Woman wearing metallic silver eye paint on colour changing background with tubes of Spectra eye paint
It goes from black to silver under your phone’s camera light (Picture: Metro.co.uk/ Spectra)

Even if you’re a total beauty obsessive, the name Lauren Bowker and her company, The Unseen, is probably not on your radar — yet.

But then there was a time when nobody knew who Estée Lauder was and when you hadn’t heard of The Ordinary.

And 36-year-old Lauren and her revolutionary new eye product, which launches today, is the most exciting beauty news in ages — it’s makeup that can change colour under your phone’s camera light.

‘The Unseen began out of curiosity,’ says Lauren, explaining how her ‘dual-reality’ makeup, Spectra, came about. ‘When I was at university [studying textiles at Manchester] I developed a compound that changed colour, from yellow to black, in response to air pollution.

‘I thought it would help people understand an abstract concept and that — being able to visualise unseen things through colour, materials science and design — is where the name and the idea came from.’

After leaving Manchester, Lauren did a master’s at the Royal College of Art but it was a postgraduate project at the Royal Academy of Engineering that inspired her to set up her own company.

MIAMI BEACH, FL - MAY 29: Designer Lauren Bowker attends the Miami Fashion Week Designer Dinner at Chotto Matte on May 29, 2019 in Miami Beach, Florida. (Photo by Johnny Louis/WireImage)
Lauren Bowker developed the colour-changing technology (Picture: Johnny Louis/WireImage)

‘I was working on researching how humans were going to live in the future and predicting what materials might help with that,’ she says. ‘I found it really frustrating that it was just research and not an application of potential solutions so I decided to try to bring these sorts of “smart” materials to life.’

Early projects included sculptures that changed colour according to air friction — an offshoot of an aerodynamics project with a Formula One team — and a collaboration with Swarovski that used 4,000 crystals on a skull cap that changed colour according to brain activity. However, it was four years ago that Lauren dipped her toe — or rather her hair — into beauty.

She’d been asked to come up with something that would promote science to women. The result was Fire, the world’s first colour-changing hair dye — think retro Global Hypercolour T-shirts but much, much cooler.

‘I had really long hair at the time and was forever in the lab accidentally getting colours on me,’ she says. ‘I’ve also always had an interest in the occult and there’s a great film called The Craft where one of the actresses changes the colour of her hair just by stroking her hands across it. It was science fiction but I knew it was achievable.

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Lauren’s black to red hair dye was inspired by cult movie The Craft

Fire debuted at London Fashion Week in 2017 and, within a week, a video showing hair changing from black to red had been viewed more than 80 million times. Lauren’s company, The Unseen, has since partnered with Schwarzkopf Professional and, after pandemic-related hold-ups, plans to launch Fire next year in 48 countries. In the meantime, it’s launching the aforementioned Spectra.

‘The technology comes from those road signs that glow when you shine light on them,’ says Lauren, ‘but it was inspired by a gig a few years ago where it felt like every person there was viewing the world through a phone. I wanted to create something that exists physically on your face but you can only see via a digital screen.’

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The eye paint is available in grey and black

Available in black and a barely-there silver grey, both colours transform under a phone camera’s flash or a torch to reveal reflected silver. This — and next year’s Fire launch — is just the beginning.

‘I imagine that with Spectra, we will have extensions of that technology, whether it’s about shades or types of products,’ says Lauren.’ And if you are launching a colour-changing product that is safe for hair, why shouldn’t it be safe for skin too?

‘Beyond that, there’s the huge potential that working with a reflective particle has. It’s a new form of colour and I think that might have implications for how we create colour cosmetics in the future.

‘I dream that we can get to the point where a single foundation can autocorrect to any skin tone or any environment. It won’t happen tomorrow but I think it’s definitely possible.’

Does Spectra really work? We tried it out for ourselves:

Spectra’s recycled aluminium tubes are reminiscent of paint tubes but at £33 for 5ml this is very pricey paint.

In terms of cost, it’s on a par with cream shadows from Tom Ford — but heaps more exciting. I squeeze a tiny bit of the black on to the back of my hand and use a fine brush to apply it as eye liner under my eye before using a finger to daub the lid.

The finish is a solid matte black. I do the same with the grey — it feels more slippery, and genuinely looks barely there.

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To test them out I stand in front of a mirror in a dark bathroom with a torch. It takes a bit of experimenting with angles but I get a glimpse of the sort of fuzzy 3D silver you see reflected from road signs.

Using a phone with a flash is more successful, with pictures showing both the grey and black as dramatic swathes of silver.

Both stay until removed with the cleanser I usually use to take off waterproof mascara. This is makeup — but not as we know it.

Spectra, £33, is available from today exclusively at The Unseen Beauty

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