Makeup Basics: Full Coverage but Natural Makeup With a Natural Glow

To me, skincare is about becoming comfortable with the skin I’m in. I have naturally terrible skin that breaks out a lot. In recent years I’ve kept this under control with good health, eating well, and skin care. I clean and exfoliate religiously without damaging my skin, and I take care of myself.

That said, I still have tons of old acne scars to cover up, as well as some occasional patchy redness. With my incredibly oily skin, this makes for very difficult make up application that will last through the day. Even though I have really incredibly troubled skin, I can look like the above picture without any touch up if I apply my make up right!

Here I will go through with you, step by step, with product recommendations, how to achieve the perfect daily base make up. This is basically a complete face tutorial, minus eyes and lips.

Preparatory Work

Make sure to clean your face and moisturize, even in the summer. If you have flaky patches, exfoliate before you moisturize. I use a simple gel moisturizer at night by Clinique (Dramatically Different Moisturizing Gel, $13 – $24.50), and a nice oil-free moisturizer in the day with SPF by Benefit (Triple Performing Facial Emulsion SPF 15 PA++, $28).

If you are going to be out at all in the day time, even for five minutes, it’s important to use sunblock. The sun is one of the greatest enemies of our skin! On days when I need extra help in sun protection other than what I already have in my daily routine, I like Kiehl’s Super Fluid UV Defense SPF 50+ ($34-$56).

Priming your skin

Priming your skin is incredibly important. I use Make Up For Ever’s All Mat, which keeps my foundation on all day and keeps my oiliness to a minimum. It also fills in lines and rough spots and makes my skin smooth, and helps my make up slide on. Another good option is the Smashbox range of primers.

Wait a few minutes to dry. I like to start on my eye make up while I wait.

Concealer

Apply concealer with your fingers or with a brush where needed. I use a stick concealer by Urban Decay (from their 24/7 pencil line, $19), and I blend it in lightly with the same sponge I used for foundation. I find this product great for covering blemishes but not so great for under eye concealing. I also like YSL’s highlighting pens at this point for under eye brightening. I like to use my waterproof concealer under my foundation and directly on my primed skin because to me, it sticks better that way and lasts all day. If it moves around a little after you apply your foundation, you can always touch it up before setting with powder.

Foundation

I use Chanel’s Mat Lumiere Long Lasting Luminous Matte Fluid Makeup SPF 15. It’s pricy at $54 per 1.7 fl oz bottle, but it’s totally worth it. It’s the most natural looking oil control make up I’ve ever used and lasts all day.

I smooth my foundation on with my fingers, and blend it in with a sponge or a brush. I like Sonia Kashuk’s Beauty Blender knockoff for this. You can use any sponge, slightly dampened with water or MAC Fix+. This helps your make up blend into your skin better, making it look more natural and last longer. If you opt to use a brush, I suggest trying a  small stippling brush like MAC’s 188.

Set With Powder

I like to set my make up with the Make Up For Ever HD powder, or if I need it to stay particularly long, their Duo Mat Powder Foundation. This helps your make up stay all day!

Contour

I don’t do this daily since I have very defined cheekbones already, but for special occasions, I like to contour under my cheekbones (in the hollow of my cheeks) lightly with MAC blush in Harmony (it’s a matte, mid-tone brown that is just a few shades darker than my skin, $14.50), and around the frame of my face. This helps also to blend the make up into the hairline, since I tan naturally more around the edges of my face and it looks awkward against my hairline when I put foundation on. Another nice, natural looking option is NARS Laguna ($33).

For this I have no other brush than MAC 168. It is amazing and fluffy and perfectly angled and sized.

Blush

Blush is so important. On light summer days, I like to use Bobbi Brown’s Illuminating Bronzer in Maui or Antigua (my review here), both light pink bronzing shades, applied with the Bobbi Brown bronzer brush (way better than the one they had before–it’s new to 2010, I believe) for a perfect glow. First, I apply with a heavier hand on my cheeks, blending back towards my temples, and then use what’s remaining on the brush to apply all over my face. For a pop of color, I sometimes add one of the two Dior Bronze de Harmonie blushes just on the apples of my cheek and blended very slightly back.

All of the above generally takes me less than 8 minutes (+ wait time between steps after cream products, about 15 minutes total).

“Just Chill” make up break down.

This is a make up info post for the outfit I posted on Thursday titled “I promise we will just chill.. just chill.” It was a really fun look to do, and the cheeks/lips combo was somewhat unusual for me.

I generally love a really pink, cool-toned cheek, but on this occasion, because I was wearing such a pretty, beige/yellow toned maxi dress, extremely pretty, extremely romantic, but extremely warm, with all these bronzy, brown, warm-toned autumn colors, I decided to try to work with warmer colors, with a splash of frostiness.

I wear brown smokey eyes pretty often, so this is nothing new. However, I went with a peachy, apricotty cheek, created with a mix of Bobbi Brown Shimmer Brick (Apricot), Dior Harmonie Blush (Coral Riviera), and Nars Orgasm. Also, for an extra glow and to diffuse light on imperfections, I blended everything together all over the face after everything (but before mascara!) with Guerlain Meteorites in Teint Beige. They are seriously my HG setting powder. I set my foundation with something else (a generic translucent-ish powder), but the Meteorites are seriously where the magic happens. It blends together everything so wonderfully and adds a subtle glow to my skin that is just right but never sparkly, resulting in the beautiful, subtle, and never over the top glow that you see on my nose, chin area, and forehead (the cheeks are the help of the Bobbi Brown Shimmer Brick). Seriously my Holy Grail product for the face.

I hope you will enjoy the full, super-detailed break down below as well as some more photos, all below the jump:

Sherry Lu Photography collaboration – the make up edition.

I did a wonderful collaboration with Sherry Lu Photography and it was pretty much the most fun I’ve ever had taking pictures for anything. I did a special fancy bridal kind of look for it, and it turned out beautifully in her photographs. I wish I could keep her forever and ask her to take pictures of my make up all the time, it came out so true to color.

Pictured is Urban Decay Naked and its Gunmetal color, among other things, over a Make Up Forever silver aqua cream color base. I’ll do a review of both of these in detail soon, but for now enjoy the beautiful photo by Sherry Lu Photography, and hit the jump for details on the make up. The dress is by BCBG.

Sneak preview: Photoshoot with Sherry Lu.

BCBG Dress, Nine West platform sandals.

I did a photo shoot recently with the lovely Sherry Lu, and this is a sneak preview she sent me of the photos that we did! It is such an amazing photo and I just cannot wait for the rest of the photos.

Eyes:
A mess/variety of stuff–mostly Naked palette by Urban Decay.
Dior DiorShow Iconic Extreme Waterproof Mascara
Urban Decay 24/7 Eyeshadow Liner in Zero
NYX Jumbo Eye Pencil in Milk
False Lashes by.. I don’t even know anymore.

Cheeks:
Chanel Rose Petale

Lips:
Stila Grapefruit Lip Gloss