Youtube is a great place to learn anything and everything. Like most things on the internet, you log on to look for one thing, and then you catch yourself clicking on one video after the other.
While I was perusing the Youtube world one day, watching some of the makeup gurus that I follow, I couldn’t believe what I was seeing. Here, a makeup icon, being watched by hundreds of thousands of people, did something so insanely gross on camera.
What is this you ask?
She stuck a Q-tip in her mouth, and proceeded to clean her mascara off with her spit. YUCK!
This is a little forgivable since she was doing her own personal makeup, but I still do not approve of this habit.
As a professional makeup artist who practices safe and sanitary practices for myself and my clients, I can’t stand to see these things happen.
What scares me is, I actually see many professional makeup artists who have no clue how to apply makeup the sanitary way.
Here are some pointers that you need to keep in mind to help keep your makeup kit sanitary:
- Don’t ever use your spit to clean anything. Don’t lick your brush and dip it into your makeup, don’t wet your Q-tip with spit to clean your mascara, DON’T DO IT!
- Clean your brushes regularly with brush cleanser, and deep clean them once a month or so with some mild soap and water.
- Haven’t used that lipstick in awhile? Spray with 99.9% alcohol, swipe the top layer of the lipstick off against a paper towel, then spray with alcohol again. Let dry, and use as you please. You can also do this with your retractable liners.
- For pencil liners, spark up a lighter and carefully bring the pencil to the flame for a few seconds. Don’t try to set it on fire! You are simply just using the flame to burn off any bacteria. (If you don’t want to do the flame method, just use plain old rubbing alcohol.) Sharpen the pencil, then spray with alcohol afterwards. Let it dry before using.
- Clean your sharpeners too. Spray your sharpener with alcohol, wipe, then spray again.
- To clean cream products like cream blushes and foundations, wipe off the top layer with a Kleenex or paper towel. You can spray with alcohol, but be careful, it might alter the cream product. Try it in a small spot first.
- Powder products don’t harbour as much bacteria as creamy or wet products do, but if you want to clean them, wipe the top layer with a Kleenex.
Products like Beauty So Clean, which is made for the sole purpose of sanitizing makeup products. You can spray any and all of your beauty products with it, but I would still be careful spraying it on powder products. It may react with the top layer of powder and create a hard crust.
There are guidelines as to how long you can keep a makeup product, but I like to keep things really simple: if it’s changed in color, texture, or smell, toss it.
How about you, are you a germophobe? How do you make sure your beauty products are infection free?