Glow Up: the best show for every make-up fan!

In a world, where our appearance is our calling card, make-up is an integral part of our everyday life. It's our way of expressing ourselves. It's our mask, our armor, our pride. 

Make-up plays many roles in our lives. But for some of us, it's more than just taking care of our image. 

Sometimes, make-up equals art. Sometimes make-up is our whole life, like for the participants of the British reality competition: Glow Up: Britain’s Next Make-Up Star. 

Source: whatsnewonnetflix.com

We're used to admiring so many artists who paint, draw, sing, make some videos. However, we're still surprised that some people see make-up as art. Glow Up tries to convince us that it's true. In my opinion, the creators of this show are really persuasive... 

Every face tells some story. Every face can become our work of art. Make-up artists are artists whose talent, imagination, and dedication to their work deserve recognition. 

Source: whats-on-netflix.com

That's what I have realized after watching Glow Up, the program in which a group of the most talented MUAs in the UK fights to win the show. What are they fighting for? The prize is a title of the winner, a contract assisting some of the world's top make-up artists, and a recognition that facilities career development. 

If you want to join the show, you just need to present your portfolio. You don't need any diploma, certificates, or years of professional experience. The creators of the show are perfectly aware that real talent doesn't need a paper. Sometimes, we don't even have any occasion to get it and to develop our potential. 

At the beginning of the program, we meet a group of ten participants that have impressed judges the most. Every episode of the show is a new creative task, new challenges, new ideas, and work under huge pressure. 

Each assignment is different but every episode sticks to a similar structure. 

The whole program is hosted by Stacey Dooley: a British presenter, journalist, documentary filmmaker, media personality, and author, mainly known for her work in social causes. 

 

The participants' ideas are always evaluated by two judges: Dominic Skinner and Val Garland – the world-famous MUAs, the real authorities in the industry who work with the largest cosmetics and fashion companies all over the world. 

Source: bbc.co.uk

Glow Up lets us go backstage at fashion events and during photo shoots for popular fashion magazines. We can see how the celebrities are getting ready for walking the red carpet. We discover the secrets of fantasy film make-up. We learn how stage make-up for drag queens is done. 

And, more importantly, we begin to understand that working as an MUA requires a lot of physical and emotional strength. 

Every Glow Up episode has the same structure: each participant has to perform two tasks following the judges' instructions. Then, every MUA is evaluated. Two participants that least impressed the judges fight with each other in the last round of the episode, called the "face-off". The participant with the lowest score has to leave the program. Sometimes, it's really hard for judges to chose who should end his adventure with Glow Up. An artistic competition is not like maths. There are no good or bad answers. Most of the time, some really small details determine who is a winner and who's gonna lose. As we can guess, it produces a lot of positive and negative emotions among the participants, judges, and the viewers of the show.

Sometimes, the Glow Up participants have really dazzling ideas. Here are a few of them (all found on Instagram):

Glow Up is a perfect program for everyone interested in the work of MUAs. The participants of the show can inspire us, the stories of their lives are sometimes really interesting and their skills make us speechless. 

The two seasons of Glow Up are available on Netflix. The third season of the show is already in production.