Ever since I can remember, I’ve wanted big brows and big lips.  Big boobs too but that’s a whole other post.  Then Angelina shocked us all with her massive lips and I was even more obsessed with getting as big lips as humanly possible.  Since you’re reading this blog, I’m assuming we’re all on the pursuit for natural beauty-this post isn’t about lip injections.  I’ve done zero research and really have no desire to spend pain and money on something unnatural-to each his own though.  I do love the look of a pouty, injected lip.  Enter-Lana Del Rey-my beauty guru who happens to have the best injected lips on the planet! (she makes good music too!)

So, in the pursuit of a good post and bigger lips, I’ve been experimenting.  Usually the way I achieve big lips is a lip plumper and that’s it.  I always felt like over lining my lips didn’t really help but for the sake of finding what works, I scoured You Tube, my makeup books from beauty school and pictures of famous big lips in order to find the technique(s) that would achieve the best pouty lip, naturally.  So let’s get right into it!

Big Lip Tips:

• First and foremost-exfoliating your lips is a must.  It encourages blood flow and makes lips softer and smoother.  Go HERE for more on that!
• Start with priming.  You don’t need a lip primer for this.  I applied a layer of concealer.  I also tried just a layer of cream eye shadow.  Basically, I wanted to take the color out of my lips so I had a neutral canvas to start with.   A few makeup bloggers suggested applying a thin layer of lip balm-I see no point in this.  I think it just makes it harder to apply everything else.
• My favorite tip is to apply a highlighter to the cupid’s bow and above the lip.  I’m not sure that this makes your lips look bigger, it just make them look prettier.
• Another tip that I ran across over and over was to get rid of your cupid’s bow by lining over it.  This truly does make your lips look way bigger.  I personally can’t make this work without it looking very obvious but it’s an individual lip shape thing.
• Shade right below the center of your lower lip with a taupe eye shadow, bronzer or contour.  This creates the illusion that your bottom lip is so big, it creates a shadow.
• This tip is different but when executed properly, looks awesome.  Using a very sharp brow or eye liner, draw in lip wrinkles.  This gives the illusion that your lips are so big that they are literally bubbling up!  Example:Angelina Jolie.  Blend and blur with a q-tip then apply your lipstick over it.  It should be very subtle so you might need to blend a bit more depending on what color your lipstick is.
• I find the more shine, the more pout.  I choose a creamy lipstick like THIS that will stay put and keep the shine.
• The last tip is to apply highlighter to the middle of your bottom lip.  Again, it catches light.  Remember, shade anything you want to recede and lighten anything you want to bring out. 

So as I was researching, I ran into the “Kylie Jenner Challenge”.  There are lip plumping cups that are about the size of a shot glass.  When you create a suction, it brings blood flow to the lips and makes them bigger.  It seems easy to over-do this and make your lips MASSIVE.  Find this type of lip plumper HERE.  FYI-I’ve never tried it but I heard the plumpness lasts about 2 hours.   It’s a completely natural way to plump up your lips as long as you don’t get them too big, too often.

In conclusion, I think achieving big lips is a very individual thing.  It really depends on your lip shape and texture.  I saw amazing You Tube tutorials that I was not able to recreate on myself without looking extremely over done.  My favorite tips I found were highlighting above my cupid’s bow and in the center of the lower lip as well as shading underneath the lower lip.  I found that using a concealer or eye shadow on my lips helped my lipstick stay for longer too!  I really wrote this post feeling like I could give you a makeup tutorial but since I ran into several techniques, some worthless to me but possibly good for others I decided to share the best tips and let you do your own experimenting.  After all, not one set of lips are alike!

xx, Jenni