Balmain had us doing double takes after seven famous faces (among them Rosie Huntington-Whiteley, Gigi Hadid, Kendall Jenner and Alessandra Ambrosio) temporarily swapped hair colors thanks to Sam McKnight's expert lace wig styling. "Olivier wanted to create a surprise today, but we've still got natural, sexy, easy, cool girl Balmain hair," explained McKnight, who used a curling iron and lots of serum to create believably shiny and bouncy new 'dos. Over in makeup, Tom Pecheux stuck to the script of past seasons (if it ain't broke...), contouring cheekbones to Kardashian levels, applying sheer nude cream to lips and eyelids and highlighting the inner corners of the eyes with shimmery gold lipstick.

Adventure-seeking, well-traveled women—the kind who manage to look effortlessly chic as they weave in and out of traffic and across the countryside on motorcycles—inspired the weathered eye makeup and lightly flattened hair on the models at Chloé. Aaron de Mey drew black liner with a greasy finish along the waterline, dragged it down under the eyes and then wiped the color away with a Q-tip dipped in gloss. "I'm trying to get them to look imperfect, asymmetric and worn-in, like they've had the makeup on for a couple days. But not in the sense of looking rough; I just want to give them a slight toughness."

While the majority of models walked the runway with Parisian au natural makeup, three were given crystal cat-eyes that Tom Pecheux described as looking like "Beauty & the Beast." To create them, he drew wings across the lids and out with shiny black liner, pressed makeup adhesive at the outer corners and "glued" down deconstructed pieces of the earrings in the collection. The final step, to keep the crystals from feeling too overpowering, involved tracing the liner along the lower lashes and up around the edge of the embellishment for seamless fluidity.

According to Peter Philips, Creative and Image Director of Christian Dior Makeup, the beauty look all started with a so-dark-it's-almost-black purple lipstick called Poison that current designers Lucie Meier and Serge Ruffieux loved. From there, "it was all about contradictions," said Philips. "They went for something boyish with the hair, but at the same time, buns are girly. With the makeup, we went for a really sophisticated, intense, almost dangerous lip, but to make it less gothic and more glamorous, we added a high gloss, high shine. For the eyes, I said, 'let's go for extreme volume in mascara, but not like a beautiful fan of lashes, a bit more punkish.'" His trick for making the lip color both opaque and dimensional is four-pronged: Outline the lips in matching 'Poison' lip liner, fill them in with black eyeliner, apply the lipstick (twice, mattifying with a Kleenex in between), then go over with lip gloss right before the runway, so as not to get a swipe of lacquered black across the clothes. The lashes, which Philips euphemistically described as "packages of lashes" rather than clumpy, were achieved through first brushing on a clear primer, then going over that with two coats of black mascara, the second one applied in swirling fan motions as the first was almost dry. Over in hair, Guido was giving models two low mini twists on either side of the head, a nod to the '20s and '30s—and not to Björk, Princess Leia or prairie girls.

Isabel Marant hair is usually synonymous with Parisian hair—that is, easy, effortless, nothing. This season, however, Marant "wanted more of a statement," said Guido as he styled three different looks—quiff chignons with a fifties feel, and soft blowouts with heavy sideswept bangs that worked with the more eighties-themed collection. The key is to use "just a little bit of hairspray," especially on curls; Guido misted water from a spray bottle to keep things feeling light and soft instead of shellacked.

Makeup artist Val Garland cited "Charlotte Rampling in a Helmut Newton photograph" as the inspiration behind the three eye looks she created backstage: one, "a Velvet Underground, rock revolutionary party girl in green [above];" two, romantic pink glitter; and three, "mess-cara," which was more '60s Twiggy than morning after clumpy. To get the final result on the glittery girls to look so precise and pigmented, Garland began by applying cream eye shadow as a base. Next, she went over that with powder shadow to set and intensify it. Then she dipped a liner brush into M.A.C. Mixing Medium, which acts as adhesive, dipped it into glitter and lightly pressed it onto the lid. Black winged liner was added as a final touch to the outside edges for a rock 'n' roll framing.

True to form, Mugler's fall collection, with its fiery color palette, leopard prints and thigh-high slits, was not made for wallflowers—and neither were the dominant side parts and flashes of orange on the eyes of some models. Eric Antoniotti, Clarins International Artistic Director, rejected the term 'tribal,' and instead described the streak of earthy orange pigment as "natural art that takes us back to our roots." He mixed a soon-to-come shade of Clarins powder eyeshadow with Blue Orchid Oil on the back of his hand, then swiped the paste across the lids with his fingers. "We want the girls to feel strong," said hairstylist James Pecis, who made side parts, blow-dried the hair smooth with mousse, then draped the front section across the forehead to look like fringe. "Center parts are easy cool, but there's a little bit more strength in the side part. I know that sounds silly, but it does make a difference."

"Giambattista always likes to feel like his girl has just come out of the shower and thrown on her dress," said makeup artist Val Garland backstage. "Here, it's all about the celebration of women, which I interpret as, every woman should have a silver lining in her life." Hence, the holographic flashes of sparkle, visible only as the models turned their heads just so on the runway. Garland started by mixing pigment with Mixing Medium to create a liner, which she drew along either the lash line or just under the brow bone. Once that set, she dabbed more clear Mixing Medium over it to act as an adhesive, then applied the ultra-reflective glitter on top.

Sex, the capital S kind, can have its smoky eyes, its mini skirts, its latex—we like the stripped-down, sensual Nina Ricci version of the word much better. The fall show was about the woman in love at night, loosely pulling her hair back and spritzing perfume on her neck, curling her lashes and adding a couple coats of mascara and giving her eyes, cheeks and lips a healthy pink flush. It's the kind of makeup men love because they think you're not wearing any, and it's the kind we love because it doesn't make a mess of pillowcases or leave us looking like a raccoon the morning after we wake up in someone else's bed.

"It's a very rock-chic, moody feeling," said makeup artist Tom Pecheux of the overlapping black ovals, outlined by high-sheen liner, on the eyes at Elie Saab. He blended taupe blush across the entire lid to the end of the brow and just under the lower lashes for a large oval shape, then filled in an almond shape inside that with greasy black gel liner. On top of the gel, he tapped shimmery black pigment. "It's important the eyes look big, and to feel like there's a dark circle inside the taupe oval, otherwise it becomes a makeup commercial in the '90s," said Pecheux.