Know Your True Colours.

The easiest way to make your eyes stand out is to use complementary shades of eye shadow that work best with your specific colour. It may come as a surprise, but you should not wear the exact same colour eye shadow as your eye colour, for example; bight blue eyes and a bright blue eyeshadow.

Here are some general guidelines:

For brown eyes, try pale greens or blues. This helps bring out the warm tones in your brown eyes and makes them appear richer. Use darker jewel tones, like dark plum, for a smoky and sultry look.

TRY THESE COLOUR COMBOS:

- Brown, beige, tan 


(make sure non of these brown colours are the same exact colour to your eyes)

- Gray, charcoal 


- Khaki, olive green, mocha 


- Bronze, gold 


- Violet, lavender, blue

For green eyes, use pink tones and reddish-berry shades for daytime wear and shimmering bronze and ruby shades for evening. The contrast of the reddish shades against the green of the eyes will make the colour of your eyes sparkle.

TRY THESE COLOUR COMBOS:

- Gold, bronze, copper 


- Brown, chocolate, mustard yellow 


- Peach, beige, champagne, taupe, apricot 


- Plum, mauve, purple, violet, pink

- 
Deep and mossy green shades 

(make sure non of theses green colours are the same exact colour to your eyes)

For blue eyes, try peach and orange shades for daytime wear and copper tones and burnt orange shades for evening shimmer. These complementary shades will make the blue of your eyes radiant.

TRY THESE COLOUR COMBOS:

- Pink, rose, violet, lavender 


- Gray, silver, copper 


- Dark blue, light blue, turquoise 

(make sure non of these blue colours are the same exact colour to your eyes)

- 
Charcoal, black, brown

TIP: Everyone's eye colour is different; a good idea is to shop where you can try out a few different shades of colours in the same families, allowing you to find the perfect match for you.

Accentuating Your Best Features.

The key to creating any amazing makeup look is to really focus on those features you really love. Whether that’s your lip, eyes or cheekbones, there are different ways to help you make these areas really stand out, allowing you to look and feel incredible. Therefore, I thought over the next couple of posts I would write about just how you can highlight these areas perfectly, giving little hints and tips that I have learnt myself, been showed, or read about.

Here are a few basic makeup tips...

Eyes; If you have great eyes, I’d say half the war has already been decided in your favour. However, you need to do your bit to draw attention to your lovely eyes. Begin by choosing a nice shade of eye shadow – one that compliments the colour of your eyes. Define your eyes by giving shape to your eyebrows and as a final touch use a mascara to give your eyelashes a sharper look.

Lips; Plump, pouty, inviting, Angelina-Jolie kinds of lips are oh-so-desirable! To keep them looking forever luscious invest in a lip balm with sunscreen. Keep your lips constantly moisturised. If you aren’t too much into lipstick, use gloss. For those that have no such inhibitions, there’s a virtually endless range of lip colours out there. Although you might think the bold, Las-Vegas showgirl lips are what turn guys on; I have it on authority those subtle shades of pinks and glossy peaches that are also considered very sexy.

Rosy Cheeks; Rosy cheeks aren’t just adorable in kids. Guys really like a well-defined jawbone, provided you’ve highlighted them with a blusher. For best results, don’t use the brushes that come with the blusher kits. Opt for the big brush instead. Now smile and rub the blusher onto the apples of your cheeks using upward strokes. Add a little shimmer over the blusher to go from beautiful to gorgeous – an unbeatable way to accentuate your best features.

Skin; If you’ve got lovely, soft, healthy, pink, clear and supple skin, you’re going to save a lot of money on all the cosmetics you would have had to buy. What most people are trying to achieve with makeup you have naturally. Which means you don’t have to worry about concealer or foundation - a freedom that very few us can claim to have. If you’ve got great skin, use makeup sparingly, probably for the eye if you have to, but let the beauty speak for itself.

And here are a few non makeup tips...

Hair; Women with lovely hair feel that leaving it open is the only way to show it off to its best advantage. While I won’t argue that it is one of the better ways, there are a variety of tricks you could use to highlight it. For instance, you could try experimenting with simple, yet interesting hairstyles and updos, tutorials for which are freely available on Youtube. If you’d like to keep it a little simple, you could also use hair accessories, clips, bands, beads, and scarves to draw attention to your crowning glory.

Legs; If you’ve got the kind of legs that would put a stilt-walker to shame, use it to your advantage. Guys go ga-ga over legs. Draw their eyes to yours by wearing a mini-skirt or a pair of shorts with sexy heels or mid-calf boots. For those on a slightly more conservative side, you could use skinny jeans and leggings. They are great ways to accentuate your best features.

Cleavage; Remember the episode where Phoebe describes Monica as having “breasts of a Greek goddess”? Well, if you have an amazing bust line and cleavage, you are already desirable to the opposite sex. And to pull them in like magnets, emphasize your cleavage with V-shaped necks. The more plunging they are the better, except you would want to stop where they make you look obscene. Use a good push up bra to perk up those assets and to make those boys go even wilder pick a silk or satin top.

False Lash Effect.

L'Oréal Paris -

Telescopic False Lash Effect Mascara

I think I have just found my Holy Grail mascara!!!

L’Oreal’s Telescopic False Lash Effect mascara is basically an improved version of their original Telescopic mascara, promising to make it look like you're wearing falsies by 'elongating lashes as if beyond their tips'.  Stretching every lash for an intense look, this sounded like the perfect mascara for me, as I prefer to have very bold, fluttery eyelashes!

This mascara comes packaged as a slim, mirrored silver tube that resembles a telescope: pretty cool, but a nightmare to photograph!  It comes in Magnetic Black or Hypnotic Brown and of course I went for the black version, due it begin in my opinion more dramatic. The wand is quite skinny and flexible with little bristles designed to catch every single lash.  I tend to prefer these types of wands, as I find really big oversized wands just end up putting more products on my eyelid then on my eyelashes.

This mascara is just amazing! It makes my eyelashes unbelivably long and luscious. I have had so many commenting on my eyelashes whilst wearing this, and some people have even asked what false lashes I’m using because they look so dramatic, but so natural at the same time. They were truly stunned when I explained I was only wearing L’Oreal mascara. Another bonus of this mascara is that it doesn’t smudge, nor is it a pain to wash off. It also doesn’t irritate my very sensitive eyes.

Overall, I love this mascara. In my opinion it gives any high-end mascara a good run for its money!!!

My New Perfect Foundation?

Vichy -

Dermablend Foundation

This product is definitely a ‘don’t judge a book by its cover product’ and I am so glad that they now sell it in Boots! The product itself looks quite bland, simple and doesn’t really even look like other Vichy products. I haven’t yet found a holy-grail foundation, some have come close, and I always find something that I just don’t quite like about them. I saw this in my local boots when picking up some La Roche-Posay skin care and I thought I would do a little research on it. Even though it isn’t as well known, the reviews online for it were seriously glowing, therefore I thought I would take the plunge and purchase it.

After researching it, I found out that it is a corrective foundation, designed to give total coverage. It’s designed to give up to 12 hours of long lasting and flawless wear whilst providing an even skin tone – which would explain why I found it made me look so flawless, it’s just doing its job! Another thing I found out, (exciting) is that it includes Vichy thermal spa water, which is renowned for its soothing and fortifying properties. This leaves your skin moisturised and comfortable all day. I can vouch for this. So basically, it's like a treatment foundation, which treats your problems.

Lets just say, I was very shocked when I applied this to my face…

I have breakouts once a month (that girl point of the month) specifically in my t-zone and even though I’m lucky enough to not have them every day, that week once a month where I do break out is always the worst week. My skin hurts, looks horrendous with and without make up and just nothing can fix it. I usually find that if I apply foundation over the top of spots, they make my skin look worse. They almost make your spots double in size and make them stand out more. I find concealer is the same; they cover redness, but seem to fail when covering spots.

When I put this on my face, I was shocked. This is hands down, the only thing that I have come across where 1. No concealer is required. 2. It doesn’t make my skin look worse. Vichy's Dermablend is actually like a miracle foundation, hence why I needed to give this a rave review. I don’t understand how it does it, but trust me, it does. I keep making the mistake of putting far too much on my fingers; because a load does tend to come out, so do be careful.

I tend to put a tiny bit on my chin (the problem area) and then because it is so thick I just blend that with my Real Techniques blending brush around the rest of the face, a tiny bit on the chin when blended, covering Some foundations are very thick, and cakey looking. This is surprisingly very natural looking when blended, it doesn’t look like a mask, or cakey and doesn’t give you those nasty lines down the side of your face as long as you blend well. With careful blending, this looks radiant, moisturizing and just great. the whole face. 

Overall, I like this foundation, it costs £15.50, which is quite expensive as the bottle isn’t that big, but, and you only need to use it sparingly. I love it and couldn’t recommend it more. 

DiorSkin.

Dior -

DiorSkin Nude BB Creme

I apologise if you are tired of hearing about BB Creams. Trust me, I am too, but this Dior Diorskin Nude BB Cream has been raved about by everyone in beauty, and I just couldn’t resist. However, it is definitely the best BB Cream that I have tried.

The Diorskin Nude BB Creams comes in 4 colours, which I think is fairly generous for a BB Cream, as I find that a lot only come in 1 or 2 colours. I got colour matched by consultant and she stated ’002 Fair’ suited me exactly. It is housed in a tube with a pump dispenser, which makes for easy and sanitary application.

The coverage of this base is light to medium, but I think it can be built up to a definite medium coverage. After seeing this product on countless blogs, it seems that most people prefer to apply this with their hands, which I agree is a really good way to apply it, especially in a morning. However, I also apply it with my Real Techniques Buffing Brush, as I find it gives me a more flawless finish, for when I have a bit more to cover. This product is definitely very creamy, but not so much that it overwhelms my slightly oily skin. It gives off a gorgeous glow (not shiny) that gives the face a healthy and youthful look. Another great attribute of this BB Cream is its weightless feel. You do not feel like you are wearing anything on your face, which is great for people who don’t like the feel of foundations.

As far as the advertised skincare benefits of this product, I didn’t really see any noticeable difference in the condition of my skin, but it definitely did moisturise my skin!

Although the Dior Diorskin Nude BB Cream gives a light-medium coverage, I still find that it perfects my complexion with only a hint of concealer needed. This, combined with the weightless feel, glowing finish, and fuss-free application makes this BB Cream a must-have for your makeup bag!

Overall, I honestly can’t think of a single bad thing about this BB Cream!