Connie Cao, K is for Kani

“I came up with the name for my blogbecause it’s the phonetic way of writing Connie

I’ve been studying over the summer, so I haven’t been posting on my blog a lot, probably only once a week. I’ve got one younger sister and we’re both in uni at the moment. She studies medicine. And I’m studying law, not a very exciting degree. The [flower crown] business is going pretty well, but because of study I haven’t had much time to do stuff. I do like to sleep a lot, which is probably why I don’t have that much time.

I’m quite into beauty

I think I have a lot of stuff. I have a Marc Jacobs thing going on. They’re all birthday presents because my friends know I love Marc Jacobs perfumes, which is why I have so many of them. I wear those during the day, quite casual for uni. I like to wear Flowerhead by Byredo during night time.

The Baies scent from Diptyque is amazing

so I thought “I need the candle as well”. But Lumira is my favourite candle scent. It smells like incense. I really love this brush cleaner, it’s really amazing. It’s from Daiso, it’s a Japanese shop and everything’s $2.80. I use to mix my own brush cleaning stuff with olive oil and shampoo, but this is much easier. I also like the Kosmea Rosewater spray and the cleansing wipes are really good too. I like to spray a lemongrass scent in my room because it reminds me of yoga.

I started my Instagram around two years ago

I started a blog first, because I never had an iPhone before then so I didn’t really know much about it. I used to use Lookbook.nu, which is a community based site where people would post photos of their outfits, it’s kind of a massive blog outlet, but I think ever since Instagram, it’s become less popular. For likes and comments, I think it depends on your audience. I think on the way to work is a good time.

I post at ten o’clock at night

…and that’s when it tends to work because everyone is in bed by then and they’re mostly uni students so they’re usually up really late. I use to hashtag in the beginning too when I was trying to get a little bit of attraction, and I felt like I was hustling a lot and then I slowed down and just used my main ones. I like to reply to all my comments on my blog but on Instagram I don’t really have enough time. My sister will send me photos and ask “did you see this comment? You have to get back to this person”. My parents don’t really get the online stuff, but a couple months ago my dad made an Instagram account so he can follow me now. It’s kind of cute. He likes seeing me when I’m on my holidays.

Normally if I’m going out, I will start with foundation

I like the Armani Luminous Silk. Sometimes I’ll mix it with the NARS one because it helps get my summer shade. I also like the MAC Pro Long Wear concealer. And then I do my eyebrows. For bronzer, I like to use the Nars Laguna powder and Nars Albatross for illuminating. It’s got gold in it but you can’t really tell when you put it on. I curl my eyelashes and then put on Dior Iconic Over Curl mascara. On top, I put on like three coats of ModelCo’s Fibre Lash and then I put on mascara again.

I wash my hair with anything, really

And then I put on hair oil, MoroccanOil. I’m surprised it doesn’t weigh my hair down because it’s quite thick. I used to use a much thinner, lighter one. But now I put on a whole squirt and it doesn’t even go greasy. And then I blowdry my hair.I don’t really use hairspray, but for flyaways I do use L’Oreal Elnett. The VO5 Give Me Texture is the only thing that holds my hair. I don’t curl my hair but I just put some of that on then flip my hair over. It kind of makes it straight but with texture. It lasts for a really long time.

I started making my flower headbandsmaybe three years ago now

There aren’t any real flowers; they’re all fake. It’s hard to find any really good fake flowers, a lot of them are quite glassy looking. I used to operate in our dining room in our old house but we moved here because I needed more space.

When we moved here I finally got a studio. It’s very messy at the moment. I just make them for fun. I really, really like it. I could never get bored of it. It never becomes tedious or anything because I make a lot of unique things. I only make one of each style. Typically it takes about an hour, but like I’ve had this one sitting on my table for like two months and haven’t figured it out yet. If I have a really good idea, then it goes much faster than if I have no idea what I’m doing. I’ve burned myself on the hot glue gun about a hundred times.”