Elaina Karras

Beauty exists on so many planes. There are things that are visually awe-striking and looking at them transports you to another place or colors that cause a surge of dopamine. Then there is the beauty within. It’s how you feel about yourself; your confidence, resilience, existence, energy, & how you move through the world. I personally feel my most beautiful after a hot yoga class when I have no makeup on and my hair is messily thrown back. It’s part that I like how I look, but also because I spent an hour with myself in meditation, letting go of the things that don’t serve me and the tensions of everyday life. It’s a time to really center myself and ponder all of life’s miracles while my blood is circulating in my face & cheeks & I’m left with a dewy glow from sweat & infrared. I believe there is probably a strong correlation between your endorphins & how you feel about yourself.

Love. I am such a lover. I love dogs, trees, the wind.. I find inspiration everywhere I look, but I like the inspiration that pours out of me the most when I am in love, surrounded by love, witnessing love. I think just being alive is wildly inspirational.

I cannot say enough positive things. I have so many favorites. The foundation palette is incredible for me onset because I’ve really been able to shade match or mix to match almost everyone I’ve used that palette on. It’s lightweight and travels easy, and the formulation is really beautiful, slippy, and glowy. The loose translucent powder is not replaceable to me. I use this on absolutely everyone and it never looks like powder. The lipsticks are beautiful, rich and creamy & they have really amazing staying power. The brow pens are another go-to, I love how delicate & detailed I can get the brush strokes. I love the dual sided highlighter stick!! It’s so natural and gives a glass skin finish. Very often, if I have a red carpet client or I’m shooting an editorial, my final topper to really bring the whole look together is the glitter pigments. They are sheer & prismatic so you can really have a lot of fun layering them. They look so pretty for night-time glam, or even if you go in a dark room & use the flash on video 🤤🤤 the liquid eyeliner & skincare are also phenomenal. This whole line is curated so well and all of the formulas have really exceeded my expectations. And just going back to my definition of beauty; using clean & cruelty-free makeup always makes me feel my absolute best & it’s what I want to use on my clients.

I learned to be kind from my mom, and she really encouraged me to be myself and investigate my curiosities with makeup. She spoiled me with so much fun makeup growing up. I really owe a lot of my ability to develop this skillset to the way she recognized and nurtured this passion of mine from a young age. One of my grandmothers “Sweetheart” was a hairstylist, so I’m sure I inherited some of my passion from her; my other Greek grandmother, my Yia Yia, didn’t have a wrinkle on her face when she passed. So, I try to take after her & do my best to maintain a Mediterranean focused diet. 😊

Hmmm…. I don't really think about makeup that way. I don’t think there are mistakes, I think makeup is super experimental and fun and it’s okay if you do a look you aren’t over the moon about- you’ll refine it and tune it and make it better everytime. I’d say my biggest work blunder though was being onset with one of the biggest celebs in the world and getting in trouble by the artist I was assisting & security & being sent home because I used the bathroom on the trailer. To be fair, no one told me that wasn’t allowed and everyone was onset at the time. That taught me that maybe I didn’t want to live in LA anymore and to never use the celebrities’ toilets. 😅

I want to do a cute blocked brow shoot- I have done that for runway but would be fun to capture for an editorial or something more produced.

All of the woman that surround me are beauty muses for me. I assisted a phenomenal hairstylist named Rob Cook a long time ago in the salon & he taught me that it is our job to find beauty in everyone and highlight that. I carry that with me today. I truly find muse-like qualities in every single human I look at, and I live in NYC so there are so many cool and creative, chic & quirky humans that inspire me in unparalleled ways.