Who are Boylan and Balfe?

Ellie Balfe (Click here for a portfolio of images)

Ellie graduated from makeup and special effects for film , TV and theatre in Dun Laoghaire College of Art and Design in 1995. Her first job was as head makeup artist for the first Bobbi Brown account in Ireland.

Her CV includes short films, stints in the makeup rooms of The Abbey Theatre and RTE and a three-year period in London where she worked as a makeup artist and store manager for cult cosmetics boutiques Space NK. In this time she gained invaluable knowledge of over thirty product ranges and was trained personally by some of the worlds top makeup artists including Laura Mercier, Francois Nars and Jeanine Lobell, the founder of Stila.

Whilst in London she worked on numerous society weddings and counted Louise Nurding and Courteney Cox among her regular clients.

She returned home to become involved with the initial setup of Blue Eriu, responsible for training staff in makeup artistry technique and product knowledge.

Her freelance work has featured in practically every Irish magazine, including Image, Irish Tatler, VIP, Womans Way, even as far back as D'Side magazine back in the 90's. She has also worked on the MTV and IRMA awards and can often be seen on RTE's Off The Rails.

For three years, Ellie was based in Brown Thomas Dublin as head makeup artist for Stila cosmetics and represented the brand in both the UK and Ireland on many fashion shoots and events.

It was in this time that she came to the conclusion that many women were confused by the many cosmetic companies and that most women did not feel confident in applying their own makeup. In particular, Ellie became aware that younger girls were not learning good techniques to start them off as consumers in the beauty industry. With a lot of money being wasted on innapropriate product choices and bad advice, girls were merely copying eachother instead of learning how to enhance their own individual beauty.

These realisations were the beginning of Boylan & Balfe.