By Noa Glow | Photo by Patrick Shannon | September 2011

Professional makeup artist Nicole Buckley has always had an affinity for style inspired by the 1920s, ’40s and ’50s. Now she’s found a way to spread her knowledge and love of all things retro to the masses through a series of ‘vintage beauty’ workshops.

Held on the last Thursday of each month in a private room at Slickity Jim’s Chat ‘n’ Chew on Main Street, Buckley’s Style Me Vintage sessions include plenty of cocktails, girl talk and practical beauty pointers for the ultra-low price of just $20 a pop.

“We go through different aspects of hair and makeup from those eras: rollers, fake lashes, liner,” she explains. “The girls, usually between 10 and 15 of them, bring their own products from home and a hand mirror, and we talk about what they’d like to do. For the most part, the group dictates what we end up learning.”

Professional makeup artist Nicole Buckley holds monthly retro-inspired beauty workshops at Slickity Jim’s Chat ‘n’ Chew on Main Street.

Replicating a vintage look isn’t as hard as you think. With hands-on help and step-by-step instructions from Buckley, Style Me Vintage participants are transformed from Lululemon-clad, rain boot-wearing Vancouverites to pinup-worthy girls in just a few short hours.

“I was getting so many requests from clients to do their makeup this way, I thought it would be fun to get a bunch of girls together and teach them as a group,” she adds. “For me, the most rewarding thing is that the women get to take what they’ve learned away with them and recreate it to suit their own needs and sense of style at home.”