Día de los Muertos Makeup and Costume

Halloween and the Day of the Dead are only a few days away! I’m heading to a Mexican celebration this weekend so I decided to put together this Día de los Muertos makeup and costume look ahead of time. This is an easy costume that you can recreate using items in your closet and cosmetics that you already have! Here and my tips on how to copy this makeup and create your own DIY flower crown.

The Day of the Dead

The Day of the Dead or Día de los Muertos is a holiday celebrated mostly in Mexico on November 1 and 2. It is also known as All Souls Day or All Saints Day. It is like a family reunion where dead ancestors are the guest of honour. Mexican families build home altars with their favourite foods and beverages for their departed loved ones. They also visit graves with these items as gifts. Instead of a sombre day, it is a day of celebrating life and the lives that have lived. I think it’s a beautiful tradition! Colourful costumes, jewelry, floral crowns and face painting are also part of these festivities. I decided to embrace that in my latest DIY Halloween costume!

Día de los Muertos Makeup and Costume

Even though Calgary received a huge dump of snow earlier this week, I’m not going to allow it to dampen my Halloween mood! It really does look like Christmas in October right now though. I’m heading to the Fairmont Banff Springs this Friday for a Día de los Muertos party. Mexico meets Banff in this celebration at their newly renovated speak-easy Rundle Bar. If you caught my blog post from this summer’s Banffchella, then you know that the Fairmont knows how to throw an absolutely amazing party! I love any excuse to dress up, especially when there is a theme involved so I’ve gone all-out in creating this Day of the Dead costume! Want to join? There are still tickets left!

This event includes:

Welcome Drink
Face Painting
Tequila Tasting
Mariachi Band
Live DJ
Roaming Performers
Passed Hors d’oeuvres
Special Food & Drink Menu

Day of the Dead Makeup

Instead of going with the traditional skeleton face paint, I decided to keep things more feminine. I’ve seen lots of beautiful Pinterest face-painting inspiration but I was a little unsure about drawing circles and designs symmetrically on my face. So I decided to do a spooky version of my regular makeup!

Here are some tips to achieve this look: use white makeup or a very light foundation as your base layer. Contour under your cheekbones, along your jaw and under your hairline to really define your face. Use a pink blush on the apples of your cheeks. Next, you can do a lot with black eyeshadow. A very smoky eye is key! Apply black eyeshadow wider than usual, going just below your brow and half an inch under your eye. Go a little overboard here, more is better. Wet your eyeliner brush and dip into your black eyeshadow to draw a black nose and mouth stitches.

The gemstone stickers really give this makeup the Day of the Dead effect. I found strips of the rhinestone stickers at Dollarama for $2. You can also use lash glue to secure them to your face. I circled my eyes using the stickers and added a few extra in the middle of my forehead. Lastly, add false eyelashes for an even more dramatic look.

What you need for Día de los Muertos Makeup:

false eyelashes
lash glue
black eyeshadow
white cake makeup or very light foundation
pink blush
mascara
gemstones

Día de los Muertos Flower Crown

In the interest of time, I decided to create my own Día de los Muertos flower crown using items from Dollarama. You can make a pretty great crown for under $20 and it’s a great excuse to get a little creative! You can find everything you need from Michaels craft stores but first, try Dollarama for some money-saving options! Dollarama has a great selection of affordable florals and during October, you can also get black Halloween flowers.

Cut your fake flowers, leaving an inch of stem so that you can secure them to the crown. Using floral tape and a glue gun, you can secure the flowers to a wire that is sized to the circumference of your head. Flower tape is thin and slightly waxy, making it easy to wrap the stems around the wire. I added gold leaves and spikes to match my gold jewelry. Crowns are usually very colourful so create one that matches the colours in your outfit.

What you need for a Día de los Muertos crown: