Shelley Craft’s simple approach to beauty is honestly so refreshing

Shelley Craft is one of Australia’s most-loved media personalities. Probably most well-known for her stints on Saturday Disney and The Block (amongst a plethora of other hosting gigs), she’s spent a lot of (virtual) time in our homes. And while you may think that her experience in front of the camera means her hair and makeup kits would rival those of the professionals who prep her for work, it’s actually the opposite. We sat down with the Neutrogena ambassador to get the low-down on her skin care habits and beauty routine, and it turns out, it’s incredibly simple and fuss-free. Refreshingly so. 

On her regular skin care routine…
“I’d love to say I have a regular routine, but nothing in my life is at all regular. I get a lot of samples from different things, so whenever I run out of something, I just rummage through the bag and find a replacement for it. I do cleanse – obviously – and I do use the Ultraceuticals Brightening Foam Cleanser. I’ll cleanse morning and night, especially wearing a lot of makeup for work during the day you know you, I gotta get it off. I hate having mascara left on my pillow in the morning; there’s nothing that annoys me more than having to wash my pillowcase because there’s makeup left on it, particularly mascara so that’s the big one. And then obviously moisturise. I don’t do a lot as far as anything else goes, except for the [Neutrogena® Rapid Wrinkle Repair® Retinol] Oil at night and then the [Neutrogena® Rapid Wrinkle Repair®] Regenerating Cream.” 

On keeping her routine simple…
“[The multiple-step Korean skin care trend] just takes too much time. I would love to pump four different [serums] into my hand, rub them altogether and whack them on, but to spend 15 to 20 minutes a morning would be a wonderful luxury. I’ve always been fairly low-maintenance, or maybe just always running late ,so I try to keep it as brief as possible.”

On the skin habit she wishes she’d done sooner…
“I think just appreciating how good my skin was when I was young – as they say, beauty is wasted on the young. And as I get older and start noticing things changing, I wish I actually appreciated my skin when I was younger. You know, I’m very lucky I’ve got a pretty normal skin base – it’s combination skin. I think genetically I was really lucky and didn’t know it at the time, I didn’t appreciate it enough and probably wore more makeup when I was younger than I would ever wear now to cover up things that I wanted to cover. Now I go makeup-less most of the time.”

On her biggest skin sin…
“I think my biggest sin was growing up in Brissy getting a lot of sun and still putting baby oil on to sunbake – head-to-toe baby oil. If there was no baby oil, you’d just go straight to olive oil and just cook, literally rotisserie myself in the sun. Yeah, I am definitely a sun baby. And I know I’m probably going to pay for that when I’m older, but for now, full cover-ups at the beach and I try to treat myself a bit better.” 

On what we’d find in her makeup kit…
“There’ll be a little sneaky Maybelline [New York] Great Lash, the IT Cosmetic [Your Skin But Better] CC, and then I’ll just wear either a paw paw [balm] or a tinted lip. I keep it pretty simple. Oh, and eyebrows, I can’t leave the door without eyebrows! [I like] Garbo and Kelly. She trained with Anastasia in LA. She knows eyebrows.”

On the beauty advice she’d give her daughters
“I’m starting now, it’s funny. I was asked this question probably five years ago and they were so little, I was saying, ‘Well, not really, they’re just going to be so happy in their own skin’, and all I want is for them to be happy in their own skin. Now that they’re nine and seven, it is a different conversation. They love [beauty], they don’t leave the house without a gloss, which is funny; they’re such girly-girls and I’m just not. I do say to them that they have to wipe their faces every day; I’ve got the Neutrogena wipes and that seems to be the easiest and quickest thing for them to be able to do. You know, to get a kid into a full skin routine seems crazy, but I certainly make sure they do that and sunscreen every day, and lucky for us, the school’s onto that now, too. I do let them wear a little bit of gloss when we’re going out, because why not? But again, I would still reiterate just be happy with who you are and that will always radiate more than anything can ever help you with. That’s my mum lesson – be happy on the inside and it’ll shine through to the outside.”  

Looking to reassess how simple or complicated your skin care routine is? Read up on the basics for starting a skin care routine. 

What are your skin care dos and don’ts? Let us know in the comments below!

Main image credit: Getty