Brand Strategy

Half Magic brings Euphoria’s makeup looks to life

Inside the first campaign for the new line from the show’s makeup designer.
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Half Magic

· 3 min read

The latest season of Euphoria may be over, but makeup designer Donni Davy is just getting started. After years of inspiring people to re-create her glitter tears and rhinestone wings, Davy released her own makeup line, Half Magic, this month.

To design the product branding and debut the line’s first campaign, Davy and Euphoria's production studio A24 worked with creative branding studio Mythology. It’s not the first time the studios have worked together: Mythology was involved in A24’s “Public Access” campaign, which involved projecting the studio’s movies like Lady Bird and The Witch on billboards in the cities where they were filmed.

“I think what’s great with [A24] and with Donni and this project, specifically, is that we’re really among peers in terms of being creatives and being artists,” Audrey Attal, creative director at Mythology, told Marketing Brew.

We spoke with Attal about Half Magic’s release and designing a show-inspired brand for all ages.

Half and half: “Part of the magic is the makeup and the rest is you,” Attal said of the brand name inspiration. According to Attal, the whole point of the line is to make creative makeup looks accessible and allow for easy self-expression–great news for anyone who’s ever been invited to a Euphoria-themed party.

Going public: The Half Magic release campaign consists of a short film that was made to look like a movie trailer. Heidi Bivens, the costume designer on Euphoria, directed. “There’s definitely a family spirit on set,” Attal said, adding that it was fun watching the makeup application process and seeing the models’ reactions to their looks. While Davy did not apply each look, Attal said each was her design.

Blast from the cast: Veronica Taylor, who plays Bobbi on Euphoria, and show consultant, co-producer, and playwright Jeremy O. Harris both make appearances in the film. Attal said it was intentional to mix familiar faces with a diverse mix of people from all walks of life, including older generations. “This level of self-expression and this level of character-building with beauty is something that Gen Z is really comfortable with, and is almost growing up with now,” Attal said. The team wanted “to show that [the makeup] could be a part of anyone’s life who feels like they want to express themselves, who feels like they want to put on glitter and sky-blue eye wings.”

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Social butterfly: The paid campaign is running across Instagram, TikTok, and YouTube and includes a recent influencer event. Chloe Cherry, another Euphoria star, can be seen on Half Magic’s Instagram account. So far, Attal said, the response on social media has been “really, really good.”

Save your (glitter) tears: Even with the many odes to the characters and show that made Davy’s looks famous, Attal said it was important to show that Half Magic isn’t just a spin-off product. While “Euphoria as a show means a lot to a lot of people, the makeup itself really became iconic and inspired a lot of people and changed makeup in many ways,” she said. They wanted to “build a brand that, beyond the show, kind of had a life of its own.”

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Marketing Brew informs marketing pros of the latest on brand strategy, social media, and ad tech via our weekday newsletter, virtual events, marketing conferences, and digital guides.