Silk Naturals

Hi and warning – long!

I just ordered a foundation sample kit and need help knowing where to start with color mixing. At age 54 I’m kind of a makeup newbie, but my rosacea has progressed to the point that I need some serious sun protection and coverage. I don’t think that mineral makeup will give me enough coverage by itself, but I’m hoping that experimenting with SN will shed some light on my problems coming up with something that looks reasonably natural on me while giving me both coverage of the redness and the acne-like papules and pustules of rosacea and a good physical SPF. I do wear a primer with SPF 15 from zinc and titanium, but I don’t feel like that’s enough by itself.

Color-wise, my experience with foundation is as follows:

About 25 years ago was told I was a blue/red at a Prescriptives counter – much to the makeup artist’s surprise, with my medium brown hair and eyes. This was before my rosacea got so bad. The blue/red based makeup looked fine, as I recall.

For many years my life was so crazy busy and filled with illness in myself and loved ones that I didn’t bother with makeup. A year ago I came to the conclusion that, with my rosacea progressing, I really had to do something.

So I’ve tried several different kinds of foundations, either samples or, sadly, returning some to the store – sometimes makeup looks different after it’s been on your skin for a few hours.

Clinique Redness Solutions in Calming Ivory was too light or too yellow; in Calming Neutral it was too dark, and the SPF is chemical.

Cover FX cream foundation in C20, for pink complexions, and Mineral Powder Foundation in E40, for pink and yellow complexions, looked too peach on me, and the SPF is chemical.

Tarte ReCreate SPF 15 in 04 for pink complexions looks too yellow on me.

Tarte Smooth Operator (kind of between a tinted moisturizer and a light foundation) in 12, for beige complexions, is too dark for me, but otherwise not a terrible color, just a tiny bit orange. In 10, it’s WAAYYY too yellow.

Make Up Forever HD #118, for beige complexions, looked extremely yellow on me.

Hourglass Veil SPF 15 in 1.5 Nude looks bit orange, and the SPF is chemical, and it’s kind of difficult to work with for the price point.

Philosophy tinted moisturizer in light/medium looks peach on me.

Laura Mercier Silk Crème Foundation in Rose Ivory is pretty close, just a teeny bit orange, but has no SPF. It does have really great coverage. Putting Laura Mercier Mineral Makeup SPF 15 in Tender Rose on top of it corrects the color and adds sun protection, but I look like I have a TON of makeup on, and there is a slight metallic or grayish cast to it. The mineral powder by itself turns darker on me after a few hours, even though my skin is not oily any more, and doesn’t provide complete coverage by itself, either, so I end up piling it on and looking awful.

I like the Tarte Smooth Operator SPF 20 tinted moisturizer for sun protection. The fact that none of the colors are right for me is less of a problem because it’s so sheer – but of course that means minimal coverage. I’m hoping that maybe I could buy one of the lightest colors and mix SN with it or wear SN on top of it. (Ingredients are: Active Ingredients: 5% Titanium Dioxide , 5% Zinc Oxide. Other Ingredients: Aqua, Cyclopentasiloxane, PEG/PPG-18/18 Dimethicone, Octyldodecyl Neopentanoate, Glycerin, Dimethicone, Aluminum Hydroxide, Stearic Acid, Triethoxycaprylylsilane, Saccharum Offcinarum (Sugar Cane) Extract, Pyrus Malus (Apple) Fruit Extract, Citrus Medica Limonum (Lemon) Fruit Extract, Citrus Aurantium Dulcis (Orange) Fruit Extract, Camellia Oleifera Leaf Extract, Panax Ginseng Root Extract, Ginkgo Biloba Root Extract, Anthemis Nobilis Leaf Extract, Phytantriol, Magnesium Ascorbyl Phosphate, Retinyl Palmitate, Tocopheryl Acetate, Tocopherol, Tretrahexyldecyl Ascorbate, Boron Nitride, Palmitic Acid, Dextrin Palmitate, Sodium Hyaluronate, Sodium Chloride, Sodium Dehydroacetate, Phenoxyethanol, Caprylyl Glycol, Hexylene Glycol. (+/-): Iron Oxides, Mica, Ultramarines.)

Or, is it possible to make a full coverage foundation by mixing SN with Hourglass Veil Mineral Primer SPF 15? (Ingredients are titanium dioxide and zinc oxide in Cyclopentasiloxane, Isododecane, Polysilicone-11, Polymethylsilsesquioxane, Hexyl Laurate, Peg-10 Dimethicone, Polyglyceryl-4 Isosterate, Stearic Acid, and Alumina.)

Here are photos of parts of my face/neck taken without makeup, next to a window in daytime, with a full-spectrum craft light and a flash. A lot of the red in my skin is (obviously) from rosacea. A lot of the yellow is also not in my undertones but, rather, falls into the category that my dermatologist would refer to as "sun damage". My veins are blue, and there is definitely a lot of blue in my lips. I have an idea that mixing mostly ebony with a little bit of something else -- maybe olive? -- and a tiny bit of lavender color corrector might work. But maybe I'm crazy.

Thank you in advance for any suggestions you might have.

Hi there!
I probably can't help with what colour you might be, but I will share with you how I have helped cover my rosacea. Hopefully it might be able to help you or just give you some ideas

The amount of redness on my cheeks/chin/nose looks similar to yours.

The only way I have been able to conceal it is a 2-step system.

I first make a concealer in my skin colour. This concealer I make using the heavy coverage foundation formula from SN. Then I add a small amount of the green concealer to the heavy formula. I find the greenn concealer on its own is not heavy enough, or concealing enough to use to combat the red. The skin colour concealer, with a tinge of green is what works best for me. I apply this concealer directly to the areas which are red (being nose, cheeks, chin etc). I use a large (probably 1.5cm?) eyeshadow brush which is a bit more dense to apply it.

I then apply foundation over my face - made with the medium coverage formula. I find that this, on top of the concealer is enough to cover any redness (and my skin does get very red!). I occasionally will do 1-2 layers of the medium coverage on my cheeks and blend out.

I was always matched as a cool when I went into beauty counters without makeup on. For me the makeup artists tended to look at the pink in my face and go you're a cool. But when the redness is taken away, I find that I am a neutral. So this possibly could be the case for you. Or you might be a cool - I am actually not great at deciphering what base colour to get.

But hopefully that's given you some food for thought! Covering rosacea CAN be done!

nicollback wrote:Hi there!
I probably can't help with what colour you might be, but I will share with you how I have helped cover my rosacea. Hopefully it might be able to help you or just give you some ideas
.....
I was always matched as a cool when I went into beauty counters without makeup on. For me the makeup artists tended to look at the pink in my face and go you're a cool. But when the redness is taken away, I find that I am a neutral. So this possibly could be the case for you. Or you might be a cool - I am actually not great at deciphering what base colour to get.

But hopefully that's given you some food for thought! Covering rosacea CAN be done!

Hi and thank you! It's great to know that I might be able to do the job with mineral makeup alone. Isn't rosacea a bummer? Makeup artists are funny, I feel like they're always trying to "correct" my rosacea with yellow-toned foundation, but what happens is that I end up looking like I have both rosacea and jaundice! A green primer does tone down my redness a bit, but, oddly, blue works even better. I think I will have fun playing around with mixing the foundation and will learn a lot about my skin tone and what works (I ordered sample kits in both All Purpose and Original so that I could make mistakes while learning This forum is wonderful, I'm glad there's help with where to start and what to do if I get stumped.

I have a question for nicolback... when you are making up your concealer mix... is the heavy foundation all ready pre-mixed to match your foundation? Or are you just adding the white heavy foundation with a bit of the green powder? Also how much do you suppose you mix or the ratio of heavy foundation to green? I have some redness and this sounds like the best way for me to cover it up and would like to try it!
Thanks so much for the suggestions.

fairyfli wrote:I have a question for nicolback... when you are making up your concealer mix... is the heavy foundation all ready pre-mixed to match your foundation? Or are you just adding the white heavy foundation with a bit of the green powder? Also how much do you suppose you mix or the ratio of heavy foundation to green? I have some redness and this sounds like the best way for me to cover it up and would like to try it!
Thanks so much for the suggestions.

I do make the concealer mix to match my foundation! So for me its 1 olive, 1/4 buttery gold and 12 white. I actually make 2 batches - one which I use as a regular concealer - incase of pimples and the like!!

The second match I make I mix up exactly the same. Then I would add in 1-2 scoops of the green concealer. I suppose the green booster would work just as well and you would need perhaps 1/4 of a scoop (and mix it well, as the one and only time I tried the booster I didn't mix well and ended up with green streaks on my face!). Your concealer shouldn't look too green, either. But play around with the ratios (as your foundation recipe might be entirely different to mine) and I'm sure you'll get something to work quickly!

Sometimes I can get away with only using the concealer I made to match my foundation - sometimes I need a bit of green. If I am using the green though, i do put the medium coverage over it to make sure I am not looking sick!

Rosy1 wrote: Hi and thank you! It's great to know that I might be able to do the job with mineral makeup alone. Isn't rosacea a bummer? Makeup artists are funny, I feel like they're always trying to "correct" my rosacea with yellow-toned foundation, but what happens is that I end up looking like I have both rosacea and jaundice! A green primer does tone down my redness a bit, but, oddly, blue works even better. I think I will have fun playing around with mixing the foundation and will learn a lot about my skin tone and what works (I ordered sample kits in both All Purpose and Original so that I could make mistakes while learning This forum is wonderful, I'm glad there's help with where to start and what to do if I get stumped.

If blue works for you by all means try it! Seriously, you will find things that help and they were the things which you think wouldn't work at all!
I haven't personally tried blue before, but you're not the first person I've heard mention it working for their redness, so definitely try it!

Rosy1-

I would recommend Ebony foundation or possibly Olive. You are definitely cool toned, but the Olive might help with the redness a little bit all on its own. There is very little yellow in it by the time it is at your depth (the colors do not dilute linearly). I think All Purpose is the white base you will want to try as it is the simplest as far as ingredients go. I am having a hard time with depth, but I think Ebony about 1:9, and Olive about 1:15. I also recommend looking at the Ultra Sheer Zinc...not so much for coverage, but other things it might help you to improve. A good skincare product for you would be Firming Moisturizer with the aloe and renovage.

I can't begin to give good advice on mixing our products with those that you mentioned. The only products I know well are ours. Adding our powders to other formulas whether they be liquid or powder themselves changes the integrity of both formulas. And it really is something you will have to experiment with if you want to give it a go.

Jen, thank you so much! I got so excited because my samples came today that I just submitted another post to the foundation thread -- please feel free to ignore that one. The ebony looked closest to my own skin tone, I mixed some 1:8 and think it's just a tad dark/pink, so I'll try adding one more scoop of the white before trying it out tomorrow. The Olive looked second closest to my skin tone, so I think I'll try that at the ratio you recommended as well. If I want to try 1 scoop Ebony and 1/2 scoop Olive, how much Ivory should I mix in?

I will definitely check out the moisturizer you recommended. I know it looks like I don't take care of my skin, but, believe me, nothing could be further from the truth. I just have a really bad problem. The prescription products for rosacea severely irritate my skin. I had the awful bumps under control with gentle salicylic acid preparations for almost a year, but then it quit working for me. I'm now getting them under control again since I found a gentle benzoyl peroxide preparation I can tolerate once a day if I layer argan oil over it. I do use zinc and being fanatical about sun protection for the redness (I ordered some zinc powder), but I'm at the stage where the spidery blood vessels start multiplying There is a possibility that bacteria in the guts of follicle mites have something to do with rosacea, so I've added a bit of tea tree oil, which kills the mites, to the argan oil (rather than using Kwell on my face -- seemed like a better idea), but it's too soon to see if it's going to reduce redness and broken blood vessels. At least it's not irritating my skin or making me flush bright red, which most skin care products do.

Thanks again for the color consult I ordered sample kits in both Original and All Purpose. I'm interested in learning to apply the All Purpose wet if that would give me better coverage, but I need to learn how to do that without making a mess of my moisturizer (with colloidal oatmeal) and primer (with zinc and titanium SPF).

Hi Rosy1.....I can't help with coverage issues, but I did want to 2nd Jenw's suggestion for the Ultra Sheer Zinc Powder. It does contain sunscreen(however due to strict FDA laws Karen cannot give it a specific SPF number) but it is very soothing and calming to the skin.
Laurie

ladycattat wrote:Hi Rosy1.....I can't help with coverage issues, but I did want to 2nd Jenw's suggestion for the Ultra Sheer Zinc Powder. It does contain sunscreen(however due to strict FDA laws Karen cannot give it a specific SPF number) but it is very soothing and calming to the skin.
Laurie

Hi Laurie,

Thank you for the suggestion. I did order a sample of the zinc powder, which I think I'll try as a second primer on top of my liquid zinc-containing primer during the day, and mixed with my moisturizer at night 'cuz it does help soothe that rosacea redness. I'm also happy to see that the Ivory foundation bases contain zinc oxide and titanium dioxide. Being a melanoma survivor, I'm a little hyper about protection from UVA rays, which SPF doesn't even measure, and which most chemical sunscreens don't provide. When I was growing up, we practically lived outdoors during the summer, and very few people used sunscreens back in the '50s and '60s -- my family certainly didn't.

Thanks for the nice welcome