I brought you Edition 1 of my all time and then-current favourite makeup products a couple of months ago, but as a makeup addict it doesn’t take long for me to find and develop new favourites. Which means it’s time for another edition of my makeup favourites! Here are the products I’ve found in the last few months that have won me over.

FACE

Seventeen Phwoarr Paint (Heavy duty under eye concealer) – This product does what it says on the pot. It’s great for the under eye, a highly pigmented creamy formula that goes on and stays put, and the ‘Fair’ colour is perfect to brighten up my under eyes. Not bad for £5.49.

Makeup Academy Pro-Base Argan Plush Concealer – This concealer comes in the form of a chubby pen like some lip products, which makes it super handy to shove into your bag when you’re on the move. The Fair shade matches my skin well enough to cover blemishes on my face when blended out, but is now my go to highlight contour flesh tone for the bridge of my nose, above my top lip, centre of my forehead and top of my cheekbones. For £3 you can’t go wrong with this baby.

Maybelline Super Stay Better Skin concealer – I love this product. I have it in the 02 light colour, which is still just a bit too dark for my natural skin, but on top of foundation it blends well enough. If I have blemishes on my cheeks that won’t stay hidden beneath my foundation after I’ve applied my contour then I can dab this on top and it evens out perfectly with the subtler shades I like to use in my contouring routine. It’s pigmented and stays put, so it’s a great addition to my beauty bag. (Or, more accurately, my beauty bookcase. For real.)

Collection Ultimate Fix Foundation-Concealer-Powder 3-in-1 – This product doesn’t quite live up to what it claims, for me, but I still like using it. I tend to like foundations with a satin or dewy finish, but those don’t work well on my forehead which can get a bit shiny over the course of a long day, so I use a stipple brush to work this foundation onto my forehead instead of using my E.L.F Flawless Finish Foundation above my brows and I find it holds up well against oil. If I’ve got a bad skin day or just want an extra polished look I also layer this over my E.L.F foundation on the rest of my face, as the fact that this has a more powdered finish feel when dry can help give my concealer some extra grab on blemishes. Plus, this foundation has SPF 15, which is always a bonus.

Barry M Brow Pen – I bought this felt brow pen for my eyebrows in ‘Dark’ because it was all they had in stock, and it’s way too dark for the way I like to do my brows. It is, however, perfect for filling in my mole once my foundation application has left it half covered. It doesn’t fade or smudge throughout the day and I feel super sad if I leave the house without remembering to use it to fill in my beauty mark.

Natural Collection SunTint Bronzing Powder – My all time favourite match bronzer for my skin is a bronzer that came out of a Lula & Bella gift set that I’ve never been able to find anywhere else for repurchase. It’s a warm, pink-toned brown that works well on my pale cool-tone skin and gives me a subtle contour that avoids the muddy brown or fake orange tones that can be scary in bronzers. I’ve been searching for a perfect match for that L&B bronzer for a year and I’ve finally found it in this Natural Collection bronzer. This is a mostly matte formula with some tiny sparkles, but nowhere near frosty or glaring. Great for fellow pale ladies who want envious cheekbones that won’t make other people lift an eyebrow or ask ‘Did she do her makeup in the dark today?!’And at only £1.99 each, this is a real steal.

EYES

E.L.F Liquid Liner – It frustrates me how hard it is to find an affordable liquid liner these days that comes with a brush applicator and not one of those felt applicators. I recently bought 4 different liners that all ended up having the dreaded felt applicator before someone pointed me in the direction of E.L.F. This liner is super cheap at £1.95 each, has a brush, and stays put. I can’t ask for anything else! If you have other needs from your liner, like additional colour options, you’ll like that this liner also comes in midnight blue and metallics.

Benefit They’re Real Push Up Liner – This was recently sent to me by my gorgeous friend Chee. I was nervous about trying it because I’d heard mixed reviews and I’m so specific not only about the applicators I like to use for my liner but also in how sharp a point I like to get my flick, something I felt sure this product wouldn’t allow me to achieve. I was wrong. I was impressed with how easy this liner was to use even on my first try. You have to be careful not to pump up too much product or else you’re either going to make a mess or have to wipe away product, which is a waste, especially at £18.50 a pop. But using the product itself was really easy, and it is possible to achieve a very thin and precise flick as long as you have already honed that skill beforehand. It has the bonus of not needing the drying time that liquid liner needs because it’s a gel, and it certainly won’t budge all day and all night. For £18.50 though if you don’t have money to burn and you’re not great with winged liner I would give this item a miss and stick to trying normal gel liners with a brush applicator while you get your liner skills built up.

Makeup Revolution Brow Dual Ultra Brow Arch & Shape Pen – This is amazing. One end is felt tip and the other end is a classic eyebrow pen in typical eyeliner-pencil consistency, but it’s the felt end of this that has me swooning. Often I’ve found felt brow pens have ink that is too dark, but buying this pen in medium to use on my dark brows means I’ve found I can apply a single layer to achieve a natural brow look or build up two or three layers to make my brows more dramatic. I’ll be buying the darker brow pen to see if this pigmentation build is an across the board phenomena or whether it’s a result of my buying a medium shade rather than dark. Either way, it works perfectly for me and for ladies that are new to filling in their brows who are scared to over-apply on their product this is a great way to get filling without fear. At £3.50 each they’re also affordable, especially when you consider this product lasts so well throughout the day.

5 Pack of Lashes from Ali Express – These lashes are my life. I recently fell for a pair of Eylure wispie style lashes but at almost £5 a pair I couldn’t get on board with having to spend out so much to have a stock of them ready at my disposable. Instead I searched on Ali Express for something and found these lashes which are not only a great dupe but better! The eyelure lashes are too long, really, and too dramatic for me, but these lashes have the exact same design but in a slightly shorter format, making them just as gorgeous but less over the top. So not only are they a superior product for my needs, but for 5 pairs at £1.20-£2 a pack (depending on current USD-GBP conversion rates and current offers) they are infinitely cheaper. The bonus of buying lashes like these in 5 packs is that I don’t have to be super precious about them so I can cut up multiple pairs to use as lovely half lash pairs for days I need to fill out my lashes on the outer corner but don’t want to wear a full strip. Shipping from China takes a little while but I had them in under two weeks rather than the month I was expecting. I’m now buying 3 packs so that I have plenty in stock for both corner lashes and full strips.

E.L.F. Makeup Remover Pen – This little pen is my saving grace for my face. Getting the perfect winged liner is a downright struggle some days, and while you can just wet a cotton bud to erase mistakes I find that a cotton bud is too cumbersome and waterproof makeup won’t be budged by one. Using this pen instead is not only more accurate an aide in correcting my clumsy missweeps but also works on waterproof makeup. When my pen ran out recently I switched to using a more expensive one I’d received in a beauty box, only to find that the more expensive option was not only so hard it hurt to use but also that it just doesn’t pick up the makeup I’m trying to remove. Definitely replacing this £3.95 gem ASAP.

Makeup Revolution Essential Mattes 1 & 2 – Both of these eyeshadow palettes contain 12 matte colours and cost £4. Mattes 1 contains more cool toned mattes and Mattes 2 contains more warm tones, so you can buy one to cater more to your colour palette if you want or else get both for the less than the cost of a high end palette and have the full range of colours available to you. Both palettes offer great pigmentation, and for pinups having so many matte neutral shadows in one handy place makes it so easy to take this palette in your purse for touch ups or in your luggage for your travel essentials when you’re vacationing.

LIPS

Makeup Revolution ‘WOW’ Stick – Despite the obnoxious name and tacky packaging, this product has become one of my Holy Grail lip products. For me Lime Crime Velvetines are pigmented and look great, but they just don’t last like people claim they do. If I eat they wear off and even if I don’t they begin to smudge in the corners of my mouth anyway. These WOW sticks, which are only £2.99 each, wear for me the way Velvetines seem to wear for others. These lipsticks go on and stay put, they’re comfortable, matte, and if I need to touch up after eating it’s only minorly. The dark red shade ‘Marie’ is a great near dupe for Wicked for those who just can’t afford to or are unwilling to try Velvetines, and ‘Call Me’ is a great replacement for Red Velvet. 100% recommend, I bought one to try originally and now own 6 shades, as well as buying them for several friends to try.

Queen of Hearts Lasting Lipstick by Collection – A lipstick I’ve reviewed before on it’s own separate post, this is still a favourite of mine months on. For £2.99 this is another product that outlasts the Velvetines for me, and I find it easier to apply than using the Velvetines’ doe-foot wand, even when adding the extra steps for longevity of adding concealer base, applying and blotting, dotting on powder, and applying and blotting again. Those multiple steps might seem somewhat of an unnecessary rigmarole but considering you can buy 4 of these lipsticks with change to spare for the price of one Velvetine and achieve an equally comfortable and long-lasting result, I think it’s worth it, especially as this lipstick comes in 9 colours. This lipstick isn’t matte, but if you really want the matte effect that Velvetines give you then all you have to do to turn any non-matte lipstick into a matte finish look is to dust a touch of translucent powder on the top of your lipstick after blotting and it removes the shine.

That’s it for now, in a couple months I’m sure I’ll have more new products to share with you. Do you own any of the products above, what do you think of them? If not, which are you curious about trying now for yourself?