Make-up Masterclass in Soho

Sculpted by Aimee in NYC

Sophie Colgan and Aimee Connolly in the Odd Sister on Mercer Street

I was one of the lucky fifty to secure a ticket to the Aimee Connolly NYC masterclass which sold out in minutes. For anyone living under a rock, Aimee Connolly is founder and sole owner of make-up brand, ‘Sculpted by Aimee’. You may have seen it online, on Grafton Street, in Boots, in Kildare Village, on Aer Lingus, in your local pharmacy or packing out the makeup bag of every millennial Irishwoman because truly, no other Irish product has had a chokehold on us like this since the grip that white O’Neill’s tracksuit bottoms had on us in 1998. 

It’s always a treat to attend an Irish event in the city. I notice my shoulders drop ever so slightly on arrival when it’s clear that my name was unremarkably but perfectly understood the first time I said it. And this night wasn’t any old Irish event but an Irish beauty event which meant only one thing: not a square inch of pasty skin on display but fake tan all around and I, for one, felt right at home. 

Someone once told me that I “rocked the pale and interesting look” which was bemusing for many reasons but not least because at that very moment, I was wearing three layers of fake tan: one layer to take the edge off the blue, two to look normal and three to seemingly look pale and interesting. On the make-up scale, my skin shade is ‘-1.5 Sick Victorian Child’. Though what I actually wear is, of course, ‘+2 Tepid Tea’. 

In a pharmacy recently, I asked a shop assistant if they had any fake tan. She walked me to the shelf, looked me up and down and handing me ‘Light’ said “This one is for you”. So it was refreshing this night to be in a group of women who would completely understand why I thanked that shop assistant for her help, waited till she was out of view before fecking the bottle back on the shelf, picking up ‘Medium to Dark’ and heading towards the till.

Meeting an Irish person abroad is like meeting up with a second cousin - you mightn’t have ever met them before but you’re immediately bonded because you share the same crazy great-grandmother and she gave you your sense of humour (and your sense of shame). So you fall into an easy patter because, well, you're more or less really the exact same. Who else would understand that your Roman Empire is wondering how did Robert get on in the Leaving Cert Irish oral or how you don’t know your own star sign but you know that Nadine Coyle’s date of birth is the 15th of the 6th ‘85, making her a Gemini.

The masterclass took place in Odd Sister, an elegant and sophisticated cafe-bar in Soho, named after Jack and WB Yeats’s sisters, Lily and Lolly. The first page of the drinks menu explains how Lily and Lolly had been unfairly dubbed the “Weird Sisters” by James Joyce and that the patriarchal society of the 1900s meant that the talents of these two businesswomen were under-appreciated. 

How fitting, 100 years later, that a bar co-owned by Irishwoman, Clodagh Culkin, was the scene for 50 Irish women to show their appreciation for entrepreneur, Aimee Connolly, whose limited company in 2022 made post-tax profits of over €2 million. Interviewed by fellow Irishwoman and friend, Sophie Colgan, Aimee told us how as a Transition Year student, she picked up last-minute work experience on a make-up counter in Dundrum. The experience led to an offer of a part-time job which she kept up throughout school and college. She went on to study Commerce & French in UCD but had by then set up as a freelance makeup artist on the side. Upon graduating from UCD, she launched her first beauty product and that business has grown to include all types of make-up products and accessories, skincare and tan - for sale online as well as in bricks and mortar shops. 

Aimee Connolly, Clodagh Culkin & Sophie Colgan

The atmosphere in the room was positive and supportive with everyone wishing her well. In many ways, Aimee Connolly seems like any ordinary Irish person - the girl next door who made it big. But she also has the aspirational lifestyle that the main character in a chick-lit novel could only dream of: she’s blonde and she’s beautiful. She sells make-up in pink boxes! She has a huge Instagram following where she shares make-up tips or updates on products while running down Grafton Street or on the way out of Pilates or bootcamp or spin. She’s never not on the go. And look at her now! In New York! Hosting a masterclass in a cool Soho venue, wearing the successful CEO uniform of a white top under a black blazer with her arms always folded in a permanent state of Linkedin-profile-pic-power-pose. What could be more aspirational than that? A husband, she has one of those too. Beautiful ring, beautiful dress, beautiful wedding. In a château in France.

During the on-stage interview, Aimee revealed that she is looking to open up a store in New York and also that she is launching a new product, a double cleanser, which we will probably all buy even though it is far from double cleansers we were reared. She is humble but confident, not appearing to have any airs and graces. She conducted the make-up demonstration herself and as guests mingled afterwards, I saw someone approach her to ask if she could recommend the correct shade of foundation for their skin and she, the founder and CEO of a multi-million euro enterprise, seemed to think nothing of immediately giving this stranger a personal, one-to-one consultation like she might have done on her work experience at 16.

The main character in the novel would undoubtedly, behind-the-scenes, be quite miserable and the whole story would be an unsubtle warning of how social media is fake and you cannot have it all. And all of that is probably true except that Aimee Connolly does in fact seem to be genuinely, very happy.