My Favorite Underrated Make Up Brand

There are lots of great, underrated make up brands out there. Some of them are indie brands. Some of them are larger brands available at places like Sephora. And some of them are drug store brands, available just about everywhere. 

My favorite of those brands is NYX. If you haven't seen NYX at your local Wal-Mart, Target, or WalGreens, don't worry. NYX products are available online and at places like Ulta. But before you rush out to buy something new, let me tell you about why I like them. 

My first NYX product was a Soft Matte Lip Cream in the shade Stockholm. If you follow me on Instagram, you've undoubtedly seen me wearing this shade before. I wear it at least once a week. Actually, the tube is just about empty; I need to buy a replacement. It cost $4.50 and it is my favorite, absolute favorite, pink-brown nude. You can check out Stockholm here. 

Since then, I've started buying more and more NYX products. At first, it was just the Soft Matte Lip Creams: I have Stockholm, Budapest, Prague, and several others. Then, it was face powder (the High Definition Finishing Powder, NYX Blotting Powder, and SFX Setting Powder are perfect if you have oily skin). And then, it was primers: the Soft Focus primer balm is surprisingly amazing and the Studio Perfect Primer in green is perfect if you have reddish skin like me. 

My most recent obsession are the Lip Lingerie lip creams; they come in a ton of beautiful nude shades and dry to a perfect, silky matte. You can check out all the available colors here. I highly recommend the colors Push Up and Lace Details. Lace Details is a gorgeous pale pink nude (pictured above) and I wear it just as much as Stockholm. 

I'm rapidly becoming a "single brand" kind of girl. NYX makes everything I love using--and they are super affordable. I used to spend $35 a bottle on the primer I thought I had to use--but now my primer is $6 or $10, depending on which formula I go with. Which means, I can throw in a few more lipsticks and eyeshadows while I'm at it! 

Do you have a make up brand that you just absolutely love? 

I Love: Matte Lipstick

Shades pictured: Wet n' Wild Velvet Lip Color in Plumgenue; NYX Simply Vamp in Covet; NYX Soft Matte Lip Cream in Stockholm and Monte Carlo; NYX Simply Red in Leading Lady; NYX Matte Lipstick in Eden and Merlot.

I love lipstick. But it took me a long time to get it and truly fall in love. For a long time, lipstick was an aspirational beauty item -- the way some people aspire to better grows, longer lashes, or winged eyeliner without actually making an effort to learn the techniques to make it happen. I don't know when it started, but one day I decided to just, you know, buy a lipstick and go for it. That was three years ago, I think, and I've never looked back. My lipstick collection has grown to an embarrassing size and I can't really say I'm sorry about it. 

Most of my lipsticks have been of the standard, cream variety: they require primer and a lot of upkeep throughout the day. I have a few tried-and-true favorites, like Urban Decay's Revolution lipstick (in Naked 2, a perfect YLBB shade) and Covergirl's Coral Crush. A few weeks ago, I decided to try a matte lipstick and... it was amazing. Perfect, really.

The first matte color I bought was NYC Simply Vamp in Covet; technically, it's not advertised as matte, but it is a matte-metallic shade in dark plum. I had loved plum shades from afar and decided an NYX variety would be easiest to learn the rights and wrongs. Well, Covet rapidly turned into one of my favorite lipsticks; it's an instant, easy way to add a little goth-y toughness to a look. And the thing I loved most about it was that it was matte and it stuck around all day long... and? It didn't rub off. It was the perfect thing.

After that, my collection rapidly expanded, mostly in the NYX brand line -- they make some of the best colors for matte lipsticks out there that are both affordable and opaque. I got NYX Simply Red in Leading Lady next, a beautiful, matte, long-lasting pink-red. 

After this, I purchased my favorite matte shades so far: NYX Matte Lipstick in Eden (a bright red shade) and NYX Soft Matte Lip Stick in Stockholm (a nude-brown shade, similar to Rimmel's popular Kasbah). Before I got any more matte shades, I wanted to make sure I really liked them. Stockholm has rapidly become my go-to lip shade on lazy days. Eden is perfect for dressing up or days where I want to look more polished. 

Matte lipsticks have a reputation for being drying, which they definitely can be. The secret is to start with moisturized, brushed lips (use an exfoliating brush or a baby toothbrush to clean them) and to skip primer. However, I've found myself not having very many issues with matte lipsticks; I mostly just love that they last all day with minimal upkeep. In general, I have never liked lips that look super goopy and wet. 

I recently ordered NYX Soft Matte Lip Cream in Monte Carlo (a dark red, similar to Taylor Swift's go-to shade) and NYX Matte Lipstick in Merlot (a rich, dark berry shade); I love both of these as much as I love Stockholm and Eden. I especially like Monte Carlo, as I've been looking for a red that is neither too pink or too orange (I have a habit of picking pink-reds and being disappointed).

The same day I received these in the mail, I purchased a Wet n' Wild Velvet Matte lipstick in Plumgenue (from the Fergie line) for only $5; for the price, I just wanted to see how well they worked. The answer: it is much more sheer than I like, but I love the color of Plumgenue. It definitely feels velvety and smooth, but definitely is not as long-lasting as my other shades. 

Matte lipsticks represent the perfect stepping stone for those who want to use lipstick, but find the upkeep and fussiness annoying. If you find the right formula and shade, they will last all day with minimal smudging and smearing. 

Old habits die hard; I said I wouldn't write about beauty products anymore and yet, here I am, writing about matte lipstick. But sometimes, you just gotta shade what you love.