Rachel Goodwin

Rachel Goodwin
Photo courtesy of Rachel Goodwin's Instagram

Rachel Goodwin is a go-to make up artist for a devoted following that includes January Jones, Emma Stone, and Amber Valletta. Clients seek out Goodwin for her expert use of color and her ability to infuse natural beauty looks with an element of surprise—not to mention her easy mirror-side manner.

At age 3, she began obsessively drawing women’s faces, a pastime that evolved over the years.

By the time she was 9, growing up in San Francisco, Goodwin was obsessed with iconic beauties like Marilyn Monroe, Marlene Dietrich, and Greta Garbo, and beginning to use real faces as her canvas.

Later, Goodwin began studying with the head makeup designer for the San Francisco Opera and moonlighting doing makeup at fetish clubs. She said that that was very big in San Francisco and she loved it because she could use a lot of glitter.

When her high-fashion aspirations outgrew San Francisco, Rachel went east to paint a bigger town. In New York, she assisted big-name artists like Linda Cantello, James Kaliardos, and Tom Pecheux while working part time at the MAC Pro store and doing test shoots on her lunch breaks.

Goodwin’s break came in 2000 with an introduction to photographer David LaChapelle, who hired her for an editorial job in L.A. It went so well that Goodwin wound up moving there. Soon afterward, she was working with such reigning Hollywood queens as Jodie Foster and Diane Lane, rising stars of the time, like Jennifer Lawrence and January Jones, and supermodel Amber Valletta, who had been a longtime inspiration.

By the time Chanel came knocking in 2004, it was clear that Goodwin was a force to be reckoned with. She also happens to be one of the most benevolent forces around. Her relationship with her clients is almost shamanic, like a conversation.

Goodwin is also an irresistibly down-to-earth mother of two who runs an ice cream Instagram, @thesundaetimes, in her spare moments. While she longed for mass appeal early in her career, she has come to a place of extreme comfort with herself as a person and an artist.

She is the Co-Founder of the Makeup Museum, together with former Makeup.com editor Caitlin Collins, and beauty entrepreneur Doreen Bloch. The Museum’s collections include artifacts spanning over 5,000 years of cosmetics history, including an Ancient Egyptian Kohl eyeliner jar and a Qingbai ware cosmetics box from the Northern Song Dynasty dated 960-1127 CE.

She is represented by A-Frame Agency and you can find her portfolio HERE

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