THE FORMULA

YOU ARE A BABE

MICHAELA MYHRBERG, ODALISQUE MAGAZINE

MARCH 05.2013 by AIMEE BLAUT

"My sister and I didn’t feel like there was a platform for us so we wanted to create something of our own. We started Odalisque Magazine about a year ago and the main focus is the visual beauty, which is why we don’t have so much writing at the moment. A lot of fashion magazines are really nice but they mix too much and it can become overly commercial -- we wanted to stay away from that.

I don’t wash my face in the morning only at night because I have such dry skin. In the winter I use Body Butter from The Body Shop as a moisturizer. Here in Sweden it gets so cold and the Body Butter helps keep everything hydrated so I don’t have any dry skin falling off my face. When it comes to makeup I usually only use mascara and I love Lancôme Hypnôse. I don’t ever wear foundation unless it’s a special night and I want to be extra pretty. I think it looks good in photos but not in reality. But sometimes I do wear blush from bareMinerals.

I dye my hair lighter and then leave L’Oréal Silver Shampoo in. I’ve been going blue/silver for about six months. I want to go even bluer but I don’t have the time to leave the shampoo in for that long. I used to have really dark brown hair but a year and a half ago I tried to go blonder so I had to see the hairdresser for quite a while. It’s really hard to move from dark to light. Now finally I’m light but it took about eight months.

I always did makeup for my relatives when they were getting married; and two years ago my sister, who is a photographer, asked if I could help with the makeup for one of her shoots. I said of course. So I started working with her doing makeup and then other photographers began to contact me. It wasn’t something that I was aiming for but it fell in my lap so now I am also a makeup artist.”

Photos by: Aimee Blaut in Stockholm

Tags: bareMinerals, Blue Hair, L'Oreal, Lancôme, Michaela Myhrberg, Odalisque, Odalisque Magazine, Silver Shampoo, Stockholm, The Body Shop

THE EXPERT

MARIA BOSTRÖM

FEBRUARY 12.2013 by AIMEE BLAUT

"I went to art school in Finland and wanted a job where I could travel. So I decided to pick up hair and makeup. Working with hair is like sculpting and doing makeup is like painting. I moved to Stockholm and applied to work with Björn Axén, probably the best salon in Sweden. Björn said that I could take five models and film my styling then come in for an interview. So here I am this little girl from Finland walking around Kungsträdgården trying to find some models, I didn’t know anybody in Stockholm (laughs). So I dragged some girls down and did my video. The next day I went to see Björn and I got the job and got into his creative team. It’s been great fun we did all the shows in New York and I was working with the royal family.

In 1989 Björn and I were in Paris for the couture shows and I met Kim Robinson who was an Australian running salons in Hong Kong. We had dinner and he invited me to come work with him. I thought about it for a while and eventually called Kim and decided to go. First it was hard but after one year it got a lot better. In Scandinavia you demand respect but in Asia you have to earn your respect so that was a very interesting journey. I worked with a team in Hong Kong for hair and set up my own makeup practice. Eventually I left Le Salon and Kim Robinson and worked a lot with the magazines. I eventually opened my own which I later sold to Elle Hong Kong when I moved back to Sweden.

(some of Maria’s favorite products)

I teach makeup to people and I teach in a different way. A lot of brands have a very scheduled process of how to wash the brushes and do things from light to dark; then I come in and am like ‘okay we are going to break all these rules! Anyone who went to a classic school is going to hate me but people who want to try something else, enjoy the ride!’ I do a lot of patchwork and work mainly with my fingers when I can. I work the best when it’s hands on and I can touch and feel things.

Since I don’t wear much makeup if I want to do something more dramatic I’ll wear red lipstick. So from time to time I throw on a red lip and put on my Tom Ford glasses.”– To see more images and learn about Maria’s daily beauty routine click here to read here.

Photos by: Aimee Blaut in Stockholm

Tags: Björn Axén, Giorgio Armani, Kim Robinson, Lancôme, Le Salon, Makeup.com, MARIA BOSTRÖM, Shu Uemura, Stockholm, Stockholm beauty, Sweden, Tom Ford

YOU ARE A BABE

MELISSA LIEBLING-GOLDBERG, GILT GROUPE

NOVEMBER 12.2012 by AIMEE BLAUT

THE_FORMULA_MELISSA_LIEBLING_GOLDBERG_GILT_2

"Before I came to Gilt I had worked in publishing for the past twelve years. I had most recently been Style Director of People.com and Digital Director of People Stylewatch magazine. Gilt was one of those opportunities I felt like I just had to take, they were doing something so innovative and so interesting, and were pushing the boundaries of the way people shopped, so to be able to add content to that experience in a meaningful way was a challenge that I thought was too good to pass up.

What I do is oversee all of the copy on the site, so I have editors and writers who work for me, I oversee all of the daily sale copy and email copy that happens on womens. We work on all of the social media streams, Instagram and Pinterest are my pet projects, those are very personally mine and then I do a lot of other interesting stuff working with the styling and creative teams. I also put together sales that are meant to help women get dressed, if they are looking for more styling advice and less being driven by a brand.

I love a beautiful compact; I tend to just hoarde those, like all of the limited edition Lancôme packages where they just feel like little jewels. I love beautiful packaging, I want to display them. I am not the kind of person who wants to shove everything into a makeup bag and put it away. I love the thought and the care that went into packaging.

I love the Caudalie Spa at the Plaza; almost all my body care is by them. They have the greatest lip balm, which they get almost no credit for but is the greatest lip balm ever. Their hand cream is the only thing I’ve used for years, their facials are terrific and their massages are heaven. I used to live on the upper west side so I would go there and then kind of walk dazed through Central Park towards home, it was so nice. We work with Caudalie on the site, so I always stock up whenever they are on Gilt.”

See more pictures and learn about Melissa’s daily beauty favorites click here on Makeup Dot Com.