Makeup and Beauty Blog | Makeup Reviews, Swatches and How-To Makeup
A beauty blog blooming with fresh makeup reviews, swatches and beauty tips from your friendly neighborhood beauty addict
Just FYI, keep your BECCA Shimmering Skin Perfector Pressed in Champagne Gold ($38) away from any flocks of wild canaries, because they could potentially mistake it for one of their own.
Don’t worry, this highlighter isn’t for the birds. Yeah, it looks jarringly yellow in swatches and the pan (at least I thought so at first), but it’s a totally different story on skin.
“Is that the girl Kiera Knightly calls to get her beat face?”
With BECCA’s Ombre Nudes Eye Palette ($40) in your makeup bag, peeps will wonder if you’re a celeb makeup artist. The palette makes it a whole lot easier to create professional-caliber, super-blended eye looks, even if you’re totally new to makeup.
Seriously. If I gave a four-year-old hopped up on Oreos and Cherry Coke a couple blending brushes, this palette, a blindfold and my face, that kid would create hella tight makeup looks at least some of the time. 🙂 It’s that good.
The palette houses five matte brown neutral eyeshadows, some of which only vary slightly, and they all have subtle gray undertones. Some of the shades are so closely related that they wouldn’t even be allowed to marry in some states. 🙂
Because the shades are so similar, they’re very easy to transition into each other, making them absolutely fabulous for hazy, blown-out eyes with subtle gradients.
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I’m afraid my pen of Rouge Bunny Rouge Nocturnal Ink Satin Liner in Blue Roan is about to start avoiding me because I’ve become totally obsessed with it. Pretty soon I’ll be knocking on its door at 3 in the morning yelling, “Blue Roan! I love you! Don’t you see?! We’re meant to be together forever!” Neighbors will call the cops and sh*t and complain about the wild-haired woman declaring her love for a liquid liner, but then I’ll just cut out a bunch of words and letters from a magazine and use them to make this note: Karen + Blue Roan = 4 Life!!!
Yeah, this dark navy blue liquid liner is le bomb, and not just because it survived season four of The Gilmore Girls (which I may or may not have marathon-ed in a single day).
The liquid flows smoothly and evenly from the flexible felt tip. This pen creates thin and thick lines and flicks faster than you can say, “Karen, you need professional help.” 🙂
The long-running Unsung Heroes series features some of my favorite permanent collection products from a variety of bodacious beauty brands.
For the record, I do not recommend living a secret sneaky makeup double life.
Bolting out the door to school without so much as a stitch of lipgloss on your lips, only to covertly cosmeticize yourself from start to finish before the first bell rings, is initially a thrill, but it gets old fast…
Trust me on this. Half the time I’d be in algebra class with one sloppy purple-rimmed eye and little else. I did this for three years until, at age 14, I was given the official “OK” by my mom to wear makeup to school.
I did learn a few things, though, during those secret squirrel makeup days, like how to appreciate makeup that’s easy to sneak in and out of the house. It’s one of the reasons I was interested in the eyeshadow sticks from Bobbi Brown’s new $38 Mini Long-Wear Cream Shadow Stick Trio.
Each of the little minis fits nicely in the palm of my paw.
Perfect for covert makeup application. 🙂
There’s a shimmery pastel rose called Pink Sparkle, a shimmery heather mauve called Smokey Topaz and a shimmery blackened charcoal that goes by the name, Espresso Bean.
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What’s that? A new highlighter? Yeah…sometimes when it comes to highlighters, I feel like I’ve seen and worn ’em all, from your subtle sheens to your full-blown glitter-fests, so when a new one comes along (you must whip it!) that successfully combines some of my favorite things about highlighters, I sit up, tie my hair into a high pony and get down to business.
Ms. Bobbi Brown, friend to women who like to wear makeup while still looking like themselves, recently revealed two of the snazziest highlighters I’ve seen in a while, her High Light Powders in Pink Glow and Bronze Glow ($45 each), which combine some of my favorite things about MAC’s Mineralize Skin Finishes and Chanel’s Highlighting Powders.
Almost creamy, like a MAC Mineralize Skin Finish powder (which makes them a breeze to blend), Bobbi’s High Light Powders do not, however, have the same glazed high-shine finish. Instead, they exude an ethereal, dreamy luster with a finespun finish that totally reminds me of Chanel.
Bobbi wanted to recreate the look of skin illuminated by a cozy fire (ahh…), with the same warm, buttery colors, and that’s what I see when I wear these highlighters.
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A couple weeks ago my friend Jen and I were chatting about makeup when one of us brought up Bobbi Brown.
Now, Jen’s a recent convert to the cult o’ Bobbi, so I asked her what she liked about the brand, and she said, “When I wear it, I still feel like I look like me, and not like I’m trying to be someone else,” which I totally get. I think it’s why Bobbi’s makeup strikes a chord with so many women, myself included.
I know that when I don’t want to fuss with five different colors blended into my crease, there’s always Bobbi Brown.
For her latest foray into holiday makeup, Bobbi created a double-decker palette designed to flatter all skin tones. The new limited edition Deluxe Lip & Eye Palette ($80) contains two tiers of makeup in lovely tortoiseshell attire, with one tier filled with neutral brown, gold, pink and beige shades for eyes, and another tier with pink, mauve and rose lipsticks for lips.
A lot can happen after dark…
Vampires can rise, cats can prowl and raccoons can subvert!
Sometimes, vivid, colorful stained glosses can thrill…
That’s right. Vivid, colorful stained glosses After Dark, which is the name of OCC’s new holiday set.
Strange name for such bright colors? Perhaps. But don’t let it stop you from rocking these glossy finishes during daylight hours, or for gifting the set to your favorite makeup-lovin’ vampire.
Yes, vampires, because with two moody, vampiric shades in the set (the sheer glossy black and the reddish orange), you know I had to go there. It was low-hanging fruit.
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Whenever I go shopping at Sephora, there’s a rule I steadfastly adhere to. I tell myself that I can only walk out of the store with what I’m able to carry in my two hands.
No baskets, ever, because the minute a basket gets up in the mix, my credit card starts throbbing with a white hot heat.
Buuuut, you know what they say: where there’s a will, there’s a way. 🙂
With products like the new Sephora Favorites Give Me More Lip Ultimate Lip Sampler Set ($59), I’m able to maximize my self-imposed system of budgetary beauty tyranny. #imjustsayin
The glorious new holiday kit includes 17 (!) sample-sized lip products from 14 makeup brands.
KA-BOOM!
That’s a ton of variety. What’s more, the pieces span a wide range of finishes, textures and coverage levels.
Sephora sorted the products by color family — nudes, berries, pinks and reds — which gives the kit a cohesiveness you don’t always find in limited edition sets.
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