Thanks to everyone who participated in the Ayria Inspired make up contest! This weekend I reviewed all the entries and I’m thrilled to announce that I’ve chosen 2 first place winners of this contest, plus one runner up! It was too difficult to choose, you are all so beautiful & creative with your looks, I loved the use of the liner, pinks, purples, other funky colours, even the hair too! But these 2 videos seemed to have gone above and beyond as I’m sure you can all see why! I’m sending them both the grand prize pictured below and something to the runner up as well. Thanks to everyone who participated, with special mentions going out: to Chloe, Helena, Kat, Amber (very amazing & informative video! I loved your colours!), Kate (awesome use of intense pink & purple), Kitts (loved your pink & smoky look, you are beautiful!), Leslie (pigtails rocked, your liner was amazing & you are super cute!), Misty Marie (loved your hair, and makeup!)
WINNER: Helena’s Ayria Inspired Make Up: Her video is amazing! I loved her intense use of purples, and using the little stick on gems at the end was so creative:
WINNER: Chloe’s Ayria Inspired Make Up: This girl is incredible! She’s done over 7 videos of different Ayria make up looks, she could pass as my little sister, and she did a great job of putting together her video:
RUNNER UP: Kat’s picture of her pink shadow, black liner, glitter and creative idea to put stars along her cheeks was very cute! Bonus points for the NHL shirt <3 😉
http://www.flickr.com/photos/birdmadxgirl/5569723645/
GRAND PRIZE:
MAKE UP KEEPSAKES:
Everyone else, if you want to have your own piece from my makeup collection, donations of any amount over $15 (or over $20 outside the U.S. and Canada as I need to cover all shipping & the cost of the supplies) I’ll send you 2 sample sized pink & purple pigments (this is the size I bring on tours & from my own experience, it lasts forever!!) pictured below. Anything over $30 I’ll send you all 4 colours including the silver & pink glitter (again, worldwide shipping is included) Every donation will also get a pink jelly bracelet & a personalized signed note to you too! (The make up is all from my personal collection, I’ve divided it into jars from a larger (unused) container! I have too much of these specific colours right now. This is meant as a keepsake from me and will only be available until my own supplies run out. Proceeds go towards helping fund expenses for my upcoming U.S. tour dates!! 😉
This is my giant travelling make up case I’ve named “Head” only it’s not pronounced “head”, you have to say it like Mike Myers’ Scottish Father in the movie “So I Married An Axe Murderer” and pronounce it “Heed!” and usually yell it out! This case contains everything that makes up my head for an Ayria show such as my make up, and hair accessories. Head has had all kinds of touring adventures. He’s been to Montreal for the Kinetik Festival, he’s driven across Canada, he’s seen the entire U.S.A., been on a tour bus with VNV Nation, and he always gets to hang out backstage. He couldn’t come to Europe last fall unfortunately, I think I’d need to get him a passport or something 😉 We had on ongoing joke that I had an actual head inside the case, that already had full hair and makeup that I simply could screw on and replace with my own head for the shows. Creepy, but funny.
I bought this case for myself last year for my birthday and I know it’s a bit excessive, since there are a lot of things in there I don’t even end up using, but it can hold absolutely everything I need on tour, and it’s great for storage of everything here at home. When I can bring head on the road, I do. It really just depends on how we are travelling and for how long we’ll be away. This is an item you’d only get to see backstage, so here are some photos of Head in all his colourful, glittering glory:
Ayria's Head - Travel Make Up CaseAyria's Head - Face & Hair Bows!Ayria's Head - Eyes!Ayria's Head - Travel Make Up Case
Here’s a few pics I could find of Head on the road, here are some backstage shots of Head in New York City (yes, the Ayria dressing room was pink!):
Head in NYC
Here’s head and I goofing around backstage in Washington D.C.
Jenn & Head hanging out backstage in Washington D.C.
And finally, here’s Head and I in Salt Lake City, UT. I’m obviously looking for Head, who’s hiding near the back.
Jenn & Head in Utah
The weird thing is, I also have a teddy bear named “head” (pronounced the same way) who lives on my bed and has a head too big for his body to ever be able to sit up right! I love plushies with disproportionately large noggins. Here’s my other Head who stays at home while I tour:
Other Head
Anyways, hope you enjoyed this silliness! I thought I’d ease into some make up stuff by first introducing you to make up case Head, the keeper all things colourful needed for a big sparkling head.
Dragon*Con Loves Ayria! The Crowd in Atlanta, GA, Sept 6th 2009 (click to see it BIG!)
We were the last band of the evening on Sunday!!
Gothic lolita anime Jenn from Ayria
This past weekend I attended Dragon*Con in Atlanta with approximately 35,000 other fans of science fiction (literature, film and T.V), anime, horror, gaming, fantasy, etc. This was my first time not only performing a show at the Con but also my first time ever attending. I had wanted to for a few years now, having heard nothing but amazing things about it. I packed up my costumes, and everything I needed for the Ayria concert that would be happening on the last official night of the con, woke up at 5:00 am on Friday and got to the Toronto airport for my flight to Atlanta. Unfortunately, my flight ended up being over 3 hours delayed, which cut into my Friday time but everything worked out ok in the end.
My friend Sarah, who was helping me at the Con for the weekend picked me up at the airport. Our first stop was to figure out where the Ayria merch table would be. Upon our arrival, one of my helpers, Angela met us to help us set up. Let me just say right now that I could not have done this weekend without my Ayria helpers. 15 volunteers that ran the Ayria merch table, taking shifts for 24 hours a day for 3.5 days. They were incredible! Thank you: Angela (the star table cloth rocked!), Brittany, Kellie, Alan, Tammy, Kevin, Bernardo, Louis, Raymond, Laura & Adam, Nicketas, Michelle, April and mangopork. There was also a team of about 30 people who helped flyer to promote the show, you guys absolutely ROCK and there’s too many to list but special thanks to Lucky and Vintu who between the two, must have distributed over 3,000 flyers on their own!
Once we checked in to the hotel, I got ready for Friday night where I dressed up as “gothic-lolita-anime Jenn” with a pink PVC dress made by Artifice Clothing. I was scheduled to do a panel on the state of the goth scene (slightly difficult, I’m not really goth but I met some great people there). Later that night, I was scheduled as the special guest at Funcom’s Anarchy Online gaming party where they played my music and announced the show. Those Funcom guys were great and so nice to hang out with.
Self portrait – Jenn from Ayria
Saturday was much of the same, hanging out at the con, signing merch for fans, taking pictures, staring at all the amazing costumes and having a lot of fun! Saturday I went dressed again as an anime, lolita character again (yeah, I really love that look!) but this time in black and white. Clothing again was made by Artifice Clothing. Highlight of Saturday was seeing my friends from the Cruxshadows play to a packed house! We toured with them in the fall of 2008 and I hadn’t seen them since last December. It was great seeing their show again!
Skipping to Sunday, the night we were to play, I was a bit nervous since the size of the concert room was HUGE. In the video’s I’m posting below, you can see there are projection screens that are half-way back in the room, that are actually playing the concert for the seated area in the back! It’s really impressive. We were the last performance of the night and we went on quite late since the party never really stops at the Con! I was blown away at how many people were there to see us live, who were energetic and ready to dance! We had the place jumping, singing, chanting and of course, making up their own dances. My favourite was the weird bird like dance that caught on during the song “Cutting” about 20 people were doing this because one row of guys started it! I even stopped in the song to ask “What is this?” Classic. This was the first show ever where the waving arms was not started by us on stage! The fans all started doing it in sync on their own, so I asked them if I could film them doing it (clip below). I loved every minute of the show, the fans did too and I fed off of their energy. I’d love to return to play again, but we’ll have to wait and see. For now, I have my memories of the weekend making me very happy. Thank you to everyone involved in this fabulous con! The organizers, the tech team at the show (and to think, not even a soundcheck! Not bad , thanks to Plastik Wrap for making our stage outfits and my Sunday Con outfit. and I have to especially thank the incredible fans who helped out and those of you who attended the show, I have one question for you: Have your feet recovered yet? There’s a gallery below to see a few more images.
I flew home yesterday night (Monday, Sept 8th) and I’m completely exhausted but it was worth every moment! My question to those of you who attended our show: Have your feet stopped hurting?
, thanks to 
