GENIUS KOREAN BEAUTY FINDS

photo credits: one | two | three | four 

I was having a coffee date with some friends in Koreatown just before Christmas last year (hee hee, last year? that's still always funny to me for some reason) when we got on the subject of Korean make up. The Koreans are known for having their own specific make up styles and really amazing products, they practically invented the BB cream (well, a German invented it, but the Koreans took it from there), there's even something called Korean brows. You're going to lose hours here, I'm sorry. But as a fellow dark-haired, yellow undertone type of lady, let me tell you. I can appreciate. I've been obsessed with reading Korean make up reviews on Amazon. But what I didn't realize is there's actually a shop in KTown that's stocked all these products all along! Cue my geeky excitement.

Koreatown is very small, just one city block on 32nd Street between 5th and 6th Avenue. It's the best spot to find japchae and bibimbap and after living in Seoul as a kid, I always get a bit of a thrill when I'm down there, but somehow I'd passed a million times but never noticed the tiny The Face Shop tucked in between all the Korean BBQ restaurants. My friends gave it all these rave reviews, so immediately after polishing off the last of our Korean doughnuts, I booked it to the shop for a little poke-about. The place is really fun. Think: crazy magazines. I get such a kick out of Korean boy bands. Anyway few weeks later and I am happy to report: totally lives up to the hype. 

I picked up this CC cream in Natural Beige while I was there and oh hell, it has thrilled me to no end. This stuff! My skin keeps getting all these compliments, I swear it's going to get a big head soon. (I also bought a tube of BB cream, though I haven't loved it quite as much.)

Another big hit for me is this Korean brow pencil in dark brown. It seriously may have changed my life. My hair is so dark it's almost black. It's been the bane of my existence to find a dark brown that is ashy enough to match my hair. But leave it to the Koreans! Thank your, Korea!

Here's a shot of the stuff in action, snapped from the roof of our building this afternoon while Huck ate all the fresh snow he could stuff in his mouth. (Snow day!) I've been using the CC cream as an under-eye concealer, and the pencil to fill out the outside ends of my brows (#shortbrowproblems).

Anyway I'm no Korean model but that ain't bad!

Record number of uses of the word Korea in this post? ;)