Beauty Secrets We Learned From Holli Smith

START
body

In high fashion, there’s almost no such thing as effortless beauty. From facial treatments that leave your complexion dewy and luminous to the perfect winged eyeliner, experts reveal their most-trusted, insider hacks for CR‘s series, Beauty Secrets.

Holli Smith enrolled in beauty school in Santa Cruz two weeks after her high school graduation. She had already been playing around with hair, dyeing and cutting her own. Her grandmother was also a hairstylist so she’d been immersed in that world since a young age. “I always had naturally curly hair and so many people messed that up and made it a mushroom,” Smith tells CR. “I had to take matters into my own hands so I started becoming fascinated with products. I was kind of destined for it in that way.”

Smith made the cross-country move to New York and had the opportunity to work with Guido Palau. Everything else took off from there. Smith started doing campaigns for Balenciaga, Calvin Klein, and Proenza Schouler and working backstage during fashion month. “This great little moment opened up for me, so I took that pat,” she says. “I’ve just been riding the wave. I’ve always loved transformations and trying to make the best happen for someone, so it’s been a nice fit to do fashion.”

Here, CR caught up with the hair guru about her favorite products, the push for inclusivity in the fashion industry, and the easiest way to achieve slicked back tresses.

Do you have a skincare routine?
“I use this brand called D&K skin care and I go to a salon that has the cleanest products. It’s not that popular in America; I don’t know why but it’s really popular in Australia. I’ve also been using products from this girl who makes her own organic stuff in LA called NOTO. I use the Face & Neck Oil and mix that with perfume to break it up a little. I use a good sunscreen by D&K.

What about favorite hair products?
“My holy grail products are from Carol’s Daughter. It has a whole bunch of different kinds for people who have naturally curly, textured, or Afro textured hair. It was started by a woman who opened up her first store in Brooklyn. The one I use the most is called Healthy Hair Butter. They also have a cream that you can put in curly hair. When I’m slicking hair back, I put Oribe Grandiose Mousse on top of water-logged hair. I need all the weight I can get, so it doesn’t look like I have tons of wax or anything like that. Oribe Gel Serum is a super strong gel that gives you this super hard, slicked wet look. I also use hand potion from a French brand called Cataier. Bumble and Bumble Sumo Gel is an edge cream that goes around baby hairs, if I want a really slicked back look, because sometimes even gel bounces up a bit. This one is actually so intense that it lays down baby hair.”

Do you have a good tip for that slicked back look?
“My favorite thing is just-out-of-the-shower hair. I tell people to make sure that the last rinse out of the shower is with their face pointing to the shower nozzle, so you get all that direction of the water spraying in your face. It makes your hair go straight back and extremely flat as if you are coming out of the ocean or pool. It turns into one solid sheet of hair and that alone is the most amazing way to slick your hair back. If you add a cream or some Carol’s Daughter or a mousse for a little hold, you can accentuate that. If you put a gel, it gets super hard, but it gives you more of a stronger, slicked-back look. I think a lot of people get out of the shower and dry it and fluff it out, and what happens is that it starts removing the water. Texture is getting volume at the root.”

Anything you’d like to see change in the industry?
“There are so many things right now, because it’s just a strange time. Things are changing so much when information is coming out so fast. It used to be a brand had an identity, you would do one look for a campaign, and the next look would be something different with the same identity. Now, brands just don’t want to fall behind, even if they don’t know what it’s supposed to look like. Doing something is better than nothing. I think we should have more sustainability, like recycle and reuse, and I think that’s starting to happen. The waste problem will be hard to fix with the fast fashion and we need to see and wait it out.”

How have you seen the push for diversity and inclusivity change throughout your career?
“I do feel like some models have a hard time when a white person does their hair, especially afro hair. We will have to go through a few years of the pain of that until we have different types of people who know different types of hair, so that everyone is shown and has a professional there to handle them. This is what has to happen because people are upset if someone doesn’t know how to do cornrows. Sometimes, assistants don’t know how to do much hair at all and it’s more of bootcamp for them. I am lucky to have 10 different people who I work with that are really good. It hurts me to hear that people are going through those bad experiences and I’m happy people are speaking about their views and experiences because that’s what it takes to make this change. Let’s do it.”

What made you want to go into high fashion makeup?
“It’s more about transformation. People who are doing red carpet and Hollywood are great, because it’s about the connection the hairdresser has with the celebrity, press, and makeup artist. There is this harmonious thing happening. I know what the challenges are behind that. I am ultimately looking for different challenges and puzzles to figure out every day. I feel like I have more leeway and adventure, being able to transform models in the fashion industry. We don’t have to have a publicist to figure out what is right for fans in Middle America. We decide what is best for the people who are there. It’s just the collaboration.”

END

prev link: https://www.crfashionbook.com/beauty/a28012482/beauty-secrets-we-learned-from-holli-smith/
createdAt:Thu, 13 Jun 2019 21:59:39 +0000
displayType:Standard Article
section:Beauty