Chloe is coming in to college with me tomorrow, to be my bodypainting model.
hands up if you’re not that stupid!
Not sure what I’m going to do on her yet.
my muse
“Xena. Make me Xena, Warrior Princess. Or whatever you think you can do.”
I don’t think so.
I was thinking more Garfield.
Wish me luck, flogstars. I have three weeks for this – well, two weeks of practice, and then the assessment! Pics to follow (if Chloe lets me).
Hey everybody, today’s post is PHOTOS because while I know you all thirst for my sparkling banter in unhealthy ways, I also know that you really just swing by here to check for tit pics and the like. Today, you are shit out of luck on both fronts, because I have nothing to say and none of the pictures I’m posting here are my own work or boobs.
You could accuse me of showing complete contempt for my enormous, international legion of fans, as I am putting next to no effort into this post and none of you are going to get anything out of it either. Why? It’s mostly just a collection of the cool shit that my friends see on the internet and post on my Facebook wall because they know I love it. And since most of you reading this are my real-life AND Facebook friends, this post is actually entirely redundant because it’s YOU who sent me the pictures in the first place! HA! We’ve come full circle!
Actually not all of it is cool shit you guys sent me. Some of it I pinched from Instagram, those ones are captioned with the creator’s Instagram link.
I’ll stop talking now. I present to you… Cool Shit, v1.
cool, huh?
instagram.com/hannamajava
keeping an eye on the time, arf arf arf
instagram.com/promisetamang
take on me
instagram.com/amberscott_makeup
KISS this!
instagram.com/madeleineharirian
instagram.com/klee608
sand, not makeup, but still cool
That should be enough cool shit to get you through the day, flogstars. Whatever you’re up to, I hope you’re living it up as much as this guy.
livin’ it up
DAMMIT, now I’ve got that Ja Rule song stuck in my head. Sorry guys.
Xx Imo
Today at imogenmaxwell.com, we’re celebrating one year, one hundred posts and almost ten thousand views. To commemorate, I thought we’d go over a few of the highs and lows we’ve been through to get here. Well, highs really, we don’t really DO lows at imogenmaxwell.com.
My site stats reveal some interesting, if completely unsurprising things about you all.
The most popular search engine terms that lead people to this, the greatest flog in all the land, are as follows:
Good to see our priorities are all in order, then. I was also flattered to find that the 3 most clicked-on photos ever on this site are:
any swelling?
would it bother you to know that I was butt naked when I took this photo? You should see what’s cropped out of it. How far down did I paint myself green?… I’ll never tell!
So you guys have a thing for a lady in costume with her baps out, eh? Boy, are you in luck. Halloween’s right around the corner, this is YOUR time of year!
And last of all, the three most-viewed posts in order are:
What a journey we’ve been on, dear reader. You’ve seen me blossom from amateur makeup artiste wannabe in my bedroom in Oban, to amateur makeup artiste wannabe in my bedroom in Glasgow. From backpacker queen extraordinaire, applying all sorts of crazy slap to my friends… to … makeup school attendee who doesn’t really have any friends so now has to practice makeup on herself all the time instead.
Every click, every like, every “you are SO hilarious!” that you bestow upon me (in my dreams)… this flog is nothing without its devout readers, and I thank both each and every one of you for your ongoing support. I will be sure to mention you all in my Academy Award acceptance speech which will probably be in 2022, but if you can hang in there with me you will get the recognition.
Here’s Boston with More Than A Feeling. Tune up those air guitars and let’s do this thang.
Chloe is lying next to me laughing at videos of cats having sex on YouTube.
yep, two single beds shoved together. This is living.
Too much creepy shit up in here.
We went to see Machete Kills this afternoon. Amazing. And you’ll be happy to hear that Machete Kills Again: In Space is underway. So is the second Sin City movie. Fucking love Robert Rodriguez. Here’s a picture of Lady Gaga’s nails in Machete Kills, a fine example of the highly stylised… styling of his movies. Stylin’!
I am too tired to say anything intelligent, best beloved. Getting up early for work after a night of no sleep, due to sharing a bed with a coughing, farting, cat-sex watching sister is really taking it out of me. Hope y’all have had a good weekend. Thank you and good night!
October is a big month here at imogenmaxwell.com – we’re fast approaching our first birthday and 100th post! Chloe has moved to Glasgow! It’s Halloween! And you know what that means. Crazy makeup, costumes, and skulls on EVERYTHING.
these are a few of my favourite thiiiiiings
Chloe is staying with me while she flat-hunts and job-hunts. The day before she arrived, I re-configured my room to fit her and her stuff in. The following morning I was in a bit of a mad rush to get out of the flat and off to college so I left something on the bed that left Chloe, by her own admission… speechless.
That’s right, a severed head aka a hairdressing dummy.
I call her Jenny.
I had been watching some reconstruction of the Meredith Kercher crime scene the other day on the telly, which inspired me to cast my eye around my own room and speculate about what conclusions a homicide detective/the world media would draw.
Not good.
My bedside table had two things on it; a measuring tape and a packet of painkillers.
How many creepy cat teapots do you have? I have three.
So now I have added “interior decorator” to my dream-list of staff, just to save me from posthumously humiliating myself.
Moving on, this week in college we continued with body painting and basic makeup. Thursday was my second wig assessment which … had to be abandoned half way through as my model fainted. Ooops. Poor old Agi, the studio really was very hot and stuffy, and the gin fumes rising off me as I got up close and personal with the body-paint wouldn’t have made her feel too good either.
This week in pictures:
Pin-curling Agi’s hair – couldn’t she have bloody well fainted BEFORE I had to do that fiddly bullshit?
Basic makeup with the Belfast Babes
I am actually that tall.
I am painted greyish white, for those too shy to ask. Yes, I am pale but not that pale!
My basic makeup on Belfast Babe Saoirse
That’s all I can show you for the time being, kids. We’ve got next week off college so updates may become (a) sporadic and (b) nothing to do with makeup, as Chloe and I will be shennaniganing all over Glasgow.
Here’s Heart, they’re sisters too.
Blogs and kisses,
x Imo
That Will Smith song has been in my head for days, and now we must all suffer. Let’s get it out the way at the beginning of the post so we can put it behind us, move on and never speak of it again.
So Thursday was a big day – a visit from the one and only Carissa (remember when I painted her boobs green?) in town for one night only, and two magnificent reasons. Firstly, to model for my first wig assessment – and oh boy, model she did. That girl knows how to throw a pose.
me emptying a can of hairspray onto her dome to hold everything in place
Carissa’s hair wrapped, pin-curled and sprayed, ready for the sexy head-sock
me looking a normal height for once
backstage madness
even more backstage madness
…and here are some of the snaps from our library photoshoot. What you can’t hear is the tapping on the glass and wolf-whistling from the big group of lads sitting outside the library. They were quite overwhelmed.
Tutor Janet seemed happy with the way they turned out, so once they’re edited etc I’m pretty sure they’ll be good enough for assessment.
Carissa’s hair once the pincurls were taken out, heehee
So then we went out to celebrate at the Cathouse (I’m not proud), with our Finnish friends Reckless Love. We turned up at the venue at about 9pm to find them coming back out on stage for their encore. The whole thing was over by 9:30pm. Can you believe it?
We had fun even though we missed probably more than half the show. Oh well.
In other news, I earned and spent my first Amazon voucher from doing online surveys. Guilt free shopping cos technically it’s free! Win! Amongst other essentials (I got a copy of Aerosmith’s Pump for 1p!) I procured some Halloween accessories, black-out contacts and vampire fangs. I don’t actually have any costume ideas, but it’s good to be prepared. Not that I’ve been invited to any Halloween parties or anything… but it’s good to be prepared. I’ll have to work out how to attach the fangs better… couldn’t get the dental adhesive to work properly, and it coated my mouth with its nastiness. Bleugh.
Give us a kiss.
Speaking of Aerosmith’s Pump album, here they are with Love in an Elevator. Two songs in one flog post? I break all the rules.
Happy Monday, flogstars! Xx
My original concept was actually quite demure. It was inspired by a steel-grey bob wig, possibly the most unsexual thing you might imagine. When Sinead tried it on, teamed with her catseye glasses it somehow came alive and my idea was born; I’d use her as my model for my first wig assessment, headmistress-inspired shoot in the library, keep the makeup very simple, have her holding a book and a coffee mug, take a nice classy photo and be done with it.
I pitched this idea to my tutor and within moments it had escalated to something rather more hardcore, including a suggestion that perhaps we could (and I quote) ‘lure a young man in from the corridor’ and get a photo of him bent over Sinead’s knee while she wields a ruler ‘or other spanking device such as a hardcover book’ about his rear end. Well I never!
hopefully not.
The idea has (d)evolved further and now bears absolutely no resemblance to its original form. Even the wig may be different. Carissa is now my model. I just had to message Chloe asking where the skin-tight pink power suit is (in the same bag as the Boy George shirt and the kimono). Things have taken a sharp turn towards… sexy secretary who just happens to be in the library.
“Amateurs.”
So that’s all happening tomorrow. After the wigwork, Carissa and I will be heading out on the town, off to rock you like a hurricane, Glasgow. Only one more decision to make today – do I wear the gold foil leopard print trousers, the blue foil snakeskin, the pink leopards, or the green snakeskin?
Here’s Reckless Love to ring in the weekend early, relevant because that’s who Carissa and I are seeing tomorrow, and because there’s some rather spectacular wigwork in this video. Enjoy, and happy weekend lovers!
The reason I have opened today’s post with an old photo of Bon Scott smiling through the agony of a badly infected testicle that you can practically hear straining against the seam of those skin-tight grey jeans is…. sorry, I’ve completely lost my train of thought.
well hello
Oh yeah. Something to do with an idea I had for one of my wig assessments. Any man out there willing to let me apply mascara to his chest hair to achieve the look? Get in touch via my contact page. I’ll make you look cool, promise.
This being-in-a-new-city-and-not-knowing-many-locals-well-enough-to-ask-if-they’ll-let-me-paint-their-bare-bodies situation is going to quickly become a problem for me at college. All I ever had to do in Oban was pull a ‘having a creative idea’ face and BAM, everyone’s volunteering to get naked, painted and photographed. Where are you, Glasgow exhibitionists?
Perhaps I should be careful what I wish for. Remember what happened when I put an ad on Gumtree looking for a flat-share? Yeah.
Anyhoo. Here are some other rock-god chests I wouldn’t mind painting, since I’m feeling particularly self indulgent today.
Reckless Love, who I shall be seeing next Thursday with Carissa – we are returning to the scene of last year’s crime…
Jettblack. When you google images of them, two pictures of me come up, which pleases me immensely. Lick lick.
Alright, that’s enough of that. We’ve got a lot to cover today.
Autumn’s here. Next week it will be October. I’m a little shit-scared of how fast time is galloping by.
I feel both settled and still very new in Glasgow. The very first time I arrived here in March 2008, I had a budget of £15 per day – £2 for food (Subway 6-inch of the day), £13 for my hostel bed which included breakfast, and dinner was a row of chocolate from the enormous stockpile I had bought in Belgium.
There is something about having absolutely no money that is kind of liberating. I mean, it fucking sucks, but it simplifies things. I walked and walked and walked around, day and night. I ‘saved’ all the free museums and art galleries for shit-weather days, and just walked the rest of the time. I would sleep in until right before free breakfast ended, so I wouldn’t be awake for too long burning calories and getting hungry. Late at night I would sit in my bunk writing, watching the others in my 14-bed dorm, wishing I was travelling with a big group of friends like they all seemed to be, wishing I knew where to go and what to do.
Everyone I spoke to raved about Edinburgh. Nobody seemed to think that Glasgow was up to much. I didn’t necessarily agree but after nearly 2 weeks walking and walking and walking around, I thought I could probably justify forking out for a bus to Edinburgh to see what all the fuss was about. There began a chain of events that lead me to running the backpackers’ hostel in Oban for 5 years, but that’s another story for another time.
What I didn’t immediately realise was that I’d developed quite a good relationship with Glasgow in this formative period of my early backpacking days. I didn’t have a head full of shit about how dangerous Glasgow was, so it didn’t occur to me to feel unsafe cruising the mean streets on my own in the middle of the night. I think I have always been reasonably sensible so I wasn’t going anywhere actually dodgy at night, but in retrospect I think the whole experience would have been different, and ruined, if I had been scared.
Instead, I felt Glasgow’s friendliness, I felt like it was a good place to be if you weren’t from here. People heard my accent and were interested. I was a young woman travelling alone so people went out of their way to make sure I was ok. I got invited into people’s homes for cups of tea and to look in their old family photo albums. They wrote down their addresses so I could send them postcards from wherever I went next. No one stabbed me, and I was never even offered heroin.
Glasgow is my Julia Roberts in Pretty Woman. Glasgow is my hooker with a heart of gold, my rough diamond. Glasgow’s reputation might not be the best, but you have to cop a feel for yourself, make your own mind up.
And do you think I can get the effing gif of Julia Roberts and Richard Gere in The Diamond Necklace Scene to work? Gah!
Anyway, here I am again, back where I first started my Scottish adventure five and a half years ago. My budget is about the same again, but the new job I start tomorrow will hopefully have LOTS of overtime and put an end to all this being-broke bullshit. It’s really cramping my style.
Are you still reading? Good for you. This week at college!
Kim Kardashian-style kontouring!
Saoirse kontoured to within an inch of her life
and just to think, most people try to get their makeup to match their skin tone and NOT leave a streaky brown tide mark around their jaw.
Wig work!
Ashleigh rocking the 90s-kids-TV-presenter look
She would have been the coolest girl at my high school in 1998
not pubes, just another wig sitting in front of the mirror
… and posing, bitches.
So here’s AC/DC with their 1980 hit, You Shook Me All Night Long, because it’s Friday. I know this flog has attracted the attention of many classic rock puritans internationally who are going to light up the whole internet with bitter posts about how you can’t have a photo of Bon Scott’s crotch one minute, and be signing off with a Brian Johnson hit the next, but all I can say is bite me. Also, AC/DC are Australian*. Ha!
Happy Friday, lovers Xx
*No one in Scotland likes hearing this truth.
I strongly dislike airbrushing. It’s frustrating. The guns we use at college aren’t the best, and it’s impossible to clean them properly. That, and our class is 20-odd chicas, so we all have to share. Everything. All the time. There’s one of each thing we need, and 20 people wanting to use it at the same time. Gah!
I just… don’t like sharing.
And as previously mentioned, the makeup itself is minging. It has turned my skin to that of a 14 year old boy, yet when it’s on my face, sinking into my pores and wrinkles and looking like a thick hideous mask, that ugly crap somehow manages to make me look 100 years old. Bah!
Anyway, that’s today’s makeup bitch. Airbrushing will come in handy when it’s body-paintin’ time…
stencilicious
…I just don’t like it on my face. And college is awesome, in fact, and we only have to do airbrushing for another couple of weeks before we move on to other stuff.
ermagherd
And even though there are more people than required materials in the class, mostly everyone’s mostly cool. The tutors are all great, and it’s nice to sit in a classroom without wishing your time away.
I pay so much attention.
So this week, apart from hating on airbrush guns, we’ve been doing normal basic makeup/foundation…
makeup is gross
….and we also continued with studio portraits for our portfolio production. Here are some behind the scenes shots for your enjoyment:
my view
then we got fancy AND schmancy with the lighting
snap.
So that’s what’s going oooon, dear reader. Tomorrow, computer class in the a.m. and WIG-WORK in the afternoon! Couldn’t you just die?
Here’s Def Leppard with their 1983 (a very good year) single, Photograph. From Pyromania, back when Rick had both arms. It’s not my favourite DL song, but it’s not my least favourite either – and it’s topical, so bloody well listen to it, alright? 😉
x Imo
also, how BUFF is my arm? That’s my left arm, too.
Here I am at college, looking pensively out the window, wishing they’d fucking give us some notice for the days we’re having our photo taken so I’d know to spend a bit of time on my hair and makeup.
I’m also reflecting on poor old Miley Cyrus’s makeup in her latest music video – is it MEANT to look terrible? As if it was hastily applied by someone who had never used liquid liner before? As if the makeup artist had none of her kit with her that day, and so had to borrow stuff from someone who doesn’t really have any makeup, except for this old mascara sample and lip crayon that came free with a magazine 8 years ago and has been sitting untouched in a desk drawer ever since?
If so, job done, but it still bothers me. More than her bare arse on that demolition ball. You don’t want dust there.
Anyway, enough about Miley, this is imogenmaxwell.com after all.
3 weeks into my course and I can still scarcely believe that Googling pictures of David Bowie and making scrapbooks of makeup pictures is now, officially, what I do. No longer a slightly eccentric indulgence furtively carried out behind closed doors. A legitimate passtime. Positively reinforced by tutors who recognise my ability to Google pictures of David Bowie with unbroken focus for hours on end as sure signs of passion and commitment.
I am in actual heaven.
Anyway. What did I do apart from go Bowie-gif-crazy this week, you ask? Why, more airbrushing, of course. I only just realised that the eyeshadow, below, I did on Sinead is a little bit inspired by David’s, above. Interesting. STOP TALKING ABOUT DAVID BOWIE IMOGEN, NO ONE ELSE CARES.
my patient model Sinead
Airbrushing is a messy little bastard, if you’ve never had the pleasure. My own jury is still out on the whole business; I mean, I know I’ve only had two shots at it, but I can’t really see the point so far. It’s messy, it smells weird, you look like a newsreader with it on, it doesn’t come off, it takes longer than normal makeup, and cleaning the gun is a real pain in the can.
see? MESSY!
splotches everywhere from the damn gun spitting! Ffffffuck!
the look now complete with Aunt Sally pink blush
We also did face charts, which is colouring in, but less fun because you’re doing it with makeup that doesn’t stick to paper (if it’s powder) or doesn’t blend properly (if it’s cream). But kind of cool anyway. Here’s my first one:
show us yer cheekbones
So that’s what’s all going on at college, y’all.
Bet you’re wondering what song will accompany today’s flog post. David Bowie? Not today. Not even the Misfits even though I’m wearing my Misfits top in my window portrait up top there. No, not the Misfits. Don’t worry, not Miley either. How about some Korn because it’s a cool video and they’re about to release a new album for the first time in ______ years?
digital imologue 