Behind Dior's Retro-Inspired Eyeliner from the Spring/Summer 2022 Runway

This week, Dior set the tone for a celebratory and vibrant return to in-person Paris Fashion Week with a bold Spring/Summer 2022 catwalk featuring a beauty look already being embraced by the masses—retro eyeliner. Seen on stars like Ariana Grande and even fictional favorites like Beth Harmon in The Queen’s Gambit, mod liner gives a simple yet impactful effect. On the runway, the graphic eye makeup complemented the ‘60s-inspired collection of color-blocked dresses, mini skirt sets, and A-line frocks, adding a bit of a Youthquake edge. 

For several seasons now, Dior Beauty Creative and Image Director Peter Philips has made eyeliner the focal point of the makeup. According to the MUA, this is inspired by Maria Grazia Chiuri, the creative director of Dior, herself. “Maria Grazia, she prefers eyeliner,” Philips tells L’OFFICIEL, referring not only to her own beauty regimen (“If she’s made up, it’s a dark eye”) but also the references she gravitated towards when developing the look with Philips. 

Looking at images from the ‘60s—the decade that Marc Bohan took the helm at Dior, and which was a main influence over Chiuri’s designs this season—Philips and the creative director decided to strip back the makeup of the era to just the liner, leaving out any mascara, blush,  and lip color. Chiuri was particularly enthralled by a photograph that showed a woman in profile, looking down, revealing a gap in between the eyeliner of the upper and lower lashes. Philips says that Chiuri was attracted to this negative space—“It’s about the space in between,” she told him.

With the challenge of creating a uniform look across a diverse group of 90 models, Philips kept it simple yet precise with parallel flicks of the Diorshow On Stage Liner (096 Vinyl Black) that extended from the outer edge of the eyelids to the outer corner of the eyes. By drawing one line from the upper lash line and one from the bottom lash line, the makeup highlighted the space in between that Chiuri admired. 

There was also a logical reason for adding the lower line. “I started [adding under eyeliner] a few years ago more as a practical solution, not as a trend,” Philips shares. “Because when you have 90 girls with 90 different eyes—half of them hooded eyes—I can do an eyeliner on top and then it leaves marks and it just doesn't work. If you do an under line, or in this case, a side eye line, it just matches every eye shape and you don't have to worry that it smudges or runs.”

To keep it polished, Philips used the Diorshow Khol (529 Beige) to touch up between the black lines, and kept eyelids matte with neutral shades of the Dior Mono Couleur Couture eyeshadow tailored for the individual models’ skin tone.