On June 6, 2024, at Pier 36 along the East River, Hermès held its Resort 2025 show. The French house’s artistic director, Nadège Vanhée, drew inspiration from New Yorkers flitting around town and injected a dose of Parisian flair. One thing both cities can agree on? The fruits of the edgy, smudged eyeliner models wore on the runway.

 “When I spoke with Nadège, she said, ‘I want the makeup to be like it’s eight in the evening, and the girl did her makeup in the morning, so it became a bit hazy, a bit misty, it ran a bit, then she smudged with her fingertips,’” explained Gregoris Pyrpylis, makeup artist and creative director for Hermès Beauty. So, as Pyrpylis worked backstage, the stormy and humid weather outside didn’t detract from the evening’s makeup look; it only strengthened its impact.

To create the gritty, lived-in eyeliner look, Pyrpylis pulled from Hermès Beauty’s Le Regard collection, their tightly edited range encouraging self-expression with color, and more specifically, its forthcoming eye pencils (launching this fall). In the mix were browns, greens, deep blues, and dark plums in both matte and iridescent finishes.

“We found inspiration from New York City, all the elements you find around it,” explains Pyrpylis. “It’s a city that vibrates so that you can feel it from the choice of colors in the collection, this melting pot of colors, textures, and patterns.”

He smudged liner along the upper and lower lash lines, using a small brush for a “slightly blended, but not too much” effect. Others got an extra layer of liner and smudge for a “kind of hazy, misty effect around the eye.” Gazes were topped with brown or black Trait d’Hermès mascara wiggled into the roots of lashes to punctuate the effect. As for the rest of the makeup, au naturel was the word. The skin was enhanced with a light veil of Plein Air Complexion, and lips were layered in rich Rouge Hermès nudes with a dab of Hermès lip balm.

As summer in the city sets in, the Hermès liner looks serve as a welcome reminder: there’s beauty in imperfection—and, yes, even a little bit of that end-of–the-day smudging. “The makeup is inspired by a real woman who lives in New York,” says Pyrpylis. “She runs around, and her makeup can move with her and have life as well.”