Four make-up tricks that are just magic

While on your quest for ethereal beauty it's worth knowing the ingredients that help garner results, but also some tricks of the trade when it comes to make-up. While there's no prizes for knowing lipstick is applied to lips and eyeshadow sits on the eyelids, certain products can serve numerous purposes with bewitching results.

Here are four you should give a try.

1. Beauty balms, such as Elizabeth Arden's Eight Hour Cream, are revered for their multipurpose properties. As well as soothing minor abrasions and dry skin, they're a saviour for dry cuticles and nails in between manicures, and amazing as a finishing balm for make-up looks (try dabbing a touch on your cheek and collar bones). They can also gives a natural glow to lips, which brings us to tip number two...

2. As well as keeping your gums and pearly whites clean and healthy, your toothbrush can also help create a smooth canvas for balms, gloss and lipsticks. Being ever so gentle, brush the bristles over your lips to slough away dead skin and let your polished pout shine through.

3. Social media has fallen in love with tantouring, and by all accounts when done carefully it works a treat. Using a make-up brush, apply a quality fake tan designed for faces (try Bondi Sands' One Hour Express Face Mist) in the areas you want to contour, wait one hour and voila! Perfect contouring that'll last a little longer than one night.

4. Cream-based make-up is often designed for a certain part of the face, but in reality can be applied wherever you find it flattering. A favourite pink-based lipstick might also give the perfect amount of colour to your cheeks, while a blush in a coral tone can make blue eyes really pop when applied to the eyelids. Trinny London's Lip2Cheek range is a foolproof way to start experimenting.