Victoria's Secret Fashion Show 2011

This years Victoria's Secret Fashion Show had its regular dose of wings, bling, celebs & Angels but for the first time in regards to the makeup everything was stripped way down and pared back to allow the inner girl next door shine through without any interruptions. This kind of makes sense, since Victoria's Secret is the one show where its about the girl and the lingerie is kind of secondary. This translated to Tom Pechaux designing a makeup look that included no fake spray tans, no contouring & no fake lashes. This also extended to the hair as there no extensions used. The goal was to let the girls' real beauty & individuality shine through:

Tom demo-ing the look

Isabelle Goulart

Flavia de Oliviera

Emanuella de Paeva

Tom designed this years look highlighting the beauty of the girls. He used brilliant shimmer shadow in Stardust (which is actually a loose pigment) lightly dusted across the lids and the tops of the cheekbones. Eyes were finished off with a thin line of black liquid eyeliner ever so slightly winged and black mascara was used on the lashes. Mineral bronzing powder in Glitterati was used as a slight contour & Starlet blush was mixed in and applied on the cheek. Black liquid eyeliner winged ever so slightly was applied to the lashline and finished off with black mascara. A nude lipstick and gloss in Sublime (my favorite, I fell in love with it last year) finished off the look. All color makeup used is from the VS makeup line.

Scenes from backstage:

new meaning to the word: boobie bling. This years version (above) is worth $2.5 million & will be worn by Miranda Kerr...

 

The 'shell' wings that Miranda Kerr wears with the $2.5 million dollar bra

 

Wings, wings and more wings...

A close up of the set of wings above from the Aquatic Angels section

First timer Sui He & Liu Wen being interviewed by a Chinese TV Network. They were so excited as its not everyday that they get to do interviews in America for China.


 

 My favorite selection of the evening: diamond cuff bracelets, and matching diamond rings in white, rose and yellow gold


Alessandra Ambrosio's jewelry selection for the 4th look

Sui He, in first looks

 

Glitterman doing final touches...he literally sprinkles the entire runway in glitter...

Neon light up wings in the wings from the Pink section...

Champagne to close out the evening after the last taping. It was a 14 hour day (and it was the day right after Versace for H&M & the afterparty with the Purple One)...definitely well deserved...

This was just a preview but to see the rest, you will have to tune in to see the Angels, Maroon 5 and the rest of the musical guests!!

The 2011 Victoria's Secret Fashion show airs on Tuesday, November 29th, at 10:00pm EST on CBS.

Victorias Secret 2010

This is my second year doing the Victorias Secret Fashion show. It's always a ton of fun and a lot of hard work...A few changes from last year in the lineup:  more high fashion supermodels are walking, to we welcome a whole new influx of Brazilian Beauties and the main news of the return of Alessandra Ambrosio, Karolina Kurkova & Adriana Lima, back on the runway with their fabulous post baby bodies...It's hard doing makeup, running around backstage doing touchups and trying to take photos so I had to document this year with my camera phone and when time and my hands could permit, my regular camera (thats an apology in advance as there may be some resolution issues)...Regardless, I hope that you guys enjoy!

Upon entering the venue,  I was greeted by some familiar sights: a selection of this years Angel wings on display....

...and then passed by the main stage featuring: "Wild Things"- One of the numerous Victorias Secret sets for this years show... The set/production teams starts the actual physical transformation of the venue about 3 weeks prior...

....and upstairs, the model board of who's walking this year...

...And Tom demo-ing the on Lily Aldrige...The look this year was a bit more approachable and girl next-door ish

                                            

Selita Ebanks & Anja Rubik, 'VS-i-fied' by moi in final makeup...

                                          

No VS show is ever complete without the requisite hair extensions....



and Selita  & the other angels blowing kisses....

Do you think that we could pass for sisters??? I mean, at least I don't look as bad as I did in last years candid shot. She's camera ready, I'm not...sigh...

Bling, the real stuff & pictures of how to style and wear it...

First timers: Gracie Carvalho, Fabiana Semprebom and Lais Ribeiro. Not only do they have their first time strutting for VS in common, they're also all brazilian...

The model board in the dressing area broken down by sections...

Shannon with her 'crosse' stick...

Shoes belonging to Candice Swanepoel...

...and Adriana (no last name required)...

As always there was a ton of lacy, sheer, body conscious blingy sparkly things but this year there was a welcome addition of studs:

a closeup of the skull epaulette on Adriana's opening number...

Backstage, the spikes Rosie's wings almost took out my eye...no joke!!

All in all, a ton of fun, even though somebody or somebodies, stole my schwag bag. I came back after the second show taping and Poof! It was all gone...

It will be cool to see how it all comes together and how they firm up the edits....

I swear though that there must be a conspiracy because every time the show airs, I'm out of town travelling back and don't have an access to a television while I'm in transit. Therefore, barring a miracle, I won't be catching it the first time around. The Victorias Secret Fashion show airs on November 30th, 2010 on CBS. If you want more behind the scenes photos and teasers go here for all access...

Victoria's Secret Fashion Show 2009

Work It! Be Sexy, and Have Fun were the instructions in the backstage area at the 2009 Victoria's Secret Fashion Show. This is the most picture heavy post that I've done, but, I figured that you would want the 'True Hollywood Story' of the behind the scenes. I will say that this show is always highly anticipated from everyone who is involved. Other than touring, by far, this is one of the biggest backstage productions I have been involved with in quite some time, if not ever. I've worked backstage at well over 200+ shows and I have never seen anything like the press that descends upon this show....

The call time to arrive at the venue was 8 am...I did not walk out of there until well over 12+ hours later after prep time, run thru's, 2 live television tapings and catering changing out the chafing stations 4 or 5 times. I stopped snapping behind the scenes pics between the first and second shows because honestly, if I had to be hit in the head one more time with a boom mic or an HD Cam, or someone wearing a Portabrace... Its not so easy to touch up the girls in lineup that are going out when the girls coming back are inadvertently hitting you with their wings. Add to that that I actually wanted to see the show in the green room as I knew I would be out of town when the show aired for the rest of the world...

A quick view of a portion of the backstage show area before all of the hoopla and hub-bub

The makeup for the look and a bag of 'schwag' was already waiting for us upon arrival at our stations.

Body Makeup in the 'Body Room'. The girls get full body makeup/airbrushing and body shimmer dusted in here (you would too if you were literally walking in your underwear in front of the world, on HDTV...)

Angels awaiting...(the calm before the storm)

Marisa Miller in hair; She was the first 'Angel' that had to be camera ready...

All of the models sported the VS 2009 Show Robe, and most wore Christian Louboutin stilettos, but only Liu Wen rocked these amazing studded combat boots with hers. Models always have great personal style...

Anja Rubik and Shannon Click's hair extensions

Each model has her own designated bag of extensions...

...And just when you thought there could be no more hair...

The brilliant Tom Pechaux (key), demo-ing the sexy bedroom look on Miranda Kerr...

Sessilee Lopez

Ms. Selita Ebanks (she should require no introduction) after I've done her makeup

Selita pre-makeup and myself (one of the rare pictures of me as I'm super camera shy believe it or not and usually not as camera ready as my clients), with Selita...Thanks Martha for snapping this one...

Linday Ellingson: The look that Tom designed was bombshell gorgeous. Super sexy, glammed up, almost Barbie like (from what some of my twitter followers said). I fell in love with the new VS Mascara & the lipstick and lipgloss from this look...

Lindsay Ellingson after I did her makeup. Mind you, the day of the taping (Nov. 19) was her 23rd birthday...

Nick Verreos interviewing Lindsey for Modelinia.com (one in a seemingly endless string of interviews that night)

Nick's 'cheat sheet', which was more like a book, with all the VS Angels, Models and interview jump off points

Heidi, camera ready and doing takes...

This is THE most insane Backstage I've ever encountered in my over 11 years backstage doing shows...To zone all of that out and work in it like nothing else is going on is a sheer test of professionalism, experience and willpower...

Alessandra caught in a swarm of press giving interviews...

Lets go downstairs to the 1st floor....

Jewels...YES, its all real...

The model board...

Tatiana K

Not to say that Tatiana isn't gorgeous here, but in the background is that racist security guard who was seriously one of THE most unpleasant unfortunate souls that I've ever had the misfortune of coming across...Yes, I'm putting her on blast here...Please pray and/or meditate for this woman. Poor sad thing, truly...

Freshly polished armor...

...and balloon wings on a stand waiting to be worn

Selita almost ready to go...

Shannon Click

Behati Prinsloo decked out in 'Pink' flashing a peace sign & a smile...

As is the case with most shows that I do, I'm never around to actually see them from a vantage point OTHER than backstage. And since I'm working, I usually miss how everything comes together. That is no exception here either: I missed the airing of "The Sexiest Show on Earth" on Dec.1st but plan to catch an encore showing of it on December 9th at 9pm on the CW...