Our conversation with Rae Ann Silva, the creator of the Beautyblender, on how she came up with the idea for the ubiquitous makeup sponge.
After decades of working as a makeup artist, Rea Ann Silva came up with the idea for the Beautyblender while on set for the TV series. It’s been over 20 years since she launched her business, and in that time, she’s created a line of products that includes, and more sponges.
To this day, though, the original bright-pink egg-shaped sponge — the product that started it all — continues to be a best seller and has become a staple in cosmetic bags. It’s become such an iconic tool that Silva was contacted by a curator at the Smithsonian five years ago. The museum wanted to include the Beautyblender in a collection of innovative products that changed an industry. And it has inspired many “fans,” as Silva likes to call them, or similar oval-shaped sponges that try to replicate the Beautyblender. Because it’s become almost synonymous with a makeup sponge, I decided to interview Silva for the “I Designed the…” series The goal was to make the actors look like they weren’t wearing makeup but still stylized. I realized airbrushing — a kind of unique skill at the time — was the best way to achieve that. But the downside was that airbrushes are too loud to use on set. At the same time, our union had a seminar that I had just attended.talked about using sponges to mimic airbrushing. I started doing that on set and hand-cut many different shapes and sizes of sponges: There was a barbell, a half-triangle, all these crazy shapes. Finally, I came up with the beautiful egg-shaped Beautyblender that is edgeless and creates a flawless, seamless application. That is the genesis of where the idea came from, because when you’re a makeup artist, you have to problem-solve in the moment. I had to MacGyver something. I had to make sure I was doing my job.Traditionally, makeup artists always used a triangular wedge. The edges would leave lines of demarcation under the eyes and around the nose, even if you were blending. The first goal of mine was for it to be seamless and edgeless, because in high definition, you suddenly saw everything — peach fuzz, pores, scars, discoloration — in a close-up. That’s how I started cutting these rounded edgeless shapes, so no matter if you stippled or dragged it, you wouldn’t get a harsh line of demarcation. Second, I knew it needed to have a rounded tip to go into the nooks and crannies and perfect tiny details. I also wanted to make sure there was enough space to apply makeup to big areas. It just so happened that it ended up being an egg shape, which is the most perfect shape in mankind.Every part of the surface of this product is usable. I use the tips to go under the eye into very detailed areas, and also to spot conceal when you have imperfections. The bigger rounded area is for quick application. I use the sides to blend, erase, and reapply. I also use the sides for finishing. I tell people that Coco Chanel saying about putting yourself together and removing one accessory. That’s how you finish a makeup look. After everything is blended, the Beautyblender comes in as a finisher to make everything look really natural. And I also go between the tip and the big side for cream blushes. You can use it for powders. It’s a great sculptor. The tip can sculpt your nose, your chin, your jaw. It’s so versatile.The actors on set started wanting it. They would take them, since you can’t share this tool. I realized that there was an opportunity if I could figure out how to make them quicker than me sitting on the side of the set with my little cuticle scissors and cutting them. I knew high definition was the wave of the future, so I knew it was just a matter of time until other makeup artists like myself were going to have the same challenge. Also, I knew it was an opportunity to revolutionize this particular tool. The makeup sponge itself was never designed to put makeup on, it was designed as a tool of convenience. They wouldn’t tell you how to replace it, clean it, even how to use it. They would just tell you,Was sustainability a role in designing the Beautyblender? Before I even started to craft the Beautyblender, I worked on movie sets, TV shoots, and music-video shoots where I’d have a team of makeup artists working with me. You can’t reuse your tools. At the end of those shoots, I would see trash cans full of sponges and think,It’s rubber. We were at a time that focused on being more conscious of the earth and of sustainability. All that to say, when I created the Beautyblender, I wanted to make a reusable sponge for the consumer market. If you could clean your brushes and reuse them, why is it not okay to clean your sponge? People would say, you can clean a brush, but you can’t clean a sponge. Their anatomy is different. I wanted to figure it out. I realized that it’s very beneficial to clean your sponge, and you can do it. Beautyblender became the first sustainable makeup sponge ever on the market. It was to replace that replenishment idea that manufacturers had. It was just practical thinking, really.In the beginning, I thought, well, maybe I can bake them in my oven or something, which was so ridiculous. But anyway, between working on three TV shows and working with touring musicians like Brandy and Eve, I was trying to figure out how to get this made. I would go to beauty stores and drugstores and look on the back of the sponges. I knew to start with material, because even if they don’t know about a Beautyblender, I was going to have to introduce this idea to them. I needed to find somebody who could bake the bread. It quickly dawned on me that there were only one or two companies making this material. There was no Google, so I called an 800 number on the back of a package that was based in the U.S. I told them I was a Hollywood makeup artist and about my idea. I was connected to the marketing department, and that person was like, “Oh, honey, we have hundreds of patents and probably have something similar. You’re wasting your time.” I said, “If you sign my NDA and you have something similar, there’s no harm.” I also asked who designed their sponges. The person on the phone said it was a packaging engineer. I said, “So, you’re telling me that you already have my idea, from someone who’s a Hollywood makeup artist/union-card carrying girl? Even though packaging engineers make your product and not makeup artists?” She got my point and signed my NDA.Once I established who was going to help me, I realized that the materials that they had sent me were not what I wanted to use. Because what had happened in the sponge business is that cosmetics companies had gotten complaints about sponges sucking up makeup. They created material that actually repelled liquid instead, but the materials were really hard. After they sent me many different samples, I realized there was no way they could get it to the softness that I wanted. I asked them to send hydrophilic sponges instead. I remembered from that class with Kelcey Fry that she talked about wetting hydrophilic sponges, squeezing water out, and putting makeup on with them. And when someone like Kelcey Fry tells you it’s going to work, you go try it. So I told them I wanted to try hydrophilic material even after they tried telling me it wouldn’t work. I started wetting the material and drying it before I applied makeup. It was magic. I used every kind of makeup in my trailers from all kinds of jobs: liquid makeup, stick makeup, powder makeup, oil-free makeup, long-wear makeup. The Beautyblender is made of more than hydrophilic, but if I told you my material, I’d have to kill you. This was the general idea, though, and how I came to understand the material.As you can imagine, they sent me many, many samples. We did everything over the phone, not video, so they would pour every variation of material into a different color to make it easier to reference. One day, I received a little box and it felt like Christmas morning. There was a big note on it that said, “I think we nailed it, but don’t look at the color.” I opened it up, and it was the Beautyblender pink. I called them back and was like, “It is perfect. We nailed it.” They asked me what color I wanted it in, and I said, “No, we nailed it with the color.” They told me it should be either white, beige, or peach . I was adamant about the pink. I wanted people to see it from across a room. I knew I was going to put it in some kind of clear space-age packaging. I’m sure I sounded a little crazy at the time, because when you create a category, you have to get people to dream with you. And they were wonderful people, but they were really stuck in their ways. I was challenging them, but that’s how the color came about.The original pink Beautyblender continues to be the company’s top seller, which is why Silva calls it “the Queen.”Silva added a black Beautyblender to the mix as a way to honor professional makeup artists. “At the time, all makeup packaging was black. And we also wear a lot of black,” she says. “I wouldn’t be talking to you right now if it weren’t for my peers.”“I worked with so many actors who went on the red carpet. They would borrow fancy purses and clutches and have to give them back at the end of the night,” Silva says. “God forbid they got any makeup inside the clutch, because I would hear about it.” This is also the only Beautyblender that’s used dry, since it’s meant to suck up excess oil.is designed to surface useful, expert recommendations for things to buy across the vast e-commerce landscape. Every product is independently selected by our team of editors, whom you can read aboutYesterday at 8:00 a.m.
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