Mac Hipness blush and Marine Life highlight powder comparison photos and swatches

Since I've had some questions about how Hipness blush compares to others, I thought I'd post these photos I took comparing Hipness to Marine Life, Instant Chic blush and Ripe Peach blush ombre. Hope this helps in your blush purchasing decision! :)

Top row: Marine Life, Hipness, Bottom row: Instant Chic, Ripe Peach

Guerlain Meteorites Voyage Powder Midnight Diamond and pictures of my collection

If you've been following my blog for a while you will know that I am a huge fan of Guerlain, and in particular Guerlain Meteorites. Every year for Christmas Guerlain releases a special limited edition pressed powder called the Voyage Powder that normally co-ordinates the Meteorites Pearls in colour. These powders are very expensive, they cost around £100 for 8 g. They are refillable and the refills come at around £30, and they are absolutely beautiful, both on the inside and the outside. They are the ultimate luxury make up items. I've got sucked into collecting them when the 2008 limited edition one came out as it was so pretty and now I own 10 of them (plus a couple of back ups that I managed to pick up half price and actually use quite a lot). There is still one missing, it's called Eclat de Rose and I think it's from 2003, so it won't be easy finding one in good condition now. The other one I'd been trying very hard to find is Midnight Diamond from 2004. Fortunately after searching eBay and MUA for it every day, I've managed to buy a brand new boxed one for my collection. Cost a lot, but yay! I finally got it.

Guerlain Voyage Powder Midnight Diamond

I thought I'd also show you my whole collection of Guerlain Voyage Powders (also included the Terracotta Bronzing Powders as they are the same mosaic design as some Voyage Powders) and while I was at it, the pressed powder version of the Meteorites pearls. A word of warning about these, if you are planning on buying these from eBay, be careful as I have seen fakes of these powders. They are set deep in their container and come with a puff. The real ones as you can see in my pictures, are raised and don't come with a puff.

Marks & Spencer's Moisture Lipstick Review

I posted about the new Marks & Spencer make up line a little while ago (over here) and I've finally got around to writing a proper review on the lipstick. The line is called Perfection and contains eye, lip and face products.


I didn't own any lipsticks by M&S before so can't really tell you if there's been any improvements in the formula, but the packaging is definitely nicer and sleeker than before, and there seems to be a lot of colours in this line (24 to be exact according to the M&S website). I chose Coral because it seems to be the must have shade for the summer and it is very summery and bright, but not overly so. I think it's one of the prettiest corals I've seen this summer. Formulawise, it's not very soft, although it applies nice and even, it doesn't slip, but despite it not being very creamy, it's not drying at all. It also lasts quite well (again because it doesn't slip on your lips), probably lasted for 2-3 hours on me (not with eating though).

Mac To The Beach haul part 2

I'm sorry this is late, but I've been very busy with family life and never got around to post these pictures. I'm really struggling to find time to post, but will keep trying. I have taken photos of so many things and composed posts in my head over the last weeks. :) So last Thursday I went back to my local Mac counter to check out the To The Beach collection in person having already ordered some things from it unseen. I came away with 4 more items including a cream bronzer, an eyeshadow, a lipstick and a lipglass. I bought Beach Bronze cream bronzer which is a lovely fairly light slightly shimmery cream to powder bronzer. I'm not a bronzer person and not too sure why I got it, but it is lovely and works very well on pale people like me. :) The second thing I got is Firecracker eyeshadow. I already own Shimmermoss and have a dark green shade similar to Humid (don't remember its name, it came out in Love That Look last year), but Firecracker is such a pretty shade, I had to get it. I also got Funbathing lipstick and Flurry of Fun lipglass. Funbathing looks brown in the tube, but it's an interesting reddish purple on me, very pretty. Flurry of Fun has loads of greenish sparkles in it, it's absolutely beautiful. And that completes my haul from this collection, I'm happy with everything I got and there's nothing else I want. Now then, who's for Superglasses? :) See pictures of my haul and swatches...

Beach Bronze, Firecracker, Flurry of Fun, Funbathing

Beach Bronze, Firecracker, Flurry of Fun, Funbathing

Funbathing, Flurry of Fun, Firecracker, Beach Bronze

Bright springtime face of the day

It's been a while since I last posted on here (I've been busy with family stuff) and even longer since I did a look, so I thought I would show off what I'm wearing today as it is really pretty and springy. Unfortunately my camera is really rubbish on capturing bright colours, so what you see here is a bit of a toned down version of what it actually looks like, but this is the best I could do. :( Today I'm using make up from The Body Shop, these products are actually from their spring collection, but I'd never got around to trying them out properly, and also the weather is still definitely more springy than summery even though we're fast approching June. To create this look I used: Eyes: Urban Decay Primer Potion The Body Shop shimmer cubes no. 19 Urban Decay 24/7 eyeliners in Covet and Ransom Guerlain Le 2 mascara in black Mac Show Off Brow Set Face: Guerlain Meteorites Perles primer Givenchy Photoperfection foundation Mac MSF Natural The Body Shop Kiss Of Colour blush in Vibrant Rose Lips: The Body Shop Love Gloss in Fuschia Flush (no. 16) See some photos (and let me know what you think)...

I have loads more posts coming up in the next few days, including my second Mac To The Beach haul and a very beautiful (albeit pricey) addition to my Guerlain Meteorites Voyage Powder collection. Stay tuned!

My Mac Pret-A-Papier haul

Mac's new collection Pret-A-Papier has arrived in the UK last Thursday and of course I had to go and check it out for myself! :) I had ordered a few items online that I was sure I'd like and also picked up a couple more when I visited my local counter on Friday.

My haul included:

Instant Chic blush Made To Order lipstick Fold and Tuck lipglass Pret-A-Papier lipglass Tissueweight eyeshadow Cut to Fit eyeshadow

Here they all are:

I also picked up Love Nectar lustreglass as they had that displayed instead of C-Thru at my local counter, and I am a huge fan of Mac's lustreglasses (much much nicer than their lipglasses) and Love Nectar is such a gorgeous colour as well.

I didn't take pictures of the swatches, but there are plenty of them over on Specktra (http://www.specktra.net/) and of course Temptalia (http://www.temptalia.com/) as usual.

Let me know what you got from this collection!

Mac To The Beach haul part 1

I ordered my favourites from Mac's To The Beach collection on Tuesday immediately after they were available online, and my little black box has just arrived with the following goodies: 2 x Marine Life Highlight powder Hipness blush Thrills lipstick Splashing lipglass Yes, I had to get two of the highlight powder because otherwise I just wouldn't use it. I feel it's just too pretty to destroy, and I'm quite happy to pay £19.50 for another one. Hey, I paid for two of Chantecaille's Protected Paradise palettes (both face and eyes) and they are a lot more expensive (£80 each!). I know, I have a problem, lol! After the initial confusion about release dates, I can now confirm that To The Beach will be arriving on the counters next Thursday (13th May), however, the collection is available online if you can't wait until then (the highlight powder is sold out already though!). As usual, free standard delivery on order over £50! I will go to my counter on Thursday to check out the rest of the collection, I'm pretty sure I will pick up another lipstick and/or lipglass (or two!) and maybe an eyeshadow as well. See photos of my goodies below!

On the right top to bottom: Thrills lipstick, Splashing lipglass, Hipness blush

On the bottom left the two shades of Marine Life highlight powder

More L'Occitane make up!

My local L'Occitane has finally got the eyeshadow duos in, so of course I bought them all! :) They come in 3 colours, light purple with dark purple, yellow with brown and light pink with burgundy. The bigger, lighter coloured half is more of a highlighter / all over colour, little bit shimmery, and the darker bits are more crease colours. They are all pretty, quite sheer, really lovely. My favourite is the light pink / burgundy duo, especially as the burgundy is a bit shimmery as well, really lovely colour.

I also picked up one of the lipsticks, shade number 03. I think they didn't have this one last time because I really like this and the lipsticks I tested last time I wasn't too keen on. It's a lovely shimmery pinky-coral shade, quite sheer, but really glossy. Lovely. :)

I'm still ooh-ing and ah-ing about the bronzer powder, but I think I will leave it as I've already bought way too much from this collection.

See some product and swatch photos below...

Guess the brand!

Okay, here's a little game for you all. See if you can guess which brand these lovely items are from. :)

I will let you know later.

EDIT: The winner is Ms. Wedgie, it is indeed the new make up range from Marks and Spencer. I will post a proper review on it later this week.

To The Beach and Pret-A-Papier now available on maccosmetics.co.uk

3 whole weeks before the US release date Mac's summer collection titled To The Beach is now available on http://www.maccosmetics.co.uk/! Also available is Pret-A-Papier a more nude and coral coloured collection. Both will go on sale at counters on Thursday.

I have already ordered some items including Marine Life highlighting powder that I've been waiting for since I first heard about the collection. I'm too mean to pay for faster shipping, so I'm going to have to wait until probably Friday to get my hands on them. I will also go to my nearest Mac counter to check the remaining items out in person.

What's on your wishlist?

The Body Shop Nomadic Goddess Collection Haul

The new summer collection has landed in The Body Shop stores and I've already purchased a few things, and here they are. I bought all 3 baked eyeshadow duos and one of the baked bronzing powders.

Baked eyeshadows and powders are my weakness, I have a huge collection of Mac mineralize eyeshadows and skinfinishes, and when I see anything similar to them, I always get them. The Body Shop released similar eyeshadows and blushes last summer too, then they had 3 colours mixed in the pan (like Mac's Too Fabulous collection with the two colour blushes). This time you get one solid shade and a smaller "crescent" shaped section with a mixture of shades. The bronzing powder (I purchased Warm Glow) has marbelized effect, it's a lovely shade of light brown, beige and pink. It's not even a bronzing powder as such, although it adds some colour, it's more of a shimmery highlighter on me and I'm actually quite pale. The other shade (Golden Glow) was darker, but also more shimmery, so I didn't like that one. Warm Glow is actually a very good name, because that's pretty much what it gives you, a warm glow on your skin.

See photos of the eyeshadows, bronzing powder and swatches below. Are you planning on buying anything from this collection?

Top row: Copper, Moonstone

Bottom row: Jade

Top row: Copper, Moonstone

Bottom row: Jade

Copper

Moonstone

Jade

Top row: Moonstone, Copper

Bottom row: Jade

Warm Glow Bronzing Powder

Warm Glow