Travel Makeup Bag: Packing the Essentials

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Over the next month, I have three trips coming up for complete different occasions. They’re all basically back to back trips which will all require completely different wardrobes. Needless to say, I’ve got travel on my brain. I’ve written a lot of travel posts on here before, but I realized that I haven’t written one about how I pack my travel make up bag or how I pick my makeup essentials. Space is always important, so I thought it would be fun to go through the process together.

How I Pick the Essentials for My Travel Makeup Bag

Know your location and occasion

Are you going to the beach with friends or a hotel for a work conference? Not only will your wardrobe change for both of these trips, but the make up you’ll need will as well! The beach will probably require minimal make up during the day (plus a lot of sunscreen and chapstick) and a more fun look at night. While the conference will require a more professional look with a touch of lipstick.

Layout what activities will happen

This is great to know in case you may need to reapply anything or if you may need to keep face wipes on hand. These are perfect in case you decide to you want to go exercise and need to take off your make up in a Pinch.

Picking the exact pieces for your bag

The real trick here is getting everything back down to the basics. Your goal isn’t to put every piece of make up you own into this bag. Instead, you just want to grab the few tings you actually need.

Pick Your Base Pieces

For the bases pieces, you first need to look at what you put on your face daily after washing it. Or rather, your basic make up look. For me that typically means moisturizer, primer, and then a tinted moisturized (I switch between Bare Minerals and Beautycounter). Also, mascara, under eye cover-up, zit coverage (or this one), and a lip balm. For some people, there may be more pieces in there, like eyeliner, blush, brown tint, or lip gloss! These are just my basic pieces though.

Add In the Extras

Then, you’ll add in the extra pieces. What would you need to take it up a notch if you’re going out for the evening or if you have to take a super important work meeting?

For me, this only really means adding in eyeliner and lipstick. I’ve been debating adding some blush in, but I haven’t gotten quite there yet. I use to do eye shadow, but now, I mostly use it Cosmetics “Bye Bye Under Eye Illuminator” to help brighten up my eyes a little bit. This does kind of go back to me not knowing that much about beauty and make up though. Since I don’t know that much, I just keep it simple and honestly, that works for me!

Skin Care Products

I might go into this a little bit more in another post, but I didn’t want you to think that I was ignoring it! You’ll definitely want to make sure you’re packing up your skin care routine when you go on vacation. That’s not the time to go off track! Especially since you don’t want to come back and break out. We’ll get into that in a different post though.

Eliminate any duplicates

Okay, back to the topic at hand. Now that you have your collection of products to bring, look through your bag. Do you have any duplicates? Pick one and put back the rest. I know you may want to bring them all, but space is important here!

If you have a difficult time narrowing it down from duplicates, think of it like how you think of your clothes: which one will you get the most use of during the trip? Which one will be the most versatile? Pick that one!

Pick up travel sizes whenever you can

Aren’t travel size products the best? I love grabbing them whenever I can and you need to as well! So many brands now offer their best products in travel sizes, so make sure to peruse your favorite site to see if your favorites are also in travel size.

Always have a packed up bag ready with your favorites.

It’s also great to have your favorites in travel size, because then you never have to pick through the make up on the counter to put your travel makeup bag together. Nope! Instead, you can always have a makeup bag ready to go and filled with all of your favorites! That way whenever you’re packing you can just grab your bag, through it in your suitcase, and you’re good to go!

I’ve done this with my toiletries and it’s such a time saver. It’s made my packing life so much easier and I’m starting to do it with my makeup as well. It’ll definitely make the next month or so a breeze.

Are you still not sure where to start with what you should put in your bag?

Not a problem, I have a great suggestion for you! Beautycounter, the brand I’m a consultant for, has a great collection called “Flawless in Five” where they’ve put together all of the makeup products you need to put together a great look in under five minutes!

The collection currently includes:

Now, separately the total cost of these products comes to $187, but Beautycounter sells the set for $150 (which is 10% off the price of each product).

But I have a better offer for you! Right now, Beautycounter is hosting their Friends and Family Sale and while this collection isn’t offered as part of this sale, if you put each product in your cart individually, the total cost will be lower than $150!

Either way, it’s a great way to see how to put together an easy make up look in under 5 minutes PLUS this could be the starting point for your travel make up bag!

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Travel Makeup Bag: Packing the Essentials