New Year's Eve Makeup Look

Hello! Since I missed on the christmas makeup look, I decided that I would do a New Year's Eve makeup for you. New year's eve is such a fun time to play with makeup! You're entering a new year, you can use and abuse the glitter, the sparkle, the shine and the metallic shadows, it's a celebration time and nothing better than makeup to show how excited you are for the new year that is ahead of you.

So I did this look inspired in Simone Simons' stage makeup for Epica's Utrecht show with loads of glitter and sparkle! I was scrolling down her Instagram to find a photo that she has with Fernando from Moonspell and came across this beautiful makeup that looks so festive. I instantly got a boom of inspiration and decided that today I would do this look for the post.
My version of it turned out a lot less dark but still very sparkly, I hope you enjoy it.

In Simone's Instagram photo, her eyeshadow looked pretty metallic and in a grayish blue shade. That's what I tried to mimic with this metallic teal eyeshadow that reflects gold in certain lights. Most of the eyeshadows I used are from this new palette I was given for christmas that I will show in a future post in my christmas haul.

I used this color all over my lid till the crease. In the crease I used first a matte shade a couple of shades darker than my natural skin tone as a blending color. Then I placed black in the outer V, creating a cat eye effect, just like Simone had. I blended it all out with a fluffy brush I got as christmas present, which I will also show you in a future post. On the lower lid I used black on the outer corner, connecting it to the top lid and some of that teal shade along the inner third of the lower lash line. In the inner corner of my eye I used yet another eyeshadow from that palette that is very shimmery and that highlights the eye quite a lot.

Now for the fun part, the glitter!

Simone had loads of sparkle going on and that's what I tried to do too by using gold glitter. Glitter tends to fall out a lot if it doesn't have a base to stick to. If, like me, you don't have a glitter base, here's a tip: take your clear eyebrow gel, rub your ring finger in the wand and use that gel very lightly all over the lid. While it's still wet place the glitter on top. It will stick to it like no other.

I used a gel eyeliner to line the eye. I did a line a little more dramatic than usual for this one.

I also used that same gel liner on my water line, to give the eye a bit more of depth and drama.

You can't skip lashes with this look and that's why I used quite dramatic ones from Ardell in 131 Black.

I also filled in my brows with H&M Dark Brown eyebrow pencil and used a clear brow gel to keep them in place.

I don't use foundation. I have created some sort of aversion to foundation, I hate the feeling of liquid foundation. I just don't use it in general. I only used some moisturizing cream and concealer in my problem areas and to highlight under the eyes.

I then set all of that with a translucent powder and move on to face sculpting. 

Try to go with your natural shape, only enhancing it a little bit. That's what I did by placing a little bit of bronzer on my cheeks to define them and just a dash on my temples. I then went to a pinkish blush similar to Nars' Orgasm and highlighted the tops of my cheekbones, nose, chin and cupid's bow.

For the lips I used a lipstick that is the exact same shade as my natural lip color.

Simone had a peachy pink color on that seemed very glossy and quite a big outline on those lips, but I decided to leave it a bit more subtle there.

And that's the look complete! I'm not gonna do this one on myself but I've already got requests to do it on someone else. This year I've decided not to use glitter on myself.

I want to make a little note here and say that most of the photos for this look have zero to no edition. All credits to the amazing Catarina from the blog D'une Lune and a huge thank you to this girl for the spectacular job she did today.

This is it for this week's post! I hope you have liked it and gotten inspired for some new year's looks.

I will be back this weekend with a christmas haul with all the goodies I got for christmas.

Love,

Anna

Beyoncé Inspired Makeup Look

Hi! I'm back and today I bring you a look. A look that I am very excited about!
I'm not a crazy fan of Beyoncé, I have, in fact, loved her more in the past than I do now, but I just came across some photos of this beautiful eye makeup she wore for that thingy for the song Mine and I had to do it.
I thought I would just do it for fun on a tuesday afternoon but then I loved it so much, why not make a post on it?
So here it is and I hope you enjoy it as much as I do (I really love it).

This makeup look looks fairly simple but it's quite hard to achieve if you don't have the right products.

The look is constituted by a strong blue eye, a subtle glossy lip and simple skin.

In the video, Beyoncé has this vibrant blue eye makeup that is deepened in the corners of the eye.

The center of the eye has a vibrant almost turquoise shade, fading to a deep dark blue both in the inner and the outer corners. This technique gives the illusion of a rounder and bigger eye, which is perfect for Beyoncé herself because she has almond shaped eyes.

If, like me, you don't have a turquoise eyeshadow that is pigmented enough to stand out in the middle of the dark blues, my advice is to use a white cream shadow or a white creamy pencil in the center of the lid. This technique applies to all bright eyeshadows that you want to enhance. To deepen the eyeshadows you do the opposite, use a black creamy pencil or shadow, which is what I did to darken the outer corner.

After applying the creamy bases, choose a metallic turquoise blue eyeshadow or pigment. Eyeshadows that will do the work perfectly are Mermaid by Makeup Geek and Candy Crush from Sugarpill's Sparkle Baby palette. 

By the photos I saw, I am led to believe that Beyoncé's makeup artist used a pigment and for that I would suggest MAC's Rain Drop metallic pigment. 

On the corners of the eyes I used a matte dark blue eyeshadow, which I blended into the vibrant blue.

To blend the dark blue, I used a dark purple and a bright pink, making the perfect transition from cold tones to warm tones.

On the lower lid I used green in the inner half of the lid, just like Beyoncé, and on the outer half I used the dark blue again. I blended it out with two eyeshadows a slight bit lighter to smoke up the bottom lid.

This look doesn't require eyeliner but if you want, you can totally add it. I used a black eyeshadow very close to the roots of my top and bottom lashes to darken them a bit.

The waterline was brightened with a pinky beige pencil to further open up the eye. Use your favourite mascara on the lashes.

False lashes are totally optional since Beyoncé herself didn't have that big of a lash action going on, but I decided to use a very subtle pair, you can barely notice them.

My skin always looks ghostly white in photos, so, to mimic Beyoncé's skin is perfectly impossible. 

Her skin is obviously darker and also much warmer than mine but in order to get those gorgeous cheekbones of hers, I contoured my cheeks and temples with a shade much warmer than my natural complexion.

The key to all of Beyoncé's looks, I think, is to highlight. It is obviously easier to do on darker skin tones, it looks just the loveliest, but, if like me you have a lighter complexion, you will want to contour more and use more bronzer to sculpt the face. You can obviously use a highlighter on the high points of the face, as I also did.

She had little to no blush, so I skipped that.

On the lips, and with such a strong eye makeup, you have to go nude. She had a very light nude with a bit of a gloss on it, so that's what I tried to mimic by using a nude lipstick on the center of the lips and a golden pink gloss on top.

And that's it, you're done! 

This look is perfect for a night out or for fun parties.

Here's a bonus photo of an unprepared me while "dancing" to the sound of Love On Top. 

This is it for this week's post, I hope you enjoyed it. I loved doing it, it's such a fun look! 

Love,

Anna

Halloween Special: Mz. Hyde

Hello! So I'm back and this week I bring you a Halloween look.
I'm really excited about this one because it is very special. This look is inspired in a song by Halestorm called Mz. Hyde. This song is about a hidden side of Lzzy, the vocalist, a much darker and evil side.
I figured I would do this look to show the appearance of my darker side, sort of like to show what is hidden inside of me.
Turns out that this look is way more on the punk side than I anticipated, nevertheless I love how it turned out.
This is the look I'm going to do for my Halloween night only with a few changes, so I hope you enjoy it!

"Welcome to the nightmare in my head,
Say hello to something scary,
The monster in your bed,
Just give in and you won’t be sorry,
Welcome to my other side,
Hello it’s Mz. Hyde!"

Meet Mz Hyde.

I imagine Mz Hyde as a "browless" all pierced character.
I didn't, although, picture her as someone so punk but I love how it turned out!

I suppose that the hardest part about this character is the concealing of the eyebrows.

That can be considered FX makeup because it changes your face to something that is not considered "normal" or "regular".
I used a glue stick over my brows several times until I achieved a minimally smooth finish. You can find videos on how to cover your eyebrows on youtube.
I then powdered them to get rid of the stickiness of the glue. Then I would suggest using a warm concealer color to conceal the color of the brows. I used my eyeshadow primer and it worked very well.
After you have finished the rest of your makeup, you will want to use concealer in the same shade as your skin to further erase your eyebrows.

For the actual makeup I did something very simple.
I used a dark blue eyeshadow all over the lid and just a bit of black eyeshadow in the crease. After I did the eyeliner on the top lash line, extending it quite far, I brought the blue eyeshadow together with the liner, blending it in in a triangular shape.
On the bottom lash line I also drew a little flick, pointing downwards and blended some black eyeshadow, again, in a triangular shape, leaving a space between the top and bottom flicks.
On the inner corners I extended the eyeliner on the top part of the eye as well as on the bottom, leaving a blank space between where I placed a white sparkly eyeshadow.

 Under the place where my eyebrows used to be, I drew a sharp line with black eyeshadow, which I blended down just to create some shape.

On my cheeks I used a black eyeshadow to contour and a black lipstick on my lips.

I drew a line down my chin and down my neck till my chest because I wanted to give the character a bit more of a personality.

When it comes to piercings, I used little silver beads that I placed in my cheeks to make dimple piercing, in the bridge of my nose and in the center of my lip. For the septum piercing I used a silver ring. I also added some silver rings to my ears.

In the pictures it is not very visible what I did to my hair but I basically pulled it up, very tight on the sides to simulate side cuts and teased it down the center of my head to create a hawk.

The look wouldn't be complete without a leather jacket and black clothes.

And the look is complete!
This is how I believe my inner darker self to be.
Apart from the song, one of my biggest inspirations for this was Nicole Greenleaf.

Little note: I would just like to thank my girlfriend for taking the photos. She's always in charge of all the photos in my looks, so thank you, babe.

That's all for this week's post, I hope you have enjoyed!
If I don't post anything before Halloween, my next post will be full of photos of my Halloween night and photos of everyone's costumes!

"There’s no way to be sure,

Which girl you’ll get to know."

Love,
Anna

Autumn Vampire

Hi! I'm back and this time with another look!
I intended to do a fall look but turns out i got carried away and what turned out was something more vampy'ish than I was initially expecting.
I had a lot of fun doing this look and shooting the photos for this look, so I hope you enjoy it as much as I did.

I chose these reddish colors because, to me, they resemble fall and all the leaves that we see on the street.

Another major inspiration for this look was the gorgeous dress Manuela Kraller used in the video Xandria made for the song Valentine.

This look is what most people would call a "party look" since it's a wearable look for most people on a daily basis.

I used a mixture of matte, satin and shimmery eyeshadows to achieve this cat eye look.

I placed a brick red in the center of the lid and brought it a bit in to the inside of the eye but not completely till the inner corner. 

MNY eyeshadow by Maybelline in 333

After placing that red color, i used a gel eyeliner to add that darkness and then blended it out and into the red with some black eyeshadow. In the innermost part of the eye I used an old pink satin eyeshadow that gives me loads of shine and brightness, which is what I was going for with this look.

I also brought the black eyeshadow in almost till the brow, as you can see in these photos. By doing this, I gave my eyes even more of a "cat eye" shape.

On the lower lid I used regular black gel eyeliner to give me the darkness I was going for.

On the inner corner I used a very fine brush and gel eyeliner to create a small triangle that further elongated the eye and the cat eye shape. This technique is also used in Arab style makeup.

To achieve that sharp line with the gel eyeliner, I used a piece o duct tape to give me a clean sharp line.

A cat eye wouldn't be complete without false lashes. I used the biggest false lashes that I own that emphasize the cat eye shape the most. You would want to choose falsies that are longer on the outer corner than on the inner corner, again, to elongate the eye.

With a coral blush I brought some life to my complexion as well as with a cold toned bronzer.
The cold toned bronzer can also be used to shape the face.

For the lips I used a red lipstick in the same shade as the eyeshadow and I darkened it a little with a black lipstick. In the center of the lips I used that same eyeshadow to give the lips more of dimension.

When it comes to eyebrows, I just followed my natural brow shape, just as I do every single day.

I hope you have enjoyed this look, I had so much fun creating it!
For my next post I will be doing a lipstick wishlist with all the lip products I have been craving.

Love,

Anna