General
The Best False Lashes for Halloween
10 Fantasy Lashes to Spice up Your Halloween Costume
Halloween is the best time to get crazy with your makeup and try some things you wouldn’t normally dream about doing! I love extreme false eyelashes but lets face it, if you wore these out any other day, you would look kind of crazy! Luckily, it’s that time of year and hopefully these lashes will inspire you to take your Halloween makeup to a whole ‘nother level.
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1. Dramatic Swoop Lashes
These swooped lashes can add drama to many a costume this month. Add a little extra flair with a small swoop, or go for the gold with these MUFE lashes.
Costume Ideas: Morticia (The Adams Family), Cat Woman, Betty Boop
2. Feathered Lashes
Feather lashes can be a really fun addition to your costume. These are definitely costume lashes so Halloween is the perfect time to pull out the feathers. Go for the black, or even try some colored ones!
Costume Ideas: Snow White, Pin-Up Girl, Flapper, Bat-Woman
3. Rhinestone Lashes
Eyelashes with rhinestones incorporated can look so glamorous! It adds a little extra sparkle and definitely brings the attention to your eyes.
Costume Ideas: Fairy, Prom Queen, Doll, Barbie
4. Glow in the Dark Lashes
Glow in the dark lashes are perfect for kids and teenagers on Halloween! Even if you don’t have a costume, and you’re taking your kids out trick-or-treating, what could be more fun and flashy than glow in the dark eyes! These lashes can also add a creepy feel to the scary costumes as well!
Costume Ideas: Skeleton, Raver, Zombie
4. Extended Lashes
Eyelashes that extend out dramatically past the eye add those extra showy details that many Halloween costumes need.
Costume Ideas: Flapper, Showgirl, Peacock
5. Rainbow Lashes!
Rainbow lashes are just fun! The bright colors are so playful and these are another pair that would be great for children and teenagers. The second picture are actually for the bottom lashes!
Costume Ideas: Clown, Care Bear, Rainbow Bright, Flower Child
6. Spider Lashes
These spider lashes are very elegant, yet powerful. The separated hairs give a sharpness that could be a great fit for any “evil” character that you still want to keep pretty. I love the added sparkles within these MUFE lashes.
Costume Ideas: Elvira, Witch, Vampire, Spider
7. Couture Winged Lashes
If you can afford the splurge, these intricate “scales” would be the perfect detail to make your costume extra unique.
Costume Ideas: Joker, Mime, Medusa
8. Long Feathery Lashes
I know that I already spoke about feathered lashes, but these long, wispy ones deserve their own mention! I love the airiness of these ones. These would be perfect for animal costumes because they look like fur!
Costume Ideas: Lioness, Fairy, Sexy Leopard.
9. Colored Lashes
Wearing colored eyelashes can add to just about any costume. Luckily, they make just about any colored lash under the rainbow, including rainbow itself! If you have a costume that wouldn’t work with any of the other lashes we’ve seen, simple colored lashes can add that fun, costume-y twist.
Costume Ideas: Strawberry Shortcake, Queen of Hearts, Moulin Rouge, Fanta Girls
10. Intricate Lashes
Splurge Alert!! These lashes are $75.
Look how gorgeous these eyelashes are! Shu Umeura really does make the best falsies ever! They are so intricate and delicate, and these soft white lashes with the embedded rhinestones are heavenly!
Costume Ideas: Snow Princess, Angel, Pixie, Ice Queen
All Eyelashes Pictured are From MUFE, Shu Umeura or www.eEylash.com
Beauty Icon- Brigitte Bardot
How to Get Brigitte Bardot’s Iconic Look
Brigitte Bardot celebrated her 75th birthday two days ago! It’s hard to believe that this beauty icon is already 75, yet we still use her famous makeup and hair as a popular references for today’s styles!
Brigitte’s look is the embodiment of “sex kitten,” with her teased, voluminous hair and smokey bedroom eyes. Re-creating this look is actually quite easy and when you wear it out, I guarantee you’ll make some heads turn! 
Key Items You Will Need
1. Black Eyeliner (preferably liquid or gel)
2. Grey or Black Eyeshadow
3. A Volumizing Mascara
4. Apricot or Nude Lipstick and Lipliner
5. Teasing Brush or Comb
6. Bobby Pins
7. Curling Iron
8. Hairspray
How To: Makeup
1. Start by taking your grey or black eyeshadow and sweeping it across your eyelid and up to your crease. Brigitte Bardot was all about the smokey eye, so the darker the better. However, keeping it lighter can also be a more casual option.
2. Next, BLEND! Blend like you’ve never blended before! Dark eyeshadow can look very harsh and amateur if you don’t blend it well enough. My recommendation would be to take a fluffy eyeshadow brush and use a “windshield wiper motion” across the shadow as many times as it takes to see the edges start to soften up.
3. Now it’s time for liner! This can be one of the toughest parts of the look if you are not comfortable putting on liner, but with practice comes perfection! Line your upper lash-line with your liner and bring it out a little past your eye to give it that cat-eye, winged look. Clean up any rough edges, and sharpen your point with a pointy Q-Tip (talked about here). Don’t forget to line your bottom lash line as well. Smudge with with a Q-tip to keep it sexy.
4. Apply 3-4 coats of volumizing mascara to top off the eyes. I, of course, am a huge fan of L’Oreal Voluminous Mascara in Carbon Black (click for review).
5. Line your lips with a nude lipliner, preferably one that is the same color, or slightly darker than your lipstick. I like MAC’s “stripdown” liner for nude lips.
6. Next, apply your lipstick. You can choose to blend your lipliner into your lipstick to keep it modern, or keep the slightly darker liner (as pictured above) to stay true to the original look.
7. You can finish of by applying your foundation, or, if you applied it first, make sure to clean up any fall-out from the black eyeshadow!
How To: Hair
Brigitte’s hair is super messy and big, so it’s very easy to pull off since it doesn’t have to be precise!
1. If you have straight hair, I would start off by adding a few loose waves to it with a curling iron. My favorite technique for waves is to simply wrap separate strands of hair around your closed curling iron. Leave for several seconds depending on how well your hair curls and the spray with hairspray.
2. Next, section your hair at the crown of your head and use your teasing brush or comb to back-comb the hair. Don’t skimp on this part because the volume is the most important part of the look!
3. Spray your teased rat’s nest with hairspray and let it sit for a few minutes. I know it looks crazy right now, but trust me
4. Now, lightly start to comb the back-combed hair into place. Be careful not to take out all the teasing! You are just trying to smooth over the top of the hair.
5. You can either leave your hair like this, or take your bobby pins and start pinning sections of your hair back, into a half-up, half-down, voluminous look!
Drew Barrymore’s Bardot Inspired Look!
10 Ways to Utilize Q-Tips in your Beauty Routine
Q-Tips: The Ultimate Beauty Tool
Yesterday I spent the day working as a rep for Q-Tips. The company has recently released 3 new vanity packs, that are cute enough to leave out on your counter. As makeup artists for the brand, we were only allowed to use Q-Tips to apply a full face of makeup! It was challenging but also really fun, and it got me thinking about the best ways to utilize Q-Tips in your own beauty routines!
1. Erase Mistakes
I use Q-tips mainly for quick and easy clean up, when I make mistakes. They are also great for when your mascara or eyeliner start to run. Just dab the Q-tip in a little bit of moisturizer or eye makeup remover and lightly run it over the mistake. Voila, it disappears completely!
2. Smudge Your Eyeliner For Perfect Smokey Eyes
The cotton head of the Q-tip is perfect for smudging your eye makeup to give you that sultry, smokey eye. Apply a black or grey eyeliner to your bottom eye-lid and use the Q-tip to smudge the line, making it less harsh, and ultra sexy.
3. Soften Harsh Lines and Colors
Ok, maybe you went a little overboard when trying out that new makeup look, but have no fear! Use a Q-tip to softly blend in a circular motion over dark, dense colors. The cotton picks up excess pigment and softens the harshness of your mistake. You can use this trick on your eyebrows, eyelids, lips, etc..
4. Prevent Bleeding Lipstick
Don’t you hate it when you apply a beautiful red lip, only to find that half-way through the day, the color has traveled past your lip line, and onto the rest of your face? Try dipping a Q-tip in a little bit of loose powder, and run it along the edge of your freshly applied lipstick. The powder acts as a barrier, keeping lipstick on your lips, and only your lips.
5. Highlight The Inner Corner of Your Eyes
Lately, I have really been into highlighting the inner corner of the eyes. I feel like it brightens the whole eye area and makes you seem awake. In order to pull off this little trick, you need a Q-tip to get in this hard to reach area. Dip the Q-tip into a shimmery eyeshadow or pigment and dot the color right at the corner of your inner eye. I prefer to do whites, golds and neutrals to keep it natural but experiment with different colors as well!
6. Clean Up Excess Nail Polish
I don’t know about you, but whenever I paint my nails I make a HUGE mess, I literally get polish everywhere! Whether you are as messy as I am, or if you only make tiny mistakes, they are easily fixable with Q-Tips! Dip the Q-tip in nail polish remover and rub away the errors. The small, precise tip makes it perfect for small details such as this.
7. On the Go Touch Ups
Keeping several Q-tips in your purse or backpack is a great way to ensure that you stay fresh all day. I use them to clean up my smudged mascara and bleeding lipstick (like mentioned above), but they are also great for when your eyeshadow starts to crease. If you find this happening, pull out a Q-tip and gently clean up wherever you see creasing, and you’re good to go! Also when wearing a smokey eye, do you ever get the black “goop” that travels the the inner corners of your eye? Swipe a Q-tip in the tear duct to clean it up in a hurry!
8. Dab on Some Concealer
The best way to cover up a zit is to dab it concealer and gently pat around the pimple to blend the cover-up into your skin. The only problem is, your fingers are not always clean and the bacteria you could be spreading to your face will only give you more zits. Use a Q-tip to dab the concealer on your blemish and blend with the soft edges of the cotton tip. Clean, sanitary and effective!
9. Perfect Your Liner
The only thing I love more than a regular Q-tip is a pointed Q-tip!! These babies can be an amazing tool to help you perfect a winged eye liner look. First, draw on your liner and bring it out past your eyes into the cat-eye shape. Don’t worry if it’s not perfectly sharp or precise. Next, take your pointed Q-tip and dip it in a little bit of moisturizer. Use the sharp edge to perfect the shape, taking little bits off at a time until you have the cleanest, hottest cat-eye around!
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10. Apply Makeup in a Pinch!
Whether your brushes are dirty, or your heading straight to a fancy dinner from the office, Q-tips can be a great tool when you have to apply makeup in a pinch!
My main tip for applying your makeup with a Q-tip is to keep it simple! Dip one in a black eyeshadow and run it along your bottom lashes for a sexy smokey eye. Swipe a bright colored shadow along your eyelid for a fun and quick makeup look. Apply your eyeshadow with a wet Q-tip for a more dramatic color pay-off. Dip one in a sultry lip stain and swipe across your lips. Dot a liquid highlighter along your cheekbones and blend in for sexy shimmer. The possibilities are endless and easy! I don’t recommend applying lipgloss with it though! The cotton “hairs” get stuck everywhere and it becomes really messy. Trust me, I had to learn the hard way haha
The New Vanity Packs!
Understated Beauty Tool
The Metal Eyelash Comb
Clumpy, thick, spider lashes are a beauty nightmare for most women. Old mascara can be the culprit, as well as application techniques, but don’t worry! Perfectly separated lashes are lot easier to achieve than you can imagine.
It’s much easier to prevent a mistake than to fix it, so follow these easy steps tips to get separated lashes every time:
1. Make sure your mascara is not expired
Mascara has the shortest shelf life out of all your makeup. 4 months is the maximum amount of time that you should keep your mascara tube around, and that is only if you take great care of it! Don’t pump the wand in and out because it forces air inside the tube, causing the mascara to dry out and become a bigger breeding ground for bacteria. Keep your mascara fresh and you will avoid dry clumpy eyelashes.
2. Wiggle It!
The magic is in the application. When applying your mascara, place the want at the base of the lashes and wiggle it left to right all the way up to the tip. The wiggle motion keeps the lashes separated.
3. Get rid of excess product on the wand.
When you pull the wand out of the tube, check it to make sure there is no excess product build up on it. Too much product on the wand will mean too much product on your lashes, and too much product on your lashes will result in clumpy-ness. Wipe excess mascara on a tissue, or on the rim of the tube to ensure you get just enough mascara on your eyelashes.
Ok, So You Missed a Step, Ignored a Rule or Used Old Mascara and Now Your Lashes are Thick, Clumpy Galore. What Now??
Meet your new best friend: The metal eyelash comb/separator!
You’ve probably seen or even owned a plastic eyelash comb. They come in most brush sets, but this one is a little different, and SO much better! The teeth are metal, which force them through the clumpy build-up of mascara coated to your lashes. Comb through two or three time and say good-bye to spider lashes! Seriously, it’s that easy! I use it a lot when my models sneak off to the bathroom to apply more mascara. They think they’re pulling a fast one on me but I’m not blind! haha Combing through their mess with this tool has saved many photo shoots.
Just BE CAREFUL! Sharp+Metal+Eyes= No Bueno.
Fun Fact! Julia Roberts uses a safety pin to separate her eyelashes when she applies her own mascara!! She brought this real-life detail to her character in Charlie Wilson’s War! Please don’t try this at home. A metal eyelash comb is much easier lol.
If only Tammy Faye had known about this magic wand…
Back to School Beauty
Don’t Cake it On-
There is nothing worse than cake-face, and heavy foundations are the last thing you need to be concerned with when starting school. Sure, you might look bangin’ during first period, but as the day goes on, chances are you’ll start to melt, and wind up looking like a hot mess before you even make it to gym class. Instead, opt for lighter, oil-free foundation which will ensure that you look fresh all day. I am so not a fan of mineral makeup for photoshoots, but for everyday wear, they can be a great option. If you have good skin, tinted moisturizers are super light feeling, but give you enough sheer color to even out skin tone. Just dab concealer over blemishes and your good to go!
Prescriptives- Traceless Foundation
Keep it Fresh-
School days are loooong, and chances are the makeup you apply in the morning is not going to last you ’til the end of the day. If you have any after-school activities, you can pretty much forget about it. Luckily, there are a few things you can do to stay fresh all day long.
1. Blotting Sheets:
These little things can be a lifesaver on hot days. I tend to get really shiny on my t-zone. When I was in high school I would constantly take down shine with my Covergirl pressed powder compact ALL day long, and at the end of the day my face felt so gross and thick from piling product on it non-stop. Blotting sheets solve this problem. Just press it on any shiny spot and it absorbs oil, leaving your skin matte without applying any product! The best thing is they are so CHEAP. Elf carries a pack of 50 sheets for $1!!!! wtf?! I use these on set allll the time.
*Bonus Tip* If you are in a bind and all out of blotting sheets, book it to the nearest bathroom, rip a little piece off of a (clean) toilet seat cover and press it on your face. It does exactly the same thing, for free. I know… it sounds really weird and gross, but it totally works!
2. Primers
Using makeup primers are great ways to ensure you are getting enough longevity out of your makeup. I use primers for brides religiously because I am not always able to stay and make sure the makeup looks flawless all day. If a crazy bridezilla can keep her makeup fresh all day, I guarantee that you can too! I love Smashbox’s Photofinish Primer, it is a staple in my makeup kit. They also make a “light” version that is not as greasy as the original. Laura Mercier makes a great face primer as well. For eyes, I swipe Urban Decay’s Primer Potion on the eyelid before applying eyeshadow and it keeps the shadows from creasing all day. LOVE!
Smashbox- Photofinish Primer
3. Dry Shampoo-
I used to loathe gym class. Thinking about it still makes me nervous. My teacher used chase us on her mountain bike and threaten to “nip our heels” if we didn’t pick up the pace. Seriously, the bell could not ring fast enough, and when it did, I was sweaty, smelly, and my hair looked like crap.
Dry shampoo will save your life. Not really, but it is the perfect pick-me-up when your locks are not are luscious as they were 45 minutes ago. Spray or sprinkle the powder in your hair, brush it out and you can save yourself another day before washing. Use after gym, and your sweaty limp hair will be refreshed and ready for next period. I like and use Oscar Blandi’s Dry Shampoo (not the spray). Tigi just came out with a new one called Rockoholic. It’s pretty good and smells amazing, but the bottle doesn’t last very long.
*Bonus Tip* Baby powder is a super cheap way to soak up excess oils in your hair! Just make sure that you brush it all out ,or your hair will give off a gray hue and people might think you are prematurely aging. Not cute.
Prolong Your Summer Tan-
Everybody knows how bad tanning is for your skin, but let’s face it, it does not stop people from laying out. However you got your tan this summer, whether it be through frying in the sun, or slathering on self tanner, follow these steps to make sure your glow keeps rockin’ well into the school year.
1. Moisturize!-
Keeping your body moisturized will help prolong real tans as well as fake ones. Dry skin cracks, making your color fade much quicker. Lather on a moisturizer after you get out of the shower. Even better if it contains SPF!
2. Switch to Gradual Self-Tanners-
Once fall starts approaching, deep dark tans can scream fake. Switch to a gradual self-tanner and control the color of your skin. Gradual tanners also tend to look more natural and give you a subtle glow.
3. Bronzer-
Brush a little bronzer over your face for instant sun-kissed beauty. When applying bronzer, I like to only hit the spots of the face where the sun would normally touch: forehead, cheeks, chin and nose. Don’t go overboard or you can easily look dirty, not sun-kissed. I love NARS Laguna bronzer but N.Y.C makes an amazing bronzer for ridiculously cheap (like under $4)! It’s kind of an industry secret 
N.Y.C Smooth Skin Bronzer
Multitask-
Products with multiple purposes make my life a little easier, and I’m sure that you will be able to reap the same benefits! Add a little glow to your cheeks and your lips! These products do double duty, saving you some precious morning time.
Stila- Convertible Color: Lillium is a natural color that will brighten you up and give you a fresh look.
Nars- The Multiple: These come in 12 amazing shades. They are a bit more expensive but SOO worth it.
Benefit- Benetint: Give your lips a rosy stain and your cheeks a sexy flush.
Fake It-
Chances are you’ve been sleeping in all summer. Getting back in the swing of things once school starts can definitely prove to be difficult. Follow these simple tricks to give yourself that well rested look, even though you feel like hell.
1. White/Nude Eyeliner
Line the rim of your eyes with a white eyeliner and they instantly appear wider and brighter! If you’re feeling that white is making you look a little dated, try nude. I love using a nude pencil on models and actors that didn’t get much sleep the night before, and they love me for it!
Stila- Kajal Eyeliner: Topaz (Apricot Nude)
2. Curl Your Eyelashes.
Using an eyelash curler can do wonders to make you look like you’ve got an easy 9 hours of sleep under your belt. Follow up with some mascara and you’re good to go!
3. Put a Little Color On Your Cheeks.
Adding color to your cheeks can make a world of difference to a dull complexion. It’s an instant pick me up brings life to your face. While you’re at it, dab some color on your lips too! (See “Multitask” Above).
DISCLAIMER: ALL PRODUCT RECOMMENDATIONS ARE BASED OFF OF MY OWN OPINION. I HAVE RECEIVE NO COMPENSATION OR INCENTIVE IN ANY WAY TO ENDORSE THESE PRODUCTS.
