thank you very much Sharon!~

by Misselizabeth Saturday, January 19, 2013 at 03:21PM Report as inappropriate

I loved this article, and I think it provides great tips for Asian Americans. Personally, I'm going to be trying some of these. I think the only way that this article can be construed as racist is if you consider all makeup misogynist - after all, makeup is meant to enhance the way a woman looks, to make her conform more to accepted standards of beauty.

by schien Thursday, December 27, 2012 at 11:23AM Report as inappropriate

I messed up sending messages to this website so soon. Please delete all messages I sent here, and any replies to my messages. It's an OCD thing LOL

by david_fromohio Friday, May 18, 2012 at 11:26AM Report as inappropriate

Beautiful!

by lisiana_de_bem_justino Saturday, April 28, 2012 at 08:23PM Report as inappropriate

These are great tips for accentuating natural beauty.

by beautybody Thursday, April 5, 2012 at 10:07AM Report as inappropriate

To the previous poster: I'm absolutely aware of Asians being racist towards their own race. I have seen it before. I don't understand it. Asians are fantastic, beautiful, wonderful, hard working, super intelligent, strong willed, kind, well mannered, determined, confident, outstanding members of society and if I were Asian, I would feel blessed. I don't see why everyone doesn't like them as much as I do.

by david_fromohio Wednesday, March 7, 2012 at 05:57AM Report as inappropriate

Whether or not it was written by an Asian is moot. People can be discriminatory toward their own race. Ever heard of the "brown paper bag test?" The question is whether it's disrespectful or offensive toward Asians, which I think this article should be. It's describing Asian eyes as problematic/undesirable/flawed/etc. and suggests that making them less Asian or non-Asian (i.e. faux-creasing, bletharoplasty) would make them better. Perhaps another problem is that this author views non-Asian eyes as "normal" and Asian eyes as "abnormal," because instead of trying to work with or enhance the natural shape of the eye, they are suggesting that destroying what makes it Asian is an improvement.

by emozemoz Wednesday, February 29, 2012 at 01:58PM Report as inappropriate

To Grimm: The reason why I found this at least a liiiitle bit racist, is "The monolid is to blame". monolid....in other words, Asian people's eye shape. I am someone who has TONS of respect for the Asian community. I'm only looking out for them.

by david_fromohio Saturday, February 25, 2012 at 02:37AM Report as inappropriate