At the start of every new year, we look forward to seeing what trends will become popular. Glossy lips? Baby bangs? More foodmetics? All sorts of makeup in Living Coral? Trends come and go and only time will tell which ones would come to define the year ahead. What we know for sure is that we’re saying goodbye to 2018 and its beauty hypes that were just not worth it.

When you barely have a minute to put your face together, swiping on a favorite lipstick is a fast and easy way to elevate your look. If you’ve ever been told that you look pale or sickly because you skipped your usual full face of makeup, putting on lipstick literally brings color back to your face. But what happens if you’re too busy to reapply throughout the day? We discovered that Pink Sugar’s Sugar Tint Lip & Cheek Tints (P349 each) is a great solution to this problem!

Since discovering the Miss Hana (花娜小姐) gel pencil liner during my last Taipei visit, I knew that Cosmed/Watsons/Ximending and I had unfinished business. Armed with a week’s worth of research and P3000 (converted to NTD1765), I set off for my Taiwan trip with the aim of trying out more of their makeup products. You might be wondering: what about Dr. Morita, My Beauty Diary, My Scheming, Naruko, and 23.5N? The skincare brands are slowly making their way to our shores, so we decided to focus on makeup instead! So if you ever find yourself in Taipei, Kaohsiung, or any of Taiwan’s beautiful cities, consider picking up these local finds.

As I’ve gotten older, I’ve noticed my preferences in makeup shifting. Perhaps it’s the fact that I’ve been working for a while, and so (ideally) better understand the value of money. Or perhaps it was the rude awakening that was destashing two train-cases worth of barely-used drugstore makeup. Whatever the reason, I find that beyond K-Pop related fangirling, I’m harder to excite in the cosmetics department, having shifted my “collector” tendencies to skincare products and generally sticking to (and using up) the same makeup staples and shades.

I consider myself to be PV’s resident gadget girl, as I like to bite the bullet and try out different gadgets as part of my quest for better skin. I recently wrote about my gadget collection and declared that the most indispensable is my Clarisonic Mia, as I find that having thoroughly cleansed skin is of utmost importance. I was very curious about trying the Foreo Luna though, but what I didn’t expect was that it would displace the Mia as my new favorite!

Hello weekend! Finally, a couple of days dedicated to binge watching our fave shows, eating way too much food, and catching up with friends, family, and the world of beauty! This week’s roundup has got the scoop on a K-beauty collab that’ll have the kid in you freaking out, makeup and skincare perfect for the gym (#fitnessgoals2019), and the launch of the Boy De Chanel campaign featuring one of our favorite oppas! We’ve also got the lowdown on why Kendall Jenner is being dragged online and Pat McGrath’s new… mascara!

We often talk about “painful” beauty treatments but there’s another aspect of pain that no one really tackles: long wait times! I consider myself a Patient Patty when it comes to waiting during treatments (my parents are doctors and I’m used to waiting around the clinics), especially since I frequently have my hair bleached and colored and that takes aaaaalllll damn day.

When I first went to Korea to study makeup, I expected to be swamped by K-Beauty brands, idol endorsements, and their collectibles. And while that was certainly true, I honestly didn’t expect for luxury Western brands to have a place of respect among my friends and makeup instructors.

For Koreans, beauty brands follow a pretty tight market classification - a pecking order, if you will. They tend to look at consumers in terms of age, and will cater very specifically to each group. Koreans have a word 대 (dae) which means “generation” and pertains to the age bracket that a person falls under: teens, twenties, and so on.

Ah, award shows - perfect fodder for commentary, shade, and (the occasional) inspiration. This year’s red carpet saw a lot of corals and nudes, which are perfectly safe but are also kinda boring. So we’ve picked out a few standouts from the bunch so you can look at pretty people who’ve really. Gone. For. It.

Living Coral blew our collective minds when it was announced as Pantone’s color of the year for 2019. It is such a beautiful color, and it’s so easy to work into our existing wardrobe! We probably already have a piece (or five) in this shade just begging to be put back into heavy rotation. Of course, makeup-wise, the color itself is quite flattering on any skin tone. I’m here to share three of the lip looks I came up with to inspire you to wear Living Coral more. Here’s the twist: I used only one lipstick shade!

When I first started to get serious with my skincare routine, one of the brands that would constantly pop up in my searches is Dear Klair’s. This Korean brand’s approach to skincare is “simple, but enough” and they encourage a gentle skincare routine that’s fuss-free yet effective. It seemed the complete opposite of the popular Korean 10-step process.

Hello, 2019!!! How has your first week been so far, PV fam? We hoped it’s been filled with nothing but good food, loads of laughs, and tons of beauty! This week’s roundup is the perfect way to celebrate the first weekend of the year as we’re talking Benefit Cosmetics newest makeup product (they haven’t launched something like this since 2014), FENTY Beauty’s epic drop, and exciting news from BYS! We also have an update on Lady Gaga’s beauty company and L’Oreal’s newest foundation! Are yah ready? Let’s go!

Whenever Althea releases exclusives, I’m always excited because they seem to marry function, form, and price points well. I was especially excited to try their new sunscreen because I didn’t want to use up my Banila Co. Hello Sunny Hydrating Sun Essence that quickly, but also hated Biore’s formulations. It all seemed perfect: petal finish, less than P500, feels like a moisturizer (and not a powder), has a cute bottle, plus it has a bunch of good reviews, too. My experience was a little different.

I’ve always been curious about Dior makeup but I’ve never tried any of their products - until recently, when they invited me to explore their newly opened boutique in Mall of Asia. This is right in between the two escalators in the Main Atrium so you can’t miss it! The space is much larger than their old one on the second floor; it’s also more inviting, with a spacious area on the side so you can get immersed in the Dior experience.

I’ll confess: sometimes I cringe when I’m complimented about my ‘Korean’ face. I appreciate the intention, but I also can’t help but want to argue about how much skill it takes and the kind of mental dissection I do to make people (myself included) achieve K-Beauty without looking too contrived.