How to create strange eye make-up with everyday objects

“I want people to feel something when they see my beauty looks,” says make-up artist Sofie Petersen, “whether it's inspired or disgusted. I want to show emotions and tell stories and joke around. I like that my Instagram is a place that can contain different expressions.”

From toothpicks glued into spikes on eyelids to safety pin lashes, Sofie uses a range of unconventional objects in her make-up looks. These unorthodox aesthetics are the antithesis of what she saw growing up in a Danish suburb, however, where Sofie says everyone pretty much looked the same. “I ended up feeling like there were expectations to the way I should look and it resulted in mental issues and very low confidence,” she says. It was only after Sofie started experimenting with glitters and coloured eyeshadows that she began to feel freer to express herself. “Make-up got to be my therapy when I felt down. I finally reached a point where I just wanted to be 100% myself, even if it made me stand out.”

She had started to get bored with the same old eyeshadow looks when one day Sofie decided to put some safety pins, that had been intended as earrings, on her eye and people loved it. “So I just kept finding random things in my room and trying to figure out how to create something cool with it on my face. It’s so much more fun to find the products to use yourself.”

Recently Sofie has turned to “vegan” looks, for example these glossy lettuce lids, because she likes the naturalness of it and the experimentation. “What I want people to feel after visiting my Instagram,” she says, “is to be encouraged to just put whatever they want on their face and own it! Do whatever you want, you just have to feel awesome and be confident about it.”