How to Create Aquarelle Lips: Colour Design, Setup and Session Steps

This technique requires colour design, expectation-setting and an agreed session order: the colour you mix, the colour immediately after the session and the settled colour are different observation points. Below is a practical working order.

Step 0: Confirm the technique suits this client at all

This is not a technique step, but it comes before technique. Whether lip work is appropriate depends on health status, medication and medical history — particularly a history of cold sores — and that is a clinical judgement. No technical detail substitutes for it. The questions a client should take to their doctor are set out in Aquarelle Lips (Lip Blush): How the Technique Works and Who It Suits.

Step 1: Colour design — for the healed result, not the immediate one

This is a step to check between consultation and execution. Three working prompts:

1. Do not set the colour from the "just finished" appearance. The colour right after the session is not the healed colour, and how long it takes to settle varies between people. Design for the healed result.
2. Record how much correction is being discussed first. Is the natural lip cool, dark, or pale? Does it need brightening or covering? Write the correction direction and expectation into the consultation record.
3. Work from the underlying tone, not from the target colour alone. Treat the natural lip tone as a separate variable in the colour discussion; whether a touch-up is needed depends on the post-session assessment and the agreement with the client.

A practical test: talk your colour plan through as "what it will look like healed", not as a colour-chart selection. If you cannot describe roughly what it will look like healed, the plan is not finished.

Step 2: Machine and cartridge setup — connection first, configuration second

ATTO's established position on needle selection is unambiguous: interface fit is non-negotiable, and every other specification comes after it. The order is:

1. Confirm the connection your machine accepts (universal-style or a screw system). These are separate purchase paths, not interchangeable names for the same product.
2. Then confirm the needle configuration (single needle, round liner, flat and magnum families, and so on). Read the complete Style value rather than shopping from one abbreviation.
3. Then consider diameter and taper, which answer different questions and should not be used as shorthand for each other.

One point deserves emphasis: do not copy a needle code from a video or someone else's work. Cartridge configuration serves your technique and your machine setup, and the same cartridge behaves differently under different hands. Confirm your machine's interface, then choose from the matching product family by the full Style. The method and full pre-order checklist are in How to Choose PMU Needle Cartridges.

Step 3: Session sequence

In execution order:

1. Decide the lip shape and the edge strategy. The defining feature of Aquarelle Lips is the absence of a hard lip line, so before starting you decide how diffused the edge should be and how far beyond the natural border to work.
2. Lay the base. Establish a foundation colour rather than chasing target saturation in one pass.
3. Layer for gradient. Add depth in stages where it is needed, darkening and blending progressively, instead of driving one area to full depth in a single attempt.
4. Check symmetry. Besides the front view, look at the balance from at least two angled views.
5. Close out and record. Take a standardised set of images (same light, same angles), which makes it easier to decide later where colour needs adding.
6. Agree the review and touch-up. Whether a touch-up is needed, and when, is agreed with the client based on how the work actually responds.

What determines working depth and pass count

This is not a parameter you can take from an article. Working depth, and how many passes a given area receives, depend on your training, the equipment you are using, and the client's skin. That is exactly why copying parameters from someone else's photograph is risky: you cannot see the depth they actually worked at, and you do not know their machine setup.

The workable order is: settle colour and edge strategy as above, select the equipment by connection and configuration, and then adjust according to how the skin responds during the session — rather than fixing a number in advance.

Step 4: Session length and quoting

Session duration depends on technique, the amount of correction required and whether the work is split across visits. Do not quote a fixed number of hours at consultation; put the range into the quote and the expectation, which is easier than explaining it afterwards.

Step 5: How to set client expectations

• Give a maintenance expectation, not a guarantee. Semi-permanent pigment changes over time. If you state a duration, say which endpoint it refers to — time for a refresh, or colour completely gone. Build the touch-up into the plan and the client will not read it as a failure.
• Say the removal difficulty up front. Semi-permanent pigment is not easy to remove: the FDA states that laser removal usually takes several treatments spaced a few weeks apart, that complete removal can take many treatments and in some cases may not be possible, and that flesh-coloured tattoos, white ink and permanent makeup are particularly tricky because the pigment can oxidise and turn black, after which it is no longer treatable by laser. Getting the colour right the first time therefore matters more than fixing it later.

Execution checklist

1. Complete the suitability judgement first (the clinical part belongs to a doctor).
2. Design colour for the healed result, and commit an estimated correction amount.
3. Confirm the machine interface before choosing configuration, diameter and taper.
4. Layer rather than drive depth; no hard lip line; check symmetry beyond the front view.
5. Record standardised images and agree the touch-up timing with the client.
6. Say only what is verifiable: a maintenance expectation rather than a promised number of years, and the fact that removal is difficult.

To select cartridges by connection and full Style, see ATTO's PMU cartridge needle range. To check lip pigment colours by application area, see ATTO's PMU pigment range.