Lady Gaga is feeling philosophical. “I love artists, I love their artistic spirit and there’s something spiritual that takes place when we all bond over the ways that we can be imaginative with life,” she tells me as she beams into my spare room from the dressing room of her Malibu home over Zoom. All around her, shoes and handbags are tucked neatly on shelves, while her countertop is stacked with perfume and makeup.
Dressed all in black with tailored wide-leg trousers, a crop top and a blazer over the top, it’s her makeup that’s the star of the show. She has a perfectly overdrawn nude lip, endless fluttery lashes and seriously chiselled cheekbones.
Of course, artistry seeps into all areas of Gaga’s life, from her music, to her fashion (who can forget the meat dress and that fabulous strip tease at the Met Gala). It’s expressed through her makeup, too, from the Ziggy Stardust lightning bolt that became a signature of her Just Dance era, to the high-shine latex red lip she frequently gravitates towards and the otherworldly sci-fi Monster Queen she inhabits when the feeling takes her. The creativity that makeup offers up is woven closely into the fabric and iconography of who Lady Gaga is, so her decision to launch her own makeup line, Haus Laboratories, to share with her community in 2019 felt like a natural next step.
Always the innovator, she metamorphosed the brand into Haus Labs last June, introducing new packaging and formulas. And now, she’s making her line more accessible to Brits by launching onto Sephora.co.uk and in store at Sephora Westfield White City from 6th June, so we can swatch and play with the products IRL.
Over the next 10 minutes, I tapped Gaga up for all the intel on Haus Labs, where she picks up her beauty tips and the wildest thing she’s done in the name of glam…
“I’ve learnt a lot from the University of TikTok…”
I think the thing that I’ve loved the most is just seeing the beauty community on TikTok. Obviously not everyone is kind, but there are a lot of really kind, lovely people on TikTok that just want to share their knowledge of makeup, their knowledge of beauty, their experiments, and not only their looks, but their techniques and their hearts. I love watching people tell stories about their lives while they do their makeup to get to know them better. But also, it adds a sense of emotion and warmth to the experience, which is how I feel a lot of us feel when we’re doing our makeup. There’s a lot of reflection that takes place.