Foundations, BB's and CC's for pale skin

Finding a foundation that's even vaguely near your skin tone is a difficult task for all of us. In anything more than light or sheer coverage foundation, there is very little room for error and the shade must be spot on. Recently, it seems there has been an influx of lighter, more sheer formulations. We have also seen the arrival of BB balms, swiftly followed by CC creams which usually have a limited shade range - sometimes only one colour (argh). I imagine this is pretty annoying whatever your skin tone and certainly for pale skinned folks (ghosties)  like myself, this lack of shade range is a bit of a nightmare.

However with some clever application and a bit of a trial-and-error approach, you can still reap the benefits from these new fangled formulations and cover what you need to cover, all while avoiding the biggest beauty faux pas = orange-face-with-white-neck.

I've gone through a lot of foundations recently. A lot. I've tried (in the lightest shade available of course): Max Factor Xperience (meh); Bourjois 10 Hour Sleep Effect (looks amazing if your skin is a bit dry and lacklustre, looks gross if you're naturally oily!); Max Factor Lasting Performance (a former favourite), Lancome Teint Idole (too thick, too dark); No7 BB cream for normal/oily (poor coverage, even for a BB!); 17 BB cream (99% sure this made my skin break out); Loreal Paris Infallible (great colour, 65% sure this made my skin break out although it was quite possibly a joint effort between this and a dodgy cleansing balm!); Max Factor Colour Adapt (too dark)... etc, etc, etc... I'm not the only one that does this am I? Please tell me we all try every bloody foundation, like it for a bit, then give it away?

Anyway, my top four of the year (for vastly different reasons) are: Lancome Teint Miracle Foundation in 005 Beige Ivoire (SPF15); Max Factor CC Cream in 40 Fair (SPF 10); Dr Jart+ Regenerating Beauty Balm (SPF 30); bareMinerals Original SPF15 Foundation in Fair.

I reviewed the Lancome one earlier and you can find that review here. I'll go through each of these focusing on the formulation and how I use it first, then I'll go onto the shade and swatches.

Starting with the first one on the left in that picture: the Dr Jart+ Regenerating BB Balm. This one is dark. There's no getting away from that. But it has SPF30. 30!! Even a tiny droplet of this mixed into your moisturiser and blended all over before putting on your proper foundation will give you a bit more sun protection that you would normally have. That, incidentally, is how I use this = mixed into moisturiser. I sometimes just smear a dot of it over my face without moisturiser if my skin is a bit oily, or only moisturise my cheeks, then put this all over (but a very small amount).

On the far right of that picture, is the Max Factor CC cream. This has been my base of choice recently and I'm almost finished this tube after a few months of wearing it everyday. It's a great pale colour (swatches below) and it doesn't seem to make my skin break out. I will admit that oily girls will likely struggle with this. It says on the bottle that it is "infused with skincare ingredients" and I would say that even skin which is a teeny bit dry will find that putting this on top of moisturiser is just too much and the finish will be quite shiny. I usually put a tiny bit of moisturising gel on my cheeks, then put this CC cream on all over, either with my fingers, or with the Real Techniques expert face brush. I then swirl a bit of face powder (bareMinerals Mineral Veil) to calm down the sheen.

Lastly, at the bottom of the picture, is the bareMinerals Original foundation in Fair. Mineral foundations take a bit of getting used to. I bought this a while back, right at the start of my recent facial meltdown (cystic acne, milia, blackheads, whiteheads = the whole package). It was the ONLY makeup I could use that didn't allow my skin to cultivate crops of new blemishes throughout the day. My skin got over this initial flare-up and went the other way = extremely dry and sensitive. Buffing this into broken, irritated skin is not a good idea, and will not look good. You need a good base for this, preferably load up on your favourite moisturiser, then buff this on (don't use the bareMinerals flawless face brush, it's gross and scratchy) with a brush designed for mineral powders. I use the ecotools buffing brush, which is probably completely the wrong tool, but hey, who cares, I like the finish it gives.

Wow that was long! So what do these products look like on the skin? Well:

As you can see, the bareMinerals foundation is an excellent shade. Really light with not too much pink or yellow but just enough "yellowness" to counteract the underlying red/pink tones often found in pale skin. If you are the other type of pale however, you would perhaps benefit from trying the other fair shades as you might want a bit more pink to counteract your natural yellow tones.

The Dr Jart+ Regenerating balm is very dark here as you can see. No problem at all with it if you use it as I've described above.

My favourite of the moment, the Max Factor cream, is a rosey-pale colour which matches my skintone perfectly, but as mentioned, I sometimes need a bit of yellow in my base to counteract my natural redness. Mixing this with a bit of the Lancome one (the last swatch) seems to sort that out though and it's not overly pink toned so I actually get away with using it alone.

Phew. I hope that was helpful. No doubt I'll continue buying foundations even after finding these beauties, so brace yourselves for another long post on bases in the future. I'm currently eyeing-up: bareMinerals "ready" compact, NARS Sheer Glow, Laura Mercier Silk Creme, Bourjois Healthy Mix Serum, and about a hundred others. When will it end?!

Where to buy:
Dr Jart+ Regenerating BB - Boots - £14 (usually £21)
Lancome Teint Miracle - Feelunique - £27.50
Max Factor CC - Boots - £9.99
bareMinerals - Feelunique £19.95