FOTD | Go-to Night Out Makeup

If you’re at university, or you have been, you’ll understand the feeling that you may not have that much time to do your makeup before a ‘spontaneous’ night out. Or maybe you’re not one to spend hours getting ready. Recently I have found my favourite look for a night out that I can throw together pretty quickly, and as an added bonus, it looks really nice in photography. So if you’re into the bold lips, lashes and brows, keep on reading…

I’m always one to focus most of my time on my base. When it comes to a night out, I rarely skip using the Hourglass Veil Mineral Primer as it keeps my makeup in place better than any other product I’ve tried. For foundation lately, my favourite has to be L’Oreal True Match – this is a great budget alternative for my beloved Giorgio Armani Luminous Silk (check out my full review here). I add the Nars Radiant Creamy Concealer anywhere I may need some extra coverage, and I also take a shade lighter under my eyes and on the high points of my face to highlight. I set everything in place with a powder, either the Mac Mineralize Skinfinish Natural or the Hourglass Ambient Lighting Powder in Dim Light. I also found it important to add colour and definition to the cheeks or your face can look pretty flat in pictures. I bronze up the skin with Nars Laguna Bronzing Powder, and have been loving the Anastasia Beverly Hills Contour Kit to add shadows under the cheekbones and on the temples, and I also like using the lighter shades to set my under eye concealer and any highlighting I have done. I’ll top the look off with a little powder highlighter – my favourite recently has been the Bobbi Brown Shimmer Brick in Beige. I add some to the tops of my cheeks, the tip of the nose, the cupids bow and the chin. 


This eye makeup is incredible simple and easy to achieve. I start by defining the crease, and I do this by building up different shades of orangey-browns, increasingly getting darker to achieve a blended and blown out look. Any matte browns will work for this, but I tend to reach for my Makeup Geek Eyeshadows, in particular Peach Smoothie, Creme Brulee and Cocoa Bear. I will then pack a shimmery shade all over the lid, and my absolute favourite for this is Mac Tan Pigment. It catches the light beautifully and is amazing for any warm-toned look. I then create a winged out eyeliner with the Kat Von D Tattoo Liner in Trooper, apply lashings of mascara, and then a pair of false lashes. These will help your eyes really pop and add instant glamour to any look. The pair I’ve used in this look are the Eylure no. 121 which are thick, fluffy and are longer on the outer corner, which help to emphasise the winged-out shape of this look. I’ll then run some of the shades I used in my crease along the lower lash line to balance out the look. To finish off the eyes, I filled in my brows with the Anastasia Dip Brow Pomade in Blonde, going for quite a strong brow which I think works well with this look. 

Finally, the star of the show, the bold lip. I find that I can wear any colour with this look, but my favourite shade to wear by far is a bright pink. I’m definitely a lipstick addict, so I have several favourites, but the shade I went for in this look is Mac Viva Glam Miley Cyrus which I have a full post on here. With a bright lip, you tend to need a little added colour on the cheeks, so for blush my go to is Tarte Amazonian Clay Blush in Exposed as it is a no-brainer shade that goes with any look.















































I hope you enjoyed this look, and perhaps if you’re not so into bold lips this may have inspired you to give one a go? I think they are so flattering and will also reduce your getting ready time as the eyes really don’t need as much work. Let me know your go-to look for a night out below! 

RachelElizabeth

Makeup Geek Eyeshadows | Review and Swatches Part 2

So this is part 2 of my first venture into Makeup Geek eyeshadows. If you missed part 1, you can check it out here. This second instalment is focusing on the darker shades that I got. I felt like I had been lacking some really good matte browns in my collection, so I made sure to get some really essential shades that I can wear all the time.


Latte is described as a ‘matte medium brown’. This is slightly cooler than some of the other shades I bought, but works really well as a crease colour. The texture, the payoff and the blendability of this shadow are excellent, and I can definitely see this as becoming a staple in my collection.
























FrappĂ© is described as ‘medium maple brown matte’. It isn’t too dissimilar from Latte but it is different enough in undertone as it is much rosier and warmer to warrant having both (at least that’s my way of justifying it…). Much like Latte the formulation is again really excellent, as it is really pigmented and smooth, and really easy to blend into the crease. 























Cocoa Bear is described as a ‘matte reddish brown’. This is a really interesting shade as although it has really obvious red undertones, it is still really wearable as a crease shade (I find it much warmer in person than in these pictures below). As I mentioned in part 1 of this review, I have been really liking warm smokey eyes on me recently, as it really brings out the blue in my eyes. Again, this is a beautifully formulated eyeshadow, and probably one of my favourites that I ordered.























Mocha is described as a ‘deep matte brown’. It is much cooler than Cocoa Bear but it isn’t overly cool or too grey. This sort of colour is an essential for me as I always use them as eyeliner on more natural days. This is another richly pigmented and smooth shadow that I would highly recommend. 






















In terms of size, these are the same as Mac eyeshadows, and therefore you could put them in a Mac palette if you wanted to. I ordered a Z Palette from Love Makeup, but you can order them from the Makeup Geek website – the one I wanted wasn’t in stock when I placed my order. I got the small palette and it fits 9 shades in perfectly, but they come in several sizes depending on how much you want to fit in. 

I am overall really impressed with the shadows that I ordered, and I have been reaching for them on an everyday basis. For the price, you really can’t go wrong as they are all incredible quality. If you are interested in other shades, there are swatches of all the shades on the Makeup Geek website, which I think is super helpful. I would definitely say they are comparable to Mac eyeshadows, and if your budget doesn’t quite stretch to the likes of Mac, then I would 100% recommend checking out the shadows Makeup Geek. I am very tempted to order some more!

RachelElizabeth

Makeup Geek Eyeshadows | Swatches and Reviews Part 1

The Makeup Geek line was released a few years ago now, but it has recently been getting a lot more hype on YouTube. If you didn’t know, the line is the creation of Marlena, MakeupGeekTV on youtube, and currently consists of brushes, eyeshadows and pigments.  I have been eying these up for a while, particularly because it seems that she has personally put so much effort into her line, and is very much in control rather than going through another company. Staying on the safe side, I ordered 9 neutral eyeshadows in the pan, and I must admit, this was one of my most exciting orders in a long time. This post includes 5 of the 9 shades I ordered, so if you are interested in the others I bought, check back tomorrow… 

Each shadow in the pan is $5.99 (approximately ÂŁ4) available here, making these an incredibly affordable option compared to the likes of mac. Shipping was very cheap and arrived in two weeks, which isn’t bad considering it came from the US. Be warned, I did have to pay ÂŁ14 in customs charges which is a bit annoying, but it didn’t hurt quite as much as the shipping and the shadows themselves were very affordable. 


Shimma Shimma is described as a ‘metallic champagne’. It is a frosty light pinky-beige shade, which is perfect for highlighting and sweeping all over the lid to brighten. This shade is so creamy and pigmented and is really easy to work with. I did find that the shimmery shades seem to fade a little throughout the day but that’s nothing that a good primer can’t fix. 























Peach Smoothie is described as a ‘light peach beige with a soft matte finish’. It is a pretty light pastel peach shade. This was a little disappointing as it doesn’t pack as much of a punch as I wanted it to, and it feels a little dry in texture. It is however, still decently pigmented and is nice to sweep over the eyelid to create a warm eye look. I’ve been gravitating towards slightly more orangey shades for the summer and I find this to be a great base colour for those looks.






















Glamorous is described as a ‘shimmery bronze gold’. On my skin, at least, this pulls a bit more coppery and orange than gold. However, I find shades like this look more gold and less orange the more tanned I get, so bare that in mind if you are a darker skin tone than me. Other than Shimma Shimma this was the only shimmery shade I ordered, and this is the same beautifully buttery formula. It’s incredibly pigmented and absolutely stunning for bringing out blue eyes in particular.























Crème Brulee is described as a ‘medium sand colour with a soft matte finish’. This is probably one of my favourites that I ordered. It is a mid-tone brown shade which leans more on the warm side, and is really nice for a transition colour in the crease. It is much more buttery and smooth than Peach Smoothie, and blends beautifully, which can be an issue for matte shades. I think that everybody needs a shade like this, a couple of shades darker than your skin tone, which can be used in pretty much every eyeshadow look.























Chickadee is described as a ‘matte yellow orange’. This shade was another buttery matte shade, but it is slightly powdery when you swirl your brush in it, but I didn’t find that this affected how it applied or blended. Now you’re probably questioning my statement that I bought all neutral eyeshadows, but hear me out on this one. To warm up any smokey eye, it looks absolutely stunning to put a shade like this right above the colour that you have put in your crease. I also bought this with the intention of experimenting with colour, and orange looks absolutely stunning on blue eyes. 























So that concludes part one of my Makeup Geek Eyeshadow review, but make sure you check back tomorrow for the rest of the shades I picked up…

RachelElizabeth