A summer day here is really two climates. You step out into heat and humidity, then into air conditioning cold enough to need a jacket, then back out again. Makeup does not fail because of one of those. It fails at the transitions.
Most of what helps is placement and layering rather than products.
Less, in thinner layers
One thick layer slides. Two thin layers, each given a moment to set, stay. This is true of everything — base, cream blush, lip colour. The instinct in heat is to apply more so it lasts longer, and it does the opposite.
Give each layer thirty seconds before the next one. That pause is the whole technique.
Let your skin settle first
If you apply makeup straight after a shower, or straight after moisturiser, you are placing it on a surface that is still moving. Wait a few minutes. Skin that has settled holds colour; skin that is still absorbing does not.
Cream before powder, always, and powder only where you need it
Powder over a cream blush that has not set will lift it. Powder in places you do not need it will look heavy by mid-afternoon. Most faces need it in a narrow band down the centre and nowhere else.
Lips: line, fill, then colour
In heat, lip colour migrates before it fades. A liner filled across the whole lip gives the colour something to hold onto and keeps the edge where you put it. Then apply your gloss over the top.
For a long day outdoors, matte holds better than shine. For an evening indoors, shine is the more comfortable choice.
Eyes: keep it simple, keep it dry
Humidity and cream eyeshadow are not friends. A wash of colour from a cream stick is fine because it is thin. Anything built up will crease. A brow product that sets is worth more in summer than any other eye product.
What to carry
Blotting paper rather than powder, because powder on top of a shine you have not removed becomes texture. One cream stick for cheeks and lips, since it fixes both in one step without a mirror. A lip liner, because that is what goes first.
The top-up, in thirty seconds
Blot first, always. Then press — never sweep — your cream stick back onto the high points of the cheeks with a fingertip. Reline and refill the lips if they have gone patchy, then colour on top. You are repairing the two places people look at, not redoing a face.
