Bouffants and Beehives: Marilyn Monroe Halloween Tutorial

It has been a really long time since I've posted a tutorial. I hoping that the upcoming Halloween holiday will inspire me to start back up. If you have any ideas for tutorials that you would like to see, email me at ali@redroosterdesign.com.

So to start, here is a Marilyn Monroe tutorial because she is one of my favorite vintage inspirations and I've actually never been her for Halloween.

I started with a black and white photo of Marilyn, but I wanted to make this look more severe to really emphasize all of her famous features and because it's for Halloween. It's a bit of a mix between a regular Marilyn makeup and and a pop art Marylin with muted colors.

Marilyn photo used for reference.

I used my Make Up For Ever Flash Palettes. They are creams so they blend easily and they are very pigmented.

Make Up For Ever Flash Palettes

I started by adding the highlights. I just roughly applied them using a flat brush.

Highlights

Then I added the shadows using browns. I used the photograph as a reference as to where to put the shadows and highlights. Marilyn was known for her bedroom eyes and that's achieved with the defined shadows and highlights.

Shadows

I then added the signature arched eyebrows. They are pointy and thicker at the points.

Eyebrows

I then blended the face with a blending sponge by patting the areas lightly.

Blending Sponge

Results of blending the face

Then I used a smaller brush to blend around the eyes.

Real Techniques brush

Next, I went over the brown areas with a brown eye shadow from my naked palette to set it.

Naked Palette

I also went over the highlights with a white eye shadow to set it and even it out.

Sleek palette

Then it was time for the signature Marilyn lips. Her lips have a big bow and are red. I used the same brown cream that I used on my face to outline the lips. Marilyn actually used many shades of red to create her dramatic dimensional lip. After I blended the lips I added different shades of red and pink to the center and finished it off with a dramatic white highlight on the bottom center lip.

Lined Lips

Blended Lips

Lips with Red in the middle

Lip Highlight

Finally, I added eyeliner. You don't have to be super precise. If you look at photos of Marilyn, you can see that her eyeliner has a bit of an angle down on the ends and she usually had liner on the outside bottom of her eye to create that droopy shadow.