Rea Ann Silva travels the world as a celebrity makeup artist and has a family base in Los Angeles, but when it's time to focus on her line of beauty tools, Silva prefers the quiet, slower pace of the Lehigh Valley.
With more than 25 years of experience as a makeup artist in music, film and television, Silva has become a common name in the entertainment beauty industry. Today, she is best known by makeup customers for her game-changing makeup sponge, beautyblender®, which is manufactured in Hanover Township.
From Hollywood and Beyond
While Silva may be best known in the retail world for beautyblender® and its sister products, she is quick to point out that sponges aren't her passion or even her first business—they are a tool she uses in her day-to-day work as a makeup artist.
“I [was], and still am, a celebrity makeup artist,” she says. “I created beautyblender® as a makeup artist, to solve the problems that I was experiencing, and thought that my customer base would be my peers. The fact that this product could become so popular with consumers was something out of my wildest dreams.”
Silva's career began in the early 1990s when she worked with top music artists such as Rod Stewart, Brandy and Macy Gray. She would eventually transition into film and television, working with actors on top television shows and movies.
“I've been really lucky to have some great clients that were doing memorable and historic things. I loved working with Whitney Houston. I worked with Sean ‘Diddy' Combs through all of his bad-boy band inventions. He had so many artists, and I worked with some of them,” she says. “There are all kinds of ways a celebrity makeup artist works, whether it's red carpet or for film. I think I've probably worked in every circumstance that a makeup artist could use.”
She most recently worked as a makeup artist with Epic Records' CEO L.A. Reid during his two years as a judge on The X Factor, and also worked with Taraji P. Henson during press for the television series Empire. Silva has worked with Henson for years, including the promotion of The Curious Case of Benjamin Button.
While Silva still travels extensively as a makeup artist, she now spends six months out of the year at her Lehigh Valley business and home.
Her Wildest Dreams: Beautyblender®
Beautyblender® is a reusable makeup sponge that allows women to apply makeup more easily—its tagline is “wet, squeeze, bounce”—with professional results: no streaking, less waste and a flawless, natural-looking finish. It's an edgeless, egg-shaped sponge that allows precise application of complexion correctors, concealer, powder or blush on both large and small surface areas. (Under-eye baggies, anyone?)
But while beautyblender® has become a game-changing tool for makeup consumers, it wasn't designed for home use. Instead, beautyblender® was created roughly a decade ago with the advent of high-definition film. Silva was one of the first celebrity makeup artists to work with high-definition film and was tapped as the department head for the sitcom Girlfriends in 2000 because of her experience with beauty airbrushing.
“When high-definition filming came into being for broadcasting, there were some challenges in every aspect of the process. Suddenly you couldn't do those really thick, pancake-y makeup applications that had worked with 35mm filming. It would look like your makeup was overapplied,” she says. “You're trying to create beautiful makeup on actresses who want to appear perfect and natural, and with high-definition, it was a balance.”
A typical day of filming would take at least 12 hours and require countless makeup touch-ups. Unless Silva and her peers could develop a way to reapply makeup in a more natural-looking way, actors would need to start fresh midday with a clean face and a new application of airbrushed makeup—a time-consuming reset for the entertainment industry.
Silva began experimenting with damp sponges in the hope that these sponges would allow her to redistribute the makeup already on the actors' and actresses' faces. It was a success.
“I needed an applicator that could mimic my airbrushing,” she says. “By using a damp sponge, we could freshen their makeup without that cakey, overapplied look.”
Silva initially sought to share her design with other makeup artists. But once her design team realized beautyblender®'s broad appeal for easily applying and blending makeup, not
just reapplying it on set, beautyblender® would become an award-winning commercial product.
Her other beautyblender® products have had similar success. Beauty.blusher is a smaller, gray sponge, designed to allow users to gauge how much blush is on the sponge—a challenge on the iconic pink beautyblender®. The micro.mini is a smaller version of beautyblender® meant for concealer and corrective makeup. Liner.designer® helps provide a steady hand and a symmetric line when applying eyeliner.
Silva's newest product, blotterazzi™, is a reusable blotting cushion made from beautyblender® material. “It's a better way to blot,” she says. “It has tiny holes, like baby pores. When you press it onto your makeup, it redistributes your makeup. You're removing oil and shine but you're also creating a really even finish.
“All of my products that I've designed are based on things that I need to work,” she adds.
Inspired by the Valley
Silva and the beautyblender® brand have been based in the Bethlehem area for seven years now—but it took a chance meeting for the California native to come to the Lehigh Valley.
When Silva was first designing beautyblender®, she was hand-cutting sponges into the now-iconic egg shape. As she traveled the world with her clients as a makeup artist, she would look for new sponge types in each country she visited.
“I would always look at the back of the sponge packages to see who manufactured these tools. I knew I needed help to make my products,” she says. “I realized that I needed to make this in a more timely fashion, and professionally cut, if I wanted to make them available to makeup artists.”
One name that appeared on countless sponge packages was Victoria Vogue. After doing some research, Silva contacted the company's headquarters in Bethlehem. She spoke with the product development department and Catherine Bailey, who was immediately on board to help develop Silva's egg-shaped makeup sponge. Bailey would eventually become Silva's chief operating officer and close friend.
“Eventually, I had [Bailey] move all of my inventory from California to here,” she says. “I started the business in California, but it was so different here.”
Silva has experienced many cultures, including the celebrity-focused atmosphere of L.A., where she currently spends part of the year as her son finishes school in California. The slower pace of our area, away from the big cities, was a welcomed change.
“My past was Manhattan, L.A., France and London—the hubs,” she adds. “It's so different here. I love it here and the people are amazing. We have created a great business here in the Lehigh Valley, and we are very invested in staying here and growing our business.”
‘When you feel good, it shows'
Perhaps the most rewarding part of this journey, Silva reports, is knowing that she's influenced women by following her passion.
Beautyblender® has received Allure's “Best of Beauty” award seven times. Silva and Bailey recently earned the Ben Franklin Innovation Award for entrepreneurial achievement, and the original beautyblender® and related products have indeed become a game changer—for makeup artists and consumers alike.
“You want to look your best. You want to feel confident. That's what makeup is supposed to do,” says Silva. “I feel really proud and satisfied when people have the confidence to do what they need to do, whether that's going to a business meeting, being on camera or just being with a loved one. When you feel good, it shows.”
She notes that makeup should be fun to experiment with. Her goal is to demystify the process, encouraging women to experiment with new looks and helping them feel their most confident. She enjoys playing with each season's new colors, experimenting with and creating her own trends and making the latest trends easier for the average makeup user to understand.
“For me, the fun of makeup is showing people how easy it is. I get gratification when I show people how to transform themselves, and how to do this themselves,” says Silva.
“Clothes are fun to experiment with. Makeup and hair should be the same. The idea of makeup is fun for most women, but it becomes intimidating when they start to personalize it. It becomes overwhelming when they see so many products and tools to choose from. It should just be fun, and I think that's the secret to beautyblender®'s success.”
