Beautycon’s New York City Festival was held, for the first time, at Brooklyn Pier Cruise Terminal on Saturday May 20, 2017 from 12:oo PM until 6:30 PM. It was the first time ever that Pinky, (my very pregnant daughter-in-law, and I (makeup and beauty blogger @ Potpourri of Whatever) Sookie, traveled to Brooklyn for our first Beautycon Festival.
Beautycon is an annual festival for beauty addicts to interact with their favorite influencers. Since NYC is the Fashion and Beauty Capital of the US, and it is only an hour and a half away, it was the perfect venue for Pinky and myself to participate in the festivities.
We had options to choose the type of ticket, and package we wanted to purchase to sign up for the event. Our choices were:
General Admission 12:00 PM entry to the festival for $49.99
The Social Package – entry one hour earlier than general admission, 11:oo am, that also included a meet up at the lounge, and a VIP Tote Bag for $249.99
The Hauler Package – entry two hours earlier than general admission, 10:00 am, and a VIP Tote for $149.99
and the one I chose for Pinky and Myself:
The Beauty Academy- entry three hours earlier than general admission, 9:00 am admission, Tutorial Lounge, with Tutorials beginning at 12:45 pm, and a VIP Tote Bag that included a Tote Bag filled with products, and a pink Beautycon robe. And, we got to keep all the products we were given at our own vanity station, and used for the tutorials, which included a beautiful NYX makeup brush that we were able to customize with our name engraved into the handle!
I chose this because it gave us a chance to see the festival before the crowds came, and the lines became too long (Pinky is seven months pregnant, so we didn’t want her to poop out early because she was too tired after standing in lines!)
Pinky and I stayed in a hotel in Brooklyn Friday night so that we would be able to get to the Brooklyn Cruise Terminal by 9:00am! Not an easy thing for us, especially for me, who loves to sleep in the morning (especially Saturday morning).
Beautycon challenges traditional beauty standards and redefines what beauty means. “We at Beautycon embrace imperfections, and the non-traditional inside and out!” They focus on featuring innovations of all ages, races and identities. They have a diverse global community of content creators, celebrities, fans and brands, who all come together to celebrate makeup.Makeup is seen as a tool for self expression and the non traditional. The Beautycon audience sees beauty as an expression of creativity and power. They do not see makeup as something they use to conceal, or make themselves feel better.
Here is what we did: (There were 70 booths to choose from!)
Winky Lux is a New York City based makeup that is cruelty free, and non toxic , and the price is perfect! Not too expensive, and they had a special, a gorgeous bronze eye shadow and lipstick in meow ( both best sellers). Pinky loved four eye shadow, I loved three, but we each loved a shadow that was not “in stock!” That was a surprise considering it was nine in the morning, and the girls were unpacking the products and setting up when we arrived!We also loved the whipped cream primer, it felt really cool, like whipped cream! We loved a cream highlighter, and the diamond powder. they also had whipped lipsticks! We loved the line, we just wished they weren’t sold out of two products!!!!! Of course, I had to purchase a lip gloss called Unicorn!
Winky Lux Lipsticks.
We loved the eye palette, we both got the Flower Natural eyeshadow palette, and the Flower Gold eyeshadow palette. I purchased the Flower bronzing stick.
Flower creams were beautiful.
We were one of the first to go to the Flower booth, remember it was early in the am!
I had a few products put on me by a Flower makeup artist and product developer.
By ten am it was starting to get busy.
A stage for panel discussions.
A manicure booth for women to try out nail products!
Pinky and I stopped at the Impressions booth where they had fabulous makeup mirrors in all sizes, and we especially loved the makeup mirror station tables. We decided we needed a few of these for our future family home at the beach! It would be fun for each of us to have one in our rooms to use as a vanity!!!!!!
Many of the brands were giving out free stuff. Clarins gave out their new oil lip glosses in different shades, I took blue, Pinky took raspberry. Milk Makeup gave out these cool holographic backpack bags with a sample eyeshadow in it.
It was crowded at the Milk Makeup booth. Girls were trying out by getting photographed to be the new faces of milk makeup. Pinky and I purchased some of the above, including their new blur spray!I wanted to go to Revive where they sell light therapy for the face, and teeth! It was interesting to see all the different gadgets that use light for things like blemishes, and aging, as well as whitening teeth. We passed Artis Brushes, and I recently wrote a blog on the brush that fits into your palm to apply your foundation because the bristles are so condensed. It was their top item! Pinky was starting to get hungry, and tired, and it was almost noon. I told her to go to the Beauty Academy, that I wanted to check out Color Pop! I loved the eye shadow palette they were selling, and a setting spray with caffeine, which I purchased quickly, and met Pinky in the Beauty Academy (part of our package).
This is where the tutorials were going to be. There was a stage with two screens, and each of us had our own vanity station.
These were the products that were going to be used in the tutorial. We had to get color matched for our setting powder and concealer. We were allowed to bring all of the products home. This is where we had our brushes engraved. We also had hors deurves,
Champagne and fruit drinks were served. We had a sandwich, and the tutorials began. When Pinky looked like she needed a nap, I said we should leave because we had to drive back to Philadelphia, and let me tell you, the traffic was horrendous in Brooklyn! And the Verrazano Bridge was even worse!
The Unicorns were a big hit! On the way out you could write something on them, with chalk! I had no hands left to do anything!
New York City , and next stop, Los Angeles which is a 2 day event, Saturday August 12, and Sunday August 13th! Next year maybe, this year we are having our baby!!! Also stopping in London, Dubai, and soon will have beauty festivals in the Middle East, Singapore, and Mexico City. And over the next year, they plan to have more festivals throughout the US and Europe. Beautycon brings in the biggest content, creators, celebrities and fans. they all come together to celebrate beauty, self expression and staying true to oneself. They engage in panel discussions, meetups, selfies, brand activation. On the day of the event, over 100,000 worldwide fans and day of event hashtags trend globally.
Beautycon is a womanfest. Women of all ages, races, heights, sizes and identities come together to celebrate the fact that we are all women who basically have the same needs, and wants and wishes, and we all come together to express our womanhood, and what makes us special, as a sisterhood of women, and as an individual- woman.
You Are Awesome!
xoxoxoxo
Exhausted, and a fun experience for both of us! We really had a great time!
Sookie and Pinky(and a half) and thank you dear Pinky for taking the beautiful pictures, sending the instagrams, and being a great partner in crime at Beautycon NYC 2017! Love You!