We usually approach makeup visually by looking in the mirror, matching colors, and judging outcomes by sight. But beauty is sensory, living beyond the eyes. And when one sense is softened by circumstance, disability, grief, or even just exhaustion, another steps forward.
Clients who have lost vision in one eye often feel their face into alignment. Those who can’t hear well become hyper-aware of textures: the grit of exfoliant, the slip of primer, the hum of the lightbulbs overhead. Others close their eyes while blending to enter the experience more fully.
We think losing a sense is a limitation.
But we can look at is as an invitation to discover beauty as something internal, not just reflected.
In my studio, I’ve watched clients trace their features with their fingers before choosing where to place highlighter. I’ve handed a blush brush to someone with Parkinson’s who couldn’t grip well, but they knew by feel when the color was right.
When the usual channels close, the body reroutes.
And beauty, being the adaptable, intimate ritual it is, follows.