Statement Eye and Statement Lip

Today's what's on my face post is worked around having a strong eye and a strong lip look and not coming out looking like a clown.

To avoid looking like a 5 year old gone ape in her mother's dressing room it's best to keep the eye colours not at the black end of the colour spectrum - here I've created a gold, green and brown look that is strong enough to make a statement without fighting the red lip for the most attention. I used a gold shadow from a Sephora palette I bought a few Christmases ago and placed that on the inner corner, any shimmery gold shade will work as it's just a tiny bit right on the inner corner, then swept the green shadow - Bella Pierre's Discoteque which is a green with gold chimer running through it, all over the lid and under the eye. I'm not a massive fan of mineral make up for the face but I enjoy using the powders on my eyes and they're a great go to for anyone with sensitive eyes like me who still wants colour choice and pigment pay off. I then used the Bella Pierre shadow in the shade Cocoa in the crease and swept it along under the join with the green/gold under the eye, all done using my Real Techniques Base Shadow Brush (set currently reduced on Feel Unique). So that my eyes didn't get lose amongst all the shadow I used my Mac eyeliner in the shade Mystery - a limited edition shade, but any forrest green eye liner would do, Mac's Tarnish looks similar judging by the website. To frame the eyes I used the Rimmel eyebrow pencil in the shade Hazel, and finished off with my Clinique High Impact Extreme Volume mascara.

Lip wise I used the Bourjois Rouge Edition Velvet in the shade Hot Pepper. If I'm honest I'm not totally sold on this one, I love the same product in the shade Peach Club but the formulas of both feel completely different and this one is a lot wetter. Although it's not showing up massively in the photos it's quite a glossy finish on this one and just not what I'd expect from something called 'velvet'. It does last a really long time though and once it's set it doesn't move about the face despite the glossy finish so it's a good one if a glossy look is your preference, I'm just very loyal to the old matte red lip look.

The skin was definitely the background of this look - I used my MAC studio sculpt foundation, it has a dewy finish and is great for anyone with dry skin or for when you've gone on a holiday that's involved a long plane journey, but I'm not sure I'll be repurchasing when it eventually runs out. Concealer wise I went drugstore with the 17 Phwoarr paint, it's really similar to my favourite Mac Studio Finish concealer or the Benefit Boi-ing, so definitely worth a look for those of you on a budget who like some seriously heavy duty coverage.

I used the Kevyn Aucoin sculpting powder to try and create a little bit of definition to my round face using my beloved MAC 168 brush and blush wise I opted for Mac's Coppertone, an orangey copper that defines the face but won't fight for attention with the eyes and lips. I dusted the tops of my cheekbones with the Bourjois Java Rice Powder using the Real Techniques setting brush and that was me done!

Classic Red Lips

I'm so sorry I haven't updated in absolutely ages but between my internship and the Edinburgh commute 5 days a week my days off have been spent pretty bare faced and this was one of the first days I actually bothered to put some make up on my face!

My favourite look has always been classic red lips; growing up I was obsessed with old hollywood movies and glamour and all I wanted was to be grown up like those beautiful ladies in the films of the 50s with their immaculate red lips - which probably explains my out of control collection of red lipsticks.

One of the most glamorous I own though is this Dolce & Gabbana lipstick in the shade Devil (£24.00), the colour is just the most beautiful classic red which would suit so many skin tones, but that gold packaging really cinches it. If I'm off to a party this is always the lipstick I reach for, purely because bringing it out to reapply in the ladies will always cause a murmur of appreciation amongst my fellow powder roomers and always means I end every party with at least one new female friend after this little wonder has started the conversation. For me a classic red lip like this means precision and I lined my lips with Illamasqua's lipliner in Strumpet (£15.00) - doesn't the name make you love it a little bit more? Unfortunately Strumpet was part of a Valentine's Day collection and is no longer available but any red will do - MAC's Redd (£12.50) is another of my favourites and a safe, classic red to work with any red lipstick.

To match the perfect lip you need a perfect complexion - Estee Lauder Doublewear foundation (£29.50) provides a flawless base, whilst Nars Radiant Creamy Concealer (£22.00) brightens and conceals under the eyes. The newest product I used here was Bare Minerals Radiance Powder* (£19.00) in the shade Clear Radiance. This definitely added a soft blur effect to my skin and made it look a lot more perky, so it's a product I'll be reaching for more often from now on!

On my cheeks I went for MAC blush in Stubborn (£20.00), a beautiful berry shade I just can't get enough of, and since I'm apparently a MAC addict I also used their Soft and Gentle highlighter (£23.00) on the tops of my cheekbones.

To balance the lips I went for a fairly neutral eye, filling in my eyebrows with my Anastasia Brow Whiz (£15.50) and then went in with my Cargo Vintage Escape Eyeshadow Palette (£35.00) - using a base of Cuddle all over the lid and on the inner corner, Frolic in the centre and Rustic on the outer V, as well as sweeping some under the eye. Lashes are my favourite YSL mascara (£24.50) in the shade Rich Brown, just to stop the look from being too done and a bit more night time.

Green Eyes

When I first started out wearing make up I made a little bit of a rookie error and went through a phase (I say phase, this probably lasted several years) of matching my eyeshadow to my outfit. Blue dress? Blue eyeshadow. Purple top? Purple eyeshadow. Yellow jumper? Yellow eyeshadow. So on and so forth. As I became more comfortable with make up this evolved from purely being one shadow smudges across the lid to multiple shadows blended out in elaborate smokey eyes - three different shades of turquoise, one across the lid, one in the crease, one under the eye. And, due to my OCD, if I was wearing an outfit with more than one colour then you can bet your bottom dollar I'd have all the colours of the outfit involved on my eyes somehow. I also wasn't a fan of blending the edges and liked a nice harsh racoon look in whatever colour matched the outfit going on. *Shudder*

Anyway, I one day realised this probably wasn't the best look and went really far in the other way, I began to only apply things that were taupe or brown to my eyes and it was probably the best part of a year before I even went as far as applying a black smokey eye again. What this means is that I'd built myself up quite the collection of coloured eyeshadows and when I ordered my blogger-requisite Muji storage last year I did the final purge and binned most of the ones that were still lingering. But not all.

I have always been told green shades have really suited me as my eyes have green in them which sometimes comes out to play (they can range from gold to amber to brown to green in the space of a few hours) and something made me hold on to a few of these green eyeshadows.

You can see my first attempt at picking these back up in last August's London video here. Now, in all fairness I don't think I had the camera at the best angle and I was filming with my back to the light so I think the video is making it all look a little bit worse than it actually is, but watching it back was enough to make me put the eyeshadows safely away again.

It wasn't until recently when I was looking at photos of Olivia Palermo's wedding that I noticed just how heavy Olivia's eye make up was in comparison to her usual (I like to spend a lot of my spare time looking at pictures of Ms Palermo, or Mrs Huebl!) - she has a really dark brown across her whole lid but the eye doesn't look OTT or dramatic.

It got me thinking - could I use this theory to apply a coloured eyeshadow without looking like a 4 year old had gone rampant with the colouring in pens across my face? I think the above result speaks for itself.

I actually really, really like it.

By restricting the colour just to the lids the colour itself becomes much less of a statement and less overpowering to the whole make up look, although this eyeshadow is bright green the overall look is a really pretty, everyday make up look that I'd be happy to wear to run into the library at uni or head to the shops in - no matter what colour I was wearing!

To achieve it I used an Estee Lauder duo which is no longer - washing the basic light shadow all over my eyes and over the inner corners, you just want any old Mac Brûlée-esque shade, just to create a base and to be honest you could probably skip the step altogether if you fancied. I then went in with the green from the duo, which is Ivy Envy and still available to buy as an individual shadow, and took that all over the lid on a Prestige eye shadow brush - which is again no longer available but any blending brush will do. (I'm really showing just how long I've been into make up for here, and just how long it takes me to use products up or admit that it's time to just bin them because they're clearly way past their use-by date!)

Using the same brush I then picked up some of the brighter green shade by Urban Decay, Krush, and blended some of that just in a line in the centre of my eye lid so it would catch the light when I closed my eyes without making it into a dramatic 12 tones smokey eye. I then lined with a really thin line of Stila's Smudge Stick Eyeliner in the shade Moray (the green one!) just to add a tiny bit of definition. I didn't want to stray into making anything about the look besides the colour itself dramatic though, so it was a very very thin line. My top tip for a thin line of eyeliner is to draw it almost along your eyelashes rather than your eyelid - if you press more of the weight of the product on your lashes it means you get the thinest line on the lid and once you apply mascara any colour that might be on your lashes disappears. in terms of mascara I opted for the Clinique High Impact Extreme Volume Mascara which is starting to dry up and will need replaced soon but is still performing to the last - very impressed with it! As for my eyebrows, I filled them in with the Rimmel Eye Pencil in 002 Hazel and brush through with a MAC 204.

I had powdered with my Make Up Forever HD Powder (nice powder to have if you're into filming things but totally not necessary if you're not doing stuff on camera as it doesn't work well with flash photography so you'd only really get the benefits of it in day-time photos, depends how flawless you want those holiday snaps to be!) before applying the make up so was able to brush most of the fall down off anyway, but my top concealer for topping up after powder is the Estee Lauder Disappearing Smoothing Creme Concealer. It's not my HG concealer but it is the best for blending in and topping up without every going cakey and it works really well for topping up on a night out after you've applied powder as it blends in so seamlessly.

So there you have it - how I applied a coloured eyeshadow and came out of it unscathed! Going to experiment with different colours and see how it comes out - I will master you blue eyeshadow, I will!

What's On My Face...

The make up in this post was all contrived around the lipstick - it's Topshop's Beguiled and I've had it for a while but, as with most wine and deep red shades, had put it away when the warmer months came along and had forgotten about it. I pulled it out by chance the other day and decided on the spot that I was wearing it that day and no one was going to stop me - whether it's still July or not.

With a statement deep lip you need a flawless complexion - this one just doesn't lend itself to tinted moisturiser unless you're Cindy Crawford I'm afraid (though if you are, by all means just stick with what you're doing) so I used my L'Oreal True Match in the shade C1 to get a base that was natural looking but had enough coverage to even me out and make my skin look a whole lot more airbrushed. I layered that over a base of Benefit's POREfessional, which I'm currently trying to use up. I do like it, and had repurchased it many times, but then the Clarins Instant Smooth came along and kicked POREfessional's ass. I'm afraid once this tube is done it's Clarins forevermore for me. Concealer wise it was MAC Studio Fix in NW15, one of my ultimate favourite concealers and not one I'm ever without in my stash.

For cheeks I used MAC Frankly Scarlett blush, which is just one of the prettiest blushers I've ever owned - it looks pretty terrifying in the pan but when applied lightly it gives the most gorgeous rosy flush, and it looks really natural too thanks to the red base - it's much more representative of how I look when I actually blush and (although it is July) it's my favourite winter blush as it always gives me that healthy 'just played a rousing game of hockey outside' look. For a highlight I opted for the highlighter half of Benefit's 10 (which they've discontinued. Boohoo!)

Eyes wise I used Harvest Moon, Cuddle, Cinnamon and a tiny bit of Frolic from the Cargo Vintage Escape Palette. Don't want to say too much here as I'll have a full post coming soon, but let's just say this is pure palette love. My Stila Smudge Stick in Lionfish provided a tiny bit of definition for my eyes and I then reached for the Bourjois Volume Max mascara. Eyebrows it was MAC's Lingering eyebrow pencil (my favourite colour I've eve found for my eyebrows) and I was done!

The Simple Life

So in a world of beauty blogging, where a smokey eye can use up to 10 various shades of grey and black eyeshadows (plus your inner corner highlight, obvs) and I can get overexcited and want to pile every product from my latest boots spree on my face in one go, it can sometimes be easy to forget the simple make up looks.

This is something I'd call French Sexy - it's understated, chic and laid back - and, above all, incredibly simple.

The base was really easy - Benefit's POREfessional (which I totally forgot to include in the bloomin' photo - #fail!) around my nose and cheeks to try an drake those pores seem invisible, for however fleeting a time they may be, plus L'Oreal True Match foundation in C1 Rose Ivory - a really thin layer applied with the Real Techniques buffing brush.

An issue I find, as a pale girl, with drugstore foundations is that the cooler, pink tone based ones can often emphasise the pink tones already present in my skin if I try to build them up or create more coverage but the neutral or warm toned ones, even in the palest shades, can seem slightly too dark. I do like the L'Oreal True Match in the shade N1 Ivory but I do find I need to spend some time properly buffing it in to avoid the mask look at the edges. As far as drugstore foundations go though, they're probably some of the best I've found for the pale kids and the finish and wear time are great too. I used my Nars Radiant Creamy Concealer in Chantilly around my eyes and then dusted everything in with my Soap & Glory Powder, using the Real Techniques Powder Brush.

Cheeks wise it's MAC Tenderling, which is the perfect shade to define the cheeks and add some life without depositing too much colour. I layered that over the highlighter side of Benefit's 10, which isn't available anymore but was basically a powder form of High Beam. For me, layering highlighter first then putting blush over the top means I never go OTT with the highlight or get the really glittery look. Both applied with a MAC 168.

On the eyes I went all over with Estee Lauder Hot Cinnamon, applied with a MAC 217 and taken just over the lid itself, not blended up or out and then lined with the Stila Smudge Stick Eyeliner in the shade Lionfish (the brown one!) on the top and outer bottom of the eyes - smudging a tiny bit with the MAC 239, though you could just use your fingers. Mascara wise it was Clinique High Impact Extreme Volume and my eyebrows were lightly filled in with the Rimmel Eyebrow Pencil in the shade 002 Hazel. (As you can see my eczema is playing up and my eyebrow lady can't thread them when it is so they're quite grown in and didn't need too much filling in as a result!)

As for the lips? Nuxe Reve de Miel lip balm finished it off looking natural and leaving lips perfectly soft.

Oh! And just before I go... I am spending tonight washing all the make up brushes I own, so don't get freaked out and think I'm leaving them like that!