Illustration by Mark Nerys

• Generally, you can fake a makeover. But when you’ve got a big-deal event�a first date, a meet-the-parents, a cocktail party�at day’s end, it’s better to leave your makeup needs to a professional. I polled product junkies, beauty-editor friends, and even a few glam-looking retail clerks to come up with five reasonably priced eleventh-hour beautifiers.

  5. At Space NK Apothecary (99 Greene St., nr. Spring St.; 212-941-4200), I quickly developed a girl-crush on dishy Nina, who applied �smoky� this and �highlighting� that while complimenting my lashes. But the yeah-girl spell broke when I looked at my purple-glitter eyes and Silly Putty complexion outside the sneakily lit store. There was a �strongly recommended� buy-three-products policy; I spent $76.

  4. Though J.P., my endearingly sassy artist at the Armani counter at Bloomingdale’s (504 Broadway, nr. Broome St.; 212-729-5133), gave me several valuable application tips, I left looking rather � pink. Insult to injury: I had to purchase a minimum of three products totaling $140.

  3. Inglot, the enormous new Polish store hidden on the fifth floor of Chelsea Market (75 Ninth Ave., at 15 St.; 212-672-7124), paired me with another chirpy type, Ann, who was inclined to go the smoky route, too. The eyeliner looked boldly cool, and my skin looked like skin, not plastic�which for $40 seemed fair.

  2. Runner-Up Erik, my pleasant but admittedly exhausted technician at M.A.C (113 Spring St., nr. Greene St.; 212-334-4641) lost points for a fifteen-minute wait. But after a half-hour and only $50 (�free� mascara included), I had smooth but not goopy skin, matte red lips, and the kind of winged-out liquid liner I consistently fail at applying myself.

  The Winner!
  1. Ironically, the only free contender (or at least the cheapest one�product purchase is �encouraged�) was also the best. Pierette, manager of the West Village’s new Nars (413 Bleecker St., nr. Bank St.; 646-459-2323), was clearly a professional, working efficiently, suggesting skin-care tips without aggressively pushing product, and proving that it is possible to rock a smoky eye without looking like a drag queen.

  See Also: A Look Inside the New Nars Boutique

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  What Is This?
  Each year, everything you see in �Best of New York� has been rigorously tested by a small army of discriminating critics. That’s a given. What you don’t typically see is so much as a glimpse of the process by which we reach our conclusions. To provide a taste of that (and to sneak in a few more picks), we’ve invented the Scratchpad, a brief look at the paths our testers followed in six categories.

From the