How to Keep Your Makeup Melt-Proof, According to 5 Experts

Keeping your makeup from feathering, melting, or falling can be the ultimate challenge when the heat index nears triple digits. Spending time carefully applying your face beat then having it fade away in mere minutes can seem like a waste of time when humidity and sweat are your worst enemies. To help you out, we tapped some of the leading makeup artists in the industry—Dick Page, Lisa Eldridge, Fara Homidi, Raisa Flowers, and Romy Soleimani—for their heat-proofing tips. Below, they reveal their tricks of the trade, along with their most trusted products with maximum staying power to prevent your makeup from a major meltdown.

Start With Your Skincare

To prevent your makeup from slipping and sliding, makeup artist Romy Soleimani advises that you steer clear of heavy oils in your skincare routine. (She says, however, that it’s fine to dot a teeny bit on the high points of your cheeks for a studied glow.) She prefers lightweight creams or refreshing milky-water emulsions, like Valmont’s Primary Veil, that will instantly absorb into your skin.

It’s All in Your Handiwork

According to British makeup pro and beauty entrepreneur Eldridge, how you apply product to your face is just as important as what you put on it. “You need to apply it in thin layers. Buff, blend, and smooth everything into the skin as you go,” she explains. She refers to this method as her “patchwork skin technique,” which involves strategic placement. “With the exception of sunscreen, you don’t have to daub everything everywhere on your face,” she says. “For instance, you need only apply mattifying primer to your oily hotspots, such as the sides of your nose, forehead, and chin.”

Adjustments Are Sometimes Necessary

Makeup wizard Dick Page’s advice for dealing with melting maquillage is not to bother using it all. “Why torment yourself?” he says. But if you do still want to bother, he suggests that you search for formulations with built-in humidity resistance, such as long-lasting concealers, smudge-proof mascaras, budge-proof lip stains, and melt-proof cream eyeshadows. But, notes Eldridge, “it’s important to remember that these types of formulas can sometimes be more drying, so you might need to compensate by adding more moisturizer beforehand, using less powder than normal, or adding a bit of balm on top of lipstick.”

Less Is More When It Comes to Your Base

A full face of heavy foundation can be a nightmare when the temperature soars. Minimal coverage is best. “Go for a soft matte base that doesn’t oxidize. It’ll give your skin that sought-after, blurred, filter effect,” says Soleimani. “But apply it only where you need it.” Eldridge favors the lightweight texture of her makeup line’s face tint, since it’s formulated to last well in the heat. Page, meanwhile, forgoes foundation altogether and prefers a trace of concealer instead. For the under-eye area, Flowers suggests that you look for one that doesn’t crease, like the durable offering from Lancôme.

Set It, Then Set It Again

There’s nothing worse than when moisture beads start forming on your face. For those who easily perspire, makeup savant Raisa Flowers offers this fail-proof trick: stacking setting sprays as a means of ensuring a sweat-proof beat. “First, spritz Urban Decay’s All Nighter Spray, and let that dry. Next, apply Ben Nye’s Final Seal. Then, lock it all in with Kryolan’s Fixer Spray,” she says. “I promise you, your makeup won’t budge after that.”

Budge-Proof Your Brows

For stay-put eyebrows, makeup maven Fara Homidi swears by this hack: Dip your brow brush into a setting and sealing liquid, like the Make Up Forever Aqua Seal, then dip it again into brow powder. With the brush, fill in your brow fringe and let it set.

Say Bye to Raccoon Eyes

Instead of eye powder, Homidi recommends using a lightweight primer under a thin layer of creamy shadow. “The flexibility of a cream will look more natural and lived-in when the weather is hot, and the primer will help keep it from traveling,” she explains. For extra insurance, “finish it off with a touch of translucent setting powder under the eyes and around the edges of the shadow,” she adds.

For Homidi’s unbeatable summer melt-proof eyeliner hack: “Draw the shape with an eye pencil. Then, dust the line with a liberal amount of translucent powder, like Fenty’s Invisimatte,” she says. “Don’t worry if it looks chalky; the oils in the pencil will absorb some of the powder and the shape will shine through—it will also set the liner and the areas around it nicely. Lastly, trace the shape with a liquid liner to really allow it to lock.”

If you prefer a simpler option, try gel liners—they tend to dry in place, unlike their creamier siblings. Pat McGrath’s perma-gels are Flowers’s first choice, while Page raves about those by D-Up from Japan. “They’re incredibly smudge resistant,” he tells W.

As for mascara, most of the pros agree that water-resistance was the key to preventing a runny mess. Flowers’s fave is MAC’s waterproof version, for its fullness and separation prowess. Soleimani gives top marks to the veteran industry formulator Sarah Creal’s personal tubing iteration, the conditioning coating wraps around each individual lash for long-lasting results.

Let It Melt In

For a natural flush on the cheeks, Soleimani likes to use blush creams since they “seamlessly sink in and become part of the skin.” A cream-to-powder version is Flowers’s go-to. The Yummy Skin Blurring Powder Flush by Danessa Myricks is her favorite, since it doesn’t move. Hourglass’s serum blush is another great option.

Keep Your Lips Locked

“Line, prime, and layer” is Homidi’s motto when it comes to delivering kissers with real staying power. First, she pats the pucker with a light, cushiony balm. Next, she lines and fills them in with a lip pencil. Afterward, she layers on her line’s cream-to-powder Color Plush Soft Matte from her own lip palette to keep it anchored. As her final setting step, she traces the edges with an invisible powder.

Don’t Be Afraid of Stains

For immutable color, stains hold up better than creamy formulas, says Page. If you don’t have the liquid tints on hand, you can improvise your own variation of deep saturation by using your fingertips with a highly pigmented balm or lipstick. He likes pressing in his client, Sofia Coppola’s, collaboration with Augustinus Bader on the lips and apples of the cheeks.