Pat McGrath

Pat McGrath

The go-to makeup artist every season: McGrath's deft use of color and statement-making beauty looks on various runways set a standard and ultimately led to work on multiple ad campaigns as a celebrity makeup artist and as a consultant for various beauty brands. She continues to create beauty looks on multiple international runways every fashion season.

Pat McGrath MBE (born 1970) is a British make-up artist. She has been called the most influential make-up artist in the world by Vogue magazine and other commentators.

McGrath was born in 1970 in Northampton, England to Jean McGrath, a Jamaican immigrant.Jean was a single mother who raised McGrath in Northhampton.McGrath credits her mother for her love of fashion and make-up.McGrath has no formal training in fashion or make-up, having completed only an art foundation course at a Northampton college. Of her career, she has said, "I really love being a makeup artist. It never gets mundane or predictable and every shoot and show is different."

McGrath's career breakthrough came while working with Edward Enninful (then fashion editor of i-D magazine) in the early 1990s, when her innovative use of color "brilliantly solved the world's ennui with grunge" and helped launch i-D to a position of international importance.In the mid-1990s, she worked both with minimalist Jil Sander and with surrealist John Galliano, where she became known for her "latex petals stuck to faces, vinyl lips, bodies drenched in powder paint, dan stylized Kabuki physiognomies."

Since then, McGrath has worked with photographers including Steven Meisel (who now rarely shoots without her), Paolo Roversi, Helmut Newton, and Peter Lindbergh. In addition to appearing in i-D, photos of her work have been published in fashion magazines including American, English, and French Vogue, W, and Harper's Bazaar. She attends four fashion show seasons (counting couture) each year[6] and has worked with designers including Prada, Miu Miu, Comme des Garçons, and Dolce and Gabbana. Additionally, she designed Armani's cosmetics line in 1999[8] and in 2004 was named global creative-design director for Procter and Gamble, where she is in charge of Max Factor and Cover Girl cosmetics, among other brands.[3] During McGrath's constant travels to work locations, she takes between thirty and fifty bags of materials, tools, and reference materials.

As a makeup artist, McGrath is known for her wide range; according to Edward Enninful, her work spans from "the highest couture to club kids." She is also known for her inventive use of materials: her most creative make-up is handmade, and she works mainly with her fingers instead of with brushes.

In an interview with Vogue.com UK during London Fashion Week (Sept. 2008) McGrath explained her creative process, saying: "I'm influenced a lot by the fabrics that I see, the colours that are in the collections, and the girls' faces. It's always a challenge but that's the key - to make it different every time."

In the 2013 Queen Elizabeth II's New Year Honors List, McGrath was "named an MBE, or Member of the Order of the British Empire, for services to the fashion and beauty industry."