Kerry Washington Always Does These 5 Things — & No One Has Noticed

We hate to break it to you, but for every example of boundary-breaking red carpet beauty — like Lady Gaga matching her dress to her hair or Lucy Boynton's graphic eyeliner — there's an endless sea of no-makeup makeup paired with glowing highlighter and fluttery lashes. Gorgeous? Yes. But it's also just the sleeping pill we need to snooze through the entirety of E!'s red carpet show.

Luckily, there are a handful of celebs who always deliver something fresh and new — and Kerry Washington is one of those rare few. Quite the opposite of her most famous TV persona, Olivia Pope, Washington likes to change things up, going from graphic cat-eyes to simple swipes of shimmery powder, and from wearing her hair natural to donning a pin-straight bob.

In honor of Washington's birthday, we scoured the archives and found something surprising: While the actress does love to experiment, she also falls back on a few techniques time and time again, which we've rounded up, ahead.