KEY POINTS:
I wasn't expecting beauty school to be so physical. But here I stand before my fresh-faced client, weighed down by a builder's belt bulging with makeup tools and sweating under the pressure of drawing a straight line with a precision brush.
"Preparation is the key," advises my perfectly-made-up instructor. "It's just like building a house." I had imagined Mia the Makeup Artist, instead I'm Bob the Builder.
I'm brushing up on my very basic maquillage skills at M.A.C's Chancery store under the watchful eye of Louise Rae, M.A.C's national training manager.
Today, the luxury makeup market is more about the experience and less about po-faced sales consultants on a mission to flog their weekly quota of red lipsticks.
Many of the elite beauty brands, like Lancome and M.A.C, have discovered customers are spurning sales spiel in favour of technical advice.
A decade of the fashion for barely-there makeup has left many women with few skills when it comes to applying serious makeup.
M.A.C has a chain of stores devoted to makeovers with full face-chart renderings and private beauty lessons. With the service redeemable on product, it's also a clever way to boost profits.
There's no shame in feeling completely intimidated by makeup counters bursting with colour. Even if you do take the plunge, many women admit to abandoning difficult eye colour shades after a few mishaps.
Keeping up with trends is another minefield. Coral is big this season, and there's a big trend to making up serious eyes and lips.
"But then again," says Rae batting glamourpuss smoky eyes, "there's a big trend to one or the other".
I'm confused. So it's back to beauty school to learn some tricks of the trade.
"If you get your makeup right, people should say you look beautiful not your makeup looks good," explains Rae.
Makeup lesson 1 at M.A.C
My "client" at M.A.C is a green-eyed blonde with an olive complexion, who has a desperate desire to move on from her normal makeup routine - and she's got a hot date tonight.
There are three secret steps to makeup success: priming, foundation and concealer.
Just imagine your naked face is a wooden villa stripped back ready for a paint job. First you prime the skin - and lips - with moisturiser, allowing it to settle before applying the foundation and concealer.
"It's really important to focus on the skin," says Rae.
She demonstrates by squirting a small drop of foundation on her hand, and using a generous-sized brush, she pats it around the face.
"There's no need to stroke downwards to the neck - that was a very 90s habit."
My first valuable lesson; you don't need to apply foundation all over the face, just the patchy areas of uneven skin. The sophisticated foundations on the market should blend seamlessly with the skin's natural tones.
And Rae rarely applies foundation on the eye lid, preferring the natural colour to show through.
"Just apply it to the areas that need it - often it's just the T-zone. And powder is really a personal choice. It's useful if you want a less dewy look."
A few dabs of concealer and the base is complete.
I watch as Rae works her magic on the eyebrows, using a pencil a shade lighter than the model's natural colour. Rae advises to "extend slightly beyond the natural line to open up the eyes."
Belinda, my makeup test dummy has stunning green eyes and Rae wants to use bronzes and plums to highlight them. "When choosing colours, imagine a colour wheel and select the opposite colour to compliment your eyes."
Rae demonstrates on the right eye, leaving me to complete the left. How can I possibly copy this master art work? "It's about getting the eyes symmetrical," says Rae cheerily.
I have to apply three colours, using a rounded brush for blending and an angled brush for defining key areas.
I must remember to "pat" not "chop chop" when applying the colour. It's all about creating depth, texture and the secret is blending and more blending.
I apply the base colour - a pale gold - across most of the eyelid, followed by a deeper bronze shade over the socket. The tricky part will be applying the accentuating plum shade.
I delicately dip my precision brush into the dark plum, and with shaky hands, move slowly around the socket and towards the outer eye.
"Don't be afraid to lift up the eye - put your thumb on her brow and raise it slightly," says Rae. If wielding a brush near the delicate eye area isn't difficult enough, I also have to keep up friendly banter with my client.
I instruct her to focus eyes right, as I apply a dab of the plum in the inner corner of her eye.
"Don't worry if you make a mistake. You can always apply another layer of base and re-do what you've already done."
To achieve the smoky-eye look, I tilt back Belinda's head and apply a dash of plum under the bottom lashes.
I dread the prospect of lining her inner rim with black pencil; a poke in the eye is no fun but Rae insists it will give the eye a "real pop".
Another trick of the trade: A dab of highlighter in the middle of the brow (just below the arch) instantly lifts the eye.
I apply a little concealer over my model's lips before applying the lip pencil. Rae reminds me to use the side, not the tip, of the pencil to avoid a harsh line.
Next comes the lip gloss, with only a tiny dab in the centre of the lips - "less is more with lip gloss", explains Rae.
The cheek bone is highlighted with a cream blusher, starting at the base of the apple near the bridge of the nose.
A few licks of mascara and the look is complete. "I look so different," says Belinda transfixed by her new image in the mirror.
But will it be a success on the night?
Makeup lesson 2 at Lancome
I'm nervous about my next beauty lesson. It's at the Lancome counter at Smith & Caughey's and there's no doubt I'll be the oddball among the glamour girls. In my head I've already stared humming Frenchy's number from Grease: Beauty School Dropout. Vanishree Moonsamy, Lancome beauty adviser and a contender for a starring role in a Bollywood movie, is all charm.
Unnerved by the prospect of experimenting on a stranger in full view of passing shoppers, I've dragged along another model to inflict my handiwork.
A sassy redhead, with alluring almond-shaped brown eyes, Liz is the polar opposite of my previous model.
Moonsamy immediately identifies our skin tones from the range of beige, pink and rose.
I am a peach. So are Cate Blanchett and Julianne Moore. Sophie Dahl, on the other hand is a rose. Silver jewellery suits her pinkish complexion, whereas us peaches - a tactful way of describing yellow-tinged colouring - should stick to gold. Still you can't predict all faces. "Sometimes you assume someone is a peach and you apply the appropriate colour and it doesn't work. It can be deceiving."
Liz is a beige. But is it really that important to get the right foundation? "Definitely," says Moonsamy, "and you should adjust it as your skin changes".
Using a generous brush, Moonsamy applies foundation over the entire face, including the eye area.
She doesn't see any need for concealer and only applies a light dusting of powder.
It's a complete change of stroke from my M.A.C lesson; I'm discovering makeup artists have different styles.
Liz is sick of her style and wants to try something completely different. Moonsamy fires a list of French-sounding names to her co-worker.
"I'll have the LeCrayone kohl and the Magie blush." At this point I rather lost the thread. This too is a common customer experience: an unfamiliarity with product names.
"It's easier," says Moonsamy helpfully, "if you describe an eyeshadow as moss green, so the customer can understand."
We're going to make the most of Liz's pretty almond-shaped eyes with three colours, mostly bronze and green shades.
I'm now familiar with the application; the lighter shade first , followed by a darker shade on the socket and the accentuating darker shade on the outer eye.
But the choice of colour depends on the eye shape - darker colours make it recede and light colours open it up. "Dark colours define the eye," explains Moonsamy.
Blending is the key and my technique needs improvement.
I aim the brush at her outer eye and start circling. "Don't go near the end of the eye where the dark highlighter is," warns my beauty instructor.
Instead of lining the inner eye with black, Moonsamy opts for a white pencil.
The effect is dramatic, or as Moonsamy says, "it's like, boom".
My vigorous blending has caused havoc on my model's face.
"There's a lot of fallout," says Moonsamy dusting away the excess of eye makeup.
I'm made to tidy up my model's face with a touch of concealer - or Flash Retouche Eraser - which cuts and cleans away the mess.
Next is mascara, but never, advises Moonsamy, keep pumping the wand or you'll end with clumpy lashes.
After a wisp of blusher to the cheek bone, I move onto the lips.
Liz has a "challenging" top lip, which translates as a bit on the thin side.
My beauty instructor hands me a pencil and tells me to start in the middle and stay within the lip ridge - or it will look very unnatural.
A quick flick of bronzer and the makeover is complete.
"Very nice job," praises Moonsamy. Liz can't stop gazing at her reflection in the mirror either.
Beauty ratings
Belinda's night out on the town was a huge success.
"Lots of people kept telling me I looked amazing - and I had loads of attention from the guys. I put it down to the makeup. And it lasted until 2am."
Despite peering lovingly in her husband's eyes, Liz had little reaction to her major revamp.
Even after resorting to pointing directly at her eyeballs, he couldn't spot the makeover.
"But darling you always look beautiful," said hubby. Maybe beauty is skin deep.
10-minute beauty makeover
The challenge is to give my face an instant lift in 10 minutes. The clock is already ticking and M.A.C's Louise Rae casually reaches for her tools, seemingly oblivious of the time. She primes my faces with a spray full of revitalising ingredients. I instantly feel better. To revitalise my blurry eyes, she dabs some Fast Response eye cream containing caffeine. "It's like a latte for the eyes," laughs Rae. Removing a long brush from her makeup belt, Rae expertly dips into the satin finish foundation and circles my now-refreshed eyes in a figure eight pattern. I feel like a training ground for pony club, although it's vaguely soothing. Rae then defines my eyebrows with Shimmersand, a Shadestick a shade lighter than my natural brows. Rae also applies a Shimmersand Shadestick on my eye sockets, and being coral it instantly brightens my eyes - "corals are very flattering". Next, a sweep of cream blusher across the cheek bone. Rae says the lip gloss will also give me a boost, and a few moments later they are tingling. Ten minutes are up; I feel refreshed and more importantly, look very perky.
Beauty school tips
* Prime your skin; apply moisturiser on lips and skin.
* Use brushes instead of sponges for foundation.
* Give your eyes an instant lift by putting a dab of highlighter in the middle of the brow.
* Don't smoother your lips in gloss; a dab in the middle of the mouth will suffice.
* Cotton buds are handy tools for erasing mistakes.
* Experiment with your drawer full of eyeshadows.
* For special occasions, take a fabric sample to the makeup counter.
* Less is more with foundation: the size of a pearl is more than enough.
* When applying mascara, half close your eyes and sweep the wand upwards.
* When applying lip pencil, use the side not the tip.
* Remove all your makeup.
