30 Day Makeup Challenge: Day 15, Blue Eye Shadow

 Blue eye shadow is notoriously hard to wear for day. I think there were some moments in the nineteen sixties and seventies in which is was perfectly fine. I can picture some ladies with big hair and nipped in waists in the typing pool on Madmen wearing it, but those days are gone.

So color me bold when I put on this matte cool French blue on my lids. What's really nice about having hooded eyes is that when you look straight ahead, mostly folks can't see what color is on your lids. So you can create a dramatic surprise by adding unusual shades and finishes to that area. I like to put some shimmer, some sparkle, one bright color, or even a bunch of colors there as a little gift for folks who are paying attention.

 As you can see, this look is a bit gentler in artificial indoor lighting. I like the way the purple tones come out here.

So here's what I used:

Eyes:

• MAC Soft Ochre Paint Pot as primer
• Urban Decay Vice Palette Chaos on Lid
• Urban Decay Vice Palette Disruption on Crease
• Urban Decay Vice Palette Lace to blend Crease Color up into browbone
• Maybelline Eye Studio felt tip eye liner on lash line
• NYX Slide On Eye Pencil in Navy on Water Line
• L'Oreal Voluminous Mascara in Carbon Black

Here are some tips on working with blue eye shadow:

• Ground the blue with a neutral in the crease and blend them together there
• Finish it off with black eye liner along the lash line
• Blend the shadow a lot, and then pack on more. Sometimes blue shadows aren't as pigmented as we'd like, so they can get patchy. If you really want to be sure to get full coverage, start with a white or, even better, a black sticky base like a NYX jumbo pencil or some other creamy shadow base.
• Go smoky and put something dark, a blue, gray or brown, in the water line
• Restrict the blue to the eyelid if you want to go a bit more stealth on it, and avoid the crease
• Use a nice light concealer under the eyes to make your smoky lash line stand out, and to avoid the sense that it's just the veins and circles under your eyes showing through instead of some nice blue eye liner that you chose to rock today
• Keep the rest of the face pretty neutral, both to feature the eyes, and to avoid an overall clownish appearance
• Since blue eye shadow can be a bit old lady, but it can also be a little Rock n' Roll and glam, wear stuff that fits the Rock n' Roll style - like the black leather jacket I wore here

So what do you think, Beauty Fans? Comment below.

Thanks for coming by my blog!

Love, BeautyJones

Swatch Saturday: Crown Brush 180 Palette Panel 3

Crown Brush 180 Palette Panel 3

The day before yesterday was Swatch Saturday for me. I decided to get back to cataloging the massive and daunting Crown Brush Palette. But Yesterday was the Nautica Malibu Triathlon, so that's why you are getting this post today!

The Tri was really a fun race, the ocean was smooth and the current was with us, the water temperature was a balmy 71 degrees! And on the run, just when it should have been starting to get too hot, a blessedly soft white marine layer of cloud and fog rolled in at either end of Zuma Beach. Such a great day!

And speaking of ocean, this panel has lots of watery blue and green shades. If you haven't checked out my first two posts on this palette, click here to read Panel One, and here to read Panel Two.

So here's what I did starting with Panel Two, and I know once I get through this monster of a palette, I'll want to go back and do it with Panel One, as well: I named all the shades. Yes, it's hard to do that, but it's also a great copy writing exercise, so maybe I should thank Crown, and Inglot, and Wet n' Wild, and others, for not naming their palette shades, instead of whining about the fact that they have no names. I suppose I'd rather whine a bit. I know if I had a cosmetics company, I'd be naming all of my shades to make them memorable. And that's the end of my mini-rant.

So as I go, I'm naming all the shades. It makes it a heck of a lot easier to talk about them. Et voila! Here is the panel with my names!

And here's what they look like swatched on my hand!

Crown Brush Palette 180 Kaleidescope, Panel 3

This palette does really give you a whole lot of options! If you've been reading my blog, you know I love blue and green eye shadow probably a lot more than I should. There are some days when I do risk verging into Frank N Furter territory with my makeup. I think one of the keys to avoiding this is to keep a lot of neutrals going on the other parts of ones face, and in the crease.

Here are my favorites:

• Ariel and Siren are so intense and shiny. It's always easier to find highly pigmented shimmery shades, I've noticed, although I don't know the science behind this fact. I'd love to know why matte shades so often take a lot of work to build up intensity. This fact definitely holds true in this palette.
• Loden, Tiber and Thames. See there what I did with the names? I was just in London and Rome, and since these were murkier muted shades, I named two of them after the rivers in those cities. Ain't I clever? (I expect you to throw a pie at me at any moment, and it would be deserved.) Anyways, these 3 shades are the most neutral and wearable for fall. Thames and Tiber have some nice antiquey gold shimmer to them.
• Antifreeze. It would be wrong to wear this crazy bright green with a touch of teal on my eyelids. Really, this is the color of tennis nets, mosquito netting from the seventies, and other tackle you might find on a boat. It's wrong, and that's why I love it. Challenge.  Can you rock this shade or something similar without going full-on Little Mermaid or Frank N Furter? Can you? Do it, and link me to the images/video on the comments below!
• Siren, Reef and Cruise - These are so marine blue. They are all shades you find in the Mediterranean, and so they make me happy. Oh, I love me some ocean! This weekend the Pacific at Malibu was 71 degrees, people! For me, that's no wet suit water! Yay! There were dolphins! The curling waves were beautiful but not so large as to be dangerous. No one's there now because it's after Labor Day, so it's easy to park. Go there! It's a heat wave! Swim in the water, it's so nice!
• Bayou, Tardis and Gloaming. Yes, I'm a Dr. Who fan, a Whovian, if you will. If you have Netflix, start watching the modern seasons, starting with the Christopher Eccleston ones. You'll thank me. Yes, it's silly, yes, it's a kid's show, but it also gets you weepy, and it can really scare the pith out of you. Watch, and tell me I'm wrong. I love this show! So that's why one of these colors just had to be Tardis blue to me. I love the delicate violet tones of these blues. I think they would probably look super-pretty on brown eyes. And they will maybe look cray-cray with my light hair and green eyes, but I want to try them anyway.

And below I have loads more pictures of the swatches on my hand, because lighting makes for different colors, so please to enjoy!

I hope this post was fun for all of you. Let me know what you think!

Love, BeautyJones!