All posts filed under: Softly Special: All About the Eyes

Without Further Adieu, Goodbye Eye Makeup Month!

(LOL. I know my title is wrong. Give a girl a break for trying to crack a joke!) I was going to post an eyeshadow collection, but then it made me feel like a poophead for having so much. So I won’t post it right now, but let me know if you’d like to see it. Anyway, I just wanted to say thank you for enduring an eye makeup only month and for being so nice about my stupid queued posts and the frequency of them. 🙂 I really appreciate all the comments and the suggestions. Since this Eye Makeup Month is a sort of special celebration of my birthday… are you wondering when my birthday was? It was yesterday! 🙂 I was nursing some bizarre allergy so I didn’t get to take a photo of what I wore. However, if you were curious, here’s what I used: I turned 25, gag. I think my brain stopped being aware of my age at nineteen. Aside from Eye Makeup Month over here on Softly, this is …

Quick Tips: Face-Eye Makeup Coordination

For the last feature on this month’s eye makeup special, I wanted to bring the rest of the face along. 🙂 You can wear the most elaborate, exciting eye look but a not-so suitable cheek and lip match may dull the impact of your eye makeup either by being too subtle or too bold. Just a disclaimer: there are really no rules you have to follow when it comes to makeup. Wear whatever you want, but here are some tips to consider if you want a more ‘put together’ look. 🙂 I’ve gathered some of the things that I felt work well, and attempted to explain why they worked well! As a general rule, it helps if you pick one feature to highlight. If you want to wear a bold lip, go easy on the eye and cheek makeup and go for a more natural, defined look. You can do that by eyeliner + mascara combination, and a strong contour instead of going for a bright blush, or going for a neutral, understated eye.

Falsies: Why Go Through All the Trouble?

I’ve always been fascinated with false lashes, or falsies, but could never figure out how to wear them without feeling like I was someone else. It honestly just felt like too much effort, and I didn’t understand what the big deal was. Was the effect that dramatic that it would merit an added, somewhat complicated step to an already multi-stepped routine? Due to uneven eyelids the lashes don’t look the same on both eyes, either, because one eyelid would eat the band up, and it was just not pretty. The nail that put the idea of false lashes in the coffin was this photograph of myself… …and this video by Jenna Marbles (What A Girl’s Makeup Means) where she pointed out that having on false lashes was literally a sign of you taking the effort of gluing little hairs to your eyes. It is proof that you cared enough about how you would look that you would take fake hair and glue it to your eyes. And I didn’t like the idea of that, so …

Breaking the Neutral Mold: Colored Eyeshadow for the Not-So-Bold

I’m sorry for the no-post day yesterday! I had a scheduling conflict, lol. But it’s kind of sad because it’s been a while since I went a day without a post. I’ve just been a bit busy lately! But hopefully we are back on track. 😀 I think you all know by now that I love eyeshadow. I mean, let’s get the obvious out of the way. I used to be really scared of colored eyeshadow and would stay away from them. Except for purple because purple is really pretty. Don’t get me started on blue eyeshadow! I mean, yikes, right? But then I got over it. And certain blues didn’t seem so bad. I think a lot of people are scared of wearing colored eyeshadow because they think that it’s a one-way ticket to Train Wreck Island. I was one of those people, but here are some ways you can ease your way into the colored eyeshadow world. Here’s just a few things to keep in mind if you want to be a bit …

In Defense of Eye Palettes, Plus 8 Neutrals You Should Look Into

I love palettes. It’s a pretty good way to “save” some money while getting to try a lot of colors. I think my interest in art and design also manifests itself in this preference for palettes of singles, just because a well put together palette is one of my greatest weaknesses. I accumulated a lot of makeup in a short period of time, and the culprit really seems to be eyeshadow. When a brand releases a palette that puts together colors and shades that work so well with one another, it takes a lot for me to say ‘no’ to it. Eyeshadow palettes are probably the only makeup item that I feel like I ‘collect,’ just because my logic center shuts down in the presence of a gorgeous mishmash of colors and shades. Pretty. I’ve slowly been realizing that I am much more drawn to a beautifully thought-out product than to the option of customizing something on my own. I feel like I am partaking in a story that someone is trying to tell, though …

My Ocular Affliction

Sorta. I mean, it’s not anything serious like blindness or perpetual allergies. Nothing like that, but it’s a little trying when you can’t do simple things like getting an even thick line over it. You see, my eyes are of a typical Asian hoodedness. However, they fold quite differently, like so: As you can see, the folds are uneven. Which is, I suppose, fine for general eyelining and such: But when I want to wear a cat-eye or a thick Korean-inspired line, shit ensues and I look like an asshole who can’t do her own makeup. I just thickened the line by adding another line on top of the existing one, and check out how it looks like when my eyes are open. Yikes. Asshole alert. I tried lining my wonky eye while it’s open, but while it looks good and even when my eyes are open… I turn into a stupid face when I blink! That’s literally how much thicker of a line I need to draw on one eye just so that they …

Taupe’s Top Mystery: What is it?

Okay, so this is what happened when I tried to swatch all of my taupes. I went through most of my eyeshadows and asked myself “Is this a taupe? Yes. Is this a taupe? Sure,” and I somehow ended up with a neutral rainbow I think that’s a common issue with taupe, but I didn’t realize how arbitrary the description is to me. Apparently, everything is “kinda a taupe” in my eyes, but I digress. I tried to bunch them up into tonal categories, too, and I had a hard time. The reason why this is part of “eye month” is because taupe seems to be a universally popular color. Not counting people who are partial to just colored eyeshadow, I don’t think I’ve met anyone who actually hates or dislikes taupe. It is becoming increasingly evident that there is a taupe for everyone. I figured I could talk a bit about each color instead and think about why I find them to have taupe-y qualities. First off, though, let’s get the definition of ‘taupe’ …