If I could give some advice to my younger self, it would be: don't spend so much on make up.
I did a bit of math recently and came to the conclusion I must have spent over 25.000 euros on make up in my entire lifetime. The worst thing is that most of the products were a disappointed, so a pure waste.
So I wanted to give some tips on what you can save money on from now on.
Nail polish
I tried making a collections of them. I would pair them with my outfit... my God. I was too lazy to do my nails every day, in fact, I hate doing my nails! I realised I only like pearl, pink, red, transparants, white, lavender and milky pink shades, and they go with everything, because they are natural shades, sort of. Anything else is stupid and a waste of money.
Cleansers that don't foam
I tried so many cleansers, always looking for something that just damn foams. Well, it is much easier to just use a mousse or to look for a product that explicitally says it foams. I recommand Avène foaming cleansing and the Estee Lauder Perfectly Clean Multi Action Foam.
Scrubs
Never ever buy scrubs. It's super easy to make them for the fraction of the price. Good bases are sugar, salt, honey and lemon. You can also add rose water or rose essential oil, or a drop of ylang ylang or lavender oil. Many store boughts body scrubs have weird odors and many face scrubs are either too gentle or too harsh in my opinion.
Blush in the wrong color
Another lovely collectable but so hard to get right is blush. Many blushes are too glittery, too pale or too pigmented. Don't even get me started on choosing a shade. Picking a good blush should really come from the heart and mind together. I think blushes in the medium price category are best, such as Lancome and Zoeva.
Entire brands!
There's entire brands I avoid and so far I have no regrets! These brands have only disappointed me and I quickly realised to stay away. I'll try to list them all: Clarins, Dior (except for their brushes), YSL, René Furterer, Shiseido, Collistar, La Roche Possay, Vichy, Redken, Kerastase, Syoss, Catrice, Essence, Bourjois, Rimmel, L'Oreal make-up, Clinique, Urban Decay, Yves Rocher, L'Occitane, Physician's Formula, Elf...
Brands I do recommend are, amongst others: Guerlain, Givenchy, Lancome, Benefit, Anastasia, L'Oreal Elseve, Pantène, Herbal Essences, Ralph Lauren, Nuxe, Caudalie, Maybelline, L'Oreal Serie Expert.
Now I am not saying you should do exactly like me, but let me tell you, you'll be alright without the brands I listed. The other brands have enough to offer for everything you need for your beauty. Avoiding entire brands helps a lot to not try new things that will only disappoint you. The best thing, of course, is to make a fixed list of your favourites and to never buy anything else, but for that I refer to my previous post.
Bad brushes
I wasted so much money on bad brushes before I realised there's only two good brush brands for me: Dior and Mac. They are soft, beautiful, and work amazingly well, plus, there is a brush for everything.
Eyeshadow pallets
This is something I have never used up, and frankly, hardly ever used. I got my first palettes from an aunt and they were all Dior and Chanel, yet I could not use it up. And I was barely using all the colors. Later I started buying little Catrice and Essence pallets, soon after that Maybelline, Elf, and L'Oreal. Let me tell, many many palettes ended up in the bin. The biggest problems are that I would only use one color and that the pigment was not strong enough. What I do recommend: only buy one or two small pallets with colors you really love, or buy monos. For eyeshadow I will make an exception for Clinique, they have pretty good quattros. For monos I like the variety at Mac.
Lipsticks I have wasted so much money on lipsticks! Always trying to find a sheerful pink, but the lipstick market has become really sad and boring, with matte liquid lips in cool browns being the norm all of a sudden, god knows why. For some reason it is very hard or beauty brands to just bring out normal neutral pinks and reds, especially in the gloss field
Drugstore in general
Honestly, how often didn't I have weekly hauls of 50 euros at the drugstore when I was in college? Seeing how I don't shop at drugstores at all anymore says something about how much money I wasted there in the past. True, once in a blue moon I will pop in for something I can only find there, like a specific hair dye color or a lash dye. But makeup? Not so much. Seeing the lipsticks melt everywhere makes me icky. I know high end makeup is more expensive, but trust me, you will spend far less in your lifetime if you quickly find a favorite high end lipstick and blush and stick to that until it is discontinued.
Hair products
In the past I tried a different shampoo and conditioner every month. Garnier, Dove, Pantène, I wanted one that actually hydrated my hair. And everytime something worked, the second time I bought it, it would work anymore. Is that their secret? How do they do it? How do they keep us rotating so blindly? So my advice is to not get sucked into all this marketing on the colorful bottles. Find out your hair type: oily roots and dry ends? And stick to a shampoo with a conditioner that is for dry hair, and stick to that. Hair products are my biggest regret in life. I could have gone to a salon pretty often with the money I spent...
Foundation
Foundation can be super expensive and it's tempting to buy expensive ones. Honestly, I always used mousse foundations in college so foundation was the least of my worries. Until I started dating and mousse foundation would transfer onto people's entire lives... So the whole circus started of finding decent foundation. I had a stash at some point, and also tried couture foundations like Diors, but most foundations are oily, too light, too dark, smell, have difficult color codes, get discontinued, or have poor coverage. I finally ended up with Estée Lauder's Double Wear and I love it. A good color code, wide shade range, full coverage that I can keep low, no perfume and easy to spread, that is just perfect. They are super overpriced here (50 euros!) but I always wait til I get a 20% discount. These foundations also last me half a year.
Conclusion Try to go for quality and don't be scared of more expensive products. Try to find the one product that fits you. And sure, it's ok if you want to buy a red, pink and brown lipstick. But it's good to stay with the brands and textures that work for you.
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