And are there any treatment steps that you like to do, like face masks or exfoliators?
Oh, I love exfoliating. I just got this new one from Drunk Elephant—it was just a little trial one that you mix in with the face wash, and it’s really lovely. Face masks I really, really love too. I have one from Ren—the Glycol Lactic Radiance treatment (£36)—and that’s kind of my guilty pleasure because it kind of hurts when I put it on [laughing]. It has a bit of a burn to it, and my face always goes really red, but in the morning, I feel really glowy.
What’s the best piece of skincare advice that you’ve ever received?
I think SPF was the first one that I didn’t really know about. I got a moisturiser from Kiehl’s—its Ultra Facial moisturiser (£48)—and it’s got SPF in, and I really like that.
When I was a kid, whenever my mum would see me taking off my eye makeup and my mascara, she would always be on me about not dragging my eyes or dragging my skin too much, and that advice has really stuck with me too. I’m really wary of pulling my skin in ways that I shouldn’t. Oh, and hot water and cold water! Opening pores and closing pores. I don’t totally know the benefits of all of it [laughing] but I love the feeling of splashing with cold water after I’ve washed my face.
A quick scroll of your Instagram reveals plenty of vibrant makeup looks. It looks like you have a lot of fun with makeup and enjoy wearing it, but what products are always in your makeup bag?
I would have to go back again to the Glossier Cloud Paint because they have such a wide colour range. Dawn is my favourite, but they have so many, which is nice. I like to do the trio of the cheeks, lips and lids, so it’s quite nice because it means that I can create a slightly different colour palette on my face every day. I’ve also been playing a lot with eye shadows at the moment and just seeing what colours I like to see on my face. I have a couple of the Morphe palettes, which are really gorgeous, and the pigment is really beautiful.
I feel like your eyeliner always looks really good. Is there one that you swear by?
I tend to use more of a crayon eyeliner, and then I go over it with a liquid liner. My liquid liner, I want to say, is Urban Decay, and my crayon liner is gorgeous—it’s Pat McGrath (£23), and it’s really beautiful. But I also have this gorgeous Bobbi Brown black gel pot (£22). Because I slightly struggle with liquid liner, I tend to let my makeup artist use liquid, and I’ll stick to crayons.
And how about hair—are there certain products that you swear by in your routine? How has your journey been with finding products that work for you?
Similar to makeup and skin, hair was a massive grey area for me growing up. I used to straighten my hair a lot when I was younger—I guess just to fit in and to have hair that looked like everybody else’s. I remember the first day that I wore my afro out, and I don’t know if I loved the attention that it got, which is really funny because now I’m older I love when I have my afro out. Everybody complements it and says how amazing it looks, but I think when you’re a kid, you just want to hide in the background or be in the fold as much as possible.
When I was a kid, you couldn’t really buy products for Black hair on the high street, so I always remember going to specific Black hair shops with my mum, which were like a 20-minute drive from the house. Again, it’s much different now. I can go into Boots, and I can pick up some of my favourite products. They stock all of the Shea Moisture collection, which is really good. I love the argan oil shampoos and conditioners. Black hair is definitely a huge journey, I think because all of our hair is different. For me, because I’m mixed—my mum is Jamaican and my dad is British-Irish—I think having that middle texture meant that I couldn’t use my mum’s products, and I couldn’t use my dad’s products, so I was always trying to find things that would help.
KeraCare is one of my favourites ever. I found it through my hairstylist, and it has this product called Glossifier (£6), which is quite gorgeous. It’s bright pink, and it has a kind of greasy feel to it. I put that on my roots to make sure that my hair is hydrated at all times. I just love when my hair feels moisturised. I love coconut oil, too, which I get from anywhere. Mine’s from Aldi. Sometimes at night if my face is feeling a little bit dry, I’ll pop that on my hair and on my skin. I’ve definitely turned towards more natural products as I’ve gotten older, but it’s definitely been a struggle to find out what’s good and what’s best.
