I'm a makeup artist and beauty blogger, but the majority of my workday hours are spent in an office setting. This means that I don't always have access to my train case of tricks, and that can signal a beauty emergency if I'm headed to an event or to do someone's makeup after work. Luckily, there's a handful of office supplies that serve as beauty hacks.
Your Sticky Secret
With a roll of mighty Scotch tape, you can accomplish many beauty feats! While you can use as a guide for the perfect winged liner, my favorite use actually has to do with flaky dry skin. In the winter months, especially when I've got a cold, my nose becomes dry skin city. All I do is take a small strip of tape, press it onto my nose, and when I lift away, all the dead skin cells go with it! It might take a few times, but it will get every last flake.
Blemish Buster
If you’ve got a painful, pesky zit forming—you know the kind that feels like it’s getting bigger by the minute—dab a little hand sanitizer on it. The alcohol will kill bacteria and speed drying and healing. Apply sparingly, and wash it off when you get home. Also, if you’ve got a case of the greasies up top, work a little hand sanitizer into your roots for a boost of volume and freshness.
Blot Away Shine
Separate a tissue in two, and you’ve got the perfect blotting sheet for midday oil slicks!
French Mani Fixer
If you’ve got a chip in your French manicure, a dab of Wite-Out will camouflage the chip until you can fix it properly. Just remember to not bite your nails!
Do-It-All Beauty Fix
With just a little dab of lotion, you can perform such magic as taming flyaway hair, smoothing unruly eyebrows, or reviving stale foundation by warming a little in your hands, adding a few drops of water from the water cooler, and pressing it into your skin. You can also clean up eye makeup smudges with a dab of lotion on a tissue that’s wrapped around a pen as a poor man’s cotton swab!
DIY Vanity
Need to get ready at your desk? Use a large binder clip to make a DIY vanity! Affix the clip to the bottom edge of a small hand mirror. Next, bend the handles of the binder clip down and stand up your mirror. It’s a tiny vanity right at your desk!
Shadow Shields
Need to touch up your shadow quickly without ruining your foundation and under-eye concealer? Place a sticky note under each eye to catch any shadow fallout. Try folding a sticky note in half to create a mascara shield, too!
Makeshift Hairpin
Open a paper clip so that it forms an open-ended hairpin shape. The larger paper clips work best. Twist your hair into a messy bun and stab in several of your newly formed pins. Voila! No one has to know your tresses are full of paper clips!
Foundation Palette
I mean, come on. Who uses CDs anymore? They make excellent foundation mixing palettes! Just stick your thumb through the center hole and hold like a painter’s palette!
