To marcel or not to marcel?

I love my marcel irons.  But I also have been playing with my talented hair artist friend's no clip curling irons. It's been over a year now that I've been considering adding these to my kits.  But I still haven't made the plunge

So far my favorites have been Enzo Milano's cone clipless irons  Having to travel so much and just going up and down the subway steps, I prefer to have as little in my kit as possible.  This iron helps with it's cone shape.  Basically you are getting two different sized irons in one if you only use part of the barrel.  But this is only good if the model has shoulder length or shorter hair.  When you get into longer hair you have to use smaller sections so that your curl is consistent and I don't always want small sections.

Next, I did a little playing around with the Amika 3P Professional Styling Set.  It's genius that you have one base with three different barrels.  But I've noticed some difficulty when attaching and detaching the barrels.  Granted this will save a ton of space in my kit, but I don't trust having only one base.  My fear is that the base will go out on me when I'm on a location in a city that only leaves me with a Walgreens.  And Conair or Redken aren't going to cut it. 

The Flat iron that is included in the kit is a nice touch, but you won't be able to pry my GHD flat iron from my cold dead hands.  ( That is unless I find something better - which I haven't)

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Now I see Sephora is carrying another version of the clipless iron.  The Sultra Bombshell.  But so far I've only seen the 1" carried.  And I use my 1" iron a lot.  But I need a variety of sizes.  And I haven't had my hands on this one.

I wish I could try out all three for more than just one day.  But when trying out new things, I do so on my friends.  Not even creative tests and in no way on jobs.  Are there any friends out there that want to purchase these and let me do your hair? ;)

And in no way am I giving up my marcels totally.  I don't think any of the brands I've found offer every size I need.  Still, I'm always looking for ways to condense my kit and save my back.

I heart Tarte

Tarte is one of my favorite lines.  Most everything they have, I like.  Especially the eye shadows and cheek stains. 

Tarte is also environmentally conscious and organic!  Woot! 

A lot of my friends will be getting this in their stocking from me this year.  But since it is technically Christmas now, I thought I'd go ahead and post this amazing find so that others can take advantage while it's still available...

The Good As Gold limited-edition lipgloss gift set. I'm loving it. I've been using 90% of these glosses on my shoots lately.  In fact, the image at the top of my page has the model wearing one of the shades in this set.

Another thing I love about Tarte is their value sets.  Such amazing deals for great quality products.  And if you don't want to order online and like to see your makeup up close and personal (like I do) Ulta carries most of their products and often has the great value sets.  As does Sephora.  Too bad there isn't an Ulta in NYC.  :(  But there is a great big one on Lincoln Rd in South Beach that I often spend way too much time and money in.

For those of you that do like late night shopping online, they are offering free shipping on orders over $40.  Can't beat that.

new work

The last time I was in Dallas over the Thanksgiving holiday I got to play with my friend Scott Slusher and model Tricia Rollo from Page Parkes  It's always so easy being creative with him.  And here's some of the results.

I used Make Up For Ever's HD Foundation with my trusty Beauty Blender ( I won't go anywhere without one ) and LORAC's Croc Palette on the eyes and and cheeks.

I wanted the hair very texturized and a bit crunchy so I used one of my favorite products from KMS, the Hairplay Sea Salt Spray.

Since I'm here through the new year, I hope to have one more chance to play with Mr. Slusher again before heading back to NYC.

What to do in Dallas

With the holidays here, I have a little more free time.  I was lucky enough to have a job in Dallas (my hometown and where I will spend the holidays) this past week.  I can't tell you how happy I was that I didn't have to try and fly in from NY this week.

Many of my favorite people live here and when I am in town we go out for dinner often.  Which always ends up in too much eating and drinking.  This year I'm trying to keep the nights out to a minimum.  So now I'm left with finding ways to entertain myself and stay out of trouble.

In comes my friend, photographer, Scott Slusher.  We email back and forth about my being here and trying to figure out a time to play.  Ends up tonight was the night.  What a fun night it was.

We started out thinking we'd do some nice clean beauty on the lovely new face Ariana Fowler.  Such a doll and wonderful to work with.  With her great skin I only needed a touch of the 3 Custom Color cream concealer a bit of the Moon Beam highligter from Benefit Cosmetics , some LORAC TANtalizer on the body, some lashes and contour, then a bit of a nude lip from Make Up For Ever.  For the hair, a little Moroccan Oil Curl Control Creme and quite a few bobby pins and we had our first look. Which we shot...

at first...

Our friend Jay Evers had been working a job on the set next to us and had just wrapped up after we got the first look finished.  He came in like a Texas tornado and started constructing amazing backgrounds in lightning speed.  Next he was pulling some fabrics and and props from his kit and we had a whole new story.

I think it was my favorite from the evening.  This is just shot with my iPhone before the light was even set.  Now I'm dying to see how this one turns out.

I love coming home to play!!!

I've thought about blogging for quite some time now and have been asked by friends I work with to do so. It looks like I'm giving in and am going to start now.

For my first post, I wanted to share a great special I found on the Three Custom Color website. If you spend $75 on their website you will receive 14 of their lipliners. That is an AMAZING deal, right?!?!

They offer a 30% discount to professional makeup artists. And also offer custom blending. If you want your favorite discontinued lipstick or gloss recreated, they can do it!!!

A few of my favorites from 3CC...

The Clarifier pencils are genius.

"Our one of a kind Clarifier pencils are used on the inner rim of the eye to brighten and widen. As a rule, Light is great for fair-medium skin tones and Dark is great for medium-dark skin tones, but many of our clients have both - Dark for subtle definition and Light for more drama. Clarifiers are also great for highlighting under the brow and as a spot concealer in a pinch!"

The lip glosses in the Robert Jones collection are to die for and the Pink Hyacinth Watercolour for Cheeks designed by the amazing James Vincent is another must have.