YSL Beauty, Google Glasses & Brown Thomas Dublin - weird but interesting collaboration!

Now here's something verrrrrry cool which appeals to both the Makeup Nut and the Geek in me.

Although the Google Glass project has, as far as I'm aware, been cancelled, there are still prototypes lying around and this is a particularly clever collaboration between Yves Saint Laurent Beauté and Google Glass - a "bespoke makeup tutorial experience", available exclusively at Brown Thomas Dublin as part of their Spring Beauty Event this year.

This "complete retail experience" aims to capture makeup application through the eyes of the professional (so presumably the MUA wears the Google Glasses), allowing the person having their makeup done to benefit from the perspective of the makeup artist later on - footage of the makeover is recorded, along with a before-and-after shot, advice and the step-by-step tutorial of the personalised makeup experience.  This highly customised video footage is later emailed to the customer, along with their tutorial footage, and (even more clever) the list of suggested (YSL Beauté, natch!) products used with direct links to buy (presumably from the Brown Thomas website).

This is a genuinely clever example of a clever use of a technology for which there really weren't any hard requirements, it really was a "solution without a problem" to-date, technology for its own sake really.  I'm liking this.  I am going to book in.  It's from 11th March I believe and in BT Dublin only to my knowledge.  Fred Letailleur (YSL's North European makeup brand ambassador is on-counter on 10th March for a series of masterclasses and 11th March for the Irish unveiling of Google Glasses for Yves Saint Laurent Beauté.  Appointments will cost €35, but they're redeemable against purchase on the day.

Am intrigued!

Clarins Ladylike Collection: Look of the day

Rather than just doing a review of some of the Clarins Ladylike Collection pieces I've been trialling, I thought I'd do a quick Look of the Day post instead.  Bear with me... I've never done one of these before!

Note that mostly Clarins products were used for this tutorial, however some other products of course were also used.
Warning: picture-heavy post.

How I... Store & transport my loose powders

This one is more about how I store and transport my powders around in my kit bag...

Venice Masked Ball - my costume

So I've been quiet on the blog front as of late.  There have been a number of reasons for this, full-time work, and bootcamp classes in the evenings, a trip away to London for work, a couple of product launches, and working on my very own lipstick!  All exciting things, but it's been absolutely mental.

There's another reason too.  I'm hosting a birthday in a couple of weeks' time - my own ;-)  It's one of those mumble-mumble birthdays, one of the ones with a zero at the end of them, one of the ones we're never happy with reaching.  I wanted to do something monumental for it.  I toyed with buying a "thing", however expensive, something so ridiculously OTT that I'd always remember the occasion.  But that idea just didn't interest me.  I don't want things.  I want company, and memories, and experiences.  I want family around for dinner and my friends out to the pub some night, and my husband to accompany me somewhere special.

Special, in this instance, was something I'd always wanted to do - go to Carnevale in Venice.  Go to a masked ball.  Dress up in silly finery and have a blast.  Looking into it all, I realised just how crazily expensive it all was.  Without going into the detail, suffice it to say that the ball tickets alone, although expensive, are only half the cost of the night - you pay about the same again to rent out a costume for 24 hours.  And the ball has a strict dress policy:  period costume.

So I decided that I would make my own - both to save some cash and to have the fun of creating.  So that's what I have been doing for the last couple of weeks;  crazed sewing, trying to fit in making a costume with everything else ongoing at the moment.  I finally finished it last night.  Well, early this morning really!

If you're remotely interested in a mainly picture-based post to see the evolution of fabric-to-frock, read on (I should warn you, it's completely unrelated in any way to makeup :-))

(Warning: image-heavy post)

Blog Posts: What to write about

Snapshot of some of the stats Google Blogger provides for a particular period of time
(these are for this week)

I took a look at my viewer stats this morning to see if I could get some inspiration on what to write about today.  I have a few posts started, but nothing near completion (or even near where they should be for editing down).  So instead I took a trip down memory lane on my postings in the last fiften months.  It was an interesting trip and revealed to me what people read the most.

If you're a blogger, or an aspiring blogger, perhaps this might prove useful.  If you're a reader, then maybe you'll discover some posts you haven't seen before!

How I track my cosmetics (Filemaker Bento)

Bento

This one might seem like an odd post, but a question I'm frequently asked (along with "how do you store everything) is "how do you keep track of everything you have"?

Actually it's a good question.  With almost 3,000 individual pieces of makeup, it's too easy to buy something I already have.  A few years ago I got fed up of the purchasing-and-return cycle when I discovered the latest purchase was already "in stock" at home!  In Ireland this can be quite irritating as these duplicate items can not always be returned, from a hygiene perspective, many cosmetics counters are loath to take items back (which makes sense).

My favourite YouTube videos of the last 6 weeks

This one is a bit of a cheat post!  Things have been beyond hectic lately and I haven’t had any time to catch up with my YouTube subscriptions.  I finally sat down last night to take a look at a long long list – nearly six weeks’ full of “new” videos all to be watched.  It was a long, fun night.  At close to midnight I realised I hadn’t written a blog for today, and given my 6am start, was unlikely to begin at that point.

So I thought I’d share with you the YouTube videos I enjoyed the most out of all those I watched instead J.  Maybe you already follow or subscribe to some of these very talented people, or perhaps you might discover something new and fun!  Either way, I hope you enjoy and I’ll try find time to blog later for tomorrow!

The Eye Brush Series - 2: Socket brushes

The first part of this series discussed lay-down brushes and how to use them.  Today's post is about socket brushes.  Most would argue (and I would agree) that blending brushes are probably the next most "important" or "useful" eye makeup brush but I'm going to digress a little first and discuss the socket brush.

The reason for this digression is because a good friend of mine (who is a makeup fanatic, who has a great collection of both products and tools, and who has a far-more-than-better-than-average understanding of how to apply makeup) asked me not so long ago why she wasn't able to get product properly into the crease area.

The reason, simply, was because she was using too large a brush for this area (she was using a large blending brush).  That's not to say you can't use a smaller blending brush for the crease area as a socket brush (and you'll find some brushes perfect for "socketing" are called "small blending brushes").  Similarly, some socket brushes make great blending brushes.  But a socket brush is a thing unto itself, and like a lay-down brush, or like a blending brush, there are many different types...

The Eye Brush Series - 1: Lay down brushes

So yesterday the sun was shining and I decided to write a series of posts about eye makeup brushes.  There's no link there!  I was sitting out on the balcony for a time and it seemed like a nice way to pass the time...

Eye brushes intimidated me by far the most when I started in on my Adventures In Makeup;  there are so many types!  Angled, blender, blunt, bullet, chisel, contour, crease, detailer, dense, dual fibre, flat, fluff and fluffy, lay down, liner, natural fibre, oval, pencil, pointed, slanted, smudger, socket, square, stippler, straight, synthetic, tapered ... not to mention the combinations thereof.

It really can be quite intimidating.  But there's really only few types of brushes you need, I've roughly divided these up into five categories and each day I'll talk you through each one... hopefully by the end of the week eye makeup brushes will be well and truly demystified!

How-to: Eyeliner flicks

As you know, I did a post lately on my favourite eyeliners... and in this post I mentioned that I really should follow-up with an information piece on how to do eyeliner (cat-eye) flicks.  Here it is.  It's a bit long, wordy and descriptive, but it shows you how to create perfect eyeliner flicks.  I hope it helps!