Coachella Makeup On a Budget...IT Girl Approved!
POV: You and 5 of your friends booked a two-bed hotel somewhere out in Palm Springs just to catch a Coachella vibe. You grabbed all your cute shit out of the closet stuffed it in an overnight bag and ran to the salon to get a last minute pedi. Everything is together and then you remember… you have to run to the beauty store because you want to serve looks all weekend, and you want to do that on a budget. Let me tell you how to get those fun festive, Coachella vibey makeup looks all the girls rock with multi use products that wont run up ya coins.
Before I tell you the best products to get lets talk about the looks. Festival makeup is all about freeform, colorful, glitzy, fresh (cuz your for sure guna sweat) glam! Think blown out eye shadows, colorful cheeks, diamond eyeliner, glitter, and lots of highlight. If you’re like me you mix up a few of those to get a showstopper look and thankfully with so many of todays products on the market, this can be done with minimal effort and minimal products.
R.E.M Beauty
If were talking festival makeup, to me, R.E.M beauty was made for it! Ariana Grande did her thing with this brand; it encompasses so many cool, unique, funky products that can serve up either a classic look or in this case, a fun festive look. And the kicker is, the price point for basically everything in this brand is UNDER $25, NO kidding!
First up are the Midnight Shadows Lustrous Liquid Eyeshadows, these metallic liquids are like butter to apply and blend out so freaking beautifully its insane. They come in a tube with a brush applicator and make it super easy to swipe over the lid for a fun structured eye look or they can be easily blended with a brush or your finger. There are 11 metallic colors to choose from ranging from nudes to brights and get this they ring up for only $16 each. Crazy right!
Product: Midnight Shadows Lustrous Liquid Eyeshadow
Price: $16
Similar to the Liquid shadows are the Metallic Gel Eyeshadows, the formula for these are a bit thicker so they’re more so for the eye but they can be used on the lip if diluted with a gloss. It’s the colors offered for these that make them so fun. ‘Quality Time’ a rich red with pink shimmer is soooo cute on the lip yall I mean wow! The way it glistens and shifts is everything to me. For a simple festival look pop this color on the lips with a pair of red shades and a champagne highlighter to give effortlessly. Another steal priced at only $16, my advice grab a few shades… you’ll thank me later.
Product: Midnight Shadows Metallic Gel Eyeshadow
Price: $16
I told yall this brand is the gift that keeps on giving, next up, the Interstellar Highlighter Toppers. These are not your ordinary shades of highlighter and that’s what makes them so perfect for festival makeup. Shades like icy mint, Lavender, and vivid gold are the perfect pastel highlighters, that when paired with the right skin tone give this out of this world glow….pretty damn trippy and right in line with that psychedelic festival vibe. The color payoff is definitely worth mentioning too. I am a caramel skin toned woman and the way the lavender looks on my skin is so pretty it doesn’t give that white washed out look most pastel products leave on black skin. Definitely a win in my book.
Product: Interstellar Highlighter Topper
Price: $22
About Face Beauty
Another brand that is leading the charts in my personal book for fun, creative festival makeup is About Face Beauty. They truly have so many products under this brand that are colorful and easy to use so literally anyone can create something unique for an experience they will never forget. There is a lot to unpack here so lets begin…
*PSA: EVERYTHING IS 30% OFF RIGHT NOW AT ULTA SO UHM HURRY!!!!*
First up is the Fractal Glitter Eye Paint, and yes they are literally just like how they sound. They’re tubes of pigmented eye glitters with a brush tip for easy application and the shimmer is REAL! They look great on their own and atop shadows, creams, pigments and whatever else you can image on your eye. Use a detailed brush to create custom glitter eyeliner. Choose from 8 different colors.
Product: Fractal Glitter Eye Paint
Price: $16 - $11 RIGHT NOW WITH SALE
Next up are the Shadowsticks. A super easy to use cream eyeshadow in a pencil form. You can do so much with these and I do mean so much. Festivals are fun and sometimes that fun includes drawing shapes like hearts, clouds, and flowers on your face. These sticks, and the 10 different color options makes this that much easier. With a built in sharpener you can define the tip so you get a killer straight line or you can flatten one side so you can shade in an area. Layering colors and mixing techniques of straight lines, shading and even stippling (maybe for faux freckles) the looks you can create with these are out of this worlds.
Product: Shadowstick
Price: $14 - $10 RIGHT NOW WITH SALE
Want a sharper line for a more detailed drawing, or maybe you want more color options, similar to the shadowsticks but much much much thinner are the Line Artist pencils. These detailed liners are made of a silky, matte gel formula for intense pigment and hyper precise one stroke application.
Product: Line Artist
Price: $13 - $9 RIGHT NOW WITH SALE
Thought we were done…nope! Next up for About Face are the Matte Fluid Eye Paints. I know y’all have seen these all over social media. It’s the unique shape of the tubes for me, they just look like they’re fun to use. And I must admit, I haven’t personally played with these myself, but with this sale going on at Ulta and the 26 color options Im adding some to my cart as I type this lol. I can only imagine the things I can cook up with this. And I just know y’all can create some fire for Coachella this year and in case you need inspiration just search #AboutFace to see how the girls are slaying all over IG with these paints.
Product: Matte Fluid Eye Paint
Price: $16 - $11 RIGHT NOW WITH SALE
Danessa Myricks - Colorfix
Danessa Myricks colorfixs’ are a super easy way to add pops of color on the cheeks, eyes and lips. In fashion with festival makeup, carrot is a beautiful pop of color for the tan to deep skin tones while ballerina is a fun shimmery shade for everyone. Limesickle is that killer green that will pop out from across the field, and these are just a few of the fun colors she has in store. She even has a line that is neon so when the lights go down you still shine through. These are also great to use on the lips because once they set they are not going anywhere! You can eat, sing, sweat, guzzle a drink and she will still be there vibrant as ever. Take it a step further and apply your favorite color to your lashes using a spoolie or detailed lash brush for a fun colorful lash. You can even add to falsies, just brush on while in the pack allow to dry and touch up once lashes are applied to seal falsies to your lash. There are so many things you can do with colorfix, the quality is amazing and the colorways are endless. Truly one of my favorite products from one of my favorite brands on the market. You will NOT regret owning these, in fact I bet you’ll want them ALL, and at a low price of $18 you can have them all!
*Bonus Tip: If you have a pro account with her you can save 20% on EVERYTHING! Bringing the price of these multiuse icons to $14.40.
Product: Colorfix
Price: $18ea
CURRENT PROMOTION: SAVE 15% WHEN YOU SIGN UP FOR TEXTS
Rare Beauty Highlighter
Rare Beautys highlighter is not only good for highlighting the face added to gloss it makes for a fun iridescent formula you can pop on your lips or lid for a shimmery glossy eye. Mix that with a trail of diamonds along the crease of the eye and you have a lewk! Shade Mesmerize is my favorite. I don’t know if yall have seen the diamond lip trend that’s going all around TikTok but this shade of highlighter made this super easy to accomplish. Instead of mixing it with shadow you can brush onto the lip dry for a long lasting look. Check out this reel I did where you can see the highlighter in action.
Product: Rare Beauty Positive Light Silky Touch Highlighter (shade: Mesmerize)
Price: $25ea
SUVA Beauty
Want to travel light but still have the versatility to create multiple looks? SUVA Beauty has a fun Hydra FX palette made of 10 colors to create endless possibilities. SUVA’s palettes are water activated and can glide on as liner or be packed as shadow. They are transfer and smudge resistant so you wont have to worry when you finished jumping around after listening to your favorite artist perform. That and their vegan so like if you’re a conscious queen this is definitely for you! Because y’all are my friends though I’m inclined to share this tip with you, no shade to the brand. Because they are water activated if used as a shadow they will crease and crack as the eye naturally folds. To correct this, use a similar tone eyeshadow and pack on top. The smudge proof base and the protective layer of shadow on top will allow your eye look to last hours upon hours! There are 5 other versions of this palette to choose from but this is my fav as it splits the pan to provide two colors per dish, at a price of $32 its only $3.20 per color. That’s a STEAL! There is also a detailed liner brush included in the pack, just incase your forget yours.
Product: UV Festival Hydra FX Palette
Price: $32
NYX Cosmetics
Speaking of eye shadow, and remember were on a budget, one of my favorite drugstore brands, NYX Cosmetics has a fun palette, the Ultimate Eyeshadow Palette Brights, that has 16 colors ranging from electric greens and blues to bright yellows, pinks and oranges and deep purples. Truly a wide range of colors in a smaller sized package perfect for travel. And rest assured, the color payoff is definitely there. I do recommend prepping the eye with an eyeshadow primer or concealer lighter than your normal shade for maximum benefit but either way I’ve used the yellow on both my clients and myself multiple times and it hasn’t failed me yet. I highly recommend this palette for any festival look you desire. There are a few other color options that could work too if you want to go more towards one tone or the other and right now Ulta has a buy 2 get 1 free deal going on so if I were you I would head there ASAP.
Product: Ultimate Eyeshadow Palette Brights
Price: $18
Amazon
Y’all didn’t think that I was going to forget the pièce de résistance now did y’all? The main stage performer, the glitz, the glam, the STAPLE to any festival look ever…..I’m talking about the crystals!!!!! And no not swarovski lol, but whos guna know? If you didn’t know Amazon is the PLUG for all things crystals. rhinestones, “gold” gems, pearls and any other flashy addition you can think that will take your look from damn to GLAM DAMN!!!!! Not to mention you get so many of them for a deal. There are many vendors to choose from but I’m bias and I mean I may or may not be an amazon influencer, so here are a couple of my favorite crystals to shop on Amazon. Click here for an array of crystals all different colors and sizes, click here if you want some pearls for the girls, and click here if you’re all gold everything! Either way you cant go wrong and coming in at a valued price I’d argue you get them all cuz you just never know what its going to give.
Now you might notice I didn’t recommend anything for base makeup and I can explain. For the base, if you follow me you know I truly adopt a less is more approach. Though this has gotten me in some trouble as of recently and I should address it, for now and probably forever, I believe there is a time and place for full coverage makeup. A festival to me is NOT one of those times. I say all that to say, use less for your base, pop on a concealer and some blush, bronze ya face up if you must but focus on the fun of it all. Remember festivals are outside, specifically, Coachella is the desert of CA in the middle of April, its usually hot. Give yourself and your face room to breathe. Make a feature pop, add some cool rhinestones atop one of the many suggested makeup products above, put on a killer fit and pop out! That’s just my opinion, you guna do you regardless lol.
Anyway, now that you have your list you can run your last errand before you hit the road with ya friends to have a great ass weekend without breaking the bank. And the fun part is you’ll have these products well past the weekend, if you don’t get drunk and lose them somewhere lol…, so it’s a worthy investment if I do say so myself. The looks don’t stop serving just because your weekend is over. Use any of these products for an everyday look by simply adjusting the application. Well, my job here for the day is done. I hope you enjoyed and when you use one of these products on the list make sure you come back and let me know how the looks served!
Until next time
Xoxo Tat…