Beauty Challenge -- Twelve Months of Beauty Inventory

[haleyvvvv]

[EDIT-Updated to not limit to a year, legacy posts for all years.]

A few years ago I was inspired by a challenge on Instagram and we did a makeup inventory. ✨❄️December 2022 Challenge - 12 Days of Makeup Inventory - Show Off and Catalog Your Collection!!❄️✨

I was a little behind on planning this year (job interviews, life, not being able to login to the BIC), so I thought we could make this a yearly challenge for 2024+ and broaden it across all beauty categories. 

Why participate?

• I know I went back to my posts to find "dupes" for things that were limited edition (Melt Pumpkin King, in my case).
• It's a good idea to look through your products every bit to review for quality and cleanliness.
• Curation is important.
• Knowing how much in your stash can help with your Low/No Buy or keeping an eye on your backups. 
• The fun of organizing your collection!!

Rules 

Please no negative comments about the size or contents of others' collections, this is a place to celebrate our collections. Self-reflection is always welcome though 💖. Please don't take this as an impetus to declutter (unless you want to!). 

I'm going to try to get a little contemplative with mine, to see if I would purchase again or not. But don't feel obligated to join that part!!

Timeline

• January - Face Primers, Nail Polish
• February - Foundations, Concealers, Cleansers and Mists
• March - Bronzers and Contours (singles), Serums and Treatments
• April - Blushes (singles), Moisturizer and Oils
• May - Highlighters (singles), Sheet Masks
• June - Face Palettes, Non-Sheet Masks, Tools (Brushes, etc.)
• July - Eye Primers, Single Eyeshadows (free standing or in custom palettes), Body Cleansers, Body Scrubs, Body Lotion, Body Glitter
• August - Eyeshadow Palettes, Shampoo, Conditioner
• September - Brow Products, Eyeliners, Mascaras, Hair Treatments 
• October - Lip Balms, Lip Liners, Lip Glosses, Perfume Samples
• November - Lipsticks, Travel Sized Perfumes
• December - Setting Powders, Setting Sprays, Full Sized Perfumes and Body Sprays

[Samtian]

@haleyvvvv Thanks for the challenge again this year. @itsfi Thanks for the reminder about primers!

I had forgotten about a little drawer I have that has samples in it. So I found some primers in there I didn't remember existed, and I've set them aside. In another drawer I have other various samples but most of those I have to research what they are so I'm not worrying about them. One of the DM balms is tinted and doesn't work with my skin so I use it now for eye shadow primer. 

Primers (mostly just face)-

Nail Polish- I have more floating in the great unknown of the house, but here are the once I recently went through.

[itsfi]

"So I found some primers in there I didn't remember existed"

lolololol, if I had a $1 for everytime I said or thought that about a beauty product, including primers @Samtian ... 🤣 How do you like the Smashbox color correcting primer?

Oh, your nail polish collection - that Deborah Lippmann one is so pretty, love the shift on it. What a blast from the past with those Formula X polishes. This reminds me I still need to sort through and inventory my nail polish  collection.  

[Titian06]

@Samtian - You still have Sephora Formula X polishes! 💜

[itsfi]

January 2026 - Face Primers, Nail Polish

Face Primers

Face Primers (as of 1.1.2026)

13 total products*, all in varying sizes and stages of use. 

• ciele prime & PROTECT SPF 30+ Smoothing Primer is the newest full size in my collection. It's a nice primer; I tend to reach for it more in the warmer months if I'm not using my actual sunscreen as a primer.
• Dr. Jart+ Mini Cicapair Color Correcting Treatment SPF 30 15 mL/ .50 fl oz - not sure but the brand may have recently reformulated and repackaged this product. This is the old version. This is my last mini jar of the older version but I have several deluxe sample sizes of it so I should have plenty of time to test out the new version and/or find a suitable replacement if, in fact, it has been reformulated. 
• This is my second full size bottle of the DIOR Dior Forever Glow Veil Makeup Primer 1oz / 30ml. 
• I'm not sure if I've ever purchased a full size of the GUERLAIN Parure Gold 24K Radiance Primer 1.2 oz / 35 mL but I've gone through quite a few deluxe samples and really enjoy this product. It's similar (but different, but similar) to the YSL primer (see below) but more heavily fragranced and I want to say a slightly different consistency - well, one way to find out. I'll use them both sometime during the year to compare.
• Hourglass Nº 28™ Primer Serum was a HG for me about a decade ago when I was really struggling with very, very dry skin. My skin is more normal-to-dry in the fall and winter, sometimes leaning very dry so I like to keep a mini of this in my collection just in case my skin needs a little more oomph before I apply makeup. My skin can be sensitive but the essential oils in this did not cause any irritation; that said, your mileage may vary so if you do have sensitive skin or if you are sensitive to essential oils, please look over the INCI list carefully and definitely test the product before applying it all over your face.
• Bobbi Brown Vitamin Enriched Face Base Moisturizer & Primer with Vitamin C + Hyaluronic Acid 1.7 oz/ 50 mL is a longstanding 🐐 winter primer for me. I don't know if the brand just renamed and repackaged the product or if there's a new formulation. In any event, I have a travel size and a couple of deluxe samples to work through first. 
• Yves Saint Laurent Touche Eclat Blur Face Primer Blur Primer Gold is a beautiful primer. I've gone through several promo gwp deluxe sized samples as well as a full size (years ago, maybe pre-BT/BIC?)
• Anna Sui Gel Foundation Primer has an ... interesting ... texture. It's bouncy and is one of those formulations where you can make a dent in it and then like a starfish, the part of the product that was disturbed, bounces back or regenerates itself as if nothing happened. Reminds me of the Klairs Freshly Juiced Vitamin E Mask. It's alright, I don't reach for it much. The brand repackaged and reformulated this product last year, possibly in 2024.
• On the fence about Gucci Hydrating Silk Priming Serum 1. My first few uses I was all on board and was a little worried about that given its price tag - Gucci gets enough of my $$$ as it is. But then the fragrance in this one came through very intensely on a few subsequent uses. It may have been that my senses were a little more heightened or sensitive during that period but I haven't picked it up since. I plan to give it another try this month and will decide after that whether this stays or goes.
• Danessa Myricks Beauty Yummy Skin Blurring Balm Powder - Tinted Primer & Foundation Universal for some reason does not work well on my skin. The tinted version however, wears beautifully. I have a few mini's of this one; one was decluttered a couple of years ago, some have been passed along or re-homed to others who appreciate it more than I do, and then there's one. My skin has changed from a couple of years ago so I'll give it another go. 
• REFY Glow and Sculpt Face Serum Primer with Niacinamide 1.4 oz / 40 mL has not been open and given how many primers I already have in use (and how many I enjoy out of this bunch), I'm inclined to either donate or give this away. I feel like it'll be better served by going to someone who will get more use out of it than I will. 
• TOM FORD Traceless Soft Matte Primer with Pore-Smoothing Effect 1 oz/ 30 mL is one I've been meaning to try. I've had my makeup done with this as the primer and liked how it performed, but that was also with a professional makeup artist doing my makeup. Will be interested to see how this fares; going to set it aside for use in a future makeup capsule.
• They're not joking when they say this ONE/SIZE by Patrick Starrr Secure The Sweat Waterproof Mattifying Primer 1 oz / 30 g grips makeup in place. Whoowhee! The problem I have with it is that it pills with quite a few of my base products, especially my skin tints, which makes up quite a bit of my foundation collection. I'm sure there's a foundation or two (or more) in my stash that this will play very nicely with; I just have to find it.

* Some of these products I have multiples of so I have more than 13 items but as far as different type of products, there are 13 in the primer category.

Okay, my plan is to cycle through these primers and see if there are any I can move along out of my collection. I'll come back to update this thread when I've made some headway in my testing. 

Nail Polish

I've pared down my collection quite a bit; it's not where it was pre-covid but it's much more manageable. I was in the middle of another declutter project with it when I got sidetracked (in part because I was looking (and looking and looking ...) for a box of polish I could have sworn I put somewhere in the garage before the remodel. 🤔 I want to find that, sort through and finish that declutter project first and then will come back to post about that collection. Stay tuned. 

Thank you @haleyvvvv! It was nice to retrieve all my primers last year from their various spaces. I've been trying to reorganize my collection and last year I started doing it by brand and putting them in makeup bags but that only works well for certain brands, so this has given me an opportunity to both revisit my organization plans and to do another round of assessing what stays and what gets donated / re-homed.

[Samtian]

@itsfi I second @haleyvvvv and love your notes. That is so funny about the DM balm, I wish the tinted version worked for me, but the Universal oh my hg so much hg!

[Titian06]

I'm with you, @Samtian !  I love the DM Universal balm!

[itsfi]

Awww, thank you @Samtian; I find it helpful to know details about products so I try to provide some meaningful feedback (and to not be so wordy about it, but that latter part doesn't alwasy happen, hahahaha!) lol, I find that so interesting! There's quite a few people who really love the DM Universal but the tinted version is not a good fit for them. I didn't think the tinted version would work as well as it does on me because of how the Universal shade held up over the course of a day, but it somehow works really well. 😂

[haleyvvvv]

Thank you for participating, @itsfi !! I'm so impressed at your availability to comment on everything in your collection. I appreciate the comments because some of these I'm interested in and have to try still. I'm excited to see your progress on them in the future.

So interesting that your makeup was sorted by brand!! I don't think I have a good enough grasp of or space to split my collection that way, but I like thinking about it that way. I guess my eyeshadow singles and palettes are kinda stored that way. I have my sorted by type of product into different makeup bags.

[itsfi]

@haleyvvvv, thank YOU. I love seeing people's posts on this thread. Yes, I have a handful of brands that I keep with other things from the same brand and then there are categories like lip products and foundations, categories where my collection is muuuuch larger, where, except for the few banded by brands, are sorted together in makeup bags themeselves. Then all other eye products are in one bag, for the most part, and all other cheek products are in another bag because I have fewer of those types of products in general. But I jjust realized I may need to get a larger bag for the eye products, hahaha! Or, I'll have to do some decluttering.

If there's any primer (or other product) I have that you're interested in, feel free to let me know. Happy to share my testing results or thoughts with you on how they've held up for me. There's so much product out there, sometimes it's just helpful to know whether a product is likely going to be something that will work for you or that you'll like or if it might just be okay.

[haleyvvvv]

January 2026 - Face Primers and Nail Polish

The timeline is just a guide, but I'm looking forward to seeing everyone's collections this year (and hopefully the usage throughout the years).

Face Primers

5 full sized, 37 deluxe/travel/sample/mini sized. I know I brought in one full sized this year (Sephora Collection). I need to make a dent here. Goal is none in (maybe a DS or if included in a Sephora Favorites set, I won't best myself up too much).

What I'm hoping to use this year: 

Spoiler

4 are in use (Glow Recipe, Milk, Hourglass and Illamasqua). 18 minis seems doable.

Nail Polish

No picture because I have none. There's some in my house, but those are ones I bought for my partner.

[Samtian]

@haleyvvvv Ooh what a nice collection. 

[itsfi]

Ahhhh, Illamasqua, a blast from the past; and Too Faced Hangover primer was a HG for me back in the day. 18 mini primers this year is completely doable @haleyvvvv! Will be curious if, after going through these mini primers, there's one that you love enough to pick up a full size. 

[haleyvvvv]

Part of the problem is that some of these are discontinued 🫣🫣🫣 @itsfi. they're all mostly blasts from the past that I need to get through tbh. I do like the Saie product a lot, but there's some others I do want to try.

[haleyvvvv]

Thanks @itsfi for recently-ish referencing this post. I dusted it off and am making it ideally a bit more sustainable. Looking forward to seeing everyone's collections!!

[danielledanielle]

I need going to be forced to go this to do this... Any favorite storage/decluttering tips @haleyvvvv , @itsfi ??

[haleyvvvv]

I wish I had any suggestions @danielledanielle @itsfi . For me, it was really hard to reorganize once I had settled into a routine, but then I moved and that helped inspire me to change up some storage things. But that's my type of brain that prevents me from doing that. My main advice is to know yourself. So if you need to do it all at once, then plan it and give yourself a bit of time; but if you can do it piecemeal, buy a storage thing for you lipsticks/eyeshadow/perfumes/blushes etc and start there. In the process of organizing, I go through and declutter.

[itsfi]

Yaaaay, thank you @haleyvvvv. 😊 I have been decluttering a bit the last couple of years as I've been working through my collection and can see this being really helpful for me - for organizing and evaluating what I currently have and deciding what should stay and go, or, maybe more importantly, what I need to put into use more to make those decisions. I'm not sure if I have all my ducks in a row to do full size perfumes in December, but setting powders and setting sprays sounds doable. Adding that to my "to do" list, along with going back through the other posts here. 

[haleyvvvv]

@itsfi Let's start in January!! Although if anyone wants to post in December, that's also great.

I think a lot of us have been organizing and decluttering the past few years. We moved a little while ago and I've gotten some new organization for my eye shadow, lipsticks and perfume and it's nice to have my collection accessible and more curated. And I've definitely gone back to my previous collection posts to compare things.

[danielledanielle]

This looks so gooooood @haleyvvvv 

[haleyvvvv]

Thank you!! It's nice to be able to see all of my palettes (which actually used to be stored in storage tubs), @danielledanielle . Plus the perfume caddy makes me happy, it spins!!