A career doing makeup for Prince, Da Brat, and SWV all began with a single tube of lipstick. “My mom used to always wear this burgundy lipstick,” makeup artist Kash Thompson tells ESSENCE. “I used to sneak into her room when she wasn’t home and put the lipstick on.”
Like many artists, Thompson started off at a MAC makeup counter, attracting her first celebrity client within the first 8 months. That was her sign to go into the industry head first as a freelancer. “I started off with Lil’ Mo,” she says, on the road for her shows before expanding her clientele to Monica, SWV, and Toya Johnson.
But, it wasn’t until she worked with Prince that she realized she finally arrived. “It felt like it was destiny,” she recalls. On Mother’s Day, she received a call from someone she met at ESSENCE Festival: “Prince needs a makeup artist right now,” they said. “Prince who? Purple Rain Prince?” she responded.
What separated her from the other makeup artists lined up for a shot at doing his makeup, was that she was ready and they weren’t. “I always have my makeup kit in my trunk,” she says. “There were other makeup artists [at the venue] but none of them had a makeup kit,” since the team promised to already have new products backstage. Spoiler: they didn’t.
“That was my biggest check I’ve ever received,” she shares. Right then, she realized “this is where I’m supposed to be.”
Read on for more about Thompson’s favorite products, top makeup tip, and more.
What She Loves Most About Makeup:
I love how it makes women feel. Sitting in my chair, I can feel the energy of a woman. Let’s say her self-esteem is not too high at that moment, but once she has her makeup and she feels totally glam, you can see the difference in her aura.
You can see the change in a person. Their head is held higher and their shoulders are back more, so I feel like that’s my give back. With a client, you want to leave something with them, and I feel like that’s what I’m doing when I perform because, to me, that’s my performance. It’s art for me, and I’m giving back just to see how it morphs them.
Her Favorite Makeup Look:
I love a natural glam. I feel like it’s versatile. You can go out to dinner, you can go to a movie, you can go to brunch, you can go on a red carpet, and it doesn’t make you look super enhanced. I feel like a natural beauty look is what you’re supposed to do with makeup. I like to enhance your natural beauty. I love performance makeup, but I don’t feel like on a daily that is super versatile, so I love to stick with a natural glam.
Her Favorite Products:
I have my own cosmetic line called The Kash Brand Cosmetics. I’ve always been known for my lipsticks. We have a liquid matte lipstick that’s hydrating, mattifying, and highly pigmented, so it lasts over 8 hours. I don’t care if you suck on a straw, if you eat a burger, that lipstick is gonna be on.
And, I would say Rare Beauty. I love their blushes. I’m like a liquid blush girl because it’s buildable. Sometimes if I don’t want a highly pigmented blush or I don’t want that really like “boom” in your face look, I could put a little bit on.
Her Top Makeup Tip:
There is a difference between setting sprays. After I finish glam, I always use two. You can use a set spray, which is more of a hydrating spray to add moisture back into your face. Then, there’s a fixing spray. What a fixing spray does is seal the makeup so the makeup stays on throughout the day.
You don’t have to worry about transfer. My tip is to have two types of sprays to set your makeup, a setting spray and then a fixing spray.
A Makeup Myth She Wants to Debunk:
People think makeup is not interchangeable, meaning you can’t wear a lipstick as an eye shadow or you can’t wear a bronzer as an all-over powder. But, makeup is interchangeable. You can use it for anything. I can wear an eyeliner as a lip liner or a lip liner as an eyeliner. There’s no rules when it comes to products; it’s all about application.
I want to debunk that “oh no, that’s an eye shadow. I can’t use that as a lipstick.” You sure can if you just add it with some lip gloss. Now it’s a lipstick.
What She’s Learned From Her Clients:
I’ve learned that people sit in your chair because of how you make them feel, so you always want to leave something with someone. There are artists that may not be the best at makeup application, but they get clients and the question is why. It’s because someone that’s sitting in that chair that they can make feel good about themselves or they’re building a rapport with them where they wanna come back.
People buy into people, so the thing that I learned with my clients is to leave them with something and to make them feel good and they’ll come back. That’s how you keep a clientele and build a clientele.
How She Uplifts Her Clients:
I give words of encouragement. While they’re in the chair you can’t really talk because this is not hairstyling, this is makeup. So, I try to have that conversation at the first initial sit down and then afterwards [saying] “you look beautiful. I hope you feel beautiful.”
I try to get them to go out of their box. Sometimes we have this mindset of “I only look good maybe with a red lip” or “I only look good with something that’s neutral”, but if we push it, “let’s try this and maybe you’ll like it.”
I feel engaging your client and showing that you care instead of just saying “hey, sit down in this chair, let me do this job, and you go about your business.” I think that’s what I give back. I give that attentiveness to my clients.