FRESHERS: Quick 10-Minute Make-Up

After waking up with the world’s biggest hangover this fresher’s, the last thing you’ll want to do is put a full face of makeup on before heading out the door. So here’s a tutorial that shows you how to achieve the most from as little products and effort as possible.

1. First off, always make sure you’ve hydrated your skin with a good moisturizer and let that sink in for a few minutes. I use the Estee Lauder Day Wear Cream as it leaves my skin soft with a nice glow.

2. Cover any blemishes with a good concealer, I love the Estee Lauder Double Wear Brush-On-Glow Highlighter and Concealer, just dab onto your problem areas and sweep under your eyes to brighten up those dark circles, plus apply the tiniest amount on your eyelids and dab using your finger.

3. Then we need to highlight important areas of the face to brighten up your complexion for the day. The MAC Strobe Cream is a favourite of mine to use when not wearing as much makeup because of it’s creamy texture, use your fingers to apply to your cheekbones and up to your temples, the tip of your nose and the cupid’s bow on your lip and the arch under your brows. (Alternatively you can mix this into a tinted moisturiser or your foundation as well to get an all over glow.)

4. Just to add a bit of definition to your face, apply a non-shimmer bronzer, like the Peaches and Cream ‘Sculpt’ pressed powder underneath your cheekbones. You can also apply this over the socket of your eyes to add definition here too.

5. If you’re a lover of the winged eyeliner look and can’t bare to even think about leaving your bedroom without it, this is a toned down, more natural approach. I’ve used the MAC Eye Pencil in ‘Coffee’ across the top of my lash line. Don’t worry if it’s not perfect like your usual liquid liner, I sometimes even smudge it to make it look a bit more natural.

6. Apply 2 coats of your favourite mascara on your top lashes and a tiny bit to the bottom (only if you feel you need to as sometimes it emphasise your tiredness), this will open up your eyes even more when you’re feeling a bit under the weather after the night before. My favourite for years has been the Maybelline Colossal waterproof mascara in black.

7. And lastly, to add a bit of colour to your face, a product that has many uses: the NARS Velvet Gloss Lip Pencil, you can use this to line your lips and then fill them in with some colour, it also acts as a gloss too! (Another use I find it’s handy for is to sweep and blend it onto the apples of your cheeks to add a bit colour.)

 

So there we go, a minimal makeup tutorial that will have you looking fresh in just 10 minutes.

By Cara Slater founder of Coco Belle 

 

**Check out Cara’s Social Links for more insight into her business Coco Belle**

 https://www.facebook.com/caraslatermua/

https://www.instagram.com/caraslatermua/

FRESHERS: Best Cover Ups for the Morning After the Night Before

With your freshers just around the corner and your packing pretty much done, you’re probably beginning to plan all of the events and nights out you’re going to attend. If it’s your first year then you’re more than likely going to end up at all of them. If you’ve done the whole Fresher’s thing a few times you might have decided to take it easy. Either way, all that drinking and lack of sleep is going to play havoc on your skin. So here’s an insight into my 5 best cover up’s so you can look fresh, bright-eyed and ready for your 9am lecture the next day – even if you don’t feel particularly great, you’ll look fab!

1.MAC Pro-Concealer Palette in Light

This is one of my all time favourites when it comes to covering up those under-eye bags. I use it after I’ve put on my foundation, or sometimes without if I want a quick fix before heading out the door. I use the pink tone mostly to counteract those dark circles, and if I find it’s too heavy for my skin when I’m not wearing a lot of makeup that day, I add a couple drops of MAC Prep and Prime Essential Oils to get that dewy feel.

2. W7 Hide ‘N’ Seek Colour Correcting Concealer Quad

If you don’t want to break the bank on the MAC palette (face it you’ve probably already spent most of your student loan on clothes and a new Macbook), this is a great cheaper alternative. I bought the anti-redness palette to cover up the spots I get on my chin when I’m run down, and a little bit of this goes a long way underneath your foundation. 

3. Estee Lauder Double Wear Brush-On-Glow BB Highlighter Pen

I love this pen! It’s a concealer and highlighter in one! It’s perfect to use on top of foundation when contouring, or just sweep straight onto the skin and underneath the eyes to brighten up your complexion. And true to the Double Wear trait it will last for hours leaving your skin looking radiant all day. 

4. Maybelline Age Rewind Dark Circles Eraser Treatment and Concealer

This is another that won’t make you feel guilty after you’ve bought it. The sponge tip on the pen makes it easy to sweep under your eyes, and it does what it says on the front too, it will actually erase those dark circles you’ll have inherited after the not-so-fresh Fresher’s Week.

5. NARS Radiant Creamy Concealer

And last but not least, another favourite of mine is this miracle in a tube. A lover of all things NARS, I was love-struck when I discovered this beauty, it covers up problem areas completely and with it’s creamy and smooth finish it will leave your skin looking flawless.

By Cara Slater founder of Coco Belle

Beauty Product Buying and Preserving – The Student Way

I like to think ahead about things and I mean very ahead. I like to plan and estimate how much things are liable to cost and make budgets and all that shizz. Yeah sometimes it’s very pointless. But, sometimes it’s worth it. Like when I started university last September.

So as a student it’s pretty hard to stay on top of money (unless you budget) but sometimes there is unexpected events or you end up spending more money that you thought which means you have no money for the important things… like shampoo, moisturiser , toothpaste all the toiletries and beauty products you need. So I decided to be pro-active. Spending the whole summer working before going to university my bank balance was doing ok.

I knew that if I just bought a bulk of stuff before I actually got there it would mean I wouldn’t necessarily have to go into my loan money when I ran out. Let’s face it I could have set aside money for all those products but the liable outcome is I’m going to spend it when I think something is worth it ‘Ah, Fall out boy are playing in Cardiff- lets go!’. We all know how that ends: I’ll get in the shower and find there’s no shampoo, I’ll then have to trek to the local shop with my unwashed hair and pay way more than I usually would.

So basically I bought excess amounts of everything along with my http://www.latestinbeauty.com/ boxes. I’ve only had to buy shampoo again once. And my year was basically over!

But, what happens when you buy all this stuff but you use it so much it doesn’t seem like it will last long enough? Well I found the most perfect example of how much of products you actually need from everyone’s best friend https://www.pinterest.com/. This should help preserve your products. Ultimately saving you money, giving you more to spend on those important party beverages. (Plus you’ll look  extra good with all your beauty products on!)

Enjoy!

Festival Inspired Make-up Tutorial

Just about to turn 25 Cara Wyn Slater is a self-employed make-up and beauty therapist.  She started the business back in April of this year, which has since been rebranded from her own name to the elegant “Coco Belle” and is now on 700 likes on its Facebook page. She’s become a household name for beauty in the local area – You have to be quick if you want to get an appointment as they fill up fast! At great prices and with gorgeous results it’s hardly a surprise there’s such high demand. Here she shares with The Young Collective a tutorial for the much-awaited festival season!  You may be thinking Glastonbury is behind us but there’s still time to get all glamoured up for festivals like No.6, Bestival and Reading and Leeds! 

“I work around the clock but I love what I do: I’ve met and worked with so many different characters and clients over the past couple of months and it’s them that keep my business alive! I do all my appointments in a beauty room I’ve set up in my own home, so it’s all very personal and that personal interaction with the clients are what help me understand what they’re looking for. These relationships are what help develop my business even further!

As I woke alone it means I can adapt what I offer to the needs of the customer. Changes in what I offer are usually due to changes in the latest trends for example the highly requested festival look! I spend countless hours perfecting looks and seeing what’s hot. If you’re going to do this job, you have to keep up to date with it!

When the Summer season officially started I began thinking of new and fresh makeup looks to try out, and exciting new promotions for my business. Festival makeup has propelled in the past couple of years and 2016 hasn’t slowed it down: with flamingos, unicorns, mermaids and pineapples being used as centre-stage for inspiration. It’s the one time of year where you can wear literally anything and get away with it.

It’s a very important season in a girl’s calendar, as well as planning where to go and how big a tent to take, our hair and beauty choices for the weekend also get a very important spot on the top of the to-do list. With inspiration from celebrities like Vanessa Hudgens, Kendall Jenner and so much more at Coachella, it’s hard not to realise that festivals have become the newest catwalk.

Many clients asked if I would be doing Festival inspired makeup for the long-awaited  Festival No.6.  It’s now on its 5th year and is being held in the Italian inspired village of Portmeirion, just up the road from where I live and am based, in Penrhyndeudraeth.

After researching photos and ideas on Pinterest and Instagram (If you need inspiration for anything they never let you down). I’ve decided to promote Festival Eyes and Hair for that specific weekend in a style that corresponds with the beautiful seaside setting of Portmeirion, which sits on the Estuary. So here goes, here is my first Festival inspired look.

As it’s summer, I love a heavily bronzed face for any festival just to keep up the appearance of jetting back and forth from our villas overseas. Along with a prominent bronze across the cheeks and temples, I also use plenty of highlighters to illuminate the cheekbones and bring out the glitter. Although I’m keeping with the beachy feel I’ve gone for colours that are a bit more out there than the subtle golden colours we typically see around the summer season. Instead, inspired by mermaid everything it’s all about the Turquoises and teals for the eyes for a blue sea vibe and to bring out that bright festival feels. I’ve then finished off the look with a nude matte lip to emphasise the attention on all the glitter and not to distract too much from the glamorous make-up going on around the eyes!

Check out Cara’s social media pages and get your bookings in quick!

https://www.facebook.com/caraslatermua/

https://www.instagram.com/caraslatermua/

Is Today’s Media having a damaging impact on 21st-Century beauty?

21st-century beauty standards are portrayed as quite straightforward: tall, long-legged, white-skinned, all in an athletic-looking body. It’s amazing how for many women this has become the prime definition of beautiful. Worryingly, it’s young girls who have come to believe that a Victoria Secret Model’s body is the ultimate goal when it comes to aesthetics.  In reality, these hopeful body goals are down to what we call media: Hollywood star Instagram accounts, magazines headlines “how to achieve that summer bod!”, and model pictures with the caption: #goals, all of which are being used by the younger generation to compare and depict all their flaws.

It saddens me to think that many young women will put themselves down for not looking a certain way, instead of embracing who they are, they will criticise themselves,a habit we’re all guilty of doing. They think they’re unattractive, ugly and go as far as using words like ‘disgusting’. I’m sure you’re thinking “that’s a harsh word to describe yourself” but, the reality is it is these types of personal judgements that lead girls to drastic measures to be ‘beautiful’. This ugly turn causes young girls to forget to value themselves and can lead to threatening health issues.

As a victim of Anorexia, I googled perfect bodies, pointed at them, and said “I want to look like that.” I would look through magazine articles which told you what eating/exercising regimes stars use to look the way they do. I was obsessed. Many praised me for my quick weight-loss, and at the time I enjoyed everybody praising and complimenting me for my quick achievements. But, it’s impressive how people find a 16-year-old obsessing to lose 10 kilos to be a success, a body which I realise now is perfectly fine.

It was only when I began to look sick that people worried. And this, like it did for me, happens to so many girls, actually 1 in 5 women struggle with an eating disorder or disordered eating. I believe this all comes from the stigma of what the perfect body is created by the media. It is an extremely easy trap to fall into, when you are naturally critical of yourself, you are therefore, already placing yourself into a vulnerable position.

Not everyone falls into the category of having a disorder but, frighteningly many do live thinking they’re not good enough, oblivious to their true self-worth. Here is the important part: humans are all built differently, we all have different metabolisms, different body types, and come from completely different heritages. We fail to forget that genes play a massive role in how we look, and the issue is that these givens just can’t be changed. It is so much easier and less self-destructive when we learn to embrace our personal traits. You would never taunt the people who gave you your body, the people you love, so why do it to yourself?

Being curvy is not being fat, having an athletic body is not looking like a boy, being flat-chested doesn’t mean you’re an 8-year-old girl. Most importantly not looking like your favourite celebrity does not under any circumstances mean you’re any less beautiful. Our society needs to understand that girls are spending so much time on achieving something unattainable. Celebrities dedicate their lives to the way they look but, young girls have futures to aspire to. 90 % of people with eating disorders are women between the ages of 12 and 25, the peak ages whereas young adults we are trying to figure who we are, what we want to do, and who we want to be. How can anybody live to their full potential when they can’t find self-confidence within themselves? How will girls be the best they can be if they personally don’t believe that they’re worthy enough?

21st-century beauty standards are slowly changing and people are starting to not shy away from who they are. We’re now seeing more curvy models setting their own standards and a variety of celebrities speaking out on body positivity. However, this is just the beginning there is still a lot of work left in convincing our younger generation to start loving themselves, before putting their energy into looking like someone else.

Feature Contributor, Astrid Sofia Flores Moya