Helena Christensen has graced dozens of magazine covers and walked legendary runways, from Mugler to Versace to Karl Lagerfeld’s Chanel, but the Danish supermodel says her latest gig feels like a dream. “It makes me feel really giddy and grateful, because it’s a girl’s dream to be able to work closely with a brand that you love,” she says of her new role as the face of Saie’s campaign for its SuperSuede Baked Eyeshadows.
Christensen was already a fan of the brand before landing the role, which made fronting the eyeshadow campaign feel serendipitous. Part of the appeal, she says, is that the products enhance your own glow and natural skin without erasing it, staying recognizably you rather than layering on a mask.
That instinct toward the natural is rooted in her own history with makeup. When she first moved to Paris to model, she barely owned any products, and admits her earliest purchases were less than chic. Her first two, a frosty-pink lipstick and a blue mascara, produced what she now calls the worst look ever in her teenage photos, though she still defends colored mascara to this day.
In fact, colored mascara has become something of a signature workaround. Because she has naturally dark lashes and brows, Christensen says she does not really need mascara to add depth, which frees her to treat color as pure play rather than necessity, a small, expressive flourish on an otherwise pared-back face.
The rest of her approach follows the same logic: a lived-in eyeliner reminiscent of her Peter Lindbergh shoots, shades chosen to make her green eyes pop, and very little else. It is a fittingly low-key philosophy from a model whose enduring appeal has always rested on looking effortlessly, unmistakably herself.
