10-Minute Makeup With Urban Decay, Clinique, MAC , Make Up For Ever, It Cosmetics and More

Question: What girl puts on makeup just to clean her office?

Answer: THIS GIRL.

I figure what the haaaay! A little eyeshadow will make the act of purging old Post-It notes, product packaging and stacks of magazines that much more “professional.”

At least that’s the idea.

Fast-forward to right meow…

I didn’t want to spend forever and a day putting on mah face this morning, so I gave myself 10 minutes, and here’s what I came up with.

Because it’s a little more colorful than yesterday’s 10-minute makeup, I think it has a little more oomph.

I used cool-toned matte browns on my lids to softly define the eyes, along with a highlight in the inner corners to brighten things up a bit, and a bold fuchsia lip for a flash of extra color.

I think this look would be totally appropriate for most work environments, and you can seriously bang it out in 10 minutes.

Here are a few things I did to save time…

Simplify the primer situation — This won’t apply to you if you already skip primer, but if you’re a fellow primer addict/practitioner (seriously, I use four for most of my makeup looks), try to simplify (just a little!) by limiting yourself to one. For this look, I only used Make Up For Ever’s Nourishing Primer, which I applied all over my face, on my lids and under my eyes.

Then I concealed my under-eye circles with concealer (Maybelline Fit Me Concealer), and since I was already in the area, I took that up to my lids, adding a layer, which I then set with powder. That way I was able to skip my usual routine of NARS Pro Prime.

Same goes for brows (simplify, that is) — Instead of my usual brow rigamarole, which has lately involved filling and setting my brows with Anastasia’s Pencil and then setting them with Anastasia’s Clear Brow Gel, I used just one brow product, Bobbi Brown’s Natural Brow Shaper, because it does a little of everything.

Pick a palette (or two!) — For speed makeup, I like having a face palette that contains a blush, a bronzer and a highlighter, and 2) an eye palette stocked with flexible neutral mattes. That way I have everything I need for a basic everyday look in one place, and I don’t have to rummage through different containers and whatnot.

Try a timer — Do you have an egg timer or a watch? I use the little timer thingy in the Clock app on my iPhone. Today I set it for 10 minutes and placed it right in front of me on my desk where I could watch it counting down…

Don’t obsess about blending — I’m a weirdo perfectionist, and I can easily get carried away with blending, but for time-sensitive makeup looks, I have to let it go… Seriously, it’s OK if it looks a little messy. I think the key is picking two shades — like a light brown, and also a slightly darker brown — that aren’t too far from your natural skin tone. That way you won’t have to do a ton of heavy lifting.

Also, if the bright pink lip is a bit too bold for you, you could swap it out with a neutral lipstick. Here’s the same cheeks/eyes with a soft rosy pink matte (Tom Ford’s Pussycat) in place of the fuchsia…

Makeup I’m wearing in this look…

Click here to read the rest of this entry...