Last Saturday I went to BeautyConLA and holy crap it was overwhelming. Since 99.9% of the population doesn’t understand what a beauty convention is or why one would exist, let me explain. According to the website “BEAUTYCON IS A FASHION AND BEAUTY COMMUNITY + CONFERENCE FOR THE INTERNET’S MOST INFLUENTIAL BEAUTY AND FASHION ICONS AND THEIR EVER-GROWING NUMBER OF FANS. BEAUTYCON HAS ALREADY TAKEN OVER LA, LONDON + NEW YORK AND NOW, WE’RE HEADING BACK HOME, TO BEAUTIFUL LOS ANGELES! #BEAUTYCONLA” It consisted of a bunch of booths for makeup, hair, and skincare (mostly) products, and had panels of internet/youtube/instagram famous beauty gurus and the like as well as some quickie classes/makeup demonstrations. I had actually planned on seeing some of the panels, but it was so insanely busy and confusing in the convention I never actually made it into one.
So let’s start at the very beginning (a very good place to start). Pre-BeautyCon I was anxious for about a month as to what I was going to wear because I knew these girls were going to BRING IT. I also knew it was going to be during the day and potentially hot, a marathon and not a sprint so it had to be somewhat comfortable, and that no matter how hard I tried I’m still going to not be in the top 20% of the best dressed or best made up girls there. I decided to go pretty casual and comfy and not try too hard outfit-wise. I was really grateful that I wore flats. There were plenty of girls with heels on there, but I was glad I was not among them since their feet were definitely in pain. I did however spend a very long time on my makeup trying to recreate Lilly’s base look (not the smokey eye, it was daytime after all) and of course wore falsies because you have to at something like this. I actually tried the Ardell Self-Adhesive wispies because I couldn’t find my new incredible eyelash glue anywhere and they were sort of a pain in the ass. They were VERY sticky so they do not pull up at the corners. The down side of that was that I didn’t get one pair as close as I wanted to my lash line and it was impossible to adjust once I had set it down so I just had to live with it. They also have a thick band which means you HAVE to get them in the right position and you really should wear some liner, but I really did not want to. I knew it would look fine in pictures which is all that matters anyway. I also tried to use my new Milani Lip Intense Liquid Color in 03 Fiery Coral which is a gorgeous color and a really cool product, BUT it kept getting all over my teeth so I could not commit to a day full of that. I’ll have to try it again to see if that can somehow be remedied. I went with my BFF Annabelle who really brought her BeautyCon game face. She wore a bright blue romper, hair by dry bar, her usual full glam face, and tons of very sparkly jewelry. This was an ideal BeautyCon look as it was comfortable yet bold and pretty.
So we get there and like I said it is extremely packed (about 6000 people with 5950 girls and 50 guys MAX haha) so mentally prepare yourself for that. We start walking around to check out the different booths and they had cute jewelry for sale, an american apparel booth selling clothes, lots of prizes that could be won, even ice cream and custom screen printed panties. We went around to the booths and started meeting some people. One of the first booths we went to was Bellami Hair which is a hair extension company that is VERY popular on YouTube and social media. They had a vlogger there whose persona I’m kind of obsessed with- Arika Sato who was looking gorgeous and modeling the hair. The girls working at the booth were super friendly and told us they were supposed to be looking for “perfect looking” girls because those are most likely bloggers who they want to link up with so they can become Bellami Hair affiliates. When you’re an affiliate they send you free hair extensions and you just post about them on your blog or youtube channel and you also get a discount code and when someone buys some extensions with your discount code you get $5. There’s even a set that was designed by Lilly Ghalichi (so of course they are the most dramatic) and they are just under $300 for a full set of clip-in extensions for reference. I’ve been thinking about buying some for a while now and I would have never heard of them if it wasn’t for their affiliates so the program is definitely working out well for them. They asked Annabelle if she was a blogger and she replied no (side note: I wish she would bring back her blog I loved that thing!) and told them that I was one. I gave them my contact info and they recently sent me an e-mail detailing the application process for their affiliate program. I hope to do it one day because girl you know I could use a new weave, but I need to wait until I’m a little more established.
So let’s talk about the girls who were walking around BeautyCon. Besides having huge hair (in lots of rainbow brite colors), huge makeup, and huge outfits they also had huge DSLR cameras around their necks or their boyfriend or assistant’s necks and some of them even brought their own lighting and video cameras! It was crazy to see so many in action all in one location. There was a range of looks, but it wasn’t too different from what you would see going to a trendy place in LA- lots of boho and big hats. I (clearly) do not have a DSLR or very high quality digital camera yet, but I do plan on purchasing one in the future. I actually am recently debt free so I’m trying to stay that way! I also saw a few of my favorite beauty gurus both far away and up close in person which was cool. Here’s some that I recognized:
Annabelle also bought this super cute custom made light up mirror that goes in your purse. They are available from @candylover89 on Instagram for about $35 and they are just amazing. I’m kind of regretting not getting one for myself!
The other activity highlights for BeautyCon were the free makeup touch-ups, the NYX vending machine that gave you a free product if you tweeted them, and seeing Scott Barnes who gave JLo her famous “glow” do a live contouring demo. FYI he is not a big fan of the line across the middle of the nose, “not pretty” haha. I got a really awesome looking double tipped eyeliner from the NYX machine called “Two Timer” it’s got a kohl pencil liner and a felt tip liner I’m excited to try it out!
Ok that was the fun stuff now onto the not so fun stuff- insecurities. I’m not one of those natural networkers. I’m not great at talking to strangers, I can be super awkward, I get very shy and nervous, it’s not good. I realize it’s like a muscle and if you work on it it can get better, but it’s something I definitely struggle with. I also have insecurities about beauty blogging in general because I am by no means that super glam girl who is looking on point 24/7. My winged liner is rarely even, I can’t always get my lashes straight, my lipstick gets on my teeth, it’s always something. This is what made it difficult for me to start Blushing in Hollywood in the first place. I thought “these girls are 10x better than I’ll ever be, how can I compete!?” I just read a quote on a BeautyCon article from Bethany Mota who is a teenage YouTube superstar racking in hundreds of thousands of dollars that made me feel a little better: “I hope this experience will encourage them to stick with what they are doing,” she adds, “When I first started doing this, I felt slightly discouraged because there are so many people doing the same thing. When I first got into it, I thought you had to be a professional makeup artist. But now there are teens and kids of all ages showing how easy it is. I hope they will be encouraged to keep going. It’s a great experience to be around people who share the same passion and do what you do.” I need to just take a breath and remember that the blog is going to take hard work and dedication if I want it to be successful and that I have to be patient because it’s going to take time. I also need to just remember that as flawless as these girls look, none of them are perfect and I think the most popular ones are the ones who are real and show their flaws because they are much more relatable anyway. I need to just keep on it because it’s something fun that I enjoy creating. I also need to bite the bullet and get out there and meet some new people at events! It’s so hard to introduce yourself as a beauty blogger because it feels like the person you tell is immediately going to assess everything about how you look which is tough. I like doing this and my friends like reading it so what else matters really? As much as I feel like I NEED a DSLR and I NEED a ring light and I NEED more fake flowers to take pictures in front of what I really NEED to do is just enjoy the process. Here’s a video from Kandee Johnson who is so sweet and positive and uplifting she always cheers me up:
Also, enjoy these puppies that were at BeautyCon and just know that everything is going to be ok.
