Pre-production (Design Process)

This page features the Research and design process I went through for 1920's hair and makeup look wanted to create for the escape room project. The final decision for the Escape Room project was to have it as a 1920's murder mystery at the Old rep theatre, so this what my research was based on.

To start my research I wanted to get a rough understanding of what looks were on trend during the 1920's for women and men. For the story line there were two characters a male and a female. I created a mood board for both.

I also looked into famous stars of the 1920's who influenced the trends and created iconic styles for women in the 1920's. Women like Clara Bow, Josephine Baker and Colleen Moor (to name a few) who influenced the way women looked during that decade.

Colleen Moor

Josephine Baker

Clara Bow

She was famous for the Eton crop, a very short and gelled down hair style. And even developed hair products called 'Bakerfix' in order to allow for other women to achieve her hair style. As well as this she was a black women and it wasn't common to see black women as icons during this era especially because of racism.

Known as the 'It girl' of the 1920's most women aspired to have Bow's style. With thin over plucked eyebrows and an exaggerated cupids bow on the lips this makeup look was very popular amongst women during the decade.

A silent film actress of the 1920's Colleen Moor was considered one of the most fashionable stars of the 20's. She was well known for her bob haircut and popularised the style.

PEST analysis

We also looked into the political, economical, social and technical factors of the 1920's and this gave me a further understanding into what was popular during the decade but also allowed me to understand why.

some Examples of PEST analysis for the 1920's Makeup and Hair.

When WW1 was over women had a sense of feminine power.
Women were working and had to ration during the war which meant they had more money saved for luxuries such as cosmetics.
Doctors started to work with cosmetics to ensure they were safe for women to use
Short hair was in because it was easier to maintain.
King Tutankhamen's tomb was discovered and this had an influence on Art, fashion ,film, Architecture and jewellery.

Product Listing

The products I used for my 1920's looks makeup were:

foundation
eye shadow pallet
lip pallet
concealer pallet
brush set
glue stick (for brow blocking)
Supracolour
translucent powder
lollipop sticks
application sponge
orange water colour
Makeup wipes

The products I used for hair:

hair brush
comb
got2b glued blasting freeze spray
echo gel
gummy wax styling gel ( worked better to do pin curls on sienna's hair type)
mouse
hair curler ( for dry Marcel waves)
hair grips
Curl clips
Section clips (big and small ones)

Character Profiles

The stage management team created suspect cards with descriptions of the characters we needed for the escape room. We used these to get a better understanding of the characters.
Sophia Clarmont doesn't have one because she's the murder victim. However in the brief about her character she was a married 21 year old (she was married to a man named Laurence who was one of the suspects). Her father was the founder of the theatre and Sophia had a very successful career as an actress.

My final makeup design

This the final design I created for the 1920's female makeup, I followed this design for all the female makeup looks I had to apply for the escape room project.

The brows were plucked really thin and long in the 1920's so I created a similar effect by brow blocking and using face paint to draw them back on. The lips are a bold colour with an exaggerate cupid bow. However with my design I could have drew the bottom lip a lot more smaller because having plumper lips wasn't in style in the 1920's.

The on set experience: The advert Filming and photo shoot

In order to get people aware of our escape room we had to promo it. One way we did this is by filming an advert for it. For this we had to do a 1920's male look on the bartender (played by Will) and a 1920's look for Sofia Claremont (played by Vyv).

As well as this we also needed family photos to be used as clues for the escape room, so we had do a photo shoot for the actors. The characters used were Sophia Claremont (played by Vyv), the understudy (played by Sienna), Sofia's dad (played by Taylor) and Sofia's brother (played by Luis).

This was a good experience for me because it gave me a chance to understand what its like to have a certain amount of time to complete looks. For both of these I had one hour to complete the works. As well as this, it allowed for me to be able to work on set with a team to ensure things went the way they were meant too. For both projects I focused on hair and makeup touch ups for the actors.

Model patch test

This is a model of a patch test form that had to be filled out before doing makeup on a actor.

Product column- write the product that has been swatches onto the model

How to swatch- get a small amount of product and apply it to the inside of the models arm. Then wait 24 hours and if there's any sign of irritation to the skin then the model could be allergic.

Allergy column- write

yes if a reaction occurs
no if one doesn't

Information section

This is for the model to fill out. It also allows for them to be able to use their patch test form again and tell other makeup artist weather they are or aren't allergic to certain products. And it also shows what products have been tested on them in the past.