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Makeup Contouring vs Strobing

January 23, 2018

Whether you’re looking for sculpted over dewy, subtlety or drama, beautypress has the ‘what’s what’ about the contour-strobing debate!

Contour

What is it?
Contouring combines a mix of darker skin tone shades to chisel your features and lighter shades for highlighting – it’s all about making those cheekbones pop!

The Look you’re after
Sculpted, matte and a whole lotta drama.

Master it.
Don’t make the mistake of using bronzer – there’s too much shimmer in there. It’s all about creating an envious illusion of peaks and valleys on your face…yes really. For this reason, a contour matte must be used in a color slightly darker than your natural skin tone. Top application hack: use a small fluffy eye shadow brush for a really precise contour. Use a darker shade of contour matte along the side of your temples, under your cheekbones and jawline. Dab a foundation brush or a damp egg sponge over the contour masterpiece to make sure there are no obvious lines. Less is really more!

Strobing

What is it?
Contour’s way simpler and less dramatic sister.

The Look you’re After
Fresh, dewy, subtle.

Master it.
For a soft, radiant glow, this look uses only light to enhance your face – so forget the bronzers and dark powders here. Head straight for that highlighter stick! Switch your normal primer for a glow primer, or simpy mix a bit of luminizer with your foundation to gear up for a top glow. Avoid using anything matte in this routine as it’ll dull down your results. Next, use a highlighter to enhance where the light would naturally hit your face, which, for most of us is your cheekbones, the bridge of your nose and across your temples. Don’t apply highlighter to your forehead if you’re scared of looking oily. For light skin, apply a champagne highlighter and for medium to dark – prepare to shine in more golden hues.

Lesson of the day:

Contour works best on mixed to oily skin – or for those who want banging cheekbones. Strobing works for those who want a fresher, more subtle glow – less product, less fuss.

Source: beautypress.com

3 Splurge-Worthy Beauty Products to Recommend

December 15, 2017

What is the latest and greatest in beauty? As an esthetician you probably get this question a lot — from friends, family and clients. What do you tell them? The beauty industry is constantly introducing new products, from luxury lashes to designer brushes, here are three splurge-worthy products totally worth recommending to everyone in your little black book.

Silk Lash Extensions

When you are in a rush, your morning makeup routine might entail grabbing your favorite mascara off of the vanity and applying in the car. Mascara is often a must for women, no matter the a.m. beauty routine. Now, women can take their lashes to the next level with silk lash extensions. Soft and silky, these beauties can create a bold yet natural look that can be worn all day, without messy application. Extensions are created to look like real lashes and are applied professionally with three different lengths to give the appearance of a real eyelashes’ natural growth cycle. And while we may have a serious love affair with mascara, we can tuck our trusted wands and tubes into our makeup pouches. They require no additional makeup application to look fabulous.

Luxury Sunscreen

Sunscreen should be an essential part of every woman’s daily beauty routine. No, not the white goopy varieties we slather on when we are at the beach, a sophisticated sunscreen. Today’s sun-protecting products often do more than just protect our skin against the sun’s harmful and damaging ultra-violet rays. In addition to protecting from sun damage, luxe products like Cle de Peau Beaute’s gel oil foundation tout further beauty benefits like moisturizing and blurring capabilities. With just five dabs of the foundation, applied to areas including the chin, forehead and cheeks, women can achieve medium coverage with a soft focus finish. Housed in an eye-catching chiseled glass container and infused with natural rose essence, this foundation provides SPF 21 and is available in 12 different skin tone shades. Cle de Peau Beaute Foundation is available for $250 and would no-doubt make a fabulous addition to your own retail area.

Designer Brushes

As an esthetician you already know the importance of cleaning your beauty brushes regularly. But do your clients? Bacteria could be lurking in those dirty makeup brushes. Regularly cleaning brushes is highly advised to keep skin looking its best and there are a variety of luxury brush cleaning products available today, ranging from designers like Dior to beauty brands like Trish McEvoy, MAC and Clinique. The right type of brush can also keep skin at its best. Forget bristly brushes, soft, smooth types are key. Designer brush sets provide an array of brushes for each area of the face and the beauty products used, so there’s no double-duty required. Check out Marc Jacobs brushes —a must for the stylish woman.

Now, when you are faced with the question “What’s the latest and greatest in beauty?” you can answer confidently with three answers: silk lashes, luxe sunscreen and designer brushes. So, which will you recommend first?

Review: EVER Skin Smooth Stick Lip Tint

December 6, 2017

As you may know, I’m a lipstick junkie! SO when EVER Skin released a new product, EVER Skin Smooth Stick Lip Tint I had to give it a try. EVER Skin is known for conscious beauty, using good for you ingredients that benefit your skin. And their new lip tint is no different. Here’s whats keeping your lips moisturized: Sunflower Seed Oil, Castor Seed Oil, Shea Butter, Jojoba Seed Oil

There are two lip tint colors: Soft Pink and Berry. Check out the swatches below.

“This holiday season, pucker up and get mistletoe-ready. Smooth Stick Lip Tint smoothes, softens and hydrates lips in party-perfect colors that let the rest of your makeup shine. The multi-benefit treatment formula delivers a healthy burst of nourishment through shea butter and natural oils for extra kissable lips.

Achieve youthfully smooth, soft and hydrated lips with a natural tint. This multi-benefit treatment formula delivers the ultimate nourishment through shea butter and natural oils for more youthful-looking lips. SMOOTH STICK Lip Tint was inspired by the hydrating butteriness of SMOOTH All Over Beauty Balm.”

Now as I mentioned EVER Skin is good for you beauty so these are double duty products, here’s the tea:

DEFINE: Active peptides are clinically proven to visibly reduce the appearance of fine lines and wrinkles.

SMOOTH & SOFTEN: Luxurious natural oils (coconut, argan, camellia) and Shea Butter moisturize lips.

PLUMP & DEFINE: Hyaluronic acid promotes the look of fullness.

EVER Skin SMOOTH STICK Lip Tint in Berry

This limited edition lip tint is $24 or 2 for $39. Shop them here.

Caring for Your Makeup Brushes in 4 Easy Steps

September 19, 2017

Makeup brushes are an absolute essential if you want to master the art of contouring, coloring, concealing. Even top-of-the-line makeup products won’t give you your desired results if you don’t have a set of good makeup brushes. That being said, taking care of your makeup brushes should always be a top priority or you’ll just end up buying more replacement brushes than you should.

Fortunately, taking care of your makeup brushes is not a difficult task. As long as you know how to do it properly, your brushes will be able to last longer before you have to replace them. Here are a few tips on how to take good care of your makeup brushes.

1. Don’t Get Them Caked Over

Over time, residue from various makeup products will accumulate in the bristles of your brushes. If you don’t pay enough attention to it, these residue can get mixed with oil or moisture and eventually turn into gunk. The buildup will have a bad effect on how well your brush can apply your makeup. To make things even worse, the gunk can even become a breeding ground for bacteria that can cause acne and other skin irritations.

Fortunately, keeping your brushes clean only requires a bit of consistency and effort. For example, you can use Missha Brush Cleaner to clean the bristles in your brush before applying makeup. This is good enough for regular cleaning, but you also want to thoroughly wash your brushes every once in a while.

2. Avoid Soaking

Some people might be tempted to soak their brushes to get rid of stubborn buildup. However, keeping your brushes submerged for a long time can actually do more harm than good, especially if you’re using brushes with wooden handles. Water can seep in this material and cause it to rot or even cause mold to grow on it.

Instead of soaking your brushes, clean them using running water. You may also use a bit of soap to get rid of oil-based residue, but be careful not to use harsh cleaners as they can damage bristle fibers. Also, be careful to keep the bristles pointed away from the source of water.

3. Don’t Wring Them Out

You don’t want your brushes to stay wet for too long. However, you might get tempted to speed up the drying process by wringing them or pinching them with your fingers. While reshaping the brush heads with a few gentle strokes is fine, wringing out the brush can cause you to accidentally pull off the brush bristles and damage them.

There’s no other way around it: if you’re going to dry your brushes, you need to have them air-dried. After washing them by hand, set them on a dry towel or tissue paper. If you can, prop them up with the bristles pointed down so they can shed water faster. Make sure they are completely dry before storing, or they risk becoming a hotbed of molds.

4. Keep Them to Yourself

Because of how much they come in contact with your skin, makeup brushes can be considered very personal items. There’s really no reason why you should let anybody else use them. In fact, letting others use them is a good way of getting them contaminated because you don’t know if the other person is using your brushes on products that you may be allergic to. Also, the borrower might apply too much pressure when using the brushes, causing the bristles to get frayed or damaged.

If it can’t be helped and if you really have to lend your brushes, at least make sure that they are thoroughly cleaned before you use them again. The last thing you want is an outbreak of pimples because your brushes were loaded with stuff that can irritate your skin.

Even a cheap, well-maintained brush will work better than a neglected high-end one — and it will also last a lot longer. Just like how a good artist takes care of their tools, you should always take good care of your brushes, since applying makeup is also a form of art.

How Beauty Product Claims Come to Be

September 17, 2017

Eight out of 10 customers recommend! Ninety percent of users saw results instantly! Effective for 80% of participants!

We’ve all seen the claims that come stamped on the side of beauty product packaging and emblazoned in glossy magazine ads. They lend credibility to the product and entice us to make a purchase. But where do those claims come from?

The origin of the claim is just as important as the claim itself. The same holds true with statistics. Data can be read a number of ways and the entity behind the data could have a vested interest or lack real credentials, making their claims suspect.

Some things are easy to gauge on your own, like finding makeup that compliments your skin tone. But for the times when the benefit isn’t so obvious or isn’t a sure thing, it helps to know where the marketing hype comes from.

Third Party Product Testers

Leading market researchers like The Benchmarking Company help determine the effectiveness of products and customer satisfaction. Product testing can be conducted within controlled parameters to assess the efficacy and account for variables. Those findings are what become the beauty product claims.

When you see claims that note what percentage of users saw a certain result after using a beauty product, it likely came from a third party product testing company. The company creates standards and benchmarks that are used to accurately measure results compared to a baseline. The results from each participant are compiled together to reach the overall percentage.

In addition to the visible results, duration or length of time may also make its way into the claim. The results from third party testing can be phrased in different ways to highlight benefits, but in general, these types of claims tend to be the most reliable.

Expert Beauty Resources

Sometimes beauty publications or professionals will take a closer look at products to determine which ones are worth buying. Often they test out the product themselves and then rate the product or give it a seal of approval.

One common example of this is the Allure Best of Beauty Awards. Allure is a women’s magazine that focuses heavily on beauty products, makeup techniques, and the latest looks. Every year they award Best of Beauty designations to products in 16 categories largely based on their editor reviews. Many companies prominently display the Best of Beauty badge on their packaging to back up their efficacy claims.

User Evaluations

When you see a claim that includes a phrase like “4 out of 5 women surveyed,” that’s an example of user evaluation or self-assessment. This information can be collected in a number of ways.

Third Party Facilitator – A third party can conduct self-assessment surveys and polls for a company, which helps add legitimacy to the findings. The facilitator will recruit users, have them use the product for a specified period and then ask the users a serious of questions.

Company Surveys – Other times the product manufacturers will conduct the user surveys themselves. However, these aren’t as reliable since the company has a vested interest in getting positive results.

Beauty Sites and Resources – Allure also uses reader reviews to give out their seal of approval. In February, online surveys are sent out to subscribers who vote for their favorite products. For 2017, 49 beauty products were given the Readers’ Choice award. Beauty stores like Ulta and Sephora also collect thousands of user reviews that find their way into marketing claims.

The makeup industry is a significant segment of the global economy. The latest projections estimate that the industry will jump from $460 billion in sales in 2014 to $675 billion by 2020.

The increase is in large part due to the rapid increase in products being brought to market. Not all of those products are worth the money that’s spent. Pay careful attention to the claims that are made and who they come from to determine if a product is worth the investment.