My boyfriend recently left his job in the UK, which is great news relationship-wise: we met in my former graduate program and have been long-distance since I started my current program seven (!) years ago, and now we’ll actually be able to live together for more than a couple months at a time. On a… Read More Kiko Velvet Passion Matte Lipstick in 319 Chocolate
Most makeup collectors have their color kryptonite, particularly when it comes to lipstick: pinky nudes, corals, blue-based reds. For me that color is, and has pretty much always been, magenta. Or whatever you want to call it: bright plum, dark fuchsia, anything that walks the line between purple and deep pink. I just did a… Read More Magenta Madness: MAC Rebel and Wet n Wild Nice to Fuchsia
Something different today: a mini-review of a product that isn’t makeup! You’ve probably noticed that my obsession with color makeup is several orders of magnitude greater than my interest in skincare, brushes, haircare, or “boring makeup” (mascara, brow stuff, concealer, etc). But for variety’s sake, I thought I’d write about a new tool that’s been… Read More Real Techniques Mini Sponges
I’ve owned two Glossier Generation G lipsticks, Jam and Cake, for over a year now, and I wear both pretty regularly. They have their flaws (enumerated in the reviews I’ve linked), but I love the ease and subtlety of the sheer matte finish. So when I heard that ColourPop was releasing a new lipstick formula… Read More Sheer Matte Showdown: ColourPop Blotted Lip vs. Glossier Generation G
Now that beauty-throwback trends have slid forward in time from the Brown ’90s to the Iridescent ’90s, brands are releasing a flood of metallic lipsticks—or, at least, what they call “metallic lipsticks.” But there tends to be a huge amount of variation between one formula and another, and even between one shade and another. Some “metallic” shades… Read More MAC Metallic Lipsticks in Metal Head and Pale Rose, and a Lipstick Taxonomy
You know that feeling when you blind-buy a lipstick, hoping that your instincts are right and the shade will flatter you and fill a hole in your collection, and it turns out to do both of those things? That’s a nice feeling. It’s not a particularly interesting or bloggable feeling, which is perhaps the reason… Read More Maybelline Inti-Matte Nude Lipstick in Naked Coral
Happy Easter! Full disclosure: I’m one of those secular assholes who welcome the Easter season not for its religious significance but for the positively pagan abundance of egg-shaped chocolate. Growing up half-Jewish, I couldn’t help noticing the difference in quality between Easter candy and kosher-for-Passover candy, which consisted (and still consists) primarily of coconut-covered marshmallows… Read More FOTD: Cyborg Easter Bunny ft. NYX Twilight Tint
I was eight for most of 1996, but I remember that year quite well. In fact, I remember it as an especially good year in my young life. My parents and I had moved to San Francisco the year before, back when an assistant teacher and a busker at Ghirardelli Square could afford a nice… Read More Reverse Lipstick Chronology #3: Urban Decay Roach
Drugstore makeup has become a lot more interesting over the past few years, and I can’t help but envy people who are just getting into makeup now and have access to so many weird lipsticks at affordable price points. I’ve always been drawn to slightly eccentric makeup, but in my early twenties it was impossible… Read More Reverse Lipstick Chronology #2: Maybelline Smoking Red
SPRING BREAK WOOOO …oh, right. The weather may suggest otherwise, but I’m now on spring break. That doesn’t mean very much in ABD world, since I should technically spend every waking hour chipping away at my dissertation, but I’m still planning to use my extra free time (or the illusion thereof) to write some reviews… Read More Reverse Lipstick Chronology #1: MAC Whirl
Auxiliary Beauty 