Retro Makeup Tutorial Part 1: 50's Glam/ Pinup

Another tutorial? Yes! Recently I wrote an article for Stylecraze about this look and I thought I would share it here as well. I plan to do a look for every decade till the 80's. I hope you enjoy trying them out. This one is definitely one of my favourites.. Actually I can't decide which one i love the most! They're all so different and fun!

This look was majorly inspired by Dita Von Teese, I feel like she is one of the few people who would look completely out of place today, without the 50's look.

So here is the breakdown of the look:

Step1: Cover the entire eyelid area with a matte nude eyeshadow that is lighter than your skin tone.

Step 2: Using a dark brown matte shadow, contour the crease. Make sure the crease is defined well but the edges are soft and blended.

Step 3: Fill in the eyebrows with a dark brown shadow or eyebrow pencil. Make sure to exaggerate the arch.

Step 4: Under the arch of the eyebrow apply a pearly highlight colour, blend it down. You can also highlight the inner eye area.

Step 5: Create a dramatic cat eye liner, thin in the inner corner and very thick on the outer. You can also draw it down to the lower lashline if you wish. To make an easy cat eye follow my tutorial here.

Step 6: For an extra oomph use fake lashes. Or just curl your lashes and apply a thick coat of mascara.

Step 7: Sorry for the bad quality of this picture. For the lips, use a matte red shade, nothing says vintage like red lips. Make sure you make the cupid's bow rounded incase yours isn't. I know mine isn't! LOL!

What else? Make sure your foundation is flawless and skin is absolutely matte. Apply a pink blush to the apples of the cheeks, not the cheek bones and draw on an eyeliner beauty mark, skip this step if you already have one, like me!

This is what my final look was like:

Full face: I look so pissed here! LOL!

I even tried to make it look all vintage in Photoshop. :D

I hope you enjoyed this tutorial! Next week is the Mod Sixties! Be prepared. :D
You can try my matte moon manicure with the look or I just checked out my Reading list and Puja has done a great post on 50's nails! Check that out too and you can rock the entire look. Like a liege?

Requested K-pop Inspired Tutorial: Ren from FACE (Nu'est)

I got this request from Niti on my last K-pop tutorial, sorry it took me so long! I think I spent more time dancing to the song than I did on the tutorial.
This is the look she wanted me to do:

So, this look is actually on a guy, i know many of you wont believe me but yes that IS a guy. This look was so nerve wracking! Mostly because it looks so easy. LOL! And Asian eyes being so different I had to tweak it a bit to make it look good. Plus I had to make it look good on girls. I made it a tad smokier. :P
In the images you don't see much eyeshadow but watching the video you'll see that he is wearing eyeshadow. So, anyway, here's my take on it.

Step1: I used a silver grey pencil and drew a fat outline of the eye. I also made a downward arrow on the outer corner and filled it up.

Step 2: Blend out the pencil upwards.

Step 3: I patted on a silver shadow within the crease area.

Step 4: I used a nude matte shadow, slightly lighter than my skintone and blended out the silver from the crease. I took the nude upto my brow bone and softened the outer corner.

Step 5: I used a black eyeshadow and blended it well on the outer corners very close to the lash line.

Step 6:  I used a black gel liner and lined the lashlines, I brought the wing down rather than up.

Step 7: I added white eyeliner pencil in the center of my waterline just to brighten up the look. And added mascara.

And you're done!

I hope you guys liked this look! For the face, just keep it really concealed and flat, with nude lips.
And please give me more requests, I really enjoy doing them. :) I have 2 more to cross off my list though.

Oh, and here's the video of the song FACE by Nu'est, where you can see his look more clearly. Warning: Song is addictive!

See ya!

Nail Art Challenge Day 2

Argh! I'm so late!! Sorry Puja. :( This has to be one of my most hurried nail arts yet but I was out all day and got time to start at 11pm. So I had to hurry. ;A;

Puja at Cute Nails is having a great nail art challenge, you can go to her blog and see the other participants as well.. I still have to do that myself! Anyway, I decided my theme would be owls since the category was animals and since I started so late in the night, it seems appropriate. :P

I know it got messy, I feel so bad, I'm going to redo this some day and do it justice. Now I gotta sleep! G'night guys!

Cute Nails Lets Share Nail Art Challenge! Day 1

Instead of having just a Manicure Monday today, I thought I would take part in Puja's nail art challenge! :D She's come up with really fun things to do for this challenge and this is actually the first ever challenge I'm taking part in. So, this should be EPIC!
To take part in the challenge check out the Cute Nails blog!

So, the theme today is "Dots" and this is what I came up with:

Products used:
NYX "Surf" for base
Dots:
Maybelline Colorama Black, Roxo Metalico
Street Wear Silver Sparkles
Pink, black, white nail art pens
Sally Hansen Double Duty top coat

I'm not happy with it, the dots look messy. ;A; But I love the colours! :D

Btw, there is another blog hop this week! Do take part. :) You can check it out by clicking the button!

Blog Awards Time!

The Versatile Blogger Award!
I got this from Sweet and Bitter, who is definitely more sweet than bitter. ;) She had nominated me for this in April and the lazy lump that I am, i'm putting it up now. -__- But anyway, YAY!

The Sunshine Award!
Puja and Niesha, who both have absolutely amazing blogs nominated me for this one! Thank you girls. :D

Now for 7 facts about myself:

• I live in Mumbai with my grandma and sister.
• I'm Punjabi but I can't speak the language, instead I can speak Marathi.
• I have an OCD with my nails, one small chip and I change my polish.
• I love my pets, I have a turtle, two mice and a red betta fish. I'm going to get more fish.
• At one point of time I had 8 fish tanks all together housing 15 bettas.
• My favourite food is Chinese, i can eat it everyday.
• I love K-pop, Anime, Star Wars and The Simpsons.

I pass these awards to:

1. Anna
2. Beauty Gossips
3. Ray
4. Ms. Nyx
5. Banannie
6. Jyotsna
7. Sharlynn
8. Shubha
9. Sahar
10. Coral Crue
11. Between Friends
12. Neha
13. Stacie
14. Sudeshna (only non make up blog here. XD)
15. Beauty Through my Eyes

The rules:

1. Thanks the person who nominated me and give them a shout out
2. Pass on the award to 15 bloggers
3. State 7 Random facts about your self

Hope you enjoyed reading this, can't wait to read facts about you girls. :D

Review: KronoKare Beautiful Nails

Kronokare is a company I never really heard of before, so when I saw this Beautiful Nails cuticle remover online, I was a bit skeptical. Then again it was only 75 INR so I decided to try it out. To describe it, it looks like Gelusil or Peptobismol. :/ No smell and it claims to give you 75 manicures in one bottle. It is to be used on dry skin and not wet.

Now, for a good thorough test of this kind of product, my nails are no good. Since it is summer I have no dry cuticles or hangnails. So how was I going to test out this product? I decided to test on someone else... My dad.
My dad's feet deserve a paragraph to themselves, I hate to say but they've been mistreated. My dad's feet have seen years of gymnastics, commando training, several years in the army etc etc.. His toenails, especially the smallest ones had a lot of cuticle and skin growth on them and it was my job to get it all off! So, you can see what a challenge this was for a lowly cuticle remover (and me!)

We need a pedi! STAT!

To remove cuticles all you need is a drop, the liquid softens up dead skin and cuticles and they can easily be scraped off or removed with a cuticle removing tool. My dad's first concern was that Beautiful Nails might have some kind of acids that dissolve skin and cause damage, but that was not the case.

The Beautiful Nails softened up the skin to such a degree that I didn't even have to apply any pressure to remove the skin. It didn't cause him any pain and didn't take long either. All I had to do was scrape and clean with a cotton ball.

Me in my pajamas, working (not so) hard!

The end result:

TADAA!

After seeing these results, I'm sold! If this thing can do that ^ it can definitely work for anyone. If you're too lazy or cheap to go for a mani-pedi evey month, I would definitely recommend KronoKare's Beautiful Nails to you. It took me half an hour to do both my dad's feet and both of us were very happy with the results!

Breakdown:
Cost: 75 INR

Pros:

• Softens dead skin and cuticles fast.
• No burning, tingling sensations.
• Easy on the wallet.

Cons:

• Not available everywhere. The only place I've seen it is Urbantouch.

Verdict: Definitely a buy again product!

Hectic Schedules!

I just wanted to post about the lack of posts yesterday. It was my mum's birthday yesterday! Woohoo! I took her out to get a pedi and a facial, she hadn't had those in 20 years! D: She really enjoyed it though and I think she'll get them done more frequently now, maybe every 10 years? LOL! My sister and I also bought her a bottle of Elizabeth Arden's Green Tea.. I ♥ IT!!

Today, I've been working on tutorials and reviews, the review bit was especially hard because it require me cleaning my dad's toenails. *is never eating again*, so hopefully I'll be posting some awesome stuff over the weekend. ^u^

And psst.. I started collecting things for my very first giveaway today! I picked up two small things today, but I'm hoping to have a nice big treasure by the time I hit 100 followers. 

Anyway, I'll leave you today with a random picture of my turtle! She's a red ear slider, given to me by the BF for our first anniversary. :D She's 2 years old now. ^3^  Don't her red ears remind you of some elaborate makeup? 

She's looking all smug because she messed up the plants after I fixed them all. -__-

Now I'm off to eat my tandoori chicken dinner. See you tomorrow! ♥

The Villains of Faceville- Blackheads!

I know, blackheads are those sinister beasts we can never seem to beat, poking out of our pores, mocking us, making us feel miserable. But now Garnier Pure Active's new campaign shows us, that these little Facevillains have personalities too, and not very nice ones!

Blackheads are not something you want on your face -- ever. The word alone is not a pretty one. So before this skin issue came to a head, so to speak, the experts picked their brains. This summer, Skin care leader Garnier Pure Active has come to the rescue of many distressed teenagers and young adults haunted by this skin problem.

Talking and educating people about Blackheads is not the easiest task to accomplish. So Garnier Pure Active has come up with a campaign that will not only educate the audience but also engage them in a way never done before. So after a lot of outrageous thinking by some imaginative people, Garnier Pure Active has unveiled the Bust Blackheads Campaign.

The Thought:

Get the Blackhead talking! Give an identity to the blackheads and educate the audience through quirky characters, instead of going the usual preachy way. How is that done? 
Design characters that are likeable yet have a personality annoying enough for them to eventually die at the hands of the hero the “Blackheads Uprooting Scrub”.  The task is to ensure that when a person sees these characters, he knows they are ‘Black Heads’ in the true sense of the word.

Meet the Blackheads:

Garnier Pure Active has created a fictitious town called Faceville which for obvious reasons resides on your face & the citizens are called Facevillains taking into consideration the damage that they cause to your face. The Facevillians have names characteristic to a blackheads personality.

Education through Engagement:

Blackheads are black spots on the skin. The main reason for its occurrence is oil secretion in the skin which leads to the growth of ugly blackheads. Apart from oil; pollution, sweat, improper personal hygiene, dust, etc are also the other major reasons. Now reading these above 4 lines could probably put you to sleep. So Garnier Pure Active has decided to educate the users through funny comics and situations that occur on Faceville which is the Blackhead world.
In order to engage the users, the brand will be running a series of contests and fun interactive quizzes which allow Fans to be a part of Faceville and interact with them. 

Here are a few funny situations: 

Media:

Facebook being the central hub for the campaign, digital banners across sites such as YouTube, Yahoo, Indiatimes, In.com, IDiva, the Google Network and other niche sites are being used to proliferate the message and generate visibility.

The teasers have consumers guessing who these ‘characters’ really are. The objective is to create intrigue and generate a sense of ‘likeability’ for the design and also communicate that these characters are ‘bad’

Sustenance: 

The sustenance phase of the campaign will be revealed in two stages that will educate consumers about blackheads. Apart from being visually stimulating, the campaign focuses on core communication and has strong elements of education and zeroing in on the product truth. 

While the campaign will be on for 60 days, it took close to two and a half months to create the characters.

The aim is not only to engage but also to educate. The campaign has generated a lot of interest and people are increasingly talking about the brand.

Interesting campaign right? Check out more on this fun campaign on their Facebook page here and their app Faceville Times, which happens to be Faceville's Weekly newspaper, here.

Blog hopping anyone?

I found something really cool today on Puja's blog! Blog Love Therapy! And I'm going to try it out, it sounds like a great way to find great blogs and help people find yours! Anybody up for it? :D Click on the button!

A Late Manicure Monday: Pastel-nail-mania!

I wanted to get this up yesterday but it was family vacation weekend and I got home only in the wee hours of last night so I'm posting today! If you've been a reader of my blog for a long time, you will know I love bright colours, neons even! Especially on my nails. But now and again I like going against my personality traits just to mix it up and put in a pastel here and there.
Truthfully, I have all of 3 pastel colours, probably more if I really search but otherwise I stand by three. So, I thought I'll show them to you one by one.. So here's the first one, a very NOT me, pastel pink. But then, one can't change too much, so here it is with a few coats of NYX's Multi Glitter (which btw is a great dupe for Deborah Lippmann's Happy Birthday.)

With flash: Elle 18- No. 48 topped with NYX Advanced Salon Formula- Multi Glitter

Elle 18 no.48 on its own.

I like Elle 18 polishes! They're cheap at only 50 INR, I can try out colours that I wouldn't buy otherwise. The quality isn't the best though, they will chip around day 2-3.

With multiglitter top coat, no flash

In direct sunlight

Isn't it a pretty combination? What are combos that you like? Have you found any dupes for hard to get polishes? Comment and let me know! :D