Even if Keke Palmer wasn’t incredibly candid about her behind-the-scenes beauty process, we would love her to the max. But the fact that she is so happy to share her struggles and solutions has basically endeared her to us forever. (She had us at “My baby hairs! She took ’em!“) And over the weekend, only a few days after sharing how polycystic ovarian syndrome (PCOS) has affected her skin, she dropped her acne-coverage makeup routine in an epic 14-minute Instagram video.
Palmer went through her process, sharing her go-to products, techniques, tips, and even some interesting stories. “I’ve been dealing with acne and struggling with makeup and trying to cover it and all that stuff for a really long time. And I don’t think there’s any shame in it because you have to make it do what you gotta make it do.”
Palmer starts with a spritz of Caudalie Beauty Elixir and a light layer of Aquaphor to combat dryness, create a bit of a barrier, and help her remove it later.
The first makeup product she reaches for is the MAC Studio Fix Correction Palette — specifically the orange shade. “So I’m going to start with orange and I know we’ve all seen this before. It’s like the cancel-out method.” She then uses a Nars concealer in a shade lighter than her skin tone over the areas she shaded orange, as well as to highlight.
“When I was younger, my movies — sometimes they would just put whatever was the darkest color of my acne scars. You know, sometimes you look at my movies, you’ll see I was three, four, five different shades at once. Because if I had a bunch of acne, they would make me whatever the color of acne,” Keke recalls as she applies a MAC foundation stick with a blending sponge and a small concealer brush. “I didn’t know how to help myself. So I had to learn how to do my makeup on my own to make sure that I felt happy and comfortable.”
Palmer tells viewers that she prefers a matte finish, and we see her apply MAC Mineralize Skinfinish Natural powder with different-sized brushes to address different areas of her face. When she realizes she’s got some textured skin that’s not cooperating, she shares a quick fix: “So what I did was I put a little powder — I didn’t get too worried — I got a little powder, a little bit of the Aquaphor, and it just laid right down,” Palmer says. “Everything can be covered up but a ugly heart.”