As announced im my Asian Beauty Blogparty post I had the honour of interviewing one of our collaborating fellow beauty bloggers. I’m presenting you my interview with Michele from the blog Beautyfindsforme, formally known as Unboxing Beauty. I hope you enjoy reading it! By the way, if you click on her ID card below you will be able to read her interview with Deborah from Adoredee :)

1. Hello Michele! Please give a short introduction about you and your blog.

Hi, I am Michele and I live in the greater Boston area in the great state of Massachusetts, USA. I grew up outside of Detroit, Michigan and lived for years in the Los Angeles area, California. I work full-time outside of my home, as computer programmer/analyst and have a cat obsession. I have two old kitties and if you follow me on IG, I do post pics of them there!
I love sci-fi, horror and murder mysteries, huge fan of House of Cards, Game of Thrones, The Walking Dead,  Doctor Who and Star Wars. I am also a political junkie.  None of these things you will find on my blog, other than a passing reference to pop culture!  My blog is primarily a beauty blog ~ with more of a focus on skincare than makeup. I do unboxings (hence the name of my blog (Unboxing Beauty Finds for Me) of subscription boxes, but I have been doing in-depth product reviews now for over a year.

2. When did you try your first asian beauty product and what made you curious to try more?

The one that I remember leaving a huge impact on me and I took notice of it was Amore Pacific Treatment Enzyme Peel. It is still my bae and I always try and promote it. None of the other powder cleansers come close to it.  I received a small sample of it through Sephora several years ago and when I tried it the first time, I then placed an order right away for the full sized item.  I resisted the call of Asian skin care for a while after that and it wasn’t until Memebox Global (now defunct) that I really started to have fun with Asian beauty products.

3. Since you do unboxings: Do you think that asian beauty boxes have a main role in the rising popularity of asian beauty products?

Memebox certainly had  a huge hand in that, I believe.  Before they shut down their global operations and shifted their Korean operations to USA (BAD BAD MOVE, MEMEBOX!!), it was very popular ~ I am a member on  makeuptalk.com and our Memebox threads were huge and diverse in population. Now, I see other shops doing boxes, but I don’t think any of them will match the intensity and popularity that Memebox enjoyed its hey day.

4. Do you have a favorite subscription box and why?

Hmmm.  No, not really.  I try to be a bit diverse in my sub boxes, so there isn’t a lot of overlap for the most part.  I will say I love getting items that are eco-friendly, organic and ones made from etsy vendors!  I love handcrafted, artisan products

5. What are your favorite asian beauty brands and why?

I don’t have one favorite Asian beauty brand.  I love the Amore Pacific family (Innisfree, Primera), as I have had a lot of luck with their items, CosRX and Goodal are also brands that I have had success with as well.  I do love Melano (Japan) for their CC products.

6. If you could choose one skincare and one makeup product, what would these be and why?

For skincare, Goodal Waterest Lasting Oil (original formula).  It is moisturizing enough to use all over my face, day and night, but without leaving my skin feeling greasy.  Makeup ~ only ONE???  I will have to go with Clinique High Impact Extreme Volume Mascara. I really need more than one (such as a powder for my oily skin), but I feel that a great mascara helps define my eyes, which are my best feature.

7. Do you love to keep your skincare routine simple or elaborate? How many steps do you incorporate in your routine?

It depends on how lazy I am or if I am in a hurry!!  Cleansing is a no brainer, so I don’t really “include” that in my routine, as it is like breathing.    After cleansing, I usually use a toner, serum(s), moisturizer, spot treatments, eye cream.   Depending on what I am testing that month, I may have more steps.  I usually have 2 or 3 products that fit in the serum, ampoule, essence category as I am a big fan of spot skin care routine, due to my oily skin and blemish hot spots.  My day time vs night-time routine may or may not be the same ~ sometimes, it is very similar, with just a couple of extra products in the night-time routine, other times it is completely different! 

8. What is your favorite part about blogging?

I love it when readers comment!  Seriously, it means that someone took the time to read my post and appreciated it.  I love comments and don’t get enough of them :)

9. How much time do you spend on a blog post?

TOO MUCH TIME.  I spend hours on reviews, due taking photos, any skincare analysis (pH testing, skin digital analysis), writing down notes on  texture, absorption, scent, color, etc.  Then finding the ingredient list ~ it is getting easier, but with Asian beauty products, many ingredient lists I put together is either hand translated or I had to  type them in manually.  Picking out some interesting ingredients, researching it and then also making sure I put the ingredient list in cosDNA.com for public reference.
Even my unboxings are time-consuming, because I don’t just take a photo and put a one liner around it. So, for unboxings, which might include swatches, texture/scent impressions, ingredient list ~ about 3 hours.  For reviews ~ depending on the type of review ~ which can be up to 30 hours.

10. Why did you start blogging at first place?

This is an easy one!  Because I started purchasing subscription boxes, I wanted to keep track of  products that worked for me and what didn’t ~ with the reasons why.  I have a bad habit of not remembering what I have tried in the past, especially if it is a product that I didn’t have a strong feelings about, so I wanted to prevent purchasing something that I tried and didn’t like.  At the same time, sometimes I would be thinking  “oh what WAS the name of that product that I liked so much?” and would spend hours googling based on some obscure/vague  term.   I then realized that my friends might like reading my thoughts, as I was  always sharing them (haha) and also, just because an item was not suitable for me, didn’t mean it wasn’t a good product for them.  So, I decided to put together a blog quickly and the rest is history!

Thanks Michele, for answering my questions!

Also see the other interviews here:

Amy’s interview of Julie

Michele’s interview of Deborah (next weekend)

Deborah’s interview of Amy

Julie’s interview of Sophie (next weekend)

Sophie’s interview of me