Ask most people with deep skin about foundation and you will hear the same word: ashy. A grey film that sits on top of the skin by mid-afternoon.
It happens because many ranges start from a light base and darken it with black and brown iron oxides. Deep skin carries a lot of red and gold, and those shades simply are not there.
For Skin Veil we started at the other end. Shade 560 Ebony Night was the first master we mixed, with red and yellow oxides doing as much work as the black.
Shade 510 Uli on a panel volunteer
“We mixed the deepest shade first, and made every other shade earn its place beside it.”
Head of shade development (example quote)
We then lowered the titanium dioxide, the white pigment that gives coverage, for every shade from 350 down. Less white means less grey, but also less cover, so we balanced it with a finer milled oxide that spreads further.
Every master shade is checked on at least three volunteers of that depth, in daylight and under office lights, at the start and after eight hours.
The result is a range where the deep and rich shades sell best, at 51 percent of orders. We think that tells you something about who was waiting for them.
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