My mother would wake up at 5am in the morning to “put her face on” as she called it before her four kids woke up and before she washed our kitchen floors. Much of what my sisters and I practice today we learned from her, including her love of visiting the local chemist and discovering what her favour beauty brands have to offer. This habit she must have inherited from her French ancestors as French women love their little corner ‘chimiste’.

How to start and how much to wear? I’ve tried and tested thousands of beauty products over the years from high to bottom end, and many many of them do the same thing. However with such pretty packaging and tailored marketing we are guilty of falling for clever branding! Hopefully I can save you some money through my trial and error in the Live Whole beauty Blogs to follow, refer you to some of the more ‘value for money’ brands, useful online retailers and beauty bloggers I use (which also include natural and organic products). A few of people have suggested that product reviews and direct links to purchase products would be very handy, so watch this space.

Let’s start with our lovely Trinny who recently launched Trinny London and the wonderful concept of tiny pots of makeup to stack and carry. It also brilliantly helps you identify what colours to use. Trinny has some lovely ‘how to’ videos (see below) to help you apply makeup and achieve various looks. Applying mascara by moving mascara left and right at the base of the lash is simple and very effective for popping eyes.

I will share with you some other amazing makeup artist in future Blogs and hopefully you pick up a trick or two like I have.