If you watched the BBC’s recent queer dating show I Kissed a Girl you will be very familiar with Amy Spalding – AKA the lesbian people’s princess, and everyone’s favourite femme for femme. Hilarious and charming, Spalding captured the hearts of the nation with her humour, resilience and commitment to knee-high boots no matter the weather, situation or dress code. Now, for Dazed Beauty, she has filmed a tutorial for her go-to “quick drag” everyday look: vampy day-to-night make-up that looks like you’ve spent the day in the sun before heading straight for the club.

To start the look, Amy goes in with a primer, Hydro Grip from Milk Makeup, which she describes as super light and super dewy. For foundation, she uses a light tinted moisturiser from Laura Mercier and applies it with a damp beauty blender. “I’m such a fan of drag, I think that’s where my love for fashion and beauty first stemmed from,” Amy tells Dazed. “I do struggle with that balance of masculinity and femininity. I think make-up gives me a way to tie in both – I can wear what would be deemed as more of a masculine outfit and then have a full beat. It makes me able to express both sides of me.”

She then goes in with a Fenty Beauty cream bronzer in the shade ‘Butta Biscuit’, then adds ‘Pillow Talk Dream Pop’ blush by Charlotte Tilbury, which gives a rosy, ‘she’s been in the sun all day’ vibe but without the skin damage. “SPF is important people! Skin cancer is no joke,” Amy says as she applies it to the high points of her cheeks, nose, forehead and chin.

As a femme lesbian who dates more feminine-presenting women, she says she has always struggled with not being masc enough for certain girls. “When I wear something more masc or don’t have any make-up on, I’ve got such a positive reaction that I feel like I need to play that up and be more masculine because that’s what they are looking for. But really I do just want to be femme and girly most of the time,” she says. Being on I Kissed a Girl, however, really helped her expand her conceptions of what is masculine and feminine and move beyond binaries.

After blending the bronzer and blush, Amy sets the base with an e.l.f. setting spray which helps give the complexion a dewy look, before going in with a setting powder from Rimmel London. “You need that longevity while you’re shaking your ass to Brat at Dalston Superstore,” she says with a laugh.

Describing being on the show as the proudest things she’s ever done, she says it has been a full circle moment for her to be part of queer culture that she would have died for growing up as a “so-in-the-closet” lesbian. “I used to watch a whole series of TV just to have that drop of a WLW narrative, so when the opportunity came around for me to take part in this show that was solely about queer women, I just knew I had to do it, there was no question,” she says. “I grew up living off of the lesbian cannon and the lesbian lore and now to be a part of that for younger people is crazy.”

To create her signature smokey eye look, Amy takes a Gucci eyeliner in the shade ‘Bordeaux’, which she says makes the green in her hazel eyes pop. Her approach to applying the eyeliner is to “slap it on and then let the blending do the work”. First, she lines her eyes roughly, creating a small flick at the end, before blending it with a fluffy brush to give it that smokey look. Her little hack is to put extra powder underneath the brow to stop the product from spreading. She then adds more liner to darken it, before lining her under eyes and blending.

When she’s happy with the shape, she darkens the edges and waterline with a black eyeliner to make it more dramatic and smokier. She blends it out and then sets it with the powder. The Gucci eyeliner is great, she says, because once you’ve finished blending and it dries, it doesn’t budge. She then curls her lashes before applying the Ciglione mascara from Diego dalla Palma, an all-time favourite of hers. When she’s feeling “super frisky” she’ll add a corner lash.

Amy says her approach to make-up is just to have fun with it and experiment. “I think make-up and beauty shouldn’t always be pretty. I think there’s beauty in the ugly. And when you step outside those lines and push those boundaries, that’s when really interesting shit happens,” she says, continuing that the queer community has always been at the forefront of pushing those boundaries and leading the charge in terms of creativity and self-expression.

Next up is creating a fake eyebrow piercing – “I have commitment issues” – using gems bought on Amazon which gives a “cunty” edge to the look. Taking lash glue, she places two dots above and below the brow where the piercing would be, and then lets the glue dry a bit before putting on the gems. “Fiddly work”. For the brows, she uses Browlacq from Isamaya Beauty, slicking them up with a spoolie.

Finally, it’s time for the lips. “I could have no make-up on and then put a lip on and it transforms everything. I rely on it, it’s my staple.” Doing a vampy lip to match her eyes and hair, Amy uses the Isamaya Beauty lip liner in the shade ‘Outlaw’, concentrating the product on the outer corners of her lips to give a more 3D shape. She then goes in with Liplacq – Isamaya Beauty is the “best make-up ever,” she says – to create the final look. “It’s very vampy and whore-ish, in the best way possible.”