Just like your clothes and house, your makeup also needs to be cleaned, and this doesn’t just apply to makeup artists and beauty gurus. It’s so important to keep your brushes, makeup and tools clean so you aren’t transferring bacteria onto your face.
Beyond just avoiding clogged pores or eye infections, giving your tools a good wash also leads to the longevity of them. While this might not be a fun step in the beauty process, it’s an important one for everyone.
Before you even get into cleaning, you need to make sure you purge your collection of any expired makeup. In order to keep your products safe and effective, click here to see when it’s time to say goodbye.
Powder
This is probably the step that the least amount of people do, but it’s important.
- Gently wipe down shadows and pressed powders with a tissue.
- Then, spritz it with 70% rubbing alcohol from a spray bottle. This won’t hurt the makeup, just remove any bacteria.
- Make sure the alcohol evaporates before storing again.
Brushes
You should deep clean your brushes once a week. Admittedly, I usually do this every two weeks. I’ve used pretty much every cleanser, and I’ve been loving this one.
- Run warm water in your skin.
- Add a little bit of the cleanser to your palm. You can also use a mat if you have one.
- Gently swirl the brush around alternating between the water soap.
- If it’s a brush with thicker products, like foundation, you may need to repeat this several times.
- Do this until the water runs clear and you can not longer see product in the bristles.
- Wipe down the handles with an alcohol wipe.
- Lay the brushes flat on a towel to dry. It’s even better if you can dry them on an angle with the bristles down.
Keep in mind that it takes the brushes awhile to dry, so I recommend doing it at night.
DO NOT let your brushes soak in water. This loosens the glue on the handle and results in the brush falling apart.
Sponges
Sponges used to be such a pain to clean until I did this little trick.
- Run the sponge under warm water in the sink.
- Once saturated, rub the sponge over a bar of soap. I get the most plain gentle formula ones from the Dollar Store for this. For whatever reason, bars of soap work SO much better than a liquid soap.
Tools
Tweezers, eyelash curlers, sharpeners, scissors, etc. all need to have any makeup removed and wiped down with an alcohol wipe. You should also replace the cushion in your eyelash curler. They usually come with a backup, but you can also pick them up separately.
Hair brushes & Combs
Product easily builds up in brushes. You don’t want to be adding old built up product onto clean hair.
- Remove any hair.
- Fill your skin with warm water and add a little of whatever shampoo you have on hand.
- Let the brushes soak face down for 20 mins.
- Rinse, and lay flat to dry.
- I also like to wipe down the handles and backs with an alcohol wipe.
Lipstick
Wipe off with a tissue and spritz with some alcohol.
Eye & Lip Liners
Give your liners a quick turn in the sharpener to remove the top layer and spray with alcohol.
Drawers
You don’t want to put all your freshly cleaned makeup into dirty drawers, so make sure you wipe them down. If you store your brushes in cups, make sure you clean out the bottoms of these too.
