Courteney Cox Shared Her 5-Minute Makeup Routine for a Fresh, Natural Look at 56

Photo credit: E! Entertainment - Getty Images
Photo credit: E! Entertainment - Getty Images

From Prevention

Let’s make one thing clear: If quarantine has improved anything, it’s Courteney Cox’s Instagram game. All of this free time has led the Friends star, 56, to not only share her talented piano covers, but on February 22, she blessed us with her very own (product-specific!) five-minute makeup routine. Unlike other extensive celebrity regimens, hers includes a healthy mix of high-end and drugstore items—and there’s only 10 of them.

The clip introduces a freshly showered Cox, glowing with moisturizer and ready to serve up some grade A content. “Since I’m always late,” she says. “I wanted to learn how to do my makeup in the most efficient way … and I’m gonna show you how.”

She starts by mixing concealer and foundation.

She uses Koh Gen Do’s Moisture Foundation and concealer, but if you want to recreate the look, you can “just use any kinda base, any kind of concealer,” she says. She applies a bit of both products to the back of her hand and uses her “key ingredient,” a Rare Beauty concealer brush, to mix the two textures together “because I don’t like it to be too thick.” Then she applies them under the eyes and only where she needs it. “I don’t like to wear a full face, so I just put it where there’s redness,” she adds.

Blush goes beyond the cheeks.

Then it’s on to blush, for which she uses the e.l.f. Cosmetics stipple brush to apply Stila’s Convertible Color in Lillium. “It doesn’t have to be Stila,” she reiterates. “Even though I love it.” Rather than just brushing it on her cheeks, Cox uses the neutral shade to lightly contour, taking it across the cheeks, along the hairline, and underneath her jaw.

Brown eyeliner keeps the look from getting heavy

To cover the faded tattoo liner she got “a long time ago” (“I hate it, don’t recommend that,” she says.), the Cox uses a Tom Ford Eye Kohl Intense pencil in the shade Metallic Mink to draw a “messy but really close line” to her lashes, followed by a lighter color—NYX’s Light Brown Slim Eye Pencil—to define her lower lash line. “I don’t wanna look like I have too much makeup on,” she says. She then uses a soft pencil brush to blend the imperfect sketches and achieve a seamless, natural look.

Curling her lashes is a must

Because Cox’s lashes are “super straight,” using an eyelash curler is a crucial step in her routine. (And you can see the difference when she does it, even before mascara.) After curling, she feathers on her “favorite” Marc Jacobs Velvet Noir Major Volume Mascara while trying her best not to make The Mascara Face—you know the one. “I feel that face coming on, I wanna make it,” she admits.

An accidental 11th product blots away extra shine

Cox uses the Palladio Rice Papers to lift the excess moisture from her skin, ensuring her fresh face lasts all day. “It’s pretty gross,” she says. “But that’s moisturizer, let’s be clear.” It’s technically an extra step, but if you’re not super shiny, you can skip it.

In total, the video comes in at five minutes and 14 seconds, which *technically* exceeds the five-minute marker. But if you factor in the time she used to explain everything, that’s honestly pretty impressive.


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