I am fully in love with my new bag, which is here just in time for summer sunshine and gleeful bright colours. It’s from Cut Make Trim, who are a new small company that makes flawless leather bags in lots and lots of colours. When they said I could try one of their designs, I figured I already have an oxblood satchel I love and use a lot, so I should probably go for a different shape in a completely different colour. The mustard yellow barrel bag was the perfect solution, I reckon. I’m a fan of big bags, because I like to put as much junk as possible in there, so when I first used my new bag I wondered if maybe I wasn’t cut out for the small handbag life. But I can actually fit loads of my stuff, and to prove it, I’m going to show you all the bits and pieces I have with me on a daily basis (and because everyone loves knowing what’s in other people’s makeup bags, I’m going to show you inside that as well!)
A good barometer for ‘is this a bitchin’ item?’ is if strangers come up to you and ask where you got it, which is exactly what happened with this bag when I was in the pub on Sunday. Excellent work.
Look! All my stuff fits!
‘All my stuff’ consists of my adorable Paul & Joe makeup bag, sunglasses, keys, tampons, Moleskine diary, purse, book and Kindle.
Inside my makeup bag… it’s hard to take pictures of makeup that aren’t bloody terrible, so here’s as good as I’ve got. I carry a ‘few’ lipsticks, which at the moment are MAC in Candy Yum Yum (a bright, hot matte pink), No 7 in Gay Geranium (a frivolous coral), Nars Velvet Matte lip pencil in Dragon Girl (bright, strong red, and my absolute favourite beauty product I’ve tried for years), and Revlon Colorburst matte crayon in Elusive (a soft, chic browny-pink). Gotta have useful bits like good tweezers (I’ve had these Tweezerman ones for three years and have felt no urge to replace) and a pencil sharpener for my Nars crayon and pencil eyeliners on the very odd occasion I wear it. The sweet pinky-orange pot at the bottom is my favourite blusher, Stila Convertible Colour in Petunia, which is a gorgeous, strongly-pigmented cream blush. For my skin, I sometimes use the Maybelline Baby Skin pore-eraser under my new favourite foundation, YSL Touche Teint. I always put Benefit’s Fake Up under my eyes to conceal dark circles, and although I hate paying so much for such a boring item, I tried cheaper concealers and they just didn’t work for me. I don’t often wear eye makeup, but I like to always have some neutral shadows and a black liquid / gel eyeliner in case I decide to do something easy. I like these three little Revlon shadows which you buy separately then clip together, and I tend to wear them all at once on different parts of the eye. I’ve been enjoying the new Rimmel gel eyeliner with brush, even though it’s not a look I really go for often. I’ve also got a small Lancome black eyeliner just in case. My favourite mascara has been discontinued, at least in the UK, which is the Maybelline Lash Stiletto mascara. The only place I’ve found it is in a factory outlet shop near my grandparents’, so last time I was there I picked up 2 more for £3 each. I’m not as regimented with my eyebrows as I once was, and sometimes I just put on a slick of Urban Decay clear brow setting gel. Others, when I want to make more of an impact, I use the cheap but excellent Barry M eyebrow set.
