First up – apologies for missing out on last week’s post but I finally decided to map my domain and let’s just say, I got easily confused with some of it.
Now I generally don’t like to label my posts as for fair skin because frankly, I like my coloured makeup products contrasting with my skin tone but naturally when it comes to base makeup, I won’t be caught dead in the sun or self tan for that matter so matching for body tone is a must. As a general rule, I’d say I’m a pretty close match to MAC NC10 and I am generally the palest shade in brands that make pale shades but having said that, there are definitely people that are fairer than me. My body and neck has a slight pale yellow under tone and my face is a hint lighter and more neutral than the rest of my body with some pink in my cheeks. My skin type is dry and my main concerns are skin texture and translucent skin under my eyes.
I went through a period a while back when I ditched foundation but now I’m back in in the swing of things. Now back in the day my best match was the Chanel CC Cream in 10 and really there wasn’t much choice when it came to foundations. Since then a number of brands went through shade expansion and along came MAC NC10, Too Faced Cloud (also a good match for me) and Fenty 100s. Having said that brands still tend to struggle with diversity when it comes to under tones and more often than not the paler the shade the less opacity it will have. As far as my preferences go I like my foundation to be neutral and the best match I’ve found so far comes from the Smashbox Studio Skin Foundation in 0.1 which is a lighter version of NC10 but has that same neutrality which can work for many pale skinned people as long as you’re not very cool toned.
I use a small pump of this foundation and work it into the skin with my fingers for a good medium coverage that blurs the texture of my skin, covers a fair bit of the redness and slightly corrects the veins under my eyes in preparation for concealer. It has natural finish, dries down to a non tacky finish and looks undetectable especially for the amount of coverage it has. Even more surprising given how light the shade is but the pigmentation of this is actually fantastic. My biggest pet peeve in foundations is the pigment sitting on top of the skin and it’s certainly not the case with this one. It comes out as a fairly thick liquid but once you start blending it into the skin it starts feeling like working in a CC cream and melts in perfectly.
Because this counteracts some of the veins under my eyes, I don’t mind using it with some of the light coverage concealers I own. It works well with the Fenty Pro Filt’r Concealer in 110 which is the prime example of a product that has less opacity than the darker shades in the range but I like it for its natural finish. On the days like this one, I was feeling extra dark so I went in with the Too Faced Born This Way Concealer in Fairest first which is deeper than the foundation so counteracts the darkness really well but also has a natural skin like finish. Layering the two colours also creates the slight brightening effect without looking ashy (something the pinky 110 can do on its own). Again I find concealers work best with my fingers because the formulas are thin and the brush spreads it way too far.
To finish off, I dust my face with the Hourglass Ambient Lighting Powder in Diffused Light. Both these products are non tacky so if you are very dry, you definitely don’t need to set it but I personally prefer the look of powdered skin. I actually owned this powder years ago when my skin was more combination and I’ll admit that I found it more light impactful then but still, it’s a very fine powder with slight pearlescence and from a distance provides a more diffused look to the skin.
Overall I continue to be impressed with this foundation especially after skipping base products for so long and 0.1 is easily one of the best matches I’ve ever found in a foundation so it definitely makes me more inclined to reach for it more than any other of my base products. Have you tried the Smashbox Studio Skin Foundation or any of the other products I used? What are your thoughts?
Style On Film 