Introduction

Hi everyone. I'm Val. I'm currently an Architecture student from Singapore with a slight obsession with buying the makeup that I can afford. Between buying materials, paying for printing and makeup, I'm perpetually broke. But that's besides the point. 

*Warning, big rant in coming 2 paragraphs, read only if interested.

I like to surf makeup blogs in my spare time. I also like to google swatches of things that I might never even get (hands up I'm sure I'm not alone in this) . This blog was born because of my general unhappiness at the state of make up blogs. I believe in a thorough review, and I appreciate someone who can write an informative review. I am tired of going through blogs who claim to review products, and then swipe a picture from the internet with no actual usage of the product. I am tired of having to go through archives to find out what shade the blogger is. A picture is never accurate especially with foundations/concealers because lighting changes the colour of skin! I want to read a blog that I can trust. I do not want to read a blog where I can only assume the blogger has tried a product out, and for an unknown amount of time because that only wastes my time. I appreciate short reviews for what they are, but as I have claimed previously, to come across a thorough review is rare.

Also, I cannot, for the life of me, understand swatches. Maybe because there are less Asian makeup blogs, or maybe, it's just that there are few Asians who are as tanned as me. Or maybe, i just cannot guesstimate colour. The reasons that will forever remain mysterious to me have driven me to try to compile a series of skin tones, and to show them in comparison with my skin tone as well as the swatch. I give the example of a ruler. Without a ruler, we will never know the true length of our noses, we can only give a good guess. If that ruler is present alongside the face, not will we know how long our noses are, we know how far it is from the tip of our head or our chin. Hence, even if the swatch is just on my skin, I find having other skintones available help me out greatly is guesstimating how many shades darker or lighter I would have to go with that particular cosmetic product.

*End of rant.

All unhappiness aside, my discontent has driven me to want to do something to counter what I feel is lacking, and I will, to the best of my ability and resources, try to achieve a certain standard of integrity and thoroughness in my writing.

I have a long (as a percentage of my life) history with make up. That would be just about 8 out of my almost 23 years of life. I blame my Mom. She introduced THE EYELINER to me. Ever since then, she has persistently nagged me to use eyeshadow, and I have consistently refused. The eyeliner is my first love. 

Somehow somewhere, nobody in my life breached the topic of good makeup removal. I suffered horribly for my negligence, and broke out horribly. It might've partially been due to stress and other factors, but my negligence exacerbated it. I have had acne and scarring for a good 4 years. I saw a doctor for 3 out of those 4 years and tried everything, but this DARNED skin refused to cooperate with me until I started Accutane. So very slowly, my acne and cysts(oh lord I hate cysts) started to subside and my scars started to fade. Till today(I'm still on a low dosage of Accutane, have taken it for a year), I'm still waiting for some cysts to subside. Hold on a minute before passing judgement to say that "oh her skin can't be that bad". I have pictures from 2011. Small to not scare the living daylights out of you. Pissed because... Well who wouldn't be pissed off with skin like that.

My skin is much better now but that aside, I have developed some skills (I hope) in covering up scarring and meanwhile, also learnt how to curb acne on my sensitive skin which tends to get irritated using creams like Retin A and Benzoyl Peroxide (I blame the eczema!!!!). Also, I find that just putting foundation/concealer alone is half assed (because who doesn't like flushed cheeks and bigger eyes!), and have also developed a terrible obsession with pretty much everything except eyeshadow (in defiance of my ma?).

So this is my story, and to put a face to it, this is me trying not to look greedy as I drink my coffee.

Thanks for reading!