FOTD || EVERYDAY AUTUMNAL EASY GLAM MAKEUP LOOK

Autumn is definitely my favourite season of the year, even though I love Summer because it usually means that I get to travel somewhere nice, but Autumn is the season of cosy clothes and nice smelling candles. What I'm looking forward to the most is being able to wear dark lipstick and dark eyeshadow without getting judged by people - no, I am not a goth.

I don't necessarily think that this is a very dark or gothic look, but for me, this is the perfect Autumnal makeup look for my skin tone and hair colour. It is very flattering and easy to create, and here are the items I had used to create it:

The eyeshadows I had used include: NYX shadow in the shade Immaculate, and MUG shadows in shades Grandstand, Morocco, and Bitten. I wanted to wear a bit of eyeliner to make this look a bit more glam, but I'm out of practice and found this look glam enough to leave it as it is! The magic mascara that I've been obsessing over since the first use is the Lancome Hypnose Mascara. I love this one for elongating and volumising my lashes, it's got amazing coverage to it and I find that only one coat is enough for a full look.

If you've been after a full coverage foundation that isn't extortionate, then you need to try the L'Oreal Total Cover foundation, like, now. It glides on very smoothly and feels like velvet on my skin which is always a plus because who wouldn't want baby-soft skin? I find that the coverage of this product is very high - but I won't get into it too much as I'd like to save it for a full review. Of course, I had to use my current favourite concealer and contour shade, both by L.A. Girl as these work amazingly and the price is very much affordable! To set my foundation in place, I used the Collection Primed & Ready Invisible Setting Powder which works wonders for my combination skin, especially the oily t-zone. My favourite bronzer since 2015 has to be Hoola by Benefit which has actually lasted me nearly 2 years when I've been using it every day, so it's definitely worth the high price tag. To brighten up my face, I use my favourite Milani blusher in shade Tea Rose and Sleek highlighter in Midas Touch - I mix the pink and the white together for a blinding, yet natural highlight. My current go-to lipstick is the Colourpop Ultra Matte Lipstick in shade LAX, which was obviously applied over my favourite lip balm from Carmex.

As you can see, the majority of tools I had used to create this makeup look are by Real Techniques as they truly do amazing brushes, and I cannot wait to complete my collection! I also really want to try the Bold Metals collection, but because they're quite pricey I think I'll wait until Father Christmas pays a visit to my house! I also included a brush from MAC and Colourpop which are some of my all-time favourites.

*This post includes gifted items - all opinions are my own and are in no way influenced at all.

Have you caught up with my monthly favourites post? What's your favourite autumnal makeup look? Would you try this one out?

Lots of love,

Maya xo

Massive Drugstore Haul

Good Morning Everyone!

I hope you're all looking forward to the weekend! I'm busy working and exercising, trying to get fitter before my holiday. Shall I do a post about my progress?

Anyway, I have recently splurged a LOT on makeup, both high-end and drugstore, but today I will share with you my drugstore buys.

I will link all products down below for you guys, and I won't go into much detail as I'd like to do full reviews, so if you'd like a review of a particular product then let me know down below in the comments section!

Let's get started!

Makeup Revolution Lipsticks in a pack of five £4.

Natural Collection Lipsticks and Eyeshadows, £1.99 each.

Shades: Hazelnut and Fig Leaf. 

Shades: Crushed Walnut, Willow and Milk Chocolate. (I have since then purchased another shade called Barley which is a warm gold colour)

Rose Gold Balmi, raspberry flavour. This was around £4 I believe as it was on offer.

Real Techniques Deluxe Gift Set, £19.99.

Primark and Sleek lipliners, and Essence waterline pencil.

Makeup Revolution Rose Gold Lipsticks £3 each, in shades: Girls Best Friend, Diamond Life, Private Members Club and Red Carpet. Unfortunately, I couldn't get my hands on the nude shade, but hopefully, I'll add it to my collection soon!

Ultra Strobe Cream £8

Pro Go Brush Set £4.95

Primark Matte Lipstick £1.50

Concealer/Contour Palette £3.45 including a brush

Morphe Magnetic Palette with 7 inserts in shades: Creme Brûlée, Pretty in Pink, Breakfast at Tifanneez, Caffee Mochiato, Glow for Me, Toasted Hazelnut, and Rosewood.

Makeup Revolution Fortune Favours The Brave Palette £10

Mermaids Forever Palette £8

Makeup Revolution I Heart Chocolate, Salted Caramel, and Pink Fizz Palettes. £8 each

The Make-up Revolution Chocolate Palettes have been on my wishlist for months now! I've been lusting over the Too Faced Chocolate Bar palette but have settled for the cheaper alternative. you can never go wrong with Make-up Revolution 

Do you own any of the products mentioned above? Are any of them on your wishlist?

Lots of love,

Maya xo

How I Clean My Make-up Brushes

Hi Everyone!

Who else finds washing their makeup brushes a chore? It takes sooo long to do and should be done more often than any of us wishes to admit. I personally clean my brushes at least once a month - yes I know it's not good enough but I never seem to find the time to clean them all! However I do switch up between brushes after one gets too dirty.

I usually clean them using MAC's Brush Cleanser which you can find here for £12. I've been using this for over a year now and I use up around 20ml each time for all of my brushes - and I do own around 50.

Firstly, I like to get organised and grab all the tools I will be needing before I get started. I usually get a small dish to put the cleanser in, and paper towels to rub the makeup off onto them.

So as you can see, I grab a dirty brush and soak it in the solution. I try to do this sparingly as too much solution will make the bristles become too coarse and sometimes it can get inside the handle and cause the glue to stop working resulting in the brush to come apart. And that is not what you want to happen, especially to expensive brushes!

After I dipped the brush in the solution, I swirl the brush onto the paper towel in circular motions until the brush has no product left in the bristles.

Ta-dah! Yes, it's that easy! However, if you don't feel like spending lots of money on special cleansers you can easily substitute it for a bit of washing up liquid or shampoo and then rinse it out under a running tap without allowing the water to soak up the whole brush.

I hope this helped! How do you wash your brushes?

Lots of love,

Maya xo

Review || Real Techniques Brushes

Hello everyone :)

I hope you're all okay an have been enjoying this half term, I certainly have! Upcoming mock exams are stressing me out too much!

In today's post I decided to review Real Techniques Core Collection brushes. I have heard so much about their brushes and thought I must have them! I bought the Core Collection which includes (l-r) pointed foundation brush, detailer brush, buffing brush and contour brush.

As you can see above, the brushes look quite elegant and professional, and at the price of £21.99 for a whole set with a brush stand/case it's an amazing bargain. I'm sorry about the brushes being dirty, I forgot to take some pictures when I first got them and ran out of brush cleanser so had to post those!!

Pointed foundation brush: I really like this brush, it let's me apply my foundation on very evenly and rubs in quite well, leaving my face looking very airbrushed and smooth. It's very soft in touch and it's shape allows me to use it all over my face, especially around small areas where my old foundation brush didn't let me.

The only downfall of this brush is that it's a bit too small for my liking and takes much longer to apply my foundation.

Detailer brush: I use this brush to apply concealer on my face as it's very small and handy. It allows me to blend the concealer onto the wanted area without rubbing my foundation off. It could also be used as a lip brush but I prefer to use it to apply concealer.

Buffing brush: I love this brush so much. It's the softest one of all and all I want to do with it is stroke my face because it feels like velvet! I use it to apply my powder and it spread it out evenly on my face and uses up quite a lot of the product so you only need about 3 dabs all over the face by dipping it into the powder once and you're ready to go.

Contour brush: I use this brush to apply blush or bronzer, because I prefer having orangey/brown cheeks rather than pinky/red because of my complexions. I usually contour my face around the cheekbones, forehead and jawline with this brush, but it I cannot be bothered or don't have enough time to do that then I use it just on my cheeks.

Here you can see the top of the brushes and what they look like. You can't really see the foundation brush as the buffing brush is so big, it's literally hiding it haha.

Hope this helps if anyone is unsure whether to buy this set or not :)

Love, Maya xo