Marie Kondo on how to apply the KonMari method to your makeup bag

Which products really bring you joy?

Japanese organisation expert and consultant Marie Kondo has revealed her top tips for streamlining your beauty stash.

From YouTube makeup hauls and enticing new launches to those products you just can’t bear to throw away, it is easy to become a makeup hoarder without even realising it.

But, that’s where Marie Kondo comes in. Author of the book The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up and star of her own Netflix show, Tidying Up with Marie Kondo, the organisation guru has dedicated her entire career to helping people declutter their homes.

Now, Kondo has explained how her infamous KonMari method can be applied to your makeup collection too.

Speaking to Allure magazine for its March 2019 issue, Kondo revealed that decluttering your products has the ability to make you look at yourself and the beauty industry in a new way.

“Something I learned from working with so many people’s bathrooms and helping people organise makeup is that really going through our makeup products raises our awareness of what we think about beauty,” Kondo said.

"For a lot of my clients, organising products the KonMari way, it’s an opportunity for people to really think about their relationship with beauty and what they aspire to, and I’ve seen people make drastic changes after tidying their bathroom or vanity.”

The tidying expert explained that the best way to simplify your beauty arsenal is to start by taking everything out of storage and grouping products into categories, including lipsticks, eyeshadows, and so on.

She then suggests asking yourself: “Which ones bring me joy in this time in my life? Does this product make me beautiful right now?”

The 34-year-old also opened up about her own relationship with makeup, revealing she prefers to adopt a “simple” approach and almost never wears foundation.

“My approach to beauty is more focused on the condition of my skin and body, so that could be interpreted as a simple and minimalistic [approach],” she said.

“One thing I say is, unless I’m appearing in public or before an audience, I never wear foundation.”

The reason Kondo chooses to forgo foundation is because she finds it can cause her skin to flare up.

“I used to wear foundation every day, but I realised the more I used it, the weaker my skin was getting,” she revealed.

“One day I tried to be brave and go without foundation. And it took about a week or so, but the condition of my skin improved so much.”

As for her beauty must-haves, the tidying guru says she uses sunscreen everyday.