The makeup consultation was fabulous. Just look at the face the artist created on me!

My first Chanel look, using Orient Express e/s duo, Ming lip lacquer and black kohl pencil. (Sorry about the poor picture quality; I recently bought a new camera so future photos will be MUCH clearer!)

In the end, I purchased the Duo Irréelle in Orient Express, the Rouge Allure Laque in Ming, and the Lait Confort makeup remover emulsion. I also received a gift bag with samples of Coco Mademoiselle perfume (which I already have in a full size), Rouge Coco lipstick, mascara, eye makeup remover, moisturizer, and a Chanel-branded pencil and notepad. Nifty!

Orient Express is an eyeshadow duo of bubblegum pink and iridescent violet, and both of them are shimmery, soft and blend like a dream. They can be used dry or wet, but so far I’ve only used them dry. With a light hand, I create a subtle daytime look, and in the evening I add more violet and some black kohl to make a purple smoky eye. Though the colors typically work better on young women, I think they are versatile enough to work well on women of all ages — especially us brown-eyed ladies.

The Laque in Ming is a long-lasting, opaque, glossy lipcolor, and sort of a bluish, milky pink. It’s a very springy color, and goes pretty well with the Orient Express duo. Its lasting power could be better. In my opinion, the Chanel Glossimers wear longer than the Laque, but the Glossimers are more transparent and glittery — Laque is pure color. So, there’s a trade-off.

Lait Confort is the sweetest elixir for dry skin, and it removes both face and eye makeup without burning the eyes and leaving skin oily. It doesn’t remove waterproof makeup very well, though, I’ve found. Nevertheless, as the name implies, the soft, creamy texture feels so nice on the skin and wipes away with some toner on a cotton pad. The result is clean, nourished skin. It’s a great alternative to facial cleansers, especially if I’m coming home from a late night and don’t feel like washing my face.

I also learned a couple of makeup application tricks from the MUA.

1. For deep-set eyes, like mine, a “reverse crease” helps open up the eye. Instead of concentrating the most color in the outer crease, put it in the inner crease, parallel to the innermost end of the eyebrow and out toward the center of the lid, following the natural curve of the crease.

2. For lining the waterline and tightlining, kohl is the only product you should use, be it in pencil or powder form. I highly recommend Wet ‘n’ Wild kohl pencils (they’re only 99 cents apiece!) and L’Oreal HiP kohl powder eyeliner. First apply the kohl to the waterline, finish the rest of your makeup, reline the waterline, and then set it using a superfine translucent powder (I use MAKE UP FOR EVER’s HD Microfinish Powder). This helps seal the kohl to the waterline and last longer.

Since the event, my Chanel makeup collection has grown substantially, but I’ll save that for another post! I’ll give you a little preview, though — this is what I’ve gotten and will write about:

Rouge Coco lipstick in Rose Comète, Mademoiselle, Camélia and Vendôme
Rouge Allure lipstick in Exquise and Flirt
Rouge Double Intensité in Rosestone and Rose Pearl
Mat Lumière foundation in Porcelaine
Ombre Essentielle in Amethyst
Precision Lip Definer lipliner in Praline d’Or and Pink Sugar

Most beauty products, like lipstick, moisturizer and mascara, have a little symbol on the packaging somewhere that tells how long the product can be used after opening before it’s no longer “fresh” or suitable for use.

It’s that little jar with its lid off and a number inside or next to it. There’s a Wikipedia entry for it if you still don’t know what I mean.

I’d always wondered what that icon meant. Now, I know it’s called a PAO symbol. PAO stands for “period after opening.”

So I’ve been sitting at my desk, looking at the handful of products I have with me today and finding out what the “expiration” dates for them are. For example, my NARS blush, eyeshadow and lipgloss are good for two full years after opening them. My Diorshow mascara is good for six months after opening it. My Korres lipstick — one year.

I learned about this through Twitter, where I’m following LumeneGal, who tweets about Lumene products (so much love) and other general beauty topics. From her, I came across an article on Daily Makeover about this subject. Since I didn’t know what that symbol meant until today, I figured it made a good thing to blog about since there’s isn’t a whole lot about makeup and the like that I am not at least somewhat familiar with. The more you know, right?

Now when I get home I’m going to be looking at all my stuff (quite a task) to see what’s what in terms of when things will no longer be recommended for use. You should do the same! It’s time for spring cleaning, after all!

I rarely have time to “put on my face” entirely before going in to work, so often I will pack my travel makeup bag and stick it in my purse before I’m out the door.

My tip — put on the bigger picture at home. Foundation/powder, eyebrows, even blush. Tuck everything else (eyeshadow, mascara, lipstick, etc.) into your bag and finish things up when you have a free moment to slip off to the ladies’ room or a chance to whip out your compact mirror at your desk.

Wipe any brushes you bring on some facial tissue to minimize eyeshadow transfer to the inside of your bag. Carry a mirror and perhaps some compact brushes in your purse, as well as a nice neutral lipgloss or stain and a mini-tube of mascara, just in case you forget something at home. (This is why I love Sephora’s deluxe samples, they’re perfect for keeping as backups in my purse).

It’s a solution for those of us who, like me, would prefer to get a little more beauty sleep and take a few minutes to put on some makeup at work rather than wake up extra early to get everything done before leaving for the day.

There are several on the market, the most popular, I think, being Urban Decay’s Eyeshadow Primer Potion. This is the first kind I tried. This product has earned various accolades for being a tried-and-true staple in any woman’s makeup collection. I have no gripes with the formula itself, but the packaging is all wrong. The tube is shaped very oddly so a lot of product gets trapped in the bottom, unable to be reached with the applicator wand since it doesn’t reach down all the way to the bottom of the tube.

See for yourself.

The wand only goes down to around where the tube narrows, leaving quite a bit of primer unreachable!

Some people go to the pain of actually cutting open the tube to reach the elusive remaining primer, but why? If it gets exposed to air, the product will dry out quickly and become useless.

I was recently dismayed when my second tube of this product had to go to waste. The bottom rim of the tube had a hairline split somewhere and primer would ooze out from the cracks and get everywhere. It happened right when it was brand new, too. Bad luck, that.

If Urban Decay redesigned the packaging, I would continue to buy this, because overall it really is an excellent item.

To replace my ruined UD primer tube, I researched a bit and settled on Too Faced Shadow Insurance. It’s nearly identical to Urban Decay’s, but the tube is so much more practical.

This tube is squeezable so you can get every last drop of it out of it.

I’m very satisfied with the Too Faced Shadow Insurance. It goes on smooth and sheer without settling in the crease of my lid and definitely keeps my shadow looking fresh morning to night.

The application technique for these is pretty intuitive. The UD primer comes with a wand, but I’ve always had the best results using my pinky finger to properly spread the primer evenly over my eyelids. A little goes a long way, too. A mustard-seed-sized dot for each eyelid should be enough; use more if you are going to put eyeshadow all the way up to your brow bone.

Both of these are priced the same, running at $17 apiece.

Powder and cream shadows work over top of these primers, and they make the colors really vibrant and true.

There are other primers available, some of them better than others, some of them more or less expensive. My motto has always been “you get what you pay for” — and I can confidently say I’m glad I spent the money on both of these I’ve written about.

Do you know of other primers that are good but less expensive? Say, under $10? Let me know in the comments!

Last weekend I had the privilege of visiting the Sephora store in Times Square. If you have the opportunity to go there when you’re next in New York, I advise that you do. The selection is huge, bigger than I’ve encountered anywhere before. What I was mostly giddy about was being able to look at Yves Saint Laurent’s makeup line in person – none of the makeup counters or stores around me carry it, and it’s just not that easy for me to truck all the way up to Neiman Marcus in Tenleytown or wherever the heck it is where it is carried.

I spent some money, though not as much as I anticipated (that’s a good thing). Here’s what I brought home with me:

1. Bare Escentuals Mineral Veil in Feather Light – A fine, mineral-based finishing powder that gives skin a faintly shimmering, iridescent, soft-focus glow. Very pretty, but it’s just okay with absorbing oil.
2. Bare Escentuals Full Flawless Face Brush – Intended for use with the above powder, this is a tightly-packed goat hair brush that evenly dusts loose powder makeup onto the face. No previous powder brush technique knowledge required with this.
3. Clinique Colour Surge Butter Shine Lipstick in Fresh Watermelon – I asked the advice of one of the employees and he recommended this when I asked him what a good berry pink lipstick that wasn’t too shiny could be. The formula glides on and I love the color, it’s very appropriate for the trend that seems to be going on with fuchsia/raspberry-colored lips. Really good for the price, too. Clinique’s awesome all around, though.
4. NARS Lipgloss in Striptease – Thick and on the sticky side, but I really like the color (nude beige) and pairing it with dark eye makeup. I wore this to the theater along with NARS eyeshadow in Night Fever, Diorshow mascara and the palest hint of NARS creme blush in Cactus Flower. It was a NARS night.
5. Kat Von D Autograph Eyeliner in Puro Amor – Last week I wore black liquid liner at work and I thought it looked terrible (even though I got a few compliments on it). The liner I was using had a thick applicator wand and the formula just wasn’t that great, so I chucked it and got this instead. Much finer precision brush and rich, failsafe shades.

I also grabbed a marked-down miniature Sephora brand brush set for traveling and cashed in for a deluxe sample and got Sephora brand body butter in the coconut almond scent.

All that, and I’ve already got a list of things I want to check out when I go to Georgetown with the boyfriend tomorrow!

So I’ve been using lipstick on a regular basis for awhile now and have amassed a decent collection. Most recently I have been intrigued by Kat Von D’s lipsticks, which you can see at Sephora, the manufacturer and sole purveyor of her products.

Kat Von D Painted Love lipstick. Not sure whether this is Underage Red or Hellbent.. or neither?

All of them are a play on the color red. If you browse the reviews, their touted staying power really stands out. I also am drawn in by the matte finish; it seems like everything I own and a lot of what is marketed has a satin or shiny finish. Matte lipsticks dredge up images of bygone Hollywood starlets from the early 20th century and there is something achingly romantic and cool about that. These types of lipsticks are vintage in a non-hipster way and timeless in that they have endured to reclaim a cult status with younger women of today – typically rockerish girls like, well, Kat.

I’m disinclined to trust the color swatch given on the website, so tomorrow I’m going to find out which shade(s) would work for me. I’m most excited to try out Lolita (rose), Underage Red (crimson) and Misfit (brick red).

Finding the right red for you can be difficult as different skin undertones require a different undertone in a red. I have light skin with yellow undertones, so I look better with reds that lean toward brown and other warm, rich notes. There are also blue-reds, coral-reds, and so on.

Main thing to pull of that bold of a color, though, is to be savvy about keeping the color looking fresh and moreover, wear it with confidence (besides, red lips are hot!). Don’t be shy!

Trite as it is, the holidays are over and the new year is just around the corner. Who isn’t doing some kind of ‘year in review’-type thing now?

2008 was the year I began this blog, because 2008 was the year I actually started to give a damn about my personal appearance and took up a vested interest in beauty, makeup and style. I would attribute this primarily because I’ve started wearing what I call my “big grown-up lady life” — in other words, I’m an adult now and I want to look like one – not a college kid, working two part-time jobs (one of which is being a slacker). Those days are behind me and I’m glad for it!

With a full-time salaried job, a place to live that I call my own and a set of responsibilities that I somehow magically learned how to handle play a hand in developing my identity through the use of beauty and all its related miscellany.

So what five worthwhile cosmetic revelations can I fondly look back on from 2008?

1. Lipstick is not just for special occasions or grandmothers. Over the course of 2008, I acquired a number of different lipsticks in various colors and finishes from an array of makers. My favorite? That’s a tough one because I seriously have warm, fuzzy feelings for all of them, but I will go with Christian Dior Rouge Dior Replenishing Lipcolor in No. 357, Gala Pink. A truly long-lasting, sumptuously moisturizing lipstick formula and straight-up, high-saturation color. Daytime or evening, winter to fall. Perfect. AND it smells nice because it is modestly scented with the Dior “rose” fragrance.
2. Washing daily with a quality facial cleanser is THE first step to looking lovely. Not sloughing off the makeup from your day, plus unwanted clingers like dirt, oil and other free radicals can really make a person look drab. Lumene makes a number of face washes using extracts from skin-loving stuff like cloudberry, blueberry, cranberry, linseed and sea buckthorn. I like Lumene Radiant Touch Cream Cleanser because it lathers nicely, smells good and gently washes away makeup and oil. Since Lumene products are divided into various collections for different skincare needs, I recommend buying the accompanying toner and moisturizer to maximize the benefits for your skin. [Confession: I'm using Olay Complete Lathering Cleanser right now; but once I'm done I'm switching back to Lumene!] Lumene products are available via CVS/pharmacy, which often has them at 50% off. Ulta carries some of their line, too.
3. Big girls should use real brushes. Throw away (or at least leave them for when you’re in a pinch) the dinky sponge-tip eyeshadow wands that come with the compact. Brushes that tiny may work okay for Barbie, but we have life-sized faces and precision is key. The right brush, I’ve learned, is necessary to take an “eh, so-so” look to “wow! how did you do that?!” There are kinds for eyeshadow, lipcolor, blush, powder, blending (every woman should have a blending brush), and more. Be careful, though. You do get what you pay for – brushes from the drugstore that may look nice are often not worth the money because the hairs come out and end up on your face, where they’re completely useless. Dole out the money and get some professional brushes from a reputable retailer like Sephora. After hundreds of uses, the brushes will have paid for themselves. And don’t forget the brush cleaner! It will prolong the lives of your brushes even more.
4. Issues with eyebrows unfortunately plague many of us whether we have been a bit overzealous with the tweezers, or haven’t seen a pair of tweezers in years, or were just born with uneven, wimpy, unflattering eyebrows. If you’re like me and have the shape and arch just right but not enough oomph to properly frame your face, try on an eyebrow filler. I use a Milani Easybrow Automatic Pencil to darken and emphasize my eyebrows and the results are amazing for a drugstore product. The double-ended pencil has a spiral brush to soften and blend the color in for a natural appearance and I top everything off with Sephora’s Professional Clear Natural Mascara for a perfect finish. My eyebrows look natural yet bold and don’t budge until I want them to (i.e., when I wash it off at night).
5. Before you get that eyeshadow brush anywhere even close to your eyelid, put some primer on it first, please! Before I discovered Urban Decay Primer Potion I was always ending up with a greasy-looking eyelid and my favorite dark eyeshadows camped out in the crease of my eyelid. With a primer, that won’t happen and it will make your eyeshadow last longer (literally in the sense that you won’t need to reapply, but also because you’re not wasting any for reapplications) and look more vibrant. I don’t use any eyeshadow without putting primer on my lids first (unless it’s a cream shadow by Benefit) and neither should you. My only wish? That the bottle was not so oddly shaped and/or the wand was short. I imagine a lot of the product gets stuck in the bottom of the skinny tube and is unreachable.

Ah, all these things I’ve come to live by in just one year. I’ve come a long way, haven’t I? So naive, so innocent… I’ve learned a lot about how to be pretty (or prettier, my boyfriend would insist) in 2008!

So what am I going to set out to conquer in 2009?

Foremost, a budget. Wait, what? Yes, that’s right. I will be the first to admit I splurged on makeup in 2008, although I have now amassed a collection of products that I adore, am proud of and that I will use until I run out. Really, it all became an expense taken for the sake of research, which I also hope to share more of in the coming year.

Beyond reigning in the spending to a more frugal level, I look forward to exploring exciting, jewel-toned eyeshadows from the palettes I own, as well as taking a closer look at my fingernails and playing with lacquer. Also going give cream blush a whirl-and-swirl, hopefully with photo-worthy results. Ah, and of course, more fun with red lipstick. All of this… with PICTURES!

So cheerio, 2008, and hello ‘09! I think I’m ready for my close-up.