Vanessa Traina, Stylist

Vanessa Traina
1
Vanessa Traina
2
Vanessa Traina
3
Vanessa Traina
4
Vanessa Traina
5
Vanessa Traina
6
Vanessa Traina
Vanessa Traina
Vanessa Traina
Vanessa Traina
Vanessa Traina
Vanessa Traina
Vanessa Traina
Vanessa Traina
Vanessa Traina
Vanessa Traina
Vanessa Traina
Vanessa Traina

'I just got my ear pierced—I went with my little sister who is covered in piercings, she’s super punk rock—to Haight Street in San Francisco just to buy jewelry and I walked out with this piercing. I felt so cool for a day, and then I woke up the next morning and thought, ‘Am I an idiot? Did I really just get a new piercing at 26?’ But now I kind of want to do the other side to match!

I’ve always been really low-maintenance with beauty. I mean, I started wearing makeup in my twenties. I’ve never required a lot of maintenance or products. My secret is washing my face with water and then putting on moisturizer. I tried using cleansers when I was a teenager and I felt like they gave me pimples, so I became scared of any kind of cleanser. Somehow water and moisturizer keeps my skin looking fresh. If I have makeup on, I use remover of course— Lancôme or Darphin. I never go to bed wearing makeup. That’s one thing that every makeup artist has told me. I really don’t wear that much makeup, and even my concealer is just a tinted moisturizer. I’m a ' Chanel Ambassador', which means that I basically just formulated a relationship with them, and they introduced me to their line of products and they send things to me before the collections come out. It’s up to me whether or not I like them, or whether or not I wear them. But I actually do happen to like the products and I’m more than happy to wear them, and kind of represent their beauty. I love Chanel eye glosses. It’s my favorite. I only use a tiny bit. Like if I use the gold one, I just use a tiny bit, like in the corner there. The red one I love too. It makes your eye kind of look bruised. [Laughs] It’s good. My brows are super light so I always pencil them in. I use an eye shadow actually— NARS Bali. It’ like a gray, it’s kind of weird. I use a bronzer, NARS Laguna. And I use this really cool Chanel mascara, Exceptionnel de Chanel. It’s a super weird brush, but it combs through your lashes. I have long lashes, and I don’t like when they look too clumpy. I use little Balenciaga pouches as makeup bags, clutches—I use them for everything. They always work with what I’m wearing.

New York, I feel like, dries me out so much—so I literally use four moisturizers. I use the REN Vita-Mineral Radiant Day Cream underneath, and then Chanel Hydramax serum—it gives a really nice glow and it’s like a nice over-moisturizer—and then a tinted moisturizer. So every morning I’m wearing three moisturizers. And one for body. I use Moisture-Rich Body Lotion from Clarins and I’m obsessed with it—I love the smell and it’s not greasy. So I use the Clarins, and then over the Clarins—because you can never be using one moisturizer [laughs]—I use Rodin body oil which also kind of doubles as my perfume because it has such an amazing scent. It’s kind of like a tuberose, gardenia kind of scent. I use Aquaphor on my lips. It’s the best. Or Homeoplasmine—you know what’s really funny? My friend Daniel [Martin, the makeup artist] gave me this from the pharmacy in Paris and it’s actually nipple cream, for pregnant women! It’s like Aquaphor but a little lighter and you can use it anywhere. And I always wear sunscreen. My Chanel tinted moisturizer has SPF. And then if it’s warm outside, I go for La Roche Posay Anthelios SPF 60 and 40. I love a tan. I feel like it’s one of the most common misconceptions, that you don’t get tan if you wear sunscreen. I get so tan, and I’m always wearing at least SPF 45. You need to wear sunscreen. And also, what people don’t realize is that when you wear sunscreen you don’t burn—so you don’t peel, and your tan lasts longer.

I’ve been getting my hair colored by Laurie Foley for a little over a year now. I went to another colorist to take me brown, he did it really badly and it turned red immediately, and charged me $900. I was on-set shooting with Marie-Amélie [Sauvé] and Guido [Palau] actually told me that Laurie is the only person who can fix it. So I started going to her then, and I just love her. She really works with your skin-tone, it’s not just about a formula. It’s like your formula, which is so important. And she’s never charged me a crazy amount. Her prices, I feel like, are so reasonable. Because hair can—you know, highlights and all that—can get so expensive. In terms of products, I’ve been using Bumble and bumble Surf Spray for so long. My hair is naturally wavy and the texture is never better than when I’m in the ocean or something and this really gives you that kind of feeling. I use the Orlando Pita line mostly. The Polish, and Plump when it’s wet. I don’t really blow dry my hair. I got one of those Brazilian things, but then I felt like my hair was too straight and greasy. So I kind of went back. [Laughs] It makes your hair kind of stringy-looking when you get it.

I take a shower every morning and a bath every evening. The first thing I do when I get home from work is run a bath. I’m obsessed with baths. Growing up, and my house in San Francisco is really old, it was built in the early 1900s—so I didn’t have a shower. It’s all the original bathrooms and everything, and I have this amazing, huge, freestanding bathtub. So I’ve always been a bath person. That’s why I shower in the morning, I don’t like washing my hair in the bathtub. I just like to relax. I love REN bath oil—I buy in bulk, because there’s nothing worse than when you run out of a favorite product?”

—as told to ITG