Today we’d like to introduce you to Rashay Gidney.
Alright, so thank you so much for sharing your story and insight with our readers. To kick things off, can you tell us a bit about how you got started?
Well, it all started from a friend of mine that does make up. He saw it firsthand every time he would do a post of someone’s makeup he has done. He noticed that I will always get excited about it and I would be like OMG the way you did her make up or I was just go through his post while me and him will be on the phone and he’ll be like you know I know every time you know I post something you would get super excited and you know you would like my stuff and share it and things like that and he was like why don’t you tell that lady that did your make up for Your birthday photo shoot years ago to show you how to do make up and then I was like boy I don’t know how to do that. I can’t do no make up. I will miss somebody’s face up lol and then it just went from there… I called the lady that did my make up for my shoe and I told her hey you know I wanna do makeup lol I wanna learn and she was like OK and just told me to book her for an appointment to do a one0 one class so I went to her to let her give me a one on one class… so she tell me I want you to do my make up until I feel comfortable with walking outside with your work on my face and she stated that she haven’t let anyone do her make up in over 13 years because she’s a make up artist so I did her entire face and then she looked at it in the mirror whenever I got done in her eyes started watering and she was like ummm I don’t like how you did my face. It’s ugly wipe it off so then I said OK then I proceeded to just wipe it off and then I redid her entire face again and then she looked in the mirror after I did it the second time and she said ummm I don’t like how you did my eyebrows it’s ugly wipe it off and then I just proceeded and said OK no problem so mind you I’m thinking OK I did her entire face right she just don’t like her eyebrows so I used to make up removal light to wipe her eyebrows and then she was like no no no it is ugly wipe it off wipe it all off so I wiped everything off then I redid her entire face again then she looked at it in the mirror after I did it this time and she said I don’t like how you did my lipstick. It’s ugly wipe it off then I proceeded once again like all the other times I’m like OK well, I guess I finally got everything correct it’s just her lipstick. Let me just use the makeup removal wipe and just wipe her lipstick off and redid and redo it so I proceeded to only wipe off her lipstick. Then this is where it takes a turn she started screaming from the top of her lungs. WHAT ARE YOU DOING!!! It’s UGLY WHIPE THIS SH*T OFF!!!! YOU ARE WAISTING MY TIME… YOU KNOW WHAT GET YOUR SH*T AND GET OUT OF MY D*MN STUDIO NOOOOWWWWW!!!!! IF YOU WANT TO BE THE BEST YOU ARE GOING TO DO WHAT I TELL YOU WIPE IT OFF NOW !!! YOU ARE NOT GOING TO PLAY WITH ME DO IT NOW OR GET OUT!!!…… so the end I was like OK I will do it. OK no problem. I will just do everything you say so I redid her entire face and then she stopped me and she looked in the mirror and there was a piles for like 10 seconds or so, and she was like I love it and I was like what did I do wrong or what did I do and she was like you did it right the first time that’s why my eyes was watering in the beginning because you’re different. She said you’re gonna be a star you’re gonna be amazing she told me that the reason why I kept making you redo my face and critiquing you the way I have done. It’s because I was testing you in many different ways. I wanted to test you to see how well you are with following directions I wanted to test you to see how great you are with working under pressure. I wanted to observe your body language to see where you get nervous because in this industry clients can feel whenever you’re nervous or whenever you don’t know what you’re doingand another reason why I was hard on you because no matter how great you are there will always be someone that you can never please you will always have a client that will always find something wrong with what you are doing regardless if you are the best at what you do, but yeah that’s pretty much how I got started and things are going amazing now for me
Would you say it’s been a smooth road, and if not what are some of the biggest challenges you’ve faced along the way?
Well at first things were kind of rough until I decided to get a backbone about my business at first I wasn’t charging people/clients a deposit and I learned that very early in my career because people would cancel and then rebook it so it just made me be more organized and more professional with my work And like any other business owner, I have my rough months here and there, but I honestly feel like I’m doing great. I’m new to Atlanta and a big reason why I moved here is to further my career and eventually get celebrity clientele.
Can you tell our readers more about what you do and what you think sets you apart from others?
Well, first off I am RASHAY THA MUA… I am a phenomenal makeup artist I specialize in, not only just doing makeup, but transforming peoples lives I like to look at myself as the transformation king the make up plastic surgeon, lol because the thing that sets me apart from other make up artist and don’t get me wrong, we all are doing nothing and getting our money. It’s enough out here for all of us to get a bed, but the thing that I know that sets me apart from them it’s because a lot of make up parties. They’re good they do make up but a lot of them do it just to make you look beautiful or they do it just for the money. I know that this is my gift from God because I can’t see myself doing anything else besides this and whenever I do individuals make up it’s an experience versus them just getting their face beat. I transform their lives. It’s like a ministry for me. It’s like I’ve had so many people tell me so many times you know your energy. It’s just a match. It’s unexplainable. I’ve gotten my make up done 1000 times but it’s like when I sit in your chair. I just feel amazing afterwards. I’ve had first time clients that say they have never wore make up or never would but the things that they have saw me do for others they just wanted to book me just to have the experience so to me it’s more than just getting someone’s money. That’s the thing that keeps me going to know that I can make an impact in someone’s life through make up brushes lol I am most proud of me taking that leap of faith to try something new and little did I know I discovered my gift for my purpose in life. A lot of individuals go through life and never find their thing. They’re just doing a lot of different stuff, but never know what their true gift is into me that’s priceless and nobody can ever take that away from me.
Where we are in life is often partly because of others. Who/what else deserves credit for how your story turned out?
My biggest inspiration in life is my mother. I’ll give her full credit for what I am today because without her I wouldn’t be the person I am today. She is the reason why I’m doing make up. I remember as a child I used to watch her get dressed to go out to the clubs and I would just watch her all day walk around with his bonnet on her head like you know a lot of people‘s mamas or the average hood chick you know, but I would watch her transform from that into this beautiful queen which she’s a queen 1st and foremost all the time, but it was just amazing to me just watching what she would do to herself from the different color hair/wigs to the 6 inch stilettos to the long nails, different color lipsticks I just loved every bit of it but at the time I didn’t say anything as a child growing up because where I come from being gay was frowned upon or me as a black male looking up to or even liking things like that was frowned upon
Contact Info:
- Instagram: RashayThaMuA
- Facebook: Rashay Tha MuA
