How old were you when you fell in love with makeup? Share your story of true love!
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Eighteen! I was totally a late bloomer. I wasn’t allowed to wear makeup when I was younger, and when I went to college, I fell in love with MAC pigments.
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I would say I was about 13. I wore make up everyday for an entire year lol.
I got more into high end brands when I was 18. Totally and utterly fell in love with MAC products!
this year! hello kitty collection is what drew me in, and i’m 19 btw 🙂 in my later years i wore a bit of makeup, just mascara and liquid liner, but now i’m more interested in foundations, brozers, etc 🙂
I was a real late bloomer! I was 21, which was only about a year ago..
Twenty! I used to play with nail polish before, but when I turned twenty, I spent a semester in Spain and had a roommate who was addicted to mascara. Needless to say, I fell hard. I’m twenty-one now, turning twenty-two on the 23rd so it’s a fairly recent addiction for me!
LOL I was a really late bloomer then. I didn’t reaaaaaly get into makeup ’till I was 20! (And I’m only 21 now LOL). My first MAC lipstick and the first time I wore mascara were all within the last 13 months! LOL.
I think I fell in make-up when I was a little girl when I had this weird Barbie head and that you were supposed to style and put make-up on. The funny thing is my mom never wore make-up so I had nothing to practice on until I got old enough for allowance and then I went crazy.
Same.
Me too! Late bloomer that is. I fell in love with makeup when I was… 21!
Ofc I used makeup, but I saw it as a necessary evil that I had to use to feel that I looked good. Now I know and feel I look good without makeup, but I love using makeup for the creative outburst! 😀
Makeup and I have always had a love/hate relationship. I started wearing it when I was 12 (back in 1990), and back then it was always about bold makeup…but wearing it when your 12…not a good idea…so I just stuck to my mascara & bubble gum lipsmackers. I was never shown ar taught how to actually “wear” makeup correctly until maybe 4 years ago when a MAC Pro showed me the error of my ways…and I have been addicted ever since!!She also showed me your site..and now my addiction has blossomed into a MONSTER ha ha!! So a big THANK YOU goes out to Mariza Marinez and YOU!!
Same!!  I didn’t wear any makeup until a couple of years ago…basically when I turned 21 I became obsessed with the quest for dewy skin and ended up becoming a makeup junkie!!  Now I can never go back =)
I was about 24… that’s about last year! lol.
Same here Christine, I wasn’t allowed to put on makeups til I turned 18. But I’ve always loved makeups. I started using face powder, eyebrow pencil, blush and lipgloss when I was 16. 🙂
I wore the usual dollar store stuff when I was really little like 6 and then my mom would make me take it off but I fell in love with makeup when I was probably about 14-15 and I even remember buying my first MAC product.
I really got into makeup when I was 14 🙂
I started around 13, but it was during the ’80s so it wasn’t pretty and I was horrible at applying the stuff. That’s also when I stared to wear nail polish and my favorites were Wet’n’Wild (even back then they had black, green, multi glitter) and a brand called Andrea (now know for there makeup removers & lashes, along with Ardell) that I remember having in pastel pink, blue, green, yellow, & white cremes.
5 yrs old. I used to go into my grandmothers vanity and play with all her make up. Still remember the colors to this day.
when I was a little girl from about age 6 to 10, my mother worked at a cosmetics counter in a big Washington D.C. department store. I thought EVERYONE had that much makeup at home 😉 She always had testers and samples and wore colored eyelashes and of course I got to play with it. So basically for the last 43 years or so I have loved makeup.
i was 15…i first fell in love with mascara & lipgloss =)
How funny, I’m also a late bloomer, at eighteen as well =) After I got a boyfriend, I decided to start going out a little prettier, and now I’m obsessed hahaha
When I was 11 or 12. I know I was in the 6th grade. My mother took me to get a makeover because I guess she found out I was sneaking makeup at school and wanted me to learn to doit right. At that time it was the Merle Norman counter, I don’t even know if they are still around. They put way way way too much makeup on me but of course I loved it. I then spent my birthday money on Merle Norman makeup and carried it in my purse and ruined it all. I was devastated. That probably ended my makeup days until high school because my mother did not buy my makeup for me but I was still obsessed with people and their makeup. In h/s Joan Jett was my idol so I had the heavy black eye liner. LOL aah memories…
i always played with makeup since i was like 5 or 6 and an aunt would give me hand me downs dior and chanel makeup. At that time i didnt know much so i would draw on myself then take it all off! My last year of high school i started to practice it on myself. I think i fell in love with it at 16 or 17 but think it was 18 when i completely started to go all out!
I was 16 my mom let me wear makeup and i went out and bought every color of wet and wild they had a walgreens….as i got older i refined my look. In my 20’s i discovered MAC and fell in love with make up all over again…i have been on a never ending quest for the right foundation….now with the advent of YouTube my passion for make up had been refueled….
I was an even later bloomer than you! I didn’t start wearing makeup until I was 22.
Oh, that’s hard to say! I’ve gone in and out of makeup “phases” for years. I mean, I desperately wanted to play with my mom’s makeup when I was a really little kid, and sometimes she’d let me if she supervised (obviously no wearing it out of the house). I was probably 13 or 14 when I started buying my own that I was allowed to wear, and for a couple of years was really into it. But when I got to college I just completely fell out – no time, little interest; I pretty much only used it on Halloween until I graduated. Then it was just a little bit and mostly special occasions. It wasn’t until about a year ago (2 1/2 years after college) that I started *really* getting into more than just the occasional eyeliner or lipstick. I’m not in school now so I’m constantly getting into new hobbies to keep me creative or thinking, and makeup definitely fits the first 🙂
I’m quite a late bloomer actually. Haha. I only recently got hooked on make up earlier this year. Oh and I am 22.
I fell in love with makeup at about 14 or 15. It wasn’t til I was about 17 or 18 that I started wearing foundation and the rest though.
I was a late bloomer too! I fell in love with make-up at 20. I saw the difference it made so I loved it! I could tell the difference in the crappy makeup I had and the quailty of MAC and other brands!
this is embarrassing, but… I was 27 when I became addicted to makeup! Before that I barely used anything. My skin started to act up and makeup was there to save me!
In 11th grade I wanted to be all cool like the “scene” girls so I rumaged through my sisters makeup for a bright purple eye shadow and I loved it so much I asked for more makeup for christmas. Ever since my collection has been expanding.
I think i totaly fell in love with makeup when i was about 17 – thats what the time when i actually stated wearing like mascara, liner, shadow, etc. But before that i was alowed to wear a shimmery eyeliner (man they dont make it anymore – so mad abou it!!!), and i think thats where everything started!
Great question.
Actually when I had my make up done at my wedding. My MA was amazing. (Got married in my late twenties.) So yes I was a late bloomer
I fell in love with makeup at 25, when I could afford it! I remember always walking by the MAC counter in my teens, oooh-ing and awww-ing at the eyeshadow but kept walking because I wouldn’t spend the money — I needed to pay for tuition! But, times have changed and now I can indulge…with a bit of restraint, of course!
When I was ten I had my first powder to cover my unclean skin .. with twelve I tried some eyeshadows and mascara and with 17/18 I totally fell in love with make up!
it has been as long as I can remember…I wanted my mom and aunt’s makeup when I was about 5 or so. It comes from me spending time watching my mom get ready to go out. I loved that so much. I still go into her room when she is putting on her makeup, it is comfort thing I guess.
I started wearing it, with permission, when I was 11 or so, with the promise that I would wash my face 2x a day and I was only allowed mascara and clear lip gloss at first.
and i thought i was a late bloomer ahah :] and least u look pretty without it 😀
i started at around 14! i never really considered makeup until around then and when i started thinking about it, i didnt take the initiative to learn haha
i was shopping with my friend when my makeup virginity was taken haha i went to sephora and asked a MA to help put eyeliner on me :p (it was a guy, loveee the gay MA haha theyre so nice)
hmm as for how i fell in love with it
i had to go to a wedding and by then i just kind of saw makeup as a task
think my purchased my first mac thing then too, mineralized eyeshadow duo in odd couple :]
i wasnt really that experienced though so i youtubed some eyeshadow looks for that duo and i think i just started getting addicted from there haha
Junior year in high school. I wore black eyeliner to the homecoming dance and the next day, one of my friends raved about how I had looked so good. I’ve been wearing black eyeliner every single day since then!
19 ish – late bloomer as well.
Wasn’t allowed to wear it very much as a kid. My mom felt her mother had “pushed” her into it and made her feel like she would NEVER be human without it, so she went the opposite extreme with her kids. I wasn’t allowed to wear glittery products till 13, and no actual MAKEUP till 15, and then only special occasions. She had this bizarre thing she’d say every time i asked to wear it that was something to the effect of “well, if you aren’t pretty without it, no amount OF it will make you pretty! You need to accept yourself!” Only, said in such a way that I was certain she was telling me I was the ugliest kid in the bunch, utterly hopeless.
I enjoyed putting it on all through my teens(when she’d let me, or for stage performances, which is a WHOLE other technique) and loved it when my relatives gave me old products of theirs that they no longer used. w00t Old lady Mattes. My Grandmother bought me Sweetie, my first MAC lipstick, when I was 18.
After 18, I picked up makeup art as a hobby, supplementing my performing arts hobbies. I really only got into the GOOD stuff around 19, and even then, only really got comfortable with it, around 20. So yeah, late bloomer.
Hmm…I’ve been wearing make-up since I was 11, but I’ve loved it since I was 14 when my Mom’s friend set up a MAC makeover for me. That’s when I saw the potential in what this stuff could do and how beautiful it made me feel. I’ve slowly progressed from drug store to high end products from there, and I’d say I really started collecting/hoarding when I was 18 or 19. (I’m 21 now.) I’m now getting into nail polish thanks to Christine’s Wizard of Ooh and Ahhz swatches. What next? 🙂
I began using makeup when I was about 12 or 13. Nothing fancy, just CG drugstore makeup. Then I began using Bare Escentuals when I was about 16 or 17 and loved that. But I really began branching out into all types of brands (MAC, Lancome, even stuff sold at Sephora!) when I hit about 23. (I’m 25 now.)
I’ve always been facinated by makeup. I used to watch my sister when she applyed it at play with it when she went out for the day/night. I started wearing it around the age of 14. But at that time I used it mostly for the sake of it and not because I liked it. But that escalated some time after I finished groundschool (our version of your highschool I guess) and became more eager to learn new tecniques and explore color. After a christmaspresent containing a course at Make Up Store (a big swedish makeup brand) I started to value quality makeup in a whole new way. And since I found and tried MAC I’m totally stuck.
So let’s say I had a fling with makeup until I were 17 and after that I was madly in love (:
I was 13 when I fell in love with clear/tinted lipgloss and black eyeliner. I wore it everyday to school until my parents caught me lol. Then I went to high school (was allowed to wear makeup) and totally fell in love with MAC eyeshadows, pressed powder and lipglosses.
I was 20. I was a late bloomer too Christine! I had absolutly no interest in makeup when I was a kid. Now at 24 I adore it!!
Oh I couldn’t wait to wear make up!!! My mom finally caved in and let me wear mascara when I was 14. Then I gradually started putting more on myself…I’m 17 now and I’ve pretty much started using everything lol.
About 14 or so. My grandma uses the skincare stuff from Clinique, she’d always get the gift bags for spending so much money, and give me all the makeup from it. <3 I was started off right. =]
I didnt wear any make-up until 16, then worse litttle eyeshadow and lipgloss. Then 18 the full out make-up came out.
I think I’ve always loved make-up. My mom worked for a cosmetics company when I was little so there was always a ton of make-up in the house. Then at 13 I got into modeling, had my first sit down with an artist and I believe it has been all down hill from there! I’m obsessed!!!!
I was five and a my best friend’s house. I remember putting on navy eyeshadow and her mom making me take it off right away with cold cream!! From then on I was always into my mom’s stuff and she gave me “Play makeup”, but I wasn’t allowed to leave the house. I snuck it to school when I was 8 anyways. Now I’m 30, have taken fine art but makeup art is still my favourite hobby/obsession 🙂
I Was 13 but i was only allowed to wear mascara and lipgloss! i got completely into it last year (i was 17) lol
16! It all started during prom season, and I had no clue as to how to do makeup. Fortunately, my date’s sister is a MAC MA, and she totally got me hooked on the stuff! But I didn’t start buying until 17 for graduation (I wanted to look good in pics!). I got my very first starter kit at MAC! 🙂
I think I was 10 but I didn’t experiment until I was about 13. At 10, I played around with my mom’s stuff when she is not looking. But wasn’t this question asked before recently?
I started putting on the small stuff like eyeliner, lipgloss, and mascara when I was in 13 or 14. But then I stopped wearing it after I got picked on and then started wearing it again at 18.
It was my 12th birthday and my mom got me a COver Girl set with foundation, one eyeshadow, and an eyeliner. I was hooked and haven’t slowed down since!
First time I’m interested… 24 I guess. But the age when I start falling in love with make up (also the start of a MAC addiction) is 28 :D.
I was 20! I looooved lipgloss and nailpolish, but I really fell in love with makeup in the summer of 2008… Around the same time Sephora opened its first shop-in-shop in my city.
I’m also a late bloomer! I got into makeup when I was 18, which was last year. And now I’m addicted =)
I have several big makeup moments in my history….
When I was 10 my aunt bought me a set of 6 lipsticks and nail polishes – in all kinds of weird colors, including white and yellow. And she also bought me a 9 eyeshadow palate and a beautiful brush with metalic flowers on it that I still have (25 years later).
At 12 my mom ordered me Avon brown mascara and eyeliner as a suprise. But she said I had to make sure my dad didn’t notice the makeup or else he wouldn’t allow me to wear it out of the house. BRILLIANT!! I learned to apply with a light touch.
At 14 I can remember giving my friends makeovers.
At 17 I can remember driving all over town to match a discontinued lipstick that I saw my friend wearing and fell in love with.
At 18 I bought my first high-end (MAC) stuff.
It’s been downhill from there (or uphill!!). This week I’ve been trying to justify buying a $75 foundation that I reeeeeeally want. : )
lol…there is no justication…i call it the “i deserve it fund…..”
I like most women started wearing makeup around 13 and didn’t really think much of it. Just another part of life, but for some reason or another when I was 17-18 I fell in love. Started with Hello Kitty collection and Urban Decay Wallpaper pallet. Now Im going to go to school to become a makeup artist. I fell hard lol
I was around 12 or 13. I got my first pimple and was so embarrassed by it that I put my mom’s foundation over it to try hiding it. My mom and I have very different skin tones and everyone kept asking, “What’s that orange spot on your face?” LOL.
It took a little convincing but a few weeks later I finally get my mom to take me to the drug store and I bought my first foundation (something by Revlon that’s long since been discontinued). 🙂
I started getting interested in makeup when I was very little (10-ish?) as I was surrounded by my aunts and was intrigued by their products. However, I was not allowed to wear makeup other than the occasional tube of Bonne Belle lip balm. When I was 13, I started acquiring and wearing makeup secretly (I’d put it on after my mom dropped me off at school and scrub it off before she picked me up).
Fast forward many many years later… I stopped wearing makeup altogether when I gave birth to my first daughter (time and stress became an issue and my makeup routine was something I gave up). However, a few months ago, my makeup passion was reignited with the viewing of a few inspiring youtube gurus. I dusted my traincase, bought several new products and now I am back. I am now 30 by the way.
4/5 yrs old. Starting accumulating it very young…and I never stopped!
I always wore a little bit throughout highschool but once the end of my junior year hit going into senior year I started watching xsparkage on youtube and she taught me everything i know now! I then started investing in MAC brushes, eyeshadows, blush…etc and now i get compliments on my makeup everyday. Woot!
(Turn red…) this year is my first year of actually purchasing makeup for over $10 bucks …. and I love it! When I was much younger 14 i wore a foundation that ruined my skin, I broke out,BAD! then i did the nude face but not because I wanted to … now being older and much wiser (i like to think), i have re-discovered makeup!
Nine!
I dont know where i got it from but i always loved make-up.
(It was only eye shadow and lip gloss then)
I started to want to learn new things and try new products when I was 12.
I fell in love with makeup when I was 15. Really young… I know. This is when I was introduced to high end makeup brands like MAC. I hardly wore it. It was more an obsession with buying things that were in pretty packaging and were bright and colourful, and sparkly. My first ever eye shadow was Tilt by MAC. I fell in love. 🙂
Ever since I can remember, I have loved make up. My Mum had a beautiful copper lipstick that I kept trying on (she never wore it, or any make up in general). I remember buying her a gorgeous eyeshadow duo in green one Christmas when I was about 10, but she complained as it wasn’t blue (she has blue eyes). I don’t think she ever used them. Anyway, I got some cheapo 20-colour palettes and coloured mascara when I was 13-14 and never looked back, just love colours and make up. 🙂
At age 30 and I’m currently 31. I only needed to start wearing it now. :p
18, only 3 months ago, before it was only mascara for me, and now I’m in love with playing around with everything out there!
12!
of course at the time it was just black and brown eyeliners…
i suppose i was interested earlier but was only really allowed to wear nail polish prior to that.
I was 23 when I bought my first ever eyeshadow quad, and that was the Fafi quad, so not even 2 years ago. Haha, needless to say, my collection has bloomed quite a lot since. I started wearing a bit of foundation and eyeliner in my 2nd year of varsity, but never saw a need to go beyond that until I started working.
I am 15 and have always liked makeup, but haven’t really had a lot. In this past year i’ve doubled or tripled my previous amount of makeup! My parents don’t get it, but I know you all do :]
i was 13? yeah..
now im 14 lol a year and something ago i started 8thgrade like a month after i started wearing makeup everyday..
and a month after fell in love with mac..
my collection is grown REALLY fast. lol thanks to christine (:
maybe after university i got interested (23 years old). I actually stumbled upon the temptalia site and i have been hooked on make up since. been really inspired by this website 🙂
I didn’t get crazy in love with makeup until I was 23 which was 2 years ago! That’s a really late bloomer! I always liked makeup but I fell hard when I was introduced to MAC.
I can’t remember when I wasn’t.
I began the HUGE love affair when I was about 14. Even as a small child I remember wondering what makeup the actresses in the movies were wearing.
My first high end was Ultima II – back when they were still a department store high end brand.
Total late bloomer. I was 21… which was about a year ago! Haha.
11. (and im 12) im so incrediably obsessed! when my friends come over they comment on how much makeup i have. I try to resist but all my bookmarks on my computer are MAC and smashbox and temptalia
I liked makeup ok when I was a teenager, I didn’t really actually fall for it until 26, so I’m a SUPER late bloomer.
I started with Bonne Bell lip smackers when I was around 6 or 7. When I was about 13 I got my first MAC lipstick. There was no turning back 😉
I think i was 13 or 14, my mom came back from a charity luncheon and she won one of their give-away prizes which was a MAC kit of some sort… she gave me the 2 lipsticks that came with it… and i loved it… bought drug store make-up till i was 18 and then my manager at the coffee shop i worked for was also a manager at a MAC store…needless to say i have a long romance with MAC and anything having to do with making your face look pretty!
20! It was earlier this year when I started watching youtube gurus doing their thing. Remarkably, I have quite a collection already.. hahaha~
middle of my 22 years. lol well i’ve always liked MU, but back in college with no money, really didn’t get much of a chance to play with anything at all. It took until my 20th or 21st year before i even learned to use compact foundation (MAC, which i now hate) and eyeliner (again MAC, again i hate it because it smudged like crazy, it was the retractable pencil). later i ended up getting the BB gel liner and that was better with smudging (but it still smudged on me, badly). but until i started working at 22, i had no money to spend on additional mu, so I never really “fell in love with it”. but theni started working, and found MUA and various blogs while being bored at work…:P now i own too much and i keep adding to my collection. XD
23 @_@
I know it was late. But I am trying my best to catch up!
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11 or 12. I had a huge collection of Wet n’ Wild products in every color because everything was only $1 back then.
27… one of the latest bloomer at all 🙂 I’m trying to catch up because now I really love makeup and feel good only with a 4-shades look on my eyes LOL
I was 10 years old ,i started wearing makeup 🙂 when i was 10 my mom put lipstick on me it was so sweet so i have to share this now lol.
i was standing in the bathroom as my mom was putting on makeup and i picked up her lipstick and i put on to much she told me “you look like a monky BEHIND ” with all that red on your lips so she thought me how to blot with tolit paper ,and i walked to school all happy to and my crossing gard said i was cute shes a nice lady ,but the sad part is when i got to school my teacher who was rude all the time :/ yelled at me “Take that shit off you look like a hoe “word for word no joke .so i walked to the bath room crying and i took it off ;; walked to class and that was it. i told my mom and she talked to that teacher about calling me names like that .but i love the memmory of my mother and the crossig gourd .it was sweet .
then at 16 i started using make up normal everday.
14!
I fell in love at age 12, & that was also the time I started buying higher end products like mac, lancome, clinique etc. it was love at first sight.
I was a toddler. 😀
I can’t remember ever not being in love with makeup!
I started wearing eyeshadow when I was 13 (but of course I used those terrible sponge-tip applicators or my fingers!) and maybe some dark brown mascara as well. It wasn’t until my senior year of high school that I really started wearing more makeup, and it wasn’t till college that I got into GOOD makeup and actually learning techniques. I used to think blush was stupid; now I can’t leave the dorm without it! (NARS Orgasm, Amour, and MAC Cantaloupe are my HGs)
I would say 11. It started with an obsession with lip gloss for a couple of years, and by the time I hit 14 it was pretty much everything.
freshman year at 14 :] which was last year haha. i dont really care for skin or lip products because i kinda feel like im hiding the imperfections, but right now i do wear powder because my skins oily. anyways i lovee eye makeup though i was inspired my the the heavy black rock eyeliner look and i still love eyeliner
I would say around 22, after graduating college and getting a “professional” job. Before that it was just lipgloss, occassionally mascara, and I owned about 4 colors of shadow. Looking back, I wonder how and why I ever walked out the house without concealer, LOL!
Probably about 8 or younger.. my grandmother gave me a lipstick which I used as eyeshadow, lipstick AND blush. Very monochromatic lol. I started wearing mascara (which I obtained from my mother’s make up bag) when I was about 9 or 10 I think.
I got into makeup really early. At 11, I started wearing a little makeup. By 13, I started wearing a full face of makeup. And very soon after turning 13, I started getting into high end brands. Now I’m 15 and I use 100% high end brands and my collection is larger than the collection of most adult women.
I even get freelance jobs, now!
wow, such a love/hate relationship for a long time! in my early teens, I was constantly on the look out for makeup, but none looked good on me! being a very fair-skinned, cool toned, freckled redhead with albino lashes and brows made it difficult. I was on a quest! Finally, when introduced to MAC, when I was about 20, I started to fall in love! All the color choices for foundations and everything finally made me feel accepted in the MU world! I now have a bad addiction and love it!! 🙂
I’m 13 and was just allowed to start wearing makeup. I got into MAC immediately because drugstore brands usually break me out.