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College Beauty Tips: 5 Essential Products For An Everyday Makeup Look

Written by CB Community

Great makeup products help you accentuate your natural beauty, everything from lip-plumping gloss to contour-specific powders.

However, as a college student, it can be hard to find a makeup routine that fits into your busy schedule.

We put together our list of recommended items for an easy everyday look. If an item doesn’t match your taste or something we don’t list, make changes.

Your makeup works for you, not the other way around!

Let’s look at our list of top five makeup products you need for an easy everyday makeup look.

1. Mascara And Eyeliner

We’ve combined these two products into one category because of how much they serve the same purpose – and they are a quick and easy way to get an everyday college makeup look!

Both should highlight your eyes, accentuate your iris, and emphasize the eye area over other face areas.

Now, the ‘weight’ of mascara and eyeliner varies with each new fashion season. Sometimes light and subtle are everything, only for a dark smokey eye to gain favor again a few months later.

The best strategy for deciding on the right mascara and eyeliner is to go with what you like. 

It comes down to finding an eye you like and finding an easy routine that doesn’t take extra time on a normal busy college day. We recommend black or charcoal shades of both mascara and eyeliner. 

Colors are great for occasions, but they depend on your entire outfit and limit your options for the rest of your makeup. So for your daily driver, stick to something simple. 

2. Primer

There are a lot of ‘essential’ makeup products on the market. However, one can’t get replaced with any other primer.

Primer has its benefits in that it plays a role in your general skincare while preparing your face with a smooth and even application of makeup.

Sure, it is an extra step in your routine, but it makes the rest of the work that much easier and, perhaps more importantly, that much quicker. 

3. Concealer

Another non-negotiable makeup must, concealer is the secret weapon in your makeup arsenal, especially if you’re battling acne breakouts.

If you use it right, it should look like you haven’t used it. A concealer differs from a foundation in a vital way. Designed to correct uneven color and skin tone, it is a must-have. 

Any redness, spots, or dark or shadowed areas are ‘concealed’ by this wonder-product. It is thicker in consistency than your average foundation and gets used in moderation. If you used it right, it would look like you haven’t used it at all. 

Therefore, your concealer must match your foundation perfectly. However, your foundation should precisely match your skin tone, so concealer should always be a shade lighter.

That is because concealer has more pigmentation, so it will look darker than your foundation unless it is just that little bit lighter with its thicker consistency.

4. Foundation And Powders

Foundation is fundamental, or so we always say. As the name suggests, it quite literally is the foundation of your makeup look. Foundation creates an evenness in tone across the face.

You may not notice it, but different face areas have thinner or thicker skin. It is usually a pretty slight difference, but adding it over tends to highlight the differences. 

Before any makeup look comes out as intended, you need the even skin tone that foundation offers. Remember, even a slight difference in skin tone changes how makeup and powders are present on the face. 

We use several powder products to different effects, but that all come down to the same purpose.

Here we mean things like contouring powder, bronzer, and blush; anything you use primarily on the cheek. 

5. Lipstick

There was a time when lipstick would have made the top of our list, but these days we are all becoming a little more confident in our natural beauty.

It means different things for each of us, and for many, it means no more lipstick in favor of a truly nude lip. That is one of the cases where you can skip this entry if you fall into the latter category.

If you use lipstick, it is probably one of the anchoring aspects of your entire makeup look. A factor that brings the entire look together while emphasizing the lip area.

In that case, you should always have your lipstick within an arm’s length. 

Given industry trends and what we see in bleeding-edge fashion, you might want to make one small change. Top professional makeup artists all agree that we wear our lipstick a shade or two too dark on average.

Try going on a shade lighter in your favorite color and see if the results aren’t perhaps a better match for your skin tone. 

About the author

CB Community

Passionate members of the College Basics community that include students, essay writers, consultants and beyond. Please note, while community content has passed our editorial guidelines, we do not endorse any product or service contained in these articles which may also include links for which College Basics is compensated.