Pat McGrath takes Jennifer Landa at StarWars.com inside her new collection, a celebration of the original trilogy.
“Star Wars came out in the US before it came out in the UK and I remember hearing about it and being so excited to see it, but we had to wait over six months,” McGrath tells StarWars.com. “I managed to get my hands on a book based on the script of the film because I just had to know what this Star Wars galaxy was all about! The book was fantastic and only made waiting for the movie even harder. When I finally saw Star Wars: A New Hope in theaters, I was instantly hooked. Astounding adventures, captivating characters, scintillating storylines — it was just beyond!”
For more than two decades, McGrath has pushed creative limits and revolutionized the beauty industry. She’s the CEO/founder/creative director of Pat McGrath Labs and has worked with some of the biggest names in fashion. Ever since the early 1990s, her creative vision is always fantastical, whimsical, and otherworldly.
Now she’s bringing her signature galactic glamour to her second Star Wars x Pat McGrath Labscollaboration that is themed to celebrate the original trilogy. The collection launches today, December 16, and this sequel came about in true Star Wars fashion. “In 2019 we launched our first Star Wars x Pat McGrath Labs collection and it was a major hit. So much so that we just knew we had to do it again,” McGrath says.
Now Star Wars fans and beauty enthusiasts are queuing up for her limited-edition collections that, in the past, have sold out at lightspeed. This year marks the 45th anniversary of A New Hope, and for McGrath, it felt meaningful to pay tribute to the first three films. “The original trilogy is what started it all for me, it’s how my love of Star Wars and the fantasy genre really began,” she says. “So I just had to revisit the original trilogy for this collection.”
When McGrath first embarked on this Star Wars collaboration, she worked closely with the Lucasfilm team, which was a special experience for her. “I was able to look at their incredible archives and revisit the iconic moments and characters that first ignited my Star Wars obsession,” she says. For further research, she did what any Star Wars fan might do: have a movie marathon. “Before I created the collection, I watched and rewatched the original trilogy — talk about a dream job! — and it was so special to revisit these iconic characters and think about them through a different lens. Knowing that I needed to translate these iconic characters, scenes, and feelings into products made my rewatching experience so much more fun. I was really looking at the aesthetics of the whole Star Wars galaxy in ways I hadn’t necessarily done before.”
McGrath’s love for Star Wars is everywhere in her latest collection — from the beautifully gilded artwork on the packaging, to the names of eyeshadows (think Binary Sunset, Force Sensitive, Astrolime), to the color scheme behind each and every product. “As I was dreaming up this collection, the richness of colors, textures and the use of light and metallics were all top of mind. This is what fueled the first round of inspiration, but then I would add more based on the characters’ personalities or storylines that felt evocative to me. All of the products feature unique artwork from the Star Wars original trilogy, from Darth Vader’s helmet on the Sith Seduction 5-pan, to The Empire Strikes Back artwork on the collector’s edition Mothership VI: Midnight Sun,” she says. “I hope my fellow Star Wars fans will collect and cherish this collection as much as I do.”
Read more at StarWars.com, and the new Star Wars x Pat McGrath Collection is available now.
