Essence Beauty Beats Winter Collection

Hey guys! 

I'm so excited about this Essence Beauty Beats collection. Not going to lie, I have not tried a ton of Essence products... to be fair, I only have like one eye shadow (Party All Night, great metallic color!), a nail polish and a concealer. But I always swatch their products at the store and they seem pretty good for the price they are!

So the reason I'm excited? This particular collection is called Beauty Beats and yes, they were specially designed for Justin Bieber's tour. I might be a bit too old to fangirl, but I think he's awesome! I went to his concert once, he's such a great entertainer and sings well live too.  I was actually surprised! And have you guys heard his new stuff that he's releasing on iTunes every week? It's called #MusicMondays and I think even if you don't like his mainstream music, you would be surprised by the new stuff he's putting out. But enough about him, we're here for the make-up!

So this is what Essence has to say about this collection:

Beauties and Beliebers listen up! As an official make-up partner, essence will be presenting the trend edition “beauty beats – girls on tour with Justin Bieber” from October to November 2013 for Justin Bieber’s “Believe” tour this year! The products are as unique as the 19 year-old megastar himself and are sure to make the hearts of true fans beat faster. Live on stage, you’ll find cool and practical beauty pieces in grey, light blue, turquoise, purple and coral-pink – for the next concert or for an awesome everyday look! Already highlights of this trend edition: a blush with Justin lyrics and an innovative paper print manicure with images of the musician that can be applied on your nails. Get ready for Bieber fever with essence!


Eyeshadows:

One love! These cool eye shadows guarantee bright eyes with their metallic shimmer in grey, ice blue or purple and the embossed beauty beats lettering is a true must-have for real Bieber fans! 

001 - baby, baby, ohh!

02 - I'm backstage

03 - as long as you love me

2-in-1 Eyliner:

Believe it: the black eyeliner with one slim tip and one broad, slanted tip has an awesome long-lasting texture so you can create lots of fabulous eyeliner looks that Justin is sure to love!

01 - the biggest fan

Lipgloss:

Always a happy song on your lips! These lipglosses make your lips look lovely and irresistible in three trendy shades and are sure to last super long so they’re the perfect companions if you’re heading to a concert!

01 groupie at heart / 02 eenie meenie / 03 I'm backstage

Shimmer powder: 

Shimmer stage! This soft powder creates a subtle all-over glow that’s sure to put the spotlight on any girl with its fine shimmer pigments. Embossed with the term SWAG – one of Bieber’s favorite expressions – the shimmer powder is the ultimate make-up it-piece for the backstage party! 

01 swaaag!

Blush:

Biebs blush! The velvety, soft texture of this blush conjures-up a gorgeous rosé shade on the cheeks of all true Justin fans. The cool embossed lyrics add an extra special touch that turns this blush into a real collector’s item. 

01 groupie at heart

Nail polish: 

Dream and scream All Around The World! The four trendy nail polishes in purple, light blue, coral-pink and turquoise last ultra-long and offer great coverage for gorgeous nails with real star appeal! 

01 baby, baby, ohh / 02 I'm backstage / 03 as long as you love me / 04 groupie at heart

Some of the products have the same names even though they are not the same color... it's a little bit confusing! 

I'm super stoked about this reddish looking blush. Looks like an awesome color for the winter time! And I have nothing like that! And those eye shadows look great, especially knowing that Essence always makes great eye shadows! I'm not as excited about the lipglosses, but that's just me, I don't really like wearing lipgloss... Nail polishes look like nice winter colors as well. Essence knows what they're doing! I'll try out some of these products and let you know how they work. They are supposed to already be in stores now! You know you're a bit crazy about make up when you get so excited about about a new collection, haha!

Have you tried any of these products yet? What are they like? Let me know!

Stripped nails

Hi! Happy Monday!

Today as usual I was wandering around youtube and came across this easy and quick tutorial on how to do stripped nails. It looked pretty cool so I decided to try it out!

Apply a base coat to protect your nails and paint them a light color, I used light blue nail polish. You can wait until it is completely dry, but it's not necessary, if you don't wait you will get an interesting texture too. Then take a flosser brush similar to the one I have in the picture and paint a bit of darker color (I used darker blue) on the floss. Brush it on your nails multiple times creating stripes. Keep reapplying the darker color on the floss as much as needed. Then take another dark color, you can of course use any colors you want, I took grey color and apply on the same floss and stripe it some more across your nails. Take one brighter color, I used coral nail polish, apply it on the brush and again create as many stripes of that as you want. I applied three on each nail. Then seal your design with a top coat to protect it from chipping too soon! If you get any nail polish on your fingers around the nails (I got a lot!) just take a cotton swab soaked into nail polish remover and remove it!

It's actually very quick to do and I think it looks great!

Let me know what do you think and if you try to recreate, show me!

Galaxy manicure

Hello!

I'm so proud of myself for doing my manicure this way. It was my first time trying and I think it turned out pretty well. I know for some, it might look a little bit... interesting. To be honest, I'm not a big fan of nail art like little flowers etc. But I was trying to experiment and that's what I came up with!

This might look like a lot of work, but it's actually very easy.

Apply base coat (1) to protect your nails. Paint your nails dark purple color (2). With a pair of tweezers (4) take a tiny piece of a make-up sponge (3) and dip it into white (5) nail polish. Pat it on your nails. You can make each of the lines different. Dip the same make-up sponge piece into any yellow nail polish (6) and pat it onto the white nail polish design. Do not pat all over the white, let it peak quite a bit. Then take light rose nail polish (7) and dip in onto the white/yellow one, letting both colors be visible. Dip sponge into a pink (8) nail polish and dot a few times over the design we did. Then take light purple nail polish (9) and pat it on the edges of the white, so we blend it with the dark purple. Take any dotting tool or a toothpick and dip it into a white (5) nail polish. Quickly dot it over the dark purple nail polish so we make little stars. Then dot a few bigger "stars" on each of the nails, so it looks more realistic. Paint over your nails with a top coat to give more shine and protect the design. You're done and you have a beautiful galaxy design on your nails!

If you try this, show me the pictures, would love to see it!

Pin-up girl inspired make-up look

Hey!

Pin-up girls are widely known as glamour, fashion models or actresses. Then I think of a pin-up girl, Marilyn Monroe is the first name I think of.

Perfected skin, black eyeliner and red lips.

The look was inspired by the amazing MUA Lisa Eldridge.

I love wearing red lipstick, but it's definitely not my everyday lip color.  I also think, it attracts a ton of attention to your face, so it only makes sense that pin-up girls always had/has this perfect looking skin with no blemishes or dark spots!

with flash

no flash

Face:

1. To get as much coverage as possible, I used Revlon's Colorstay foundation 
2. To hide my under eye dark circles, I used a shade lighter concealer. This way we not only hide our darkness but also highlight the area. 2-in-1!
3. Hide any blemishes or dark spots with concealer that actually matches your foundation.
4. Apply powder to set your concealers and foundation if needed. My favorite at the moment that actually provides some coverage too is NYX's Stay Matte But Not Flat Powder Foundation.
5. Use some bronzer on the outer part of your face to warm up you skin. Do not over-do it, for this look you want to keep your face as bright looking as possible.
6. Use pink matte blush on the apples of your cheeks bringing it up to the temples. I used ELF's Studio Blush in Pink Passion.

Left: with flash | Right: no flash

Eyes:

1. Prime your eyelids, I like using Too Faced Shadow Insurance.
2. Define your brows. This is an important step. I used ELF Eyebrow Kit.
3. Take a tapered blending brush and apply a matte light brown eye shadow in your crease.
4. Using a matte cream colored eye shadow apply it on your inner corner and bring it out on your eyelid a little bit. Also use the same color under your brows to make them looks even more defined.
5. Use cream or gel black eyeliner and apply it on your upper lash line all the way from the inner part to the outer. Make it a little bit thicker at the outer part. You can also wing it out slightly.
6. Tight line your upper rim with a black waterproof pencil. I used Rimmel's Scandaleyes in Black. Also, to make your eyes look brighter, apply a white/nude pencil in your waterline.
7. Take a black eye pencil and apply it lightly on the outer part of your lower lash line.
8. Apply a few coats of black mascara, if needed, you can even use some false eyelashes.

This looks like a lot of steps, but it's actually very quick and easy to do!

Lips:

1. An important step - line your lips with a red lip liner, so your lipstick does not bleed out.
2. Apply a coat of red lipstick, I used Loreal's Colour Riche in True Red. Blot it slightly with a tissue - that will make the lipstick stay longer.
3. Apply a second coat of red lipstick. You can totally use the same you used before, but I wanted to try mixing the lipstick, so I applied Covergirl's lipstick in Flame (the famous Taylor Swift's lipstick color!)

 And that's it, you have this glamorous look! Inspired by the amazing pin-up girls!

Let me know what occasion you would wear this look for? Or maybe it's an everyday kind of look for you?

My Fall nail polish picks!

Hi! Happy Monday!

Today I'm showing you my fall nail polish picks! It's mainly about the colors, but I do enjoy the quality of each of the polishes too.

For fall, I tend to go a tiny bit darker with my nails, but sometimes I might just wear a bright coral color if I'm in that kind of mood :)

1. Wet N Wild Megalast in Private Viewing. It's more nude than it looks in the picture. A classic nude color. This is also the only color that took me two coats to get the color it is on the a display.
2. Wet N Wild Megalast in Through the Grapewine. It's one of the bright colors that still is great for fall.
3. Milani in Sail Away.  It's a pretty metallic dark blue color.
4. Boots No.7 Stay Perfect in Highland Mist. Shiny pinky nude color.
5. Rimmel 60 seconds in Grey Matter.
6. Orly nail polish. The color of it worn off, sorry! But it's a pretty dark grey color with a ton of shimmer.
7. Revlon Colorstay in Blue Slate. Nice greyish blue color.
8. Nicole by OPI Kardashian Kolor in Here We Come A-Karoling. Nice reflective dark purple.
9. Orly in Ruby Passion. Beautiful shimmery red that I love to wear any season!
10. Wet N Wild Megalast in On a Trip. Great liughter purple color.

All of these nail polishes are great quality and I do not see a difference between for example a Wet N Wild nail polish and Orly nail polish. Both stay equally well on the nails as long as you use a great top coat. Seche Vite top coat is a bit pricy, but amazing! My nail polish usually lasts about a week. It might even stay longer without chipping, but I have to re-do them because my nails grow pretty fast.

These are my picks for this Fall season, tell me what color you like wearing the most??

Tutorial: Job interview or work appropriate look!

Hi guys!

Sorry for being absent for over a week, but the past week was crazy busy for me and I had no time to sit down and blog. I still did some make-up looks over that time, so I had enough material to blog about but not enough time.

That said, today's look is job interview or work appropriate look, that a lot of us can wear on daily basis too. It's perfected face with minimal eyes shadow and nude coral lip.

with flash

no flash

1. Prime your face, I used Benefit's POREfessional to minimize the appearance of my pores
2. Apply your foundation, I wanted medium to full coverage so I used Revlon's Colorstay
3. Apply concealer where needed, I applied Essence Match to Cover concealer's darker side on my blemishes and lighter side under my eyes for some brightness there.
4.  Set your concealer and foundation with powder, I used Revlon's Colorstay
5. Use bronzer to warm up your face, apply it on the outer part of your face, I used Too Faced's Chocolate Solei
6. Use some blush to bring the color back into your face, I used shimmery Milani's blush in Luminoso
7. Prime your eyelids, I primed mine with Milani's Eyeshadow Primer
8. While waiting for the primer to set, define your brows with a pencil or powder, whichever you prefer. This is an important step that will give more definition to your face since we are not going to use a lot of eye shadow. I used ELF Brow Kit in Medium. 

9. Apply a matte light cream/white color (1) over your lid and and on the inner tear dot. Then, take a fluffy blending brush and apply matte light brown color (2) to the socket of your eye, to give your eyes a little bit of depth. Apply cream (1) color on your brow bone and dark matte brown in between your upper and lover lash line instead of an eyeliner - this will define your eyes but still look a lot more natural than a liner. For all these steps I used Physician Formula Matte Collection eye shadow palette in Canyon Classics.

10. Apply a few coats of mascara on your upper and lower lashes, I used Maybelline's Big Eyes mascara for natural looking lashes.

11. For the lips, I used an ELF Matte Lip Color in Coral and to enhance the color and give a little bit of shine I also applied some NYX Butter Gloss in Maple Blondie.

And you're done!

For the hair, I blow dried it to give it more volume, then just brushed it out, took it to one half of my face and tied it up into a side ponytale! Super simple but still pretty!

Products I used

Hope you like the look! Let me know what you think and does your work let you wear more colorful and bright make up? 

FOTD + Tutorial: Smokey Green Eye

Hi!

Today I wanted to go with something smokey, but not too dramatic, meaning it's still wearable. And it goes with the fall theme I have going on at the moment.

with flash

no flash

I was trying to focus the whole look about the eyes, so I will not write much about the face make up. It's just everyday face make up look that you can find in any of my previous posts.

Left: Wet n Wild palette in Nude Awakening|Right: Wet n Wild palette in Comfort Zone

Left: with flash | Right: no flash

Left: with flash | Right: no flash, it's a little bit out of focus, sorry!

EYES:
1. Prime your eyes, I used Milani Eyeshadow Primer
2. To get the straight harsh line on the outer corner, use some tape
3. Apply shimmery green eye shadow (1) all over the lid
4. Apply dark brown (2) color on the outer corner, cut in the crease, blend it well bringing it inwards
5. Apply matter brown (3) color in the crease and blend the dark brown shadow with it
6. Apply black liner on the outer part of the lash line and green liner on the inner part, I used Catrice's gel liner in Black and Wet n Wild  Coloricon pencil in Green
7. Remove the tape, now you have a clean line, to make it look softer I applied the green eye shadow (1) along the line
8. Use the same dark brown (2) on the outer part of the lower lash line, and the green shadow (1) on the inner part of the lower lash line connecting it to the dark brown (2)
9. Apply black mascara on your lashes and I also applied a little bit of a green colored mascara on the upper lashes, I used Maybelline's The Rocket and Great Lash in Green with Envy
10. Apply matte cream color (4) on your brow bone to highlight the area

and you're done!

For the lip color I used Wet n Wild lipstickj in Bare it All and Revlon colorburst nude lipgloss.

Eye products I used to create this look

I think this is a great look for going out somewhere at night time or if you love makeup, it can definitely rock this eye look at daytime too! I would :)

Tell me your thoughts, please!

FOTD: quick and easy everyday look

This was a super quick and easy make-up look I did this morning.

Products I used:

1. Almay CC cream in Medium all over my face
2. Maybelline Eraser Dark Circles concealer in Brightener under the eyes
3. NYX Stay Matte But Not Flat powder in Natural to set the CC cream and concealer
4. ELF Studio blush in Mellow Mauve on the top of my cheeks
5. ELF brow kit in Medium to fill in my brows
6. Milani eye shadow primer all over the lid
7. Physicians Formula Matte Collection Quad in Canyon Classics light brown in the crease, cream color to highlight my browbone and all over the lid and dark taupe color on the outer part of the lid to deepen up the look
8. Catrice black eyeliner a thick line winging it out a little bit 
9. Maybelline The Falsies mascara
10. Essence lipstick in In the Nude

and that's it! 

Have a nice Saturday evening everyone!

Friday nails

Hi!!

Hard to believe it's been a week since my last Friday nails blog post! I'm trying to keep this weekly. Let me know if you like that!

Today I felt like trying something new so I went with this nude color all over my nails and then painted the tips of the three nails this mint green color. A step-up of the classic french manicure.

I never use french manicure stickers to paint my tips, because I just don't like the harsh line they make. And I think it's an additional step so why waste my time if I can make a pretty normal tip without the stickers. 

Both of the nail polishes I used were from Wet n Wild Megalast line which I really enjoy. The nude color is called "Private Viewing" and the mint one is "I Need a Refresh-Mint". Those nail polishes don't chip for quite a while and you only need one coat to get the color to show up.

What color are you wearing on your nails tonight?

Review: St. Ives Apricot Scrub

Hey!

I know there are a lot of mixed reviews on St. Ives Apricot Scrub, but I thought I'd give you my opinion on it.

Facts:
Oil-free
Sulfate free
Paraben free
100% Natural Exfoliants
Hypoallergenic
Non-comedogenic

Retails for around $4.

Claims:
From America's #1 scrub brand, this award-winning Apricot Scrub with 100% natural exfoliants deep cleans, instantly leaving skin smooth and glowing.


I've been using this for almost 10 months so only by that you can tell that I enjoy it. I know there's a version of it with 2% of salicylic acid in it, and I tried that one too, liked it also, but now I'm just using other products that consists the medication, so I don't want to use too many products with it in it, that way it does not dry out my skin.

As the company suggests, I use it every three to four days to remove any dead skin cells from my skin. I think it does its job well and leaves my skin soft and extra clean. Did not notice any exact "glow" after using it, but it still feels nice. A lot of people say that the apricot scrub is too harsh on their skin, but I have not noticed it and I have a very sensitive skin. It did not dry my skin, did not make it more sensitive or red.

At the moment, I am very pleased with my skincare routine for my acne-prone sensitive skin. I might have a blog post coming on everything that I do to keep my skin clean and try lighten the scarring and dark spots that I have.

LIKES:

• Gets rid of dead skin cells
• Gentle enough
• Does not break me out
• Paraben-free
• Nice smell
• Very affordable

DISLIKES:

• Only available overseas

My last thoughts... 

I really like it! A great addition to my skincare routine. Works well!

Do you use a scrub for your face? What kind of? Let me know!

Tutorial: Lily Collins make-up look

Hi!

Lily Collins is one of my favorites actresses and I thought she looked stunning on the Mortal Instruments Red Carpet back in August. She went with bright red cherry lipstick and iridescent eye shadow. It's a great fall time look too so I decided to re-create the look, so here we go:

Face: I don't have the perfect porcelain skin like she does, I went with my normal face products. I use Rimmel BB Cream which I really enjoy, it has the most coverage out of all BB/CC creams that I tried so far (and I tried like 5). I used my Almay concealer on the spots I have and Loreal True Match Crayon and Maybelline Age Rewind Dark Circle Eraser concealers under my eyes. I set everything with Revlon Colorstay powder. Lily didn't have any bronzer so I did not use any. She looked like she did not have any blush too, but I felt like I needed some so I just used a natural satiny finish rose blush on the sides of me cheeks, but not the apples, almost like a contour.

Eyes: Start off by priming your eyelids with any eye shadow primer, I used Too Faced Shadow Insurance. Then Lily is well known for her bold, thick eyebrows, so I tried to make mine as thick as possible with my ELF Eyebrow Kit. You can even take your concealer and apply it under your eyebrows to make the eyebrows stand out even more - that's what I did. Then take a shimmery iridescent cream color eyes shadow, I used Loreal Infallible eye shadow in Iced Latte, and apply it all over your lid. Take a matte taupe color, I used Lavish (1) in my MUA Undress Me Too eyshadow palette, and apply it on the outer V bringing it all the way into your crease. Blend it out well, but keep the V shape visible. Then take the same shimmery eyeshadow and apply it lightly over the taupe color and on the inner lower lash line. Then take any shimmery gray color, Exposed (2) in MUA palette, and apply it on your outer lover lash line bringing it up to the V we made with the taupe color. That will smoke out a look a little bit. Lily definitely did not have any eyeliner on her lower lash line but some color were was still visible.  Then take any matte cream color (Naked (3) in MUA) and apply it on your brow bone to highlight the area. Take black eyeliner, I used Rimmel Scandaleyes in Black, and apply it between your upper lashes bringing it up to the V a little, but not all the way. Lily definitely had her eyes defined but no strong lines! Apply a few coats of your favorite mascara, this time I used Maybelline The Falsies and you're done with the eye make-up!

Lips: I feel like the lips was the main factor in her make-up. She had this great dark cherry color on, that I had trouble finding in my collection. But I got pretty close! So use the darkest cherry lip liner you have and line your lips with it. I used Wet n Wild Coloricon lip liner in Brandy Wine. Then take the lipstick, the darker the better, I used Loreal Color Riche in 701, and apply it evenly. To make the look even more vampire-like, you can use a bright red lipstick on you inner part of the lower lip!

all the products I used

Hope you guys like the look! This was my first time trying to re-create celebrity's look and I had so much fun! Tell me what you think? Have a great day!

Lilly Collins photos: Getty Images