5 Beauty Essentials You Need in College
Transitioning into college can be rough and finding a routine that fits your new schedule and is easy to store can be hard. However, there are several beauty essentials that can help you feel your best every single day!
1. A Simple Skincare Routine
Something that I found to both increase my confidence and just feel fresh on a daily basis was using beauty products that worked for me! The secret to looking glowy and feeling good in your own skin is a simple and effective skincare routine. A three-step system is a great place to start! I personally love the Clinique three-step system, but there are so many options on the market for oily, combination, and dry skin; there is sure to be something that will work for your unique and beautiful skin! Choose a facial cleanser, toner, and moisturizer that are for your skin type and prove to work for you. Top it all off with some sunscreen and lots of water every day and you will see results. For a more luxurious feel to your skincare routine, pop your products into your mini-fridge to keep them perfectly chilled. This way, when you have to wake up for an early morning class, your skincare routine will also help to wake you up. Plus, by having a simplified skincare routine comprised of four products, all of them will fit in your shower caddy, making it easy and also dorm-friendly!
2. Undereye Concealer
It is no secret that you are busy in college, especially at the beginning of the first semester when you are adjusting to a new environment and trying to make friends. Therefore, you do not always get as much sleep as you need or are used to getting back home. This can result in the appearance of dark circles underneath your eyes, which of course can make you look as tired as you are. This is where one of the staple beauty essentials comes in, the undereye concealer. Just a few swipes of concealer under your eyes, blended out using your ring finger, and topped off with powder instantly will make you look alive, awake, and like you have gotten eight beautiful hours of sleep the night before. This is especially useful before your early morning classes, such as the dreaded 8 A.M. class! I have found that just doing this one, simple makeup step can make me feel so much more confident and ready to tackle the day ahead of me, whatever it brings. It truly is the littlest things that can make a big impact!
3. Shower Shoes
Personal hygiene goes a long way in college and something that you absolutely need to have when you arrive on your college campus is a pair of shower shoes. If you are living in a traditional dorm hall, then odds are you will be sharing a community-style bathroom with a fairly large number of other people. I know when I lived in a dorm I shared a bathroom with about fifteen other girls, and we all used the same four showers! If this is true for your living situation in college, there is no option besides wearing these while you exfoliate and cleanse! If you do not wear shower shoes, you risk getting foot fungus, which is sure to stress you out more than forgetting to do the class reading for your toughest professor’s class. While you may find wearing shoes in the shower to just feel wrong the first couple of times you use them, you will love how clean they keep our feet and how convenient they are for the walk from your dorm room to the bathroom. You never know what can accumulate on the floors of shared living spaces, especially during a global pandemic. Shower shoes are incredibly cheap and you will definitely want to add them to your back-to-school shopping list!
4. A Self-care Kit
Now, this may seem a little bit on the extra side, but having a little self-care kit in your dorm comes in handy. Whether it is a girl’s night in or just a weekly pamper routine you do on your own, it quickly became one of my beauty essentials while I was in college. My personal self-care kit mostly consisted of face masks, a body scrub, a variety of colorful nail polishes, body lotion, lip masks, and even a jade facial roller to help depuff my face for the day. Really, you can put anything in your self-care kit that makes you feel relaxed and fresh! Taking the time to treat yourself with a charcoal face mask or painting your nails your favorite color is a great confidence booster. When you take the time to pamper yourself, it helps to reduce stress and make you feel more beautiful!
5. Hand Sanitizer
Just like it is of the highest importance to wear shower shoes in a community bathroom, it is necessary to carry a bottle of hand sanitizer around with you. As if hygiene was not important enough before COVID-19, for those of you heading back to your university campus this fall, it is vital. From the desks you sit in, the door handles you touch entering buildings on campus, to the dishes you use in the dining hall, using hand sanitizer is essential to making sure you stay healthy this school year! Now, it is not the most glamorous or fun item, but, along with wearing a face mask to class and anytime you are out and about on campus, hand sanitizer is one of the most important beauty essentials that you can use this fall. While some colleges are hosting some classes online and some in-person, you still need to make sure that you are protecting yourself from getting the virus at all costs when you leave the confines of your dorm room.
