The Margiela SS24 couture make-up was so beautiful you could cry

Beauty at Maison Margiela SS24 Couture

André Leon Talley is celebrating from the beyond today – the famine is over honey, our beauty-starved eyes have finally been sated. And, of course, we have Pat McGrath and John Galliano to thank.

Yesterday, Maison Margiela finished off the SS24 Paris Haute Couture calendar on a transcendent high, reminding us how magical couture can be. There was drama, there was poetry, there was fantasy, there was storytelling and, of course, there were profoundly moving designs. “At the show’s end, the audience hollered for minutes on end, and foot-stomped and clapped till palms throbbed, knowing full well the designer wouldn’t take a bow, but wanting – needing – to acknowledge just the same the fact that fashion still possesses the power to thrill and shock and awe,” Tim Blanks said in his review of the show. Alex Fury wrote that the moment will change fashion forever.

It was, in short, spectacular – and adding to the enchantment was the make-up by McGrath which, as it has been doing for decades, elevated Galliano’s transcendent designs into another dimension. The partnership between the designer and make-up artist has always produced the most sensational looks, ones which are widely acknowledged to be among the very best of catwalk make-up. For Galliano, McGrath has always seemed to find an extra gear, creating looks full of devastating romance; looks so exquisite you want to cry at the beauty of it all. Yesterday’s make-up called back to those Dior and Galliano catwalks of the early 2000s while still feeling fresh and exciting.

Under the first full moon of the year, in a shadowy cellar bar on the Seine, models walked the runway with skin transformed into the waxy complexion of a living doll; as silky and smooth as liquid melted candles poured into a human face-shaped mould. How exactly the hyper-glossy glaze was created is being kept a secret by McGrath (although it is widely suspected to be Kryolan Liquid Glass), but since the show, models have been posting videos of themselves peeling away their faces like a reptile slipping out of its skin.

The brows were, of course, pencil-thin and drawn on in a perfect arch. Under that was placed eyeshadow in pale blues, lilacs and dark teals, or burnt orange and silvery greens. McGrath used moody shades from her palettes including Midnight Sun, Subliminal and Celestial Nirvana. Yellow blush and murky lips in swampy greys created a sickly pallor on some models, while other models with peachy blush and blonde curls were bohemian cupids. The blush was cream (the Legendary Glow Colour Balm from Pat McGrath Labs) and placed on the centre of the cheeks for a “doll-like flush”, while the lips were topped with a clear gloss to continue the glassy finish of the rest of the face. The maison described the look as “a study of the muse-like relationship between artists and their anatomical lay dolls”.

On hair, alongside the ringlets, Duffy created Belle Époque styles, candyfloss-like and full of drama, as well as merkins which peeked out from the sheer corseted dresses. Combined, the beauty evoked le demi-monde: part bohemian fin de siècle artist muse, part courtesan with a touch of cabaret. Ghostly, at times ghastly, these waxy living dolls drifted through the space like spirits of the Seine, characters left behind from the late-night revelry of parties past.