Massive types of brushes have been released so far for various reasons to help us get an optimal makeup application. Many dollies might be still nervous about how to choose makeup brushes that are gonna pick effectively pigments of makeup products as well as blend nicely products on your face.

I’m really excited to share with you all about important ideas of choosing makeup brushes based on their different features and additionally, how to take care of them for your skin protection.

1. Natural or Synthetic

There are two primary types of bristles in makeup, natural or synthetic.

The natural means your bristles are made of natural animal hairs, mostly from sable, goat and squirrel. It’s really a great decision for powdery and also, high pigmented products. it’s able to smoothly pick up and blend powder-based products across your face without patchy marks.

Synthetic means the bristle’s material is by chemical or artificial substances, often polyester fibers, nylon and taklon. It’s perfect for creams or liquid-based properties, like foundation, gel eyeliner or cream blush. As synthetic bristles are stiffer than the former, they won’t absorb your products.

2. Size

Choosing the right brush sizes importantly decide how effectively you fill colours in your face.

Large sizes will facilitate you to blend evenly products all over your face.

For eye makeup, you have gotta need both large and small size of brushes to nail it. The larger can help to wipe products all over, whereas the smaller brushes seem to softly define the crease or accurate areas around the eye.

Similarly, for face makeup, bigger brushes are used for blending evenly everywhere on your face. In contrast, smaller sizes are to apply products to particular areas, like applying concealer beneath your eyes or liquid highlighter for contour.

3. Density

Brushes with thick hairs can easily pick a lot of colour in one application.

Fluffy brushes are really excellent for blending as they enable you to blend high pigmented products without applying lots of products, especially eyeshadow powder. If you use a fluffy brush to blend products on wide areas of your face, your makeup turns to look streaky and boggy.

4. Shapes

The majority of brush shapes are domed, slanted, rounded and flat.

Rounded brushes usually give soft edges for applying products in wiping motions, no need for blending. You can use a larger size to apply foundation; otherwise, a smaller size to apply concealer with moderate intensity.

Differently, domed brush is to focus precisely on particular areas on your face, especially the eyelid to create a highlight or a sheer colour payoff so it prefers to apply in a pat and roll motion. I usually use this for doing smokey eyes.

A slanted brush tends to give more control for precise placement. For blush, a bigger brush provides flat edges or angled shapes of bristles to get a perfect curve beneath your cheekbone.

Moreover, slanted eyeliners can bring about details to help you seamlessly define the crease contour and do cat eye makeup.

A flat brush enables one to lay down a thick amount of colour. It can be used efficiently to apply a highlighter or accentuate the sides of your face since it’s shaped narrow and flat. Moreover, as it picks up a lot of pigment in one application, it’s gonna be perfect for applying foundation.

5. Holding and Cleaning

The place you hold your brushes also decides the number of products you’re gonna apply to your face. If you hold your brush so close on the ferrule, you’ll get a strong application for full coverage.

Otherwise, girls mostly grip in the middle or nearly the tail for a slight, layered application.

Cleaning your brushes is really important to protect your skin from breakouts by bacteria and dirt that have been stuck into bristles for a long time. It might require a fussy process.

Once a month is really great for how often to clean your brushes. However, if you have acne-prone or sensitive skin, I recommend once a week is ideal for you. Or, if you’re having a breakout, you can clean it immediately after using it.

To clean your brush, let’s start with dipping the bristles in water and avoiding getting water into the ferrule. It’s because water can flush out the glue inside of the ferrule. The bristles then fall out and breed bacteria.

After that, swirl the bristles around a solid brush cleaner to get soap.

Photo via The Happy Sloths

Roll the bristles on the gripped surface and try to make sure all the product is off. You might have to do this many times to ensure that your brush has been clean.

Then, rinse your bristles by dipping them into the water again to make all of the soap out. Once you’ve taken out the product in water, you have to squeeze it out and maintain the shape of your brush so you can lay down to dry.

Wow! A lot of things you gotta do here! I hope you enjoy this post and hope it’s really helpful for you to use and take care of your brushes in the right ways. If you have any questions or advice for me about this topic, I’d love to hear you out. Thank you so much for your support!