A beauty editor’s guide to what to buy from Sephora as third store opens in Manchester

ok.co.uk:

After much anticipation, US beauty giant Sephora opened its third bricks-and-mortar store – and its first outside London – at Manchester's Trafford Centre on Thursday 16 May 2024 with a star-studded launch party the night before and a queue of 2,000 before doors opened at 10am this morning.This is big news for beauty fans, who have been begging for more stores to open after the first two – located in London's White City Westfield London and Stratford Westfield – proved to be so popular, with shoppers finally able to shop IRL Sephora-exclusive brands such as Makeup by Mario, HAUS Labs by Lady Gaga and Sephora Collection.

I was lucky enough to have a sneak peek around the new Manchester Sephora store before it opened to the public, and it's heaven for beauty connoisseurs.The shelves are lined with all the top brands – including a few only available in Sephora stores and on the website – plus the famous minis section that lie temptingly by the checkouts, and it's helpfully curated into categories to make it super easy to shop if you're in a rush.

But with other big beauty retailers such as LookFantastic, Cult Beauty and Boots all available to shop from too, it can be hard to know exactly what's worthy buying, but here are the products that I think are worth buying from Sephora: Makeup By Mario SurrealSkin Foundation, £42 I swatched this foundation from Kim Kardashian's make-up artist Mario Dedivanovic for the first time at the store launch and I was super impressed by its formulation.

It's very fluid and lightweight, and gives a gorgeous, natural-looking luminosity to the skin. One to try, for sure. Makeup By Mario SurrealSkin Foundation, £42 from Sephora Sephora Collection Fiber Face Mask Coconut, £3.99 Sephora's own brand.