My Travel Makeup Routine and Some New Favorites

As some of you may know, I recently went on a trip to Spain (don’t worry, I will be posting a travel blog for this trip in the coming weeks) and came back realizing how easy it was for me this time around to get ready in the mornings while I was on my trip. I don’t know about you, but traveling always seemed to help me strip down my makeup process and stick to the essentials that make me feel good and photo op ready, without it feeling so tedious. As much as I would love to be glammed up and look my very best, I want to be seeing the sights and enjoying my time in my destination, rather than spend an hour in my hotel room doing my makeup. If you want to know what my makeup routine is like during my vacation, keep reading below! I also talked about packing tips for makeup and beauty products in this post a few years ago, and definitely still use these tips to pack for my vacation until today.

Lash Extensions Sidebar:

Before I start talking about my routine, I do want to address that traveling with lash extensions has been such a game changer for me. I definitely recommend getting your lashes done when traveling, especially if it’s not a beach trip and more of a city trip like exploring cities in Europe. I find that it really helps cut down the time I do my makeup, not just for everyday, but also especially during my trips. As I’ve mentioned before, I have hooded eyes and relatively short lashes, so for me lashes bring a lot more oomph to my look than doing my eyeshadow. Yes, I can do false lash strips, but I always found them to be too obvious if I don’t wear any eye makeup, so I always end up having to do even a simple eye look if I do decide to wear lash strips. Having lash extensions lets me skip that step all together if I don’t feel like doing it, and guess what, I still look like I spent at least half an hour doing my makeup, even though I’ve only spent 10 minutes doing it. If you want to learn more about my lash extension experience, read this post I published a few months ago.

Face

So to start off, I do my face makeup first. Normally if I do glam makeup, I start with my eyes then do my face after, but when I’m traveling I find it more convenient to start with my face in case I’m running out of time, I can at least make sure my complexion looks good and evened out as I’m running out the door.

Lately, I’ve been skipping my usual Tom Ford primer and just use Natasha Denona’s Anti-shine Flawless Face Base on my T-zone, because I’m still very oily, and it was still quite warm in Spain when we were there. To even out my skin, I’ve been loving Sephora’s Matte Perfection Tinted Moisturizer and I’m in the shade 09 Chiffon. You guys, I don’t think I’ve ever loved a tinted moisturizer until this one came into my life! I love how weightless it feels on my face and how undetectable it is. I would even just wear this alone on days when I can’t be bothered to wear makeup but still want my skin to look even. I struggled with a bit of stress and jet lag for most of my trip and have been loving the Nars Creamy Concealer in Biscuit for my undereyes to not make it so obvious that I’m only getting 3-4 hours of sleep at night. I’m back to using my Kevin Aucoin Contour Powder in Deep and boy, did I miss it so much! It’s really just the perfect contour shade! It has enough warmth to look natural, but has a beautiful cool undertone to give off a shadowy look and sculpt out my cheekbones. Tom Ford’s Blush in Ravish has been my everyday blush as it just gave me the perfect tanned rosy flush on my cheeks, and then I swipe a quick wash of MAC Oh Darling Highlighter at the tops of my cheeks to give me a bit of a glow.

Eyes

For my eyes, if I do decide to wear eyeshadow, I start with MAC’s 24-Hour Eye Base. I actually I do try to swipe this eye base even when I don’t apply anything else to my eyelids because it helps control my oily lids and one enemy of lash extensions are oils because they loosen the glue that’s used to attach them to your natural lashes. And yes, the oils on your lids do make their way to your lashes and lash extensions, so putting primer on your lids will not only help to control oily lids but it’ll also work to help prolong their wear.

Complete travel makeup look in a very dim romantic lighting! LOL!

Anyway, now that I gave you that spiel, I usually use MAC Layin’ Low Paint Pot to even out my lids or even as a hint of one-and-done warm brown eyeshadow, but since I’ve been a bit darker for the Summer, it’s a bit too light on me. I actually started using Tom Ford’s Emotionproof Eye Color in Abyssinian during my trip and I think I found the perfect muted,but smoky warm brown shade for my lids! I’ve been digging the muted smoky look it gave my eyes which it made it look like I spent a lot of time with my eyes, but really I just swiped a quick cream eyeshadow. If I’m feeling like making my eyes look even more smoky, I add a little bit of Marc Jacobs Daddi O! Gel Powder Eyeshadow on the outer corner and use Sephora Eyeshadow in Flawless to blend out my crease (looks similar to MAC Soft Brown).

A shocking discovery I had during my trip is how much I enjoyed using Natasha Denona’s Mini Nude Palette for a more done up eye makeup. Seriously, I brought 3 other palettes to possibly use during my trip, and I haven’t even touched any of them. I’ve only used the Mini Nude palette when I wanted to do an actual glam eye look during my trip.

I tend to finish off my eye makeup by using Nars High Pigment Longwear Eyeliner in Mulholland Drive on my lower lashline, it doesn’t matter if I’m actually doing my eyeshadow or just putting eye primer on my lids. This eyeliner has that beautiful warm bronze color that I love for my lower lashline just like my Tom Ford Metallic Mink eyeliner, but for a fraction of the price.

Lips

I’m gonna be very honest that lips are always a struggle for me because I tend to forget to put on lipstick or delay application until I’m in the taxi or just apply it on the go, but I never skip putting on my Laneige Lip Mask. for this trip, I found that I reached for the Fenty Stunna Lip Paint in Uncuffed a lot because it was just a beautiful muted rose color that looked very similar to my natural lip color and it also just felt weightless on my lips I sometimes forget that I was wearing liquid lipstick, which is pretty uncommon to many liquid lipstick formulations. When I felt like wearing a bolder lip I went with the Nars Lipstick in Afghan Red which added just a beautiful hint dark raspberry-red to my lips.

Now you’re probably thinking but how about your brows? You haven’t mentioned anything about your brows, Kristine! Well, something that I have not announced on the blog/IG yet and something you wouldn’t know unless we’ve seen and talked to each other in person is that my brows has been microbladed back in April and I’m loving it! I almost never fill it in, as the color has been pretty good and dark, but if I do want to add more drama to my brows I found Benefit Precisely My Brow Pencil in 3.5 a perfect match to it. Don’t worry, I will have a detailed post about my microblading experience next week, in case any of you are thinking of it or just curious with what the process is like, and will link it here once it is up!

Please feel free to comment any questions you have about microblading in the comments, and I will try to answer them in my upcoming post. Also, if you have any questions about the products that I mentioned or want an in depth review of them let me know, too! Lastly, I’m curious, do you guys tend to keep it simple with your makeup while traveling or do you tend to do more makeup than you normally wear daily?