Your morning beauty regimen takes you exactly 12 minutes. First comes the face wash, then the astringent, followed by the moisturizer. And the list goes on. It’s become a chore, but wasn’t there a time when this routine was fun? Well, we decided to take you back to the days when applying makeup was a delight by giving you some innovative beauty tips and tricks to spice up your routine.
For this inside scoop, we reached out to Carmindy, resident makeup artist on TLC’s “What Not to Wear” and author of The 5 Minute Face. Here are her 10 beauty tips to keep you feeling fresh and fabulous.
Beauty tip #1 – Make the perfume last.
A few drops of perfume in the morning won’t get you through the day, no matter how expensive your bottle is. To make your scent last, try this beauty tip: Put on an unscented moisturizer first, then spritz on your perfume a few seconds later. “There’s so much alcohol in the perfume,” Carmindy explains, “that if you spray it on dry skin, it often evaporates so quickly. But if you have moisturizer on your skin, it adheres much better.”
Beauty Tip #2: Non-sticky lip gloss.
Instead of directly placing the tube of gloss on the lips, Carmindy recommends adding an extra step to ensure less stickiness. “I like to put lip gloss on my fingertips first and then just apply it to the flesh of my lips. And this way you’ll get a little bit of shine, but it won’t be too sticky.” Also, he tests with a moisturizing lipstick or lip stain first before adding the gloss to make sure the color stays put.
Beauty tip #3: a sweet scrub.
“The best exfoliant in the world is white table sugar.” If every scrub out there contains some form of sugar, like “Almond Sugar Scrub” or “Brown Sugar Scrub,” why not just use what’s in your kitchen cupboard? “What happens is that the little crystals dissipate in the water so they don’t scratch your skin.” And if you have sensitive skin, don’t worry. “It even works better because with other products you may not like a fragrance or many ingredients,” says Carmindy. When you are in the shower, all you have to do is lather your face as usual and then take a handful of sugar and rub it all over your face. And if you run out, you can ask your cute neighbor for some sugar!
Beauty Tip #4 Ditch your blemish concealer.
Instead of fumbling through your makeup bag for several concealers in the morning, just stick to one, advises Carmindy. The reason why? Because you can actually use the foundation attached to the top of your concealer lid as a spot treatment. “It oxidizes there, so it gets a little bit thicker.” Plus, she says, “it’s the same shade as your foundation, so it’ll instantly erase your blemish.” To apply, simply take a small-tipped concealer brush and dip it into your foundation cap, or the nozzle if you’re using a spray. Then brush it on the stains and you’re good to go. Now it will be a good thing when your foundation cap cakes.
Beauty tip #5 – Recycle: Good for the earth, good for your lips.
What are you supposed to do when your four best lipsticks are almost gone and your finger is tired of scraping the remains below? Carmindy suggests combining the half-used bars into your own lip palette. “Go to the drugstore and buy a plastic pill box and scoop out the remaining lipstick in the tubes. Then put each color in a different little section of the pill box.” You can mix and match the colors or even put Vaseline in one of the sections to make your own lip gloss.
Beauty tip #6 Lips the size of a celebrity.
To get fuller lips, people often line them with a pencil, but most of the time it looks noticeable and unsophisticated (especially when the lipstick comes off and you’re left with that horrible line). For an invisible enhancement, Carmindy recommends that you take a Q-tip and dip it into some shimmery white eyeshadow and lightly line the outside of your lips. “What will happen is the gloss will catch the light and make your lips look bigger.” You won’t be able to see it, but the slight glimmer will do the trick. Great if you don’t have collagen on hand.
Beauty Tip #7 – Tan but not dirty.
Applying bronzer all over your face can make you look like you’ve been rolling in the litter box all day or landed a part-time job as a chimney sweep. Carmindy prefers a spray bronzer to get the look of a cool summer tan. “I like to spray a sponge and then what I do is push it into the skin, at the temples and then right under the cheekbones because this is where the sun would kiss your face. And if you like powder bronzer, you can also apply in the same places”.
Beauty tip #8: Break through the brows.
If you’ve been awarded barely-visible brow DNA, you’ve probably tried everything to make them visible and realized that most of the time these products end up rubbing off at the end of the day. If you still want brows at 5 p.m., Carmindy recommends buying a waterproof liquid liner that matches your hair color, like black, brown, or taupe. She then says, “You can take an angled brush and apply the liquid liner to your brows and it will stay put all day. It looks more natural than a pencil and stays put longer.” It’s a win-win.
Now, if you’re like me and on the opposite end of the brow spectrum, you may need help getting your out-of-control brows under control. To do this, “take a spiral brush or old toothbrush, put some hair gel on there, and just run it over your brows so they don’t budge.”
Beauty tip #9: Not your typical smoky eye.
“What I like to do is take a color like a navy blue or kind of a bright burgundy purple and just line the inner edge and right along the upper and lower lash line and then blend it out with a Q-tip. That way In the same way, there’s no eyeshadow pushing back the eye, but you still have the smoky effect because they’re lined with color. If you have deep-set eyes, Carmindy advises you to avoid putting dark shadow on your lids because it will make them look even more “There are So many ways to do a smokey eye, but people always think there’s only one way to do it.”
Beauty Tip #10: Save Time and Eyeshadow
Running late in the morning? The best you can put on is a bright white shimmering powder. “If you highlight three key places that you establish from the planes of your face, you don’t even need eye shadow,” says Carmindy. These key points are located under the eyebrow, in the inner corner of the eye, and at the top of the cheekbone. “It brings brightness to the eyes, lifts the eyelid and draws attention to the upper part of the cheekbone.” Now all you need is a great cup of coffee to feel as awake as you look.
Who says your beauty routine has to be boring, especially now that you can take a box of sugar with you in the shower or turn a box of pills into a custom lip palette? With these beauty tips, you may have to rethink your 12-minute routine after all.
