My friends often tell me that I am the luckiest woman alive because I have a pretty sweet work week. Um…….I don’t work Tuesdays or Fridays. Yes, it’s true. On those days I either spend it doing interviews, writing, or engaging in some retail therapy. But the one thing that I usually look forward to on Fridays is waking up early enough to catch Fashion Fridays on Cityline.  

Being a Cityline viewer, I love when Tracy Peart – Makeup Artist to Cityline’s Tracy Moore and Breakfast Television’s Dina Pugliese, is featured because she talks about cosmetics for all skin tones and complexions. Being a woman of colour, I appreciate learning about colours that suit my complexion, and more importantly, how to apply them.  

One day I was sitting around pondering who I’d like to have a conversation with, and boom….Tracy popped right into my head.  

I was interested in speaking with her because I love anything to do with makeup and I really wanted to have a chat with an expert. Also, I love how she injects humour while dispensing great beauty tips to the audience.  

Although we weren’t able to meet face to face, I definitely felt her passion for her career, and her entrepreneurial spirit definitely came through during our phone interview. She told me about her long quest to work at City TV, which involved calling and submitting countless resumes for a full year. Even though her friends thought she was crazy, she was eventually given an interview. Guess what happened during the interview….? She was hired on.the.spot! Take note, perseverance and persistence are key in achieving your goals.  

That’s just a taste of her story. Keep reading to find out more.  

Hometown: Toronto, Ontario

Years in the biz: 14 years

Must-have beauty item: I’m really into matte lipstick right now- bright reds, pinks, purples. I LOVE bringing back the 90s

Astrological Sign: I’m a true Taurus!    

What sparked your interest in doing makeup?

Originally I went to school for Film and Television production – I wanted to be a director. When I got out of school, I started out doing PA work (Production Assistant) on music videos. I would see these models come in – they looked like regular girls and they would go into hair and makeup and they would come out like “glam goddesses.” I was like, “How did they do that?” I started to become sooo obsessed with the magic that was happening in the makeup and hair trailer.  

Every single music video that I was working on was the same thing. I would see the girls transform. I started not really doing the work I was supposed to be doing and hanging out in the trailer with the makeup ladies.

One day a friend said, “Why don’t you go and study makeup?” I didn’t want to do it because I had just graduated from my program about a year and a half before that. I thought it was crazy, but I just became soooo obsessed with makeup. I made the switch and I went to school and studied it and I haven’t look back.  

How did you become the exclusive makeup artist for Tracy Moore and Dina Pugliese?

I started working at City TV in 2006 but started working for Cityline and Breakfast Television a year later. The first year I was working on Saturday and Sunday nights – the shift no one wanted.  

There were two girls that worked at BT and Cityline who got pregnant at the same time, so they needed someone to do their shifts. They pulled me and another girl from the weekend shift and put us on BT and Cityline.  

When the girls came back from maternity leave, it was all of us on a rotating shift. They didn’t want to let us go. It came to a point that there were too many of us that Dina Pugliese and Tracy Moore went to the powers that be, and requested that it just be me. That happened in 2008.  

Being a part of the beauty industry, do you think the standard of beauty is changing due to the attention given Lupita Nyong’o?

I think it’s changing but very, very slooowly. It’s a good thing that Lupita exists…it’s good that she’s commercially accepted, which has not really been done before. It is sad that we have to look to others for validation; it’s important that you love yourself.  

It is important that we are commercially accepted …that means we can be on the cover of BIG magazines that are everywhere. Which means that little girls that are growing up start to see images of themselves and it becomes more widely accepted. I don’t think we are there yet, but we are slowly inching in that direction.  

How did you come up with the concept for your makeup app – Makeup IQ?

I was doing makeup on a tech show where I saw a story on apps. I said to myself, “Why don’t I try to make an app?” I was around all these tech people…..I ended up talking to a woman who creates apps and she told me that the most successful apps are video or game apps. I started my research. I literally downloaded every makeup app that exists! I saw that it was saturated with video tutorials, and I know you can find a lot on YouTube. I didn’t necessarily want to enter this realm to do what everyone else is doing.  

I thought I would do a game, and then it hit me…..I’ll do a quiz! It’s a game, but at the same time you’re learning. My whole thing with the app is that I want to make sure that I’m teaching something. I need you to walk away learning at least one thing. That was important.  

What beauty item should a woman wear every day?

One thing….lip colour. It could be a stain, a lipstick or lip gloss.  

What is your biggest pet peeve when it comes to makeup application?

If women don’t wear anything. My whole thing is just put something on. Give it a try!    

I loved our talk about her start in the biz, and of course discussing cosmetics for women of colour, but I will admit, our off topic convo about movies was a lot of fun. Somewhere in our conversation she told me that she’s a movie fanatic, and calls movies, “a feast for the eyes.” I practically shrieked when she revealed to me that her fave movie is Usual Suspects – which is one of my all-time favourites. She said that even though she studied film a long time ago, she is still in love with the art form. Maybe one day we’ll see a mix of her two loves: makeup and movies.    

Tracy’s deets:

 Website & Blog: www.tracypmakeup.com

Twitter and Instagram: @TracypMakeup

Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/TracypMakeup