For Lauren Luke, Every Women is Beautiful.

Author’s Note: I’m not condoning nor promoting the use of make-up. This article is not about shopping advice, and/or what to do with makeup, if you wear any.

I’m not going to lie: I am a fan of cute clothes and nice make-up. But, as many women know, many of the clothes and makeup made for women are for, err, skinny and tall models. That I am not—and neither are the majority of women. While I could have a whole post about why cute clothes are made for the size zero, I’m going to talk about an extraordinary women featured in the New York Times who gives make-up advice and tips to the everyday woman—no matter her shape, size or look.

Lauren Luke

Her name is Lauren Luke, a single 27 year-old mom from Newcastle, England.  She is a self-made makeup celebrity. In 2007, she started to upload videos to Youtube about how to apply makeup as an experiment. But it is an experiment no longer: Lauren Luke’s celebrity status exploded. As stated in a recent article about her in the New York Times by Ruth La Ferla, “Now, 20 months into what began as a D.I.Y. [Do-It-Yourself] experiment, Ms. Luke’s videos have logged more than 50 million views and her YouTube channel has 250,000 subscribers in 70 countries — affirming her status, and that of YouTube, as a force to be reckoned with.” Below is an example of one of her videos, entitled, My fierce violets makeup tutorial:

People gravitate to Luke and her tutorials because she is not the “typical, gorgeous girl” teaching others how to apply makeup. By appealing to a wider audience, Luke realizes that:

What the TV and the magazines tell you, it’s not normal. For years I’ve been doing what they tell you and wondering why I came away feeling inadequate. I’m an average-looking girl who can’t wear 10 layers of fake lashes to get that mascara effect. [This] disenchantment made me dig my feet in stronger. We’ve all had enough of lies.

This is refreshing coming from a world where makeup application and products can be intimidating. But Luke makes it easy, and we feel proud and confident about applying makeup, especially for us “normal” women (whatever “normal” means). Though I’m not sure what to say about author La Ferla’s  description of Luke’s physical appearance (describing her as having “plump proportions and pretty if nondescript features”), I can assure you that her celebrity status is not just because of her fabulous tips, but because I can imagine Luke speaks to every women: “I am beautiful and so are you.”

Even more than just showing women how to apply makeup, Luke has now released an affordable makeup line with Sephora, appealing to a wider and “normal” audience. You can browse her online shop here.

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