Best Lipstick Formulas 2019

As you probably know by now, I am k-pop girl-group trash. I watch a lot of k-pop videos, which means that I encounter a lot of k-beauty. Sometimes I resolve to devote an entire post to the makeup in one music video, only to find an even better look in another video three days later. If I go on like this much longer, I'll have a yearlong backlog, so let this post be my official trend report for spring 2017. I've isolated three trends from a range of videos, and since they're all more or less wearable, I hope you get some spring inspiration from this post! Trend #1: Hazy Peachy Eyes This is a much softer version of the warm smoky eye that still dominates Western Insta-beauty. In most iterations of this look, one or two light peachy shades are blown out all over the lid and the lower lashline, with a thin brown or black liner on the upper lashline. Sometimes the peach or orange accents are concentrated on the outer corners of the eyes, with a more neutral shadow on the rest o...

My tastes in makeup have shifted recently. I've noticed myself gravitating toward different colors, textures, and undertones, and caring less about "seasonal" makeup. Spring was so cold and dreary this year that I didn't feel like making my usual switch to coral and pink tones. But even now, with the hot, swampy Mid-Atlantic summer in full swing, I find myself drawn to murky, gloomy makeup: browns, dark purples, grays, that sort of thing. I'm still too much of a traditionalist to wear, say, NARS 413 BLKR in July, but I'm finding the summer-goth aesthetic more and more appealing. You might argue that this too is an expression of seasonal rules: only someone who cared about them would care about breaking them, right? Well, maybe so. And maybe I'm not even breaking them: black plums, thunderstorms, and blackberries all belong to summer. So let's say that I'm complicating the usual summer palette. Yes, that sounds pretentious enough for this blog. Th...

As I've mentioned before , k-pop is a visual genre as much as it is a musical one, and makeup is a crucial part of its visual impact. In this post, I've rounded up my favorite looks from k-pop music videos released this year, as well as some quick honorable mentions. If you're as tired as I am of hearing about Adele's contouring game in the "Hello" video, read on and get some new celebrity inspiration! I've listed the videos not in order of preference but in the order they were released this year. However, several of my favorite songs from 2015 have ended up on this list, which makes sense: if I hate a song, I'm not inclined to watch the video more than once, and a single viewing doesn't usually allow me to take note of interesting makeup. 1. Nine Muses, "Drama" Every k-pop comeback is an elaborate affair: the eager public gets a slew of teaser images and videos before the actual music video ever drops. Nine Muses hyped their January come...

October has always been my favorite month. As I'm sure I've mentioned before, my love of seasonal makeup has a lot to do with my upbringing. My parents and I lived in Boston until I was seven, when we moved to San Francisco. I spent the next ten years pining for "real seasons," especially fall, and I'll never forget the childlike joy of catching falling leaves during my first semester of college back in Massachusetts. I'm given to understand that appreciating the glory of fall is now a symptom of basic bitchery, I suppose because it's not a rarefied pleasure available to a select few. This article (since when does Buzzfeed quote Bourdieu?) notes the classism inherent in the "basic bitch" insult. I don't agree with all of the writer's points, but it's worth a read. In any case, I refuse to be ashamed of my autumnal raptures. Where I live now, there are about six weeks per year when it's actually pleasant to be outside, and October...