best powder foundation

This Powder Is Our Beauty Director’s Dirty Secret

Making a case for the pariah of makeup

Beauty editors see thousands of products every year—but it’s the ones they always go back to that should be noted. In Can’t Quit You, The Kit beauty director Katherine Lalancette shares the products she can’t live without.

In the world of foundation, powder is a bad word; a beauty faux pas as severe as badly blended contour or lipstick smudges on teeth. It is considered tacky, like something a circa-2002 Paris Hilton might slip out of a smiley-face-adorned Louis Vuitton bag at Les Deux before gyrating on a table under a shower of cocktail napkins. 

And so for years, I’ve been hiding my dirty secret, flat-out lying when fellow beauty editors inquire about my base. “Armani Luminous Silk,” I respond to approving nods. (What’s wrong with me?!) Recently, tired of living a double life, I came clean to a makeup artist. She uttered a tight-lipped “Mm-hmm” and swiftly changed the subject.

To be fair, the origin story of my love affair with powder doesn’t exactly help my cause. I was 19 and part of a professional cheerleading squad (I know, I know) when the coach handed out a list of supplies we’d need ahead of the season opener. It included nude fishnets, a lipstick “darker than our gums” (apparently so we wouldn’t look lipless when we smiled) and foundation. I found the stockings at a dance supply store, stole my mom’s berry lipstick and made my way to the drugstore for that last item.

For someone who at this point had only gone as far as slathering tinted moisturizer on her face, the prospect of painstakingly blending a real-deal foundation was flat out overwhelming. I’d apparently need a brush or a sponge and then another brush and some powder to set it, but just on the T-zone, and oh my God, who has time for this?

Sensing my discomfort, the lovely cosmetician suggested a product that had just hit the shelves. It was a powder foundation featuring a nifty grinder, thus allowing you to produce a single serving of loose pigment every time you turned the dial. The finish was luminous and not at all cakey, the coverage was airbrushed-like yet breathable and the formula was packed with moisturizing peptides and amino acids. In other words, it clapped back at every reproach ever hurled at its predecessors.

Soon I began reaching for it on non-game days, too, delighting in the soft-focus radiance it imparted. It was so quick and easy: Just twist, swipe and sweep. The ultra-fine, milled-to-order powder proved foolproof-level buffable. No more jawline blunders or weird patchy spots, just a flawless canvas achieved in 10 seconds flat, anytime, anywhere. Because unlike glass bottles of liquid foundation, this portable compact bares no risk of spilling in your purse and will never need to transition to a clear bag when passing through airport security.

The protagonists of my mental Pinterest board (Jeanne Damas, Adenorah et al.) might never approve, but attempting (pretending?) to live up to those effortless French girl ideals is just plain exhausting. It took 11 years, but I’ve finally accepted myself for who I am: a powder-foundation-wearing ex-cheerleader with one exceptionally glowy complexion. Now hold my bag as I dance on this table.

Smashbox Halo Hydrating Perfecting Powder, $58, shoppersdrugmart.ca

 

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