Beauty Picks

Bat for beauty queen lashes

MANILA, Philippines - To paraphrase my friend Xtina Superstar, when the falsies are on, you know it’s on. I have my false eyelash game down pat — I can pop a pair on within five minutes with minimal getting-glue-in-eyes, poking-eyeball-with-lash-strip mishaps most of the time. But even an admitted eyelash nerd like me is too lazy 90 percent of the time to bother with falsies, so I’m always on the lookout for mascara that comes close. (Let’s get real, though, there’s no mascara out there that will give you the length and volume of a proper pair of Dolly Winks.)

BeYu Beauty Queen Volume Mascara — the name alone has me tickled pink already, because we all know beauty queens rock crazy-thick lashes, right? — is the latest to find its way to my kit. The formula contains fine silica balls and micro fibers, key components in enhancing length and volume, and while the brush’s bristles are soft enough as to be gentle on your lashes, they’re also stiff enough to really give each lash its own coat of black pigment. Get ready to bat your eyes like a beauty queen.

Turn around, bright eyes

Young people are always asking me for advice for college. (I don’t know why; do I give off “I was a great student” vibes? What is this madness?) My advice is always to take your education seriously but dedicate enough time for fun and extracurricular activities, and to invest in a good under-eye concealer because, girl, you’re going to need it.

From college onwards, life will be littered with sleepless nights (you will be cramming schoolwork or swilling alcoholic beverages at parties, but you will definitely not be sleeping), and an under-eye concealer is crucial to keep you looking like you aren’t powering through on just two hours of sleep. While concealers with heavier pigmentation are great for covering up dark circles and blemishes, if you don’t really have any zits to cover up (did you sell your soul to the devil or something?) and you’re looking for a more lightweight formula for that delicate under-eye area, go for one with light-reflecting properties. The reflective particles in formulas like those will brighten up the shadowy areas of your eyes, thus brightening up your face and giving you that coveted fresh glow. My pick? One in a pen applicator that you can pop in your pencil case with the rest of your university necessities: Makeup Factory’s Light Reflecting Concealer.

What’s your nude attitude?

All girls will attest to the fact that it is really, really, really hard to find that Your Lips But Better shade of nude. Sometimes you think you’ve found The One, but when you look at photos of yourself wearing it, it makes you look sickly or washed out, or it looks too pink, or it looks too chola, or it comes so close to being perfect but misses the bar by just a little bit in some way you can’t explain.

Made with Asian complexions in mind, L’Oréal Paris has come up with a series of celebrity-inspired lipstick shades — varying shades of nude with pink, brown, and coral undertones — to help you find the right hue for you, whether you feel closer in complexion (or attitude) to Doutzen Kroes, J.Lo, Fan Bingbing, Gong Li, or Sonam Kapoor. Which one is The One? We’re pretty sure you’re about to find out.

The pleasure is mine

Despite my obsession with dark, brooding florientals, every now and then, I always find myself in the mood for a spritz of a bright, feminine, fruity-floral fragrance. (Also, sometimes I get tired of guys getting weirded out by my more esoteric fragrance choices. Apparently they want girls to smell like girls.)

Estée Lauder’s latest incarnation of its Pleasures perfume, Pleasures Flower, is undeniably feminine, opening with sparkling bergamot, neroli, and mandarin notes that blend into a totally fresh mix of cassis bud and leafy green notes, then settling into beautiful floral peony, rose, muguet, and jasmine with a base of ambrox and vetiver, it’s a feminine scent that doesn’t scream girl; fresh and light with a subtle hint of sexiness. It’s yummy, and you’re going to smell yummy with it on. We promise.

#NoFilter face

I never used to bother with primer. Ain’t nobody got time for that, or maybe I was just coasting through life young, fresh, and totally wrinkle-free back then. Now that I’m in my late twenties, the fine lines are sprouting like weeds, the pores are making an appearance, and my once-perfect skin is…no longer. The nice thing about spending the majority of your adult life trying beauty products for a living, though, is that you come prepared for the inevitability of aging.

In this case, primers are your friend. The Body Shop’s All-In-One Instablur Universal is a five-action skin perfector that minimizes shine and pores, helps mask blemishes, extends makeup, and unifies your complexion. In other words: It’s an Instagram filter you can slather on your face. Your skin feels smoother when you have it on; almost velvety in texture, making makeup that much easier to apply, and it never feels heavy on your face. Are you selfie-ready? You bet.

No, really, I woke up like this

I look forward to sleep because nighttime is recovery time. It’s the (ideally) eight precious hours of the day that you don’t have to spend trying to be nice to other people, and while you’re off in dreamland, your body does what it can to repair and reinvigorate itself. And your skin isn’t exempt from this nightly rehabilitation. It’s the best time to apply skincare products, because your face will have eight hours of you doing absolutely nothing to it to absorb all the nutrients and active ingredients you’re putting on.

Some of my favorite eye products have always been Estée Lauder’s Advanced Night Repair range — both serum and crème. The serum infusion is an ultra-lightweight formula that packs in hydration and preps your eye area to better absorb the eye cream you’re meant to put on afterwards. (I really exhaust my eye area by spending too many hours reading and putting on and taking off too much eye makeup, so this is absolutely necessary.) The crème then adds to that hydration and visibly minimizes the look of wrinkles and other solar and environmental damage, and it feels so soothing on the eye area that it’s no surprise you wake up in the morning looking and feeling refreshed, in spite of whatever fatigue you went to bed with the night before. Estée Lauder has improved upon their formula, and the new Advanced Night Repair Eye promises even more youthful-looking eyes. It hits shelves in August, so you only need to wait another week to try it. (You’re going to love it.)

You make me feel like a natural woman

Arguments are thrown out left and right for and against the use of natural products. Some will say that anything anyone has ever been allergic to is a natural ingredient and that synthetics are actually made to minimize this from happening. Some will say that some of the chemicals in most beauty products are actually carcinogens. Etcetera, etcetera, we can go on and on and never come to an agreement about this.

So if you lean on the natural end of the spectrum, you’ll be happy to hear that Flawless (the face and body aesthetic clinic) is bringing in Novexpert, an anti-aging beauty line that’s 100 percent natural in origin, 100 percent biodegradable, 100 percent hypoallergenic, and 100 percent chemical-free. (Sensitive skin, rejoice!) All of the eight products that we have on the local beauty market so far include an ingredient called Novaxyline, a complex derived from an algae found in Brittany that combats free radicals and inflammation, and also boosts your cells’ ability to repair themselves.