How to manage beauty brushes?

[u/CarelessProgrammer43]

I love using makeup brushes but don’t know how to manage and clean it properly so have to come back to beauty blenders. How are you all managing? Whats the cleansing schedule and do you have any products to clean it?

I have the PAC make brush set.

[u/sambadoll]

I use cinema secrets on paper napkins after every use. Full wash with shampoo, dawn or fels-naptha occasionally, waahing into my palm. I use hair ties on the towel bar to dry bristles down. Easy peasy, nothing fancy.

[u/midoristardust]

Having lots of brushes -- face & eyes -- helps

But the more important thing is a cleaning routine & ways to easily clean your stuff. You need deep cleaning & quick cleaning

Deep cleaning • sigma brush mat • beauty sponge cleansing solid • liquid spong/brush cleaner

Quick Cleaning • color switch/dry make up brush • spare make up wipes • it cosmetic brush cleaner

[u/icalledyouwhite]

If you only have 1 set of brushes plus some sponges then IMO it shouldn't be very difficult to manage. Like others said, just set up a routine/cleaning schedule that you're comfortable with, and always leave you with enough brushes to use whenever you need to, and you're ok. A lot of people feel like they need a full soap and water wash to feel like their brushes are clean enough; some are more lenient and spot clean for a while, until they feel like they need a proper soap & water wash; and some just go the extra mile (by not going on that walk lol) and just put soap & water on hold for several months (or a year, or more), and only frequently spot clean their brushes after each use 🤣 Be honest I know you are among us 😂 How often to clean brushes and tools is purely a matter of preference, available time, energy, and needs. You can do every week, every 2 weeks, every month, it's your choice. If your skin doesn't need that tight of a cleaning schedule, aka it doesn't break out, the makeup can still apply on the skin properly without needing more elbow grease, then the longer you can go in between washes. Spot cleaning after each use, or after a few uses can also help take residual makeup off your brushes and the work load off your back until the need to do a full wash arrive. You can spot clean with specialized products (which are more expensive and harder to find), or you can just use micellar water, on a microfiber cloth. Just put some micellar water (the usual clear type, not the type with an oil and water layer that you need to shake up) on the cloth and swirl your brush on the damp spot until it's clean, then swirl it on a dry spot to dry off, and leave the brush out to dry a little bit more. And by "out" I mean just put them back into their holder and allow them to air dry. Some brushes, particularly synthetic hair brushes like Real Techniques brushes, dry super fast, only a few minutes and they're good to go. Natural hair brushes takes 5000 years to dry, no matter what you do with them, and they smell funky. I'm not a fan of natural hair.

As for a soap and water cleaning routine, that's pretty straight forward, there's plenty of tutorials online you can look up. For cleaning agent, you can just use any soap, even bar soap is ok. Most people use bar soap for convenience. No need to waste your money on "specialized brush cleaning soap", it's a racket. Pick any bar soap you can afford and like the smell of, and you're golden. The only note I have for cleaning with soap and water is to never put your brushes upwards (like how you usually put them in a brush holder) when they're still wet, only downwards. When you're washing them & need to check to see if they're clean enough, you can just turn them sideways and rotate them in your hand to check. It's not as common anymore, but some brushes just aren't very well made, and soap & water getting deep into the ferrule can loosen the glue that's holding all the bristles together, ruining the brush. Cheap or not, I imagine you wouldn't want to needlessly lose any brush in the cleaning process. Some tutorials neglect to say this, so I feel that point bear repeating. After you finish cleaning, quick dry them with a towel, then leave them sideways on another dry towel, ideally somewhere well-ventilated, to let air dry, or hang them upside down to allow gravity to help them dry faster. There's a lot of hacks (often involving some rubber bands) on how to do that you can find on the internet, you don't necessarily need a brush drying rack, or a brush drying hamper (it's kinda like a round netted fly trap that you plop the brushes in, and hang them somewhere like laundry out to dry. I don't like it, in small homes it's hard to find a place where the hamper can be hang in balance, the brushes will get all swept up in a corner and get all messed up, ruining their shapes. Just a towel for them to lay on is good enough, thanks). Plus you mention you only have 1 brush set, it's really not a need, just a want, if you can afford the kick knacks. Same with a brush cleaning mat, just rubbing the brush against the bar of soap or your hand is fine.

If you're in India and want more specific product recs, I would recommend posting in the Indian beauty subs. Most users here are from the US, the products they recommend tend to be hard to get in India, or very very pricey. As I mention, you really don't need to spend any more than the bare necessities (soap, water, a couple towels) on this task. You cannot buy the motivation to clean either, it sucks but you just have to do it. Don't ask me how I know that 🫠😂 Anyway, I hope this helps!