Beauty Fix: The end of liquid liner woes and how to achieve dewy skin in the winter (yes, really!)

Every week our Beauty Fix columnist takes on your questions about makeup, skincare, hair and more. Have a beauty question we haven’t answered? Email us at [email protected]or ask away in the comments below.

What’s the best way to give my legs a bit of shine?
If you’re opting for bare limbs over tights this holiday season, give your legs a serious scrubdown to get rid of any dulling, dead skin and moisturize like crazy before heading outside. For a soft sheen with a sweet aroma, try a fragranced dry oil like Jo Malone’s new Velvet Rose & Oud Dry Body Oil ($85, Holt Renfrew). The formula contains sweet almond, jojoba and avocado oils for supreme hydration with a gorgeous scent that features notes of smoky oud, Damask rose, and praline. Bonus: you can actually put a few drops of this dry oil in your bath water before soaking to emerge with perfumed silky skin.

How can I make liquid liner application easier?
If you want to minimize the learning curve of liner application, the key is in selecting the right liner to do most of the tricky work for you. Keep your eyes peeled for felt-tip liners that are elongated, like Cynthia Rowley Beauty’s new Liquid Liner in “Cobalt” ($21, birchbox.ca). This type of liquid liner pen tip will give you the upper hand for creating lines of varying thickness and cat eye flicks with minimum effort on your part. To make a flawless flick, simply lay the liner tip on its side, lining the end of the tip up with the end of your brow and then drag the liner towards your lashline. It’s actually that simple!

Can my makeup give my skin a more unified tone?
The best part about new makeup formulations is the way skincare benefits are incorporated into makeup in order to give your skin an instant boost while improving skin with continued use. Estée Lauder’s new Enlighten EE Even Effect Skintone Corrector SPF 30 ($46, esteelauder.ca) is right up your alley if you’re looking for a more even tone, reduced redness, smoother texture, brighter skin and serious hydration. You’ll fall hard for the moisturizing aspect of this product as we move into winter, and continued use is essential to reap the benefits, so definitely consider committing to this product for the season – your skin will thank you.

I’ve always been drawn to ‘70s eye makeup. How can I make the look more modern?
Tiny tweaks or modifications regarding texture or colour are often the best way to modernize your look when you’re trying to channel a past decade or specific time period. As far as eye makeup is concerned, the 1970s were very much a glam time with a serious emphasis on metallics and a rounded 1930s shape with diffused edges. For this look to be more updated than costume-y, try taking a fluffy eyeshadow brush, picking up a small amount of (new-to-Canada!) Flower Beauty Color Play Crème Shadow in “Awesome Blossom” ($8, walmart.ca) on your brush and buffing it across your lid, into your crease and extending just above the crease in a rounded shape, building up the colour on the mobile part of your lids. This shade is a plum-bronze mauve concoction dosed with a smattering of shimmer for light reflection without being gaudy. The formula contains vitamin E for hydration and stays put once it sets.

My skin is really dry, what can I use to soothe my skin in the shower after shaving?
Shaving is a form of exfoliation, which can further irritate dry skin, so make sure you’re using a shaving cream that provides your razor enough slip or glide to make the entire process less irritating to your skin. Afterwards, give your skin a hydrating boost with a liberal pump or few of L’Occitane’s new Shea Whipped Shower Foam ($20, loccitane.ca), which is enriched with shea butter to moisturize and soothe dry, irritated skin, leaving you with soft limbs after rinsing.

More Beauty & Grooming