NYXFACEAWARDS 2014

Like most people I never win anything, but I was lucky enough to win a pair of tickets to the NYXFACEAWARDS 2014 on Twitter! I brought my good friend and fellow beauty blogger Molly aka Girl Get Glamorous. You have to check out her blog it’s really amazing and I learn tons from it. Molly came super glammed up with a classic black winged eyeliner and red lip (MAC Riri Woo which she swears by) for the event and looked amazing:

 

This event was a blast and the planners really did an excellent job making sure it was fun and that there wasn’t any boring down time. The only down time we really had was before we were let into the event which saws fine because Molly and I can gab about makeup and hair and boys for hours. The event was held at the Nokia Club at LA Live in downtown Los Angeles on August 22, 2014. The point of the contest is to find The National Beauty Vlogger on YouTube of the Year and the prize is $25,000. The contestants had made it through the four challenges and went from top 30 to top 6 and they were flown into LA to create their final video entry which premiered at the awards show. The contest was open to any beauty blogger 15 and older and 3 of the finalists were teenagers! Here’s a picture of the finalists:  

 

The doors opened at 5, but the awards show didn’t start until 7 so to entertain the audience members the sponsors had a lot of really fun little beauty stations set up. NYX had the same makeup vending machine that I had used at beauty con the previous weekend and this time I ended up getting an HD Studio Photogenic Grinding Blush in 08 Menage a Trois. This blush is like a little pepper mill and it grinders a solid brick into loose mineral-enriched powder. I swatched it and on the part closer to my pinky I put a lot of product on to build it up and make it look intense for the pic and it didn’t blend very nicely and kind of emphasized my fine lines on my hand, but when I just did a light wash the color is a very pretty orangey-coral with a hint of shimmer that’s similar to NARS Orgasm. Be careful though, this jar is a fun little concept, but is very messy!

Next I went to the LULUs swag area to take a picture with their props for Instagram in order to spin the wheel for my prize. The prizes were NYX Jumbo Eye Pencils, LULUs dresses, and LULUs accessories. I won a NYX Jumbo Eye Pencil and chose the color 630 Cashmere (see above for swatch). I already have the white/”milk” pencil which is a classic staple that is a great eyeshadow base and is excellent to use under bright colors to really make them pop. I also have a pink one because I do a lot of pink and purple eye looks to bring out the green in my eyes. Molly won an accessory and picked out an oversized teal clutch. 

 

While I was waiting in line to have my hair touched up there were some pre-teen girls in front of me who recognized someone who was clearly a beauty vlogger. I didn’t recognize the girl, but I watched their interaction as she took a picture with the girls and signed an autograph and then talked to them for a while and was so incredibly sweet and bubbly and genuine I thought “this girl is awesome at this!” After she walked away the girls were saying “OMG she smelled so good!!” “I’m never washing this shirt!” It was so cute how excited they were. I watched as she spent long periods of time with other fans that recognized her and she truly seemed to be enjoying herself. She looked pretty, but she wasn’t over done. She actually didn’t look like she was wearing a ton of makeup. Then I had my hair touched up by the GHD hair people. The girl Erika who did it was so sweet. They gave us a code (GHD4NYX) for 20% off on their website. After that Molly and I hit the photo booth to take a pic:

 

 

 

So we sat down and watched the awards and who was the first contestant that came out? It was the beauty blogger from earlier who was signing autographs and who seemed really sweet and bubbly. The awards show was fun to watch and all of the final videos were really incredible (and some of them were surprisingly deep actually). The bubbly young girl from the line was Adelaine Morin aka C0ok1emonster on YouTube. At the end she talked about how this past year in school she got switched into a lunch that none of her other friends had so she would eat in the wash room (aka bathroom she is Canadian) by herself and she was just excited to eat lunch with the top 6 let alone win. It was so sweet not gonna lie I teared up a little bit. This girl is perfect for this job and after watching even more of her videos on YouTube I can confidentially say that she is going to be great at what she does and just seems like such a sweet, uplifting person in general which is refreshing. The other girl who I liked a lot was Bailey Van Der Veen (top right in the picture above of all 6 contestants) who is super talented and does gorgeous makeup on herself so even though she didn’t win I know she will do great things. To get an idea of Adelaine’s adorable infectious personality check out this video:

 

The other highlight of the NYXFACEAWARDS was another surprise- a hip hop dance group that was amazingggg. They did a routine that was similar to the ones that go viral and they were just incredible I was so jealous. Why can’t I dance like that!? After the awards we were given some really nice little gift bags with a water bottle, a compact mirror, the NYX Nude on Nude palette, Doll Eye mascara, Matte Blotting Paper, a black eyeliner, mini stickers, and a little pen. Who doesn’t love a nice little gift bag full of free makeup goodies? Next year I need to figure out how to get a VIP invite so I can get their gift bag which was huuuuge and filled with all kinds of makeup and other non-NYX products. I was actually a little disappointed that one of the sponsors Big Sexy Hair didn’t put anything in the gift bags since I love their products. 

 

Overall it was a great night and I had so much fun with Molly. I actually went home that night and looked up more upcoming beauty events so I can keep going to them and then writing about them on Blushing in Hollywood! If you’re interested in attending some free makeup events check out department stores like Nordstrom, Neiman Marcus, and stores like Sephora.