Tiffanie B. Photo provided
By Tiffanie B
We’ve all heard the saying, “Beauty is in the eye of the beholder.” Well, that’s exactly how I view beauty in everything in life. I think for me beauty is something you carry, it’s how you share yourself to the world. It’s more so what’s beneath the surface, although the surface adds to how we feel about beauty. Let’s start from the beginning. Hi, my name is Tiffanie B. I go by @itstiffanieb on all platforms, it just makes it easy to find me this way. I’m originally from Cincinnati, Ohio but 8 years ago after I graduated from The University of Cincinnati, my life changed, not drastically but I definitely felt a shift, I’m sure we’ve all been there before, and now I reside in the concrete jungle. For those not familiar, I reside in the city that never sleeps, well didn’t sleep until COVID hit, New York City. Although living here for some time, I still have my midwest roots and ideals, that guide my thought processes and how I take on life every single day.
Over the past year, we’ve all had to take a pause, whether it was needed or not, we all had to take a pause. During that time, I know for myself I started to wonder what more the world had in store for me and how could I explore what were things that I was personally interested in? I was one of those people that sat with myself for many days because of the current circumstances surrounding our new, hopefully not too much longer, normalcy. This is where my love for things that simply made me feel good reunited with my love for literally everything I could find that was related to beauty for me. It started with acquiring everything I could find to build on my fascination with the world of nails and nail art. I started with a drill so I could take off my current nail set. Once I saw with everyone else that businesses were shutting down, I decided to research and invest in more to figure out the root to my fascination. This grew to researching and obtaining gel nail polish, tips, & more to what became my own in-house small nail boutique. After a few attempts, I finally learned a look and feel that I enjoyed even if it may not have been perfectly done, it was perfectly done for me. It was beauty. What I had sought out to accomplish, I did but the root to why I wanted to build on this was still yet to be figure out. From there, I decided to understand was just beauty in nails or was it trying to find ways that made me feel and look beautiful. Products around me started to grow in different territories of what is considered or would be considered in the beauty industry. To be honest, you really wouldn’t believe the amount of makeup brushes, palettes, foundations, skin cleansers, toners, leave-in conditioners, I’ve collected from previous years and this year. I wanted to try to make me feel beautiful with things I already had in what would become such a world of uncertainty.
Finding what my ideal of beauty was, experiencing, and experimenting throughout this year using knowledge I’ve previously had as well, has really allowed for me to find and focus on understanding my love for everything skincare and makeup. I loved figuring out throughout this time that I truly do have a love and a deep nurturing love affair for my skin, what I put into my body, and makeup looks that I enjoy that help me stand out more. Especially considering my world went completely virtual on March 12th along with many of the people around me, probably even you. Beauty for me is practically what saved me because it gave me a moment to focus on as I’ve said before, things that simply made me feel good. Now, I’m sure you’re probably wondering at this point, what are these products or at least some that have gotten me to a point to feel mentally and physically good? To give some insight into what I call, “My Beauty Catalog”, my favorite go-tos to end my night and start my day are my Garnier SkinActive Micellar Cleansing Water Rose and Sephora’s Ultra Glow Serum: Glow and Strengthen Vitamin C + E Serum. These two products together, pure gold for me. They have also pushed me to tackle this year in more ways than one.
Let’s take a moment to break these down and why I think they’re important products to have in any beauty catalog:
Throughout this year, has there been a day that after you gotten up, brushed your teeth and washed your face that you felt as though you still needed something to give you a breath of fresh air but directly for your face? That’s exactly what the Garnier SkinActive Micellar Cleansing Water Rose does for me. It’s a 2-in-1 hydrating cleansing water that really puts hydration back into your skin. I love using this product to cleanse my skin of makeup from the day and as we know, sometimes depending on that day our skin can become drained or at least feels like it. This water wakes everything back up for me. After I cleanse and hydrate my skin, as you guys may not know just yet, I’m also a foodie. So, as I love to feed myself, I used Sephora’s C+E serum to feed my skin. Vitamin C and E are very important to improving how your skin feels and looks naturally. Vitamin C which is also known as ascorbic acid (just in case you see those words instead) protects your cells from damaging themselves, helps diminish any fine lines and is very significant in keeping your skin looking firm and smooth. Vitamin E is also known as alpa-tocopherol, aquasol e, alpha tocopherol, and tocopherol, is an antioxidant that is effective in reducing UV damage in the skin. Vitamin E applied more frequently can also help nourish and protect your skin from damaging itself as well. These two important vitamins are really the perfect mesh on top of drinking my water and minding my business that feeds my skin.
I know what beauty means to me may not and probably should not mean the same to others but I hope the goal throughout this section is to help others tap into things that allow them see what beauty could mean for them. To be able to educate each other because although I know some things I definitely do not know everything and that’s perfectly fine for me. I’m excited to learn from each of you as well. This is only the beginning and I look forward to sharing this journey of beauty with all of you.