How to Perfect the Balanced Pout

It’s the Chinese New Year weekend upon us, what better time than now to don a superpower red lipstick.  Today’s post is all about that; I am going to show you how. Keep reading..

Liquid lipsticks and lipsticks in matte finishes are all the rage and let’s face it, each of us at least own a minimum three of them. Thank god for Colorpop’s liquid lipsticks, my personal favorite. It carries an amazing color selection.

While the wear of liquid lipsticks are pretty remarkable, they can be extremely drying on the lips and the post wear look can look.. Not attractive, the end.

My fellow lipstick junkies, help is at bay. Firstly, regular exfoliation keeps the lips supple and ready for lipstick wear. I regularly make my own lip scrub, super easy. I take a bit of brown coarse sugar and coconut oil, mix it in a tiny dish and it’s READY.

The dry patch that I battle with is the center of my bottom lip where the main lip area is, the cushion y bit.. One other area is the outer corners of the lips where all the icky sticky bits gather. The coarse brown sugar granules in this scrub help to gently exfoliate the dried skin while the coconut oil aids intense hydration. Did I mention that it smelly yummy, don’t worry about getting this scrub into your mouth. It’s totally safe, i promise.

Depending on your preference, scoop up the scrub with your fingers,  q-tip (cotton bud) as we call it here in Singapore. Gently exfoliate in small circular motions with mild and gentle pressure, all across the lip area for about 1-2 mins. Depending on how much time, you have on your hands. If there is any leftover scrub, this doubles up as a gently body exfoliating scrub too. Gently wipe away the scrub from your lips and now you’re ready for hydration.

I personally enjoy the Nuxe Paris Reve de Miel, it’s a “matte” lip balm. It’s almost invisible on the lips and works great for deep moisture restoration. By lightly dabbing the lip balm, it almost helps to fill in the fine lines on my lips, I love that!! Wait for 5-10 mins and gently dab away the excess remaining lip balm on the lips.

My upper lip is thinner than my lower full lip and it looks pinched in, on the sides. Almost resembling a Joker’s smile when I flash my pearly whites:(

This can be corrected with a few makeup tips and tricks that I feel have helped me over time with practice. Choose a lip liner close to the lipstick shade, first mark an “X” underneath the Cupid ’s bow and since I want to balance out the fullness, I draw a line very close to my natural lip line. I follow the natural lip line but extending the outer corners to fill in the pinched in lip area.

For the bottom lip, I draw a line inside of my natural lip line to even out the overall lip shape.  The lip liner prevents the lipstick that goes on later from feathering and serves as guideline, think of it as “coloring inside the box”

Fill the lips with the lipstick of your choice and to polish the look, even more. Take a little concealer onto a small definer brush and go around the lips, if need be. Touch on the lip line again with the lip liner once more.

For an appearance of juicy looking puckers, is to take a peachy lip gloss. I feel it looks great against a red lipstick. With a tiny bit, dab it onto the center of the bottom lips and you have a high shine 3D pout in an instant!

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Try the easy DIY lip scrub out, let me know and have an amazing Chinese New Year of the Monkey!!

Lots of Love

Shanthi A Vimalan