Booking a Central Coast Makeup Artist Who Drives In

If you have searched for a makeup artist on the Central Coast, you have almost certainly noticed that a lot of the results are not on the Central Coast. Mine included.

So let me deal with that first, because it is the thing worth knowing before anything else on this page, and nobody in this industry seems to want to say it out loud. The short version of what I offer is on the makeup artist Central Coast page.

No, I am not local, and here is what that actually means

Bellus works out of Cameron Park, which sits between Newcastle and Lake Macquarie. For a Terrigal wedding that is a bit under an hour. For Woy Woy it is more.

I have been driving down for Central Coast weddings for years and I will keep doing it, because the Coast has some of the best wedding venues in the state and I like working there. But “servicing the Central Coast” and “being on the Central Coast” are different claims, and you should know which one you are getting from anybody you enquire with.

What being non-local changes: the travel fee, and what time I set my alarm. What it does not change: the kit that comes through the door, the time I spend on each face, or the fact that I only take one wedding a day.

What the drive changes about your morning

Almost nothing, if it is planned, and quite a lot if it is not.

The absorbing happens on my side. If your ceremony is at 2pm at Avoca and you are getting ready at the house, I work the finish time backwards from the cars, then backwards again through the photographer, then I add the drive to my own start rather than to yours. You get the same unhurried morning a Newcastle bride gets.

Where it does show up is in flexibility on the day. A local artist can nip back for a forgotten lipstick. I cannot. So I bring everything, twice over, and I do not leave until everyone is genuinely finished rather than nearly finished. That is a different way of solving the same problem and after eighteen years it is the one I trust.

The other thing worth flagging is that the Central Coast is long. Wyong to Woy Woy is a serious distance and the two ends of it are not the same booking. If you are at the northern end, around Wyong, Tuggerah or The Entrance, my drive is barely different from a Hunter Valley one. If you are at Ettalong or Umina, it is the longest trip I make.

What it costs

Bride hair and makeup is $320 with lashes and airbrushing included. Bridesmaids are $300 on the same basis. Hair only is $160 for the bride, $150 for a bridesmaid. There is a minimum call-out of three people for hair and makeup.

The Central Coast sits outside the no-travel-fee zone, so a travel fee of $150 to $200 applies depending on how far south you are. That is quoted in writing before you pay a deposit, not added afterwards, and it is per booking rather than per person.

In round numbers, a bride and two bridesmaids for hair and makeup lands at about $1,070 on the Coast, where the same booking inside Newcastle or Lake Macquarie is $920. The whole list is on the pricing page, and I would rather quote your actual party than sell you a package.

When you should book someone local instead

This is the section most artists leave out, so here it is.

If your ceremony is early in the morning at the southern end of the Coast, and your party is at the three-person minimum, and cost is genuinely tight, a local artist is probably the better booking. You would be paying a travel fee for a drive that is buying you nothing you could not get closer to home.

Book me if the party is larger, if you want one artist doing every bride personally, if you have found the work and specifically want it, or if you are at the northern end where the drive is unremarkable. Book local if the maths above describes you. I will tell you which one I think you are when you send the enquiry, and I have talked brides out of booking me before.

What to check before you book anyone from out of region

Four things, and they apply to me as much as to anyone.

Ask what time they will arrive, not what time they will finish. An artist who cannot answer the first question has not thought about the drive.

Ask whether they take another wedding that day. If they do, and they are travelling, the buffer that protects your morning is the one that gets eaten first.

Ask what the travel fee is and when it is quoted. A fee that appears after the deposit is a different business than a fee that appears in the quote.

Have the trial. For a booking where the artist is not around the corner, this matters more, not less. It is the one appointment where you find out whether the person is worth the drive, and it is the right place to tell me your venue and your ceremony time. More on how I run one in the trial guide.

The Coast is worth the trip

Terrigal, Avoca, Norah Head, the hinterland estates behind Gosford, the lakeside venues up around Tuggerah. There is a reason I keep making the drive.

If you are planning a wedding anywhere between Wyong and Woy Woy, send me your date, your venue and where you are getting ready and I will tell you whether I am free and what the travel fee comes to. If you are still choosing the venue, my sixteen favourite Central Coast wedding venues is the place to start, and what I do across the Central Coast has the service detail. If you are working out what you actually want on the day rather than who is doing it, start with the bridal makeup styles.