Wedding guest beauty: How to get a pro body glow

We’ve reached the pinnacle of wedding season. If you’ve survived thus far, fair play to you. That’s a lot of stressing about the gift (which is money), choosing what to wear (money) and figuring out how to get there and where to stay (money). A friend of mine has had eight weddings to attend so far this summer and is consequently considering remortgaging her house. While I can’t help with that, sadly, wedding guest beauty is something that can at least be simplified. While Irish women love beauty and tend to know their way around a make-up bag, there is one thing we often forget — the body.

Whether or not you favour false tan, it’s easy to forget that when you’re wearing a full face of make-up — particularly of the fuller coverage, glowy sort we tend to favour for special occasions — your body should match. If you have skin on show — arms, legs or anything else — it isn’t just the shade that should be uniform through face and body, but also the finish. This is where a good body highlighter comes in. It creates light reflection at key points — in the chest and collar bone area, the rounded curve of the shoulders and down the shins especially. This extends that polished, radiant look beyond the face and will ironically make a full face of make-up look less “done” as your skin will look uniformly glowy from top to toe.

This is decidedly a special occasion thing — you won’t find me bothering on the average day, but when you’re really going for it, why stop at the jawline? For optimal light reflection, there needs to be some tonal contrast between the skin tone and the highlight so it can be tough to get a really bright highlight on paler skin tones.

Fenty Body Lava Body Luminizer (€50 at boots.ie) in comes in three shades that work across skin tones. If you’re on the fairer end of the spectrum, Who Needs Clothes? will be yours. It imbues a soft, wearable gloss to skin that looks incredible but the brand offers shades for deeper and deepest skin tones too.

Charlotte Tilbury Supermodel Body Body Highlighter (€59 at Charlotte Tilbury counters nationwide) was developed by the celebrity make-up artist to recreate that silken-legged, modelesque look we all know from editorial shoots. It has a universal golden hue that makes skin look expensive and hydrated without transferring on to clothes or looking sparkly. An excellent bet for anyone new to body highlighter, it can be applied with hands or a brush.

Bare by Vogue Liquid Body Illuminator (€25 at Dunnes Stores)

Highlighter will always look most glossy and reflective on deeper skin tones, which is why it pairs so well with tan. Bare by Vogue Liquid Body Illuminator (€25 at Dunnes Stores) is a great water-based option for those who do like to wear tan — it has a bronzey hue that will only enhance a warm base. Bali Body Body Highlighter (€24 at eu.balibodyco.com) is another bronze highlight that works really well for tan wearers or naturally deeper skin tones.