Life hack. Beauty hack. Hack this, hack that. I used to laugh whenever I heard some new “hack” everyone raves about. Lately, the joke’s on me because I discovered a few of them truly work!
Over the past few years, I’ve battled with things from terrible hormonal acne to the inability to find the right shade of lipstick. With a little help of Google, YouTube, and good old experimenting, I’ve found the top six beauty hacks that have quite literally changed my look.
Wash your body after you rinse out your conditioner.
Did you know that one of the biggest causes of back acne is shampoo and conditioner? If you need to let your conditioner sit in your hair, wash your face or legs and go back to washing your torso and back after you rinse it out so that none of it is sitting on your skin when you get out of the shower.
Avoid applying black eyeliner on your waterline.
PC: Cosmopolitan
Stick to nude or white eyeliner only! Putting black eyeliner on your lower waterline makes your eyes look incredibly smaller and causes a raccoon eye mess if your eyes tear up even slightly. Nude or white eyeliner will open your eyes and emphasize its beautiful color.
Moisturize your face even if you have oily skin.
Common misconception is you have to dry out your skin if it’s very oily. However, drying out your skin makes your it believe it needs to produce more oil to make up for the lack of it, causing your face to end up looking like an oil well. Be sure to avoid that by using moisturizers that are light and perfect for oily skin. My personal favorite is Clinique Dramatically Different Moisturizing Gel. If it’s the winter time, be sure to turn down the heater as it will dry out your skin even further, causing even more oil to surface. Yes, sadly that’s possible.
Don’t wash your hair every day.
PC: Guide To Gorgeous Hair
Going along with the previous hack, scalp is skin as well! If you constantly strip it of natural oils, you’ll find your scalp getting oilier as time goes by. Instead, brush it out consistently to distribute the natural oils which are better for your hair than any crazy pile up of product. If you’re hair is feeling just too gross to handle, dry shampoo and continue combing your hair. Try training your hair to last at least two to three days without wash. It’s very brutal in the beginning, but you’ll find that your scalp slowly adjusts and creates much less oil.
Pick out makeup based on your undertones.
What shade of foundation to choose and which color lipstick flatter you the most is dependent on your undertones. Look on the inside if your wrist. If your veins are bluer, you have a cool undertone. If your veins are greener, you have a warm undertone, If your veins are kind of blue-green, you have a neutral or olive tone and can experiment with shades to decipher which one is the best for you.
Cool Undertones: You probably get sunburnt easily and find that your skin usually looks a little pink. Stick to colors that have more blue in them. Lighter shades of pinks, bright reds, peaches, and light nudes often look great on you and can make your teeth look whiter. Your most flattering jewelry is most likely silver. Celebrities with this undertone include Anne Hathaway and Emma Stone.
Neutral Undertones: I fall into this category. I find that I can swing both cool and warm shades, but I tend to lean more on the warm side. Usually, I go for foundation much like “Warm Ivory” in the chart above and wear gold jewelry. Jewel tones, brighter berries, and darker nudes look best on you. If your lipstick has a little tint of blue to it, your teeth will look whiter as well. The beauty of having this type of undertone is you have a wider range of makeup colors to choose from!
Warm or Olive Undertones: You probably tan easily, and gold jewelry makes your skin look like it’s glowing. You would want to stick to warm shades like golds, bronzes, browns, dark reds and berries, oranges, emerald, dusty pinks, and dusty peaches look best on you. Celebrities with this undertone include the Kardashians, Beyoncé, and Jessica Alba.
Biotin AF.
I’ve been on a mission to speed up my slow hair growth and increase its natural shine. After four months of taking 5,000mcg of plain biotin a day (with non of that bear nonsense that Sugar Bear Hair is putting out), my hair is so shiny and strong that my hair stylist did not even know what product to put in it after cutting and blowdrying it. My hair also grew a magical three inches which seems like a small amount but is practically a mile in my hair growth history!
If you know me at all, you know that my list goes on and on. I managed to find two Cosmopolitan articles that sum up quite a few of my other beauty hacks (that I proudly thought were Erica-Originals *sigh*) much more succinctly than I could have on my own. They are linked below if you are curious to learn more.
That’s all for now, mes chéries. Happy hacking!
-E.
Based in New York City, Erica Huang is the creator and voice behind Bouge & Rouge. This blog is a playground of her thoughts where she invites you to join her on her journey through her 20s. Erica shares her lifestyle, fashion and beauty tips, adventures, and personal thoughts with the goal of inspiring others to always persevere and be unapologetically yourself.