Archive for the 'Beauty Tips & Advice UK' Category

Beauty Spy Secret # 1    Preparing itPrimer Primer Primer!Ever wondered why your eyeshadow seems to disappear quicker than an English summer?It’s all to do with the preparation.What the beauty experts say is that for perfect eye make up you need to use a good base all over your eyelid to keep your eye make-up in place all day.Try the silicone-packed Urban Decay Eyeshadow Primer Potion - any beauty maverick will tell you it’s the silicone that gives it such smooth and silky application.Beauty Spy Secret # 2  Faking itA picture speaks a thousand words.  Check out the pictures on the left! These are from Eye-Tec (more details in ‘Stockists’ at end.) They extend your lashes and instantly transform your eyes without surgery.They can take years off you and eliminate the need for mascara, so it is a fab way to have big fluttery-but-natural-looking eyelashes. AND they last 4 weeks.Great for a spring getaway or a summer holiday! Beauty Spy Secret # 3  Making It!With the right know-how and some fabulous colours, you can really stand out this season with eye-popping gorgeous looks you’ll love.If you are feeling daring, go for a bold colour like pink, blue or green. If you want to tone it down a bit, just turn up the volume on your everyday look with some spangly golds/bronze or metal colours and knock ‘em dead! Beauty Spy Secret # 4  Remove it!The one down side of make-up that doesn’t budge is getting it to - well, budge!There are two top eye make-up remover products that will save you a lot of soreness, redness, eye-rubbing and premature ageing!Check out Lancome’s Effacil for sensitive eyes and great lash conditioning, or the gel-based Urban Decay Clean & Sober which has lavender extracts to soothe your skin.

When you apply your cleanser or face cream, really massage it into the skin by treating  yourself to a two-minute massage at night and 60 seconds in the morning. Use upward strokes and small, gentle circles. Then gently pinch your skin, starting at your jawline and working up - an instant face lift and great overall tone-up for your skin!

Ever wondered how to really make your skin look beautifully flawless and healthy? How you can look fresh and dewy, even when you have been up early or had a few late nights? There is a very simple answer. The secret to Gorgeous glowing skin that all the stars and models know is – Hydration.

Follow these 7 easy steps:

• Use a milky cleanser instead of facewash to keep your skin supple. Avene and Caudalie skincare is fantastic
• Use an alcohol-free toner to remove any greasiness. Or just splash your face with cold water to close the pores
• Follow with a hydrating moisturiser for your skin type
• Exfoliate regularly to remove any dead skin cells and smooth complexion, try Sanctuary’s Radiant Skin Exfoliator, or Clinique’s pore miminizer thermal-active skin refiner
• If you have dry skin, use a moisturising foundation eg. Stila Illuminating Liquid Foundation or Becca Luminous Skin Colour Foundation. Or, use a tinted moisturize for a lighter finish eg. Bobbi Brown’s Extra Tinted Balm SPF25 is especially formulated for dry skin.
• If there is any shine, lightly powder your forehead, nose and chin. Never powder the cheeks, this way they’ll stay dewy. If, however, the skin looks dry, take a dab of rich face cream, warm it up by rubbing it between your palms and lightly pat it onto your skin.
• Top Tip: Drink lots of water!

Firsty, and most importantly, make sure you lips are well hydrated by using a quality lip mousturiser. There are some great products out there that truly help, Estee Lauder have a great anti-feathering lip primer.

Then apply a lipliner close to your natural lip colour or close to your chosen lipstick shade. This will give the lipstick a well-defined base to sit on. Recommended nude lipliners are MAC Spice lipliner, and Bodyshop Beech lipliner. Stila have some fantastic glossy lipliners that glide on easily. And Clinique have a great range of colours that ensure a smooth application and real staying power.

You know how annoying it is to see those immaculately stylish and groomed women who look as if they’ve just stepped out of the pages of a fashion magazine? How do they do it? Well, we’ve given it a lot of thought and have come with the 22 Top Tips on Haircare, Beauty and Styling to give you the edge and insider knowledge on how to look amazing every single day.

We’ll also subscribe you to our Newsletter which looks at the season’s trends and how to adapt them to YOU.

Simply sign up at the top of this page - then be prepared to be transformed!

Not always. Shimmery products can emphasise the lines on your face however, a little shimmer on your lips or eyes can look very youthful and flattering. The key is to use just a hint of shimmer and make sure you don’t overdo it. Today’s shimmery make-up is finely milled and therefore softer and more wearable. It should be applied to the smoothest areas of the face so that it doesn’t settle into lines, so avoid the eye area if you have wrinkles there.

You could try applying a touch of shimmer to your cheeks with a creamy or powder blush. Use rosy, bronze or fleshy colour pigments to make it look more realistic. Nars Cactus Flower cheek colour is very wearable.

When applied with a sparing hand, shimmering makeup should merely illuminate the face a little, making you look brighter and more rested.

Wedding make-up should be special, but it shouldn’t be over the top. On your wedding day you want to look like yourself, but also show the world your most radiant and beautiful face. This is not time to look trendy, you want to look timeless when you look at your weddding photos in few years. The make up you wear on your wedding day should be like your normal make up, but just taken up a notch, think rosy colours on cheeks and lips, and well defined eyes.

Successful wedding make-up has to last throughout the day, looking as fresh at the end as when you put it on. Therefore, set your foundation with powder, wear waterproof mascara, and fill in your lips with lip liner before applying lipstick.

Finally always have powder, blush and lipstick handy for touch ups so you look fresh and flawless on your day.

Lip balm is really just a barrier cream and all that a barrier does is repel. Therefore, if your lips are dry and cracked, and you then apply lip balm, all you’re doing is sealing in the dryness.

To banish dry lips, you need to gently exfoliate your lips with an old toothbrush, or use a fine and gentle facial exfoliator. Then apply a small amount of your day moisturizer, and then use your lip balm. So, in effect, you are sealing well moisturized lips for the balm to protect.

Sisley and Origins have fantastic moisturizing lip balms, and, if you’re feeling extravagant, Crème de la Mer lip balm is a joy to use. More value-for-money buys are from The Body Shop and Nivea. My personal favourite is Burt’s Bees lip balm, apply regularly and watch those parched puckers become smooth and luscious.

Oily skin usually goes hand-in-hand with enlarged pores and has a tendency to break-out. Adult acne affects many of us and can knock our confidence. Take heart though, and look on oily skin as a blessing as it tends to stay wrinkle-free for longer than other skin types.

Buy skincare specifically for oily and problem skin, use a gentle cleanser with a facial brush to get the skin deep-down clean (Eve Lom’s Cleanser is excellent at balancing out the skin and comes with its own muslin cloth). Follow up with a clay mask twice a week to remove excess oil and imputrities (try Liz Earle’s Deep Cleansing Mask).

Before applying foundation, apply a silicon-based primer to prepare your skin for makeup (eg. Estee Lauder Idealist Skin Refinisher). These primers are designed to increase your foundation’s long-wearing properties, and may also prevent your foundation from discolouring.
For oily skin, you need an oil-free foundation that works with your skin, gives you a nice matte finish, good coverage, is long-wearing and doesn’t clog your pores. Foundations that fit this bill are M.A.C Studio Fix Fluid SPF15, Vincent Longo Water Canvas Cream-to-Powder, Stila Pivotal Skin, Clinique Superfit Make-up, or Maybelline Dream Matte Mousse.

You can keep your face shine-free during the day by touching up with blotting powder (Bobbi Brown’s are wonderful).

There are literally hundreds of shades brown eye shadow, so where do we start? And why is it important? The right shade will will become like a best friend because it will look terrific with all your make-up and clothes.

Play around with different textures and finishes to see which one suits you best, be it powder, satin, cream, matt or shimmer.

Great brown eyeshadows to try are Madrague 11 by Nars; Terra, Wheat, Starlight and Twig by Stila; Stila’s shadow pot in Bronze; Laura Mercier’s eye basics in Peach or Chocolate; Wedge, Bamboo, Bark, Swiss Chocolate, Symmetry by MAC; and MAC Paint (for a colour-intensive, texture-rich look) in Sublime Nature, Deep shadow, Architecture.

Try to test them on your eyes whenever you can before buying.