Makeup for glasses

Lenses for short-sightedness — minus lenses — reduce the apparent size of whatever is behind them. Eyes look smaller, and so does any detail around them. Liner has to be slightly thicker to read at all, lashes need more definition, and a light shade on the inner corner genuinely helps open the eye back up.

Lenses for long-sightedness — plus lenses — magnify. Everything is enlarged: the liner, the lashes, and equally the smudges, the unblended edge and the dark circle. Here you want less product and much more careful blending, and the under-eye area becomes the most important part of the whole face.

If you do not know which you have, the lens itself tells you. Minus lenses are thinner at the centre and thicker at the edge; plus lenses are the other way round.

Matte and satin shadows behave predictably behind a lens. Heavy shimmer does not — it catches reflections off the inner surface of the lens and produces small bright spots that are distracting in person and worse in photographs.

Define the lash line rather than the crease. Frames already draw a horizontal line across the face, and a strong crease shadow sitting just above the frame line competes with it. A defined lash line sits inside the frame and reads clearly.

Curl lashes properly and keep mascara tidy. Long lashes brushing the lens is not a small annoyance — it leaves marks on the lens all day, and mascara transferred to a lens is visible from the other side of a table.

• Matte and satin shadows — predictable behind glass
• Defined lash line — reads better than a heavy crease
• Curled lashes — stops them brushing and marking the lens
• Brow product that is precise — frames sit right underneath the brow

Frames cast a shadow under the eye and a second one across the bridge of the nose. Adding concealer to fight a shadow that is cast by an object does not work — the shadow moves with the frame, and the concealer stays where you put it, which is visible when the glasses come off.

Better to keep the under-eye light and even and let the frame do what it does. A brightening layer, pressed in thinly, is enough.

Where frames rest on the nose they will lift foundation over the course of a day, and that is unavoidable. Setting those two small spots with powder buys several hours, and a nose pad that grips product less is worth asking an optician about if it happens every day.

Frames are a fixed, permanent piece of colour on the face, and makeup either works with them or argues with them. This is the simplest adjustment on the page and the one people make least.

Dark, heavy frames carry a stronger lip well and make a heavy eye unnecessary. Thin metal frames leave room for a defined eye without the face looking crowded.

Warm frames — tortoiseshell, gold, amber — sit naturally with warm blush and lip tones. Cool frames in black or silver take cooler pinks and berries. A warm coral lip under cold silver frames is the combination that most often looks slightly off without the reason being obvious.

Tell the artist in advance and bring the glasses to the appointment. Makeup that is judged without them and then put behind lenses has been judged against the wrong face.

For photographed events, anti-reflective lenses make an enormous difference — without them, flash reflects off the lens surface and hides the eye makeup entirely in a share of the photos.

And if you wear the glasses for part of a wedding day and not all of it, say so. It is a different balance for each, and the compromise is worth planning rather than discovering on the day.