Al­though it’s not quite pop­u­lar cul­tur­al­ly in Trinidad and To­ba­go, Hal­loween is ac­knowl­edged by many coun­tries as a be­lief that su­per­nat­ur­al be­ings, or the souls of the dead, roamed the earth. Hal­loween cos­tumes are worn on or around Hal­loween, a fes­ti­val which falls on Oc­to­ber 31st. Dur­ing this time, it is com­mon to find peo­ple get­ting ex­tra cre­ative with their spooky looks.

Across our is­lands, many make­up artists have been us­ing this time to show their cre­ativ­i­ty and skill by dab­bling in some scary make­up looks. Tahi­rah Mustapha is a 20-year-old, self-taught make­up artist who has a love for these spooky Hal­loween looks. At just 10 years old, Tahi­rah start­ed play­ing in her moth­er’s make­up palettes un­til she found her­self tru­ly en­cap­su­lat­ed in the art. This hob­by has grown in­to some­thing she has be­come quite good at and loves. With Hal­loween just around the cor­ner, we con­nect­ed with Tahi­rah to learn more about her jour­ney as a make­up artist and to give us some tips for fun, spooky looks that any­one can try. If you like dress­ing up in cos­tumes for Hal­loween and do­ing those quick make­up looks to match, read what Tahi­rah had to share with the WE Mag:

What do you love the most about be­ing a make­up artist?

The best thing about be­ing a make­up artist is see­ing the smile on peo­ple’s faces when they look in the mir­ror af­ter I’m fin­ished. It makes me so hap­py to know that peo­ple like my work enough to come to me to get their make­up done. I just love mak­ing peo­ple feel con­fi­dent and beau­ti­ful.

Who are you in­spired by?

I have al­ways been in­spired by free spir­its, peo­ple who aren’t afraid to ex­press them­selves, es­pe­cial­ly in a cli­mate where raw self-ex­pres­sion may not be the eas­i­est thing. I have al­ways been in­spired by young, lo­cal en­tre­pre­neurs and cre­atives be­ing them­selves, un­apolo­get­i­cal­ly.

Tell us about three best achieve­ments /mile­stones in your life or pro­fes­sion.

See­ing as all this is new to me, my first mile­stone was def­i­nite­ly mus­ter­ing up the courage and con­fi­dence to put my work out there, by fi­nal­ly cre­at­ing my make­up page ear­li­er this year. An­oth­er mile­stone for which I am grate­ful - the op­por­tu­ni­ty to col­lab­o­rate with oth­er lo­cal cre­atives for projects and pho­to­shoots. There’s a lot in the works.

Third­ly, it would def­i­nite­ly be this op­por­tu­ni­ty right here. The chance to reach oth­er peo­ple who are in­ter­est­ed in make­up, my work and what I have to say. I am so grate­ful to be fea­tured in one of the most up­lift­ing Caribbean mag­a­zines to in­spire oth­ers just like me.

What’s a 2019 beau­ty trend you ab­solute­ly love and why?

Late­ly, I have been see­ing a lot of peo­ple re­al­ly step­ping out of the safe zone and wear­ing make­up in unique ways - bold colours, dots, lines, gems and pearls. I love that un­apolo­getic self-ex­pres­sion is be­com­ing clos­er to the norm.

What is the biggest chal­lenge you have to face as a make­up artist?

One of the biggest chal­lenges is hav­ing to deal with the fact that many peo­ple don’t view make­up as an art form or an out­let for cre­ative ex­pres­sion. How­ev­er, I be­lieve that with de­ter­mi­na­tion and tal­ent, the MUAs of the Caribbean can show peo­ple that make­up artists are cre­ative in our own spe­cial way.

Spook

With every­one now dab­bling in­to make­up for Hal­loween, can you give us three Hal­loween make­up tips?

Tip 1 - There are many ways to do cool, spooky looks for lit­tle to no cost. Don’t feel like you can’t go all out for Hal­loween if you can’t af­ford to. There are a lot of hacks on­line that are quick and easy to fol­low.

Tip 2 - If you are work­ing with face­paint, I sug­gest you start with a clean, fresh face, with ton­er and a cot­ton. You should al­so set the T-zone es­pe­cial­ly if you’re go­ing to be out all night, since most face­paints have a very oily con­sis­ten­cy.

Tip 3 - Have fun with it. It doesn't have to look per­fect and neat, it’s spooky sea­son! There’s no pres­sure. If you do end up mak­ing a mis­take or a smudge, that’s noth­ing a lit­tle fake blood can’t fix. Hap­py Hal­loween!

Face the heat