My Guerlain Holiday 2012 Collection Haul Part 6 - Ecrin 4 Couleurs 500 Les Ombres Turandot

The last product I bought from the Guerlain holiday collection is the 4 colour eyeshadow palette #500 Turandot. The biggest reason for leaving this last is that it wasn't available when I tried to buy it at Harrods and I kept waiting for Debenhams to have it for ages, until I got bored and ordered it from Escentual. It was a good decision as I saved 10% as well.

Anyway, this year's limited edition eyeshadow quad has no special pattern or packaging which is a bit of a let down in my opinion, but I know that shouldn't be the reason why we buy make up. And it isn't, it just makes it even more desirable. Turandot has 4 rather warm shades, a shimmery warm gold, a satin orangey rosy pink, a matte plum and a metallic dark brown-taupe (a very hard to describe colour). All housed in the usual gold compact, which comes in a black velvet pouch with red trim and the usual black outer box (which also has red on the inside, like with the other palette and the powders in this collection).

The eyeshadows are nicely pigmented and easy to work with, they're soft and smooth. They stayed on my eyes without creasing and fading for 10+ hours. I admit they're all rather warm and might not be very easy to pull off for some skintones. The colours remind me of the Tsarina quad from 2009(?) which is also a very warm quad. It's actually quite funny as the Tsarina quad was part of the fall/autumn collection and Turandot also feels very autumnal, rather than Christmassy.

As I mentioned, I bought my quad from Escentual for 10% less than the usual retail price of £37 which I was very pleased about. You get 7.2 g of eyeshadows which is almost twice the size of the Mac holiday eyeshadow palettes for only £5 more. Just saying...

See more pictures including swatches and a look I did with the palette after the jump!

October Favourites Video

I did a little video about the products I've enjoyed using this month, check it out!You can also subscribe to my channel by clicking here!

Urban Decay Smoked 24/7 Glide-On Eye Pencil Set Review and Swatches

This is the second 24/7 eyeliner pencil set Urban Decay has released for the holiday, and even though it's not as exciting/great value as the Ocho Loco set, I thought I'd show it to you, because this is also a good one and still very good value.

This set is supposed to complement the Smoked Palette released earlier this year, which I didn't buy, but you don't need that of course, you will still enjoy this set if you like dark, smoky colours.

The set contains 6 travel size 24/7 glide-on eye pencils and they come in a variety of colours and finishes. You have Uzi which is a dark shimmery grey, Zero, a black, Demolition, a cool toned matte dark brown, Smog, a light metallic brown, Empire, a dark aubergine with satin finish and Mainline, a dark matte teal. Out of the 6 shades 2 are permanent (Zero and Demolition), 2 have been included in other sets (Uzi and Empire) and 2 are brand new (Smog and Mainline). I only owned Uzi and Zero, I wasn't even aware that Demolition was permanent.

It's a lovely set with really nice colours, my favourites are definitely Empire and Mainline, but I also really like and regularly use Uzi. Demolition doesn't seem that pigmented to me and Smog is a little light to be referred to as a smoky colour, but it's still nice. If you don't have these colours yet, this set would be a great one to buy.

The eyeliners are 0.8 g each which is 2/3 of full size and the set retails at £26, but it's actually worth £52 based on the price of the full sized pencils (£13). So it's still a great value and it also means that you don't have to commit to buying full sized products, because let's face it, who can get through eyeliners quickly enough anyway?

All in all, I would happily recommend this set especially as Urban Decay 24/7 eye pencils are one of my favourite eyeliners.

See more pictures including swatches after the jump!

NOTD: Color Club Wild And Willling

Since I've been buying so many nail polishes, I'm trying to do a nail post a week, although I actually have quite a backlog of pictures since I change my nail polish 2-3 times week and most manis are actually worthy of sharing on here. Would you like me to do more nail posts in the future or not? I know I'm still not that skilled when it comes to painting my nails, although I have got much better. Let me know in the comments what you think!

Taken without flash in direct sunlight

Today I have this gorgeous Color Club nail polish to show you. It's called Wild And Willing and it was part of the Wild At Heart Collection from 3 years ago. It's a beautiful shimmer polish which is also duochrome, it's pink and orange, with some yellow and a bit of green thrown in for good measure. It looks great both in the sunlight and in shade.

The formula was very thin though, I think it took 4 coats, it was very sheer and runny. It dried pretty quickly though. It lasted okay on me with some very small chips on day 2, I ended up wearing it for 4 days. It's so pretty, I think I can forgive it for the thin, runny formula, but it would be just perfect if the formula was better.

I buy Color Club polishes on eBay from this seller or from TK Maxx (they sell Color Club box sets for around £8 which is a great deal!). I think I got this one on eBay for about $3 plus $4.50 postage to the UK. You get a very generous 15 ml for your money.

See more pictures after the jump!

My Guerlain Holiday 2012 Collection Haul Part 5 - Eye and Lip Calligraphy Palette

I was going to do this review last night, but by the time I fixed up my new monitor (courtesy of a friend) and put children to bed, it was late and I was too tired. But now I have a nice new monitor, so I can get on with editing and typing at the desktop computer. I don't know why, I don't like using laptops. Maybe it's my age, haha!

Anyway, Guerlain's Eye and Lip Calligraphy Palette is a limited edition product for the holiday. It contains 2 lipsticks, 3 eyeshadows and a powder eyeliner (which you could also use as eyesahdow of course). I know some people aren't keen on having eye and lip products in the same palette and I'm not always myself, especially if the eyeshadows are very powdery as they end up in the lipstick, but this one works surprisingly well.

The eyeshadows in this palette are not at all powdery. They are soft and smooth, easy to pick up with your brush, but they aren't powdery. The lipsticks are also not very soft and sticky, so the combination of the two means that the products don't mix.

The eyeshadows were the main reason why I bought this palette (and the fact that I could pick it up on eBay for much cheaper than its retail price, you know me!), they are all so pretty. You get a very light golden beige highlighter, a copper shade, a gorgeous silvery taupe and a matte black powder eyeliner. This you can use wet as well for a more dramatic look. I have only tried it dry so far, but it works well dry too, although it's a bit on the sheer side that way. The rest of the eyeshadows are soft, buttery and nicely pigmented. The copper shade is especially amazing! The silvery taupe shade looks pretty unique to me, don't think I own anything else that colour. The highlighter is pretty, although not that unique.

The lipsticks included in this palette are a bright, dark pink and a brick red shade. I initially thought the red was very similar to Gardner Rouge G, but it's not that brown, it's mor of a cross between Gardner and Garconne. The pink shade is darker than Girly Rouge G, it actually reminds me of Mac Moxie lipstick. I did comparison swatches to the 3 Rouge G shades mentioned above. The lipsticks are not as soft and smooth as the Rouge G lipsticks and they're not very long lasting either, I only got 2 hours wear out of them, whereas Rouge G lipsticks last for 3-4 hours or even longer on me. The colours are lovely though and go really well with the eyeshadows.

I did two looks using the palette, you can see them at the bottom of this post. I apologise for the lack of close up lip swatch photos, but I have managed to develope a lovely (not!) cold sore, so I didn't want to scare you.

All in all, this is a lovely palette. I wouldn't say it's a must have, especially when you look at its retail price. It costs £54, although you do get 10.2 g of product for your money (5.6 g eyeshadows and 4.6 g lipsticks) which is a good amount. If it was cheaper, I would thoroughly recommend it, the quality is excellent.

See more pictures including swatches and the looks I did with this palette after the jump!

My Guerlain Holiday 2012 Haul Part 4 - Meteorites Wulong Exceptional Pressed Powder

The most anticipated items of the new Guerlain Holiday 2012 Collection for me were the Meteorites Perles and Meteorites Wulong Voyage Powder. I collect these two powders and am always very eager to purchase them.

This year's Wulong Voyage Powder is very similar to the permanent Mythic powder and the limited edition Imperial powder form 2009, only the colours are different. I prefer these powders to have more intricate designs, like 2010's Poudre D'Or or 2008's Radiant Butterfly Voyage Powder, but I'll take what I can get anyway.

Voyage Powders are basically Meteorites in pressed form, which means they're more travel friendly. These powders are the ultimate luxury items, the powders are gorgeous, soft, velvety, and they come in gorgeous compacts. This year's compact is black with mother of pearl rosette detailing. These compacts are very expensive, with the product costing £110, the powder refills are around £30 so the compact is basically the difference. They are, obviously, refillable, but you can't normally get the limited edition refill, only the permanent Mythic powder refill.

You get 7.5 g of powder, so gram per gram these compacts are way more expensive than the loose Meteorites Perles, but they make an excellent collector's item and these compacts are just so cool to pull out in the ladies room. Incidentally, if you watch Homeland, did you notice Carrie had one of these (the permanent compact) in one of the earlier episodes?

I apologise I haven't swatched this yet, I didn't want to mess up the powder until I get myself a back up (yes, I am that crazy). I managed to get this one on eBay for quite a bit less than £110, so hoping to be able to score another one, if not on eBay, then in the after Christmas sales.

As you know, I collect these beauties and in case you haven't see my collection, you can check it out here, although it needs updating as those pictures don't include Poudre D'Or (which you can see by clicking here) or Wulong.  

PS. My computer monitor has broken, so I'm typing this on my laptop. Hopefully I'll be able to get a replacement monitor tomorrow, because I really hate editing pictures and typing on the laptop, but in the meantime, please bear with me.

See more pictures after the jump!

I've Been Busy - My Depotting Adventure

A little while ago, when using my Urban Decay Mariposa eyeshadow palette, I began wondering if there was a way to depot the eyeshadows in it and use the tin to hold some more eyeshadows. So I got a pair of nail scissors and started digging...

The eyeshadows came out really easily (they were only glued onto some cardboard) and the tin ended up housing not only the Mariposa palette, but also the Sustainable palette, the Deluxe palette and the Rollergirl palette. Talk about saving space!

I also decided to depot my many Urban Decay eyeshadow singles (same method as Mac eyeshadows - I use my hair straightener to heat up the bottom of the pans) and Stardusts eyeshadow singles (they just pop out with very light force), as well as all my big Mac eyeshadows (Mega Metals, Jeanius and Tartan Tale). I ended up purchasing my first ever Z Palette and now I have 17 empties waiting to go back to Mac in exchange for some lipsticks (my no-buy doesn't extend to free stuff - crafty eh?). Wish you could also return the Urban Decay empties, it felt wrong to throw them out.

There were a few casulties as you will see in the pictures below, nothing serious, just scrapes and bruises (the eyeshadows, not me). I enjoy depotting, I usually do it while watching a film on telly to keep me entertained. I'm now seriously tempted to depot a few of my bulky Book of Shadows as well, although the first one and the Alice in Wonderland ones are so pretty, I don't want to touch them, but the other 3 I might just have a go at. Just need to get another palette or two to put them into.

Do you depot your eyeshadows? Do you take your Mac empties back for free lispticks? What palettes do you put them into?

See more pictures after the jump!

Chantecaille Cheek Shade Elephant in Fun - Review and Swatches

Here's the blush that belongs with the Chantecaille Elephant Palette. Such a pretty delicate little thing isn't it? Almost too pretty to use. Or in my case, way too pretty to use. But fear not, I still have swatches!

I bought this beauty a little while ago from Harrods on their 10% off day, but I also managed to pick up a slightly used one on eBay for a little bit less (half price), so I have used that to show you swatches and a look I've created with it. (Crazy? Me?)

The actual shade of the blush is Fun which I thought was a permanent Chantecaille blush shade, but I can't find it on their website so maybe I was wrong. It's a very subtle soft apricot colour with slight shimmer that is very hard to overdo. It takes a few layers to show up properly on my cheeks and the swatches I did on my arm show a couple of layers. The texture is very soft, but not powdery, it feels very luxurious. The blush comes in a silver compact with a mirror inside the lid.

I'm not bowled over by the actual shade, it is pretty, but it's a bit too subtle for my liking. The blush itself is so pretty though, the raised elephant pattern is adorable and looks gorgeous with the overspray on top (which completely comes off with a couple of uses).

The blush costs £30 and you get 3.8 g for your money. You are paying £7 for the elephant as the other (permanent) cheek shades cost £23. Ouch!

I wouldn't say this was a must have product, but it is very pretty and Chantecaille collectors will definitely appreciate it. In the UK Chantecaille is available from Space NK, Harrods, selected Harvey Nichols, John Lewis, Fenwick stores. I usually buy mine from eBay.  

See more pictures after the jump!

Too Faced Return Of Sexy Palette Review and Swatches

I've been meaning to show you this palette for a while, but never got around to it, which is a shame because this is possibly the nicest palette I've bought this year. When I first saw it and swatched it in Boots, I fell in love with it. You will see in a minute why.

The palette contains 15 eyeshadows divided into 3 sections to create looks suitable for day and night. You have neutrals, purples, greys and blacks for smoky eyes, so you can create work friendly looks as well as looks for a night out. It's like Urban Decay's Naked Palette, just better. Seriously. I like the Naked Palette, but this has so much more to offer. I could use this every day for two weeks and still be creating different looks with it and not get bored because it's not just neutrals.

The eyeshadows are buttery soft and smooth, and even those with glitter don't have fallout. Most of the eyeshadows are shimmery or metallic, but you can still create a subtle look with them, and of course you can go crazy. All of them are very nicely pigmented, don't fade or crease for hours on end (I wore them for 12+ hours). They can be used wet or dry.

You get 3 looks cards with the palette with look ideas for day and night that can be created using each section of the palette: The Ingénue (chic neutrals), The Icon (girly pinks and plums) and The Bombshell (classic smokey greys). Of course you don't have to follow them, but for someone who is a bit inexperienced in applying make up they can be very helpful.

You also get a trial size (5 g) Shadow Insurance Eyeshadow Primer and a full size Perfect Eyes Waterproof Eyeliner in Perfect Black, as well as 15 g of eyeshadows, so it's a great value palette. It costs £38.50. It's a little hard to work out its actual value because Too Faced doesn't do many single eye shadows, and these shades are not available separately, but based on the value of their Exotic Color Intense Eyeshadows that cost £15.00 per 1.7 g, that would make just the eyeshadows worth over £132. The eyeliner costs £14.50 and the primer is £7.50 for that size.

So as you can see, this is a great value palette, with great eyeshadows, a brilliant eyeliner and my favourite eyeshadow primer of all time. The eyeliner pencil is a great product, very pigmented and longlasting. My only complaint about the palette that it feels a little too bulky and heavy for my liking, but aestethically it's actually very nicely done.

See lots more pictures including swatches and a look I created with this palette after the jump!

Update On My No-Buy

You might remember this post about me going on a lipstick, lipgloss and nail polish no-buy a month ago, so I thought I'd do a little update on how I've been getting on.

I'll start with the good bit. I have only bought 4 lipsticks over the last month and those were all on my wishlist, so that's all good. I have now reached my 400 limit, so now I have to be very strong and not buy any more. I can still buy 4 lipglosses until I reach my limit of 600, I have only bought the 3 Mac By Request ones lately. I've not been tempted by any, so hopefully I'll be able to resist beyond the 4 I'm allowed.

Now onto the bad bit. I am embarassed to say that I have totally and utterly failed when it comes to not buying nail polish. The bag in the picture above contains over 70 polishes and I bought most of them in the past month. This is now a serious addiction I have to address. I think the problem with nail polish is that there are always so many new colours, glitters, holos, it's very hard to resist, whereas once you have 10 red lipsticks, you're pretty much set.

So I have decided I really must stop buying them now. There are a few I absolutely must buy (Echanted Polish Magical Mystery Tour and I Am A Walrus for example), but after that I will write a wish list for every nail polish I see and think "ooh, I must have this" and then only allow myself a few (5?) every month. That way I really will only buy the ones I really really want and hopefully think twice about whether I actually need a certain shade.

For now I have on my wishlist: Color Club Halo Hues polishes (x6), Gift Of Sparkle, Fame And Fortune, Zoya Aurora, Blaze, Electra, OPI Polka.com (Spring 2013), Butter London Scuppered and Shambolic.

Wish me luck! I will update again in a month's time.

NOTD: Enchanted Polish Across The Universe - Duochrome With Holo, The Ultimate Gorgeousness?

I don't remember where I first came across Enchanted Polish, probably on one of those pesky nail blogs that make me want to buy every sparkly nail polish in the world.

Taken without flash in direct sunlight

I'm glad I did though as all the polishes I own from Enchanted Polish are gorgeous. Across The Universe is part of their Beatles collection and is extremely hard to get hold of. I'm currently after a couple of other polishes from their newer releases: I Am The Walrus and Magical Mystery Tour.

But let's talk about this one for now. Across The Universe has everything I love in nail polish: it is duochrome multichrome AND holographic! W00t! It's blue and purple, but also pink and orange at certain angles and has subtle linear holo. I couldn't stop staring at my fingers when I was wearing it, just so beautiful. My pictures don't do justice to it, the colours and the holo are more vibrant. (Also, sorry about my nails in the pictures, I had just broken my middle finger nail right down to the flesh, ouch!)

It's also amazingly opaque, only took 2 coats for the coverage you see in the pictures, didn't need to layer it over black polish or anything like that. It lasted well, for 2 days without much chipping, and I actually wore it to the swimming pool which usually makes my nail polish come off. So all in all I was very pleased with it.

My only problem with Enchanted Polish is that it's really hard to come by. They seem to be released in very small quantities and sell out within minutes. Seeing that I order from the US, I try to buy more than one at a time to save on postage, but it's almost impossible to find them all in stock at the same time. Sigh.

I bought Across The Universe from Llarowe, it cost $13 and shipping was pretty reasonable. It's a 3-free polish and you get 15 ml for your money.

See more pictures after the jump!

Guerlain Holiday 2012 Collection Haul Part 3 - Liu Perfumed Shimmer Powder

Every year Guerlain releases a perfumed shimmer powder and every year I buy it, even though I have not yet finished one and I've been collecting them since 2008. In fact dare I admit, I actually have 2 of each release. The reason is, these are often the last item to be sold out in the collection and usually make it to the new year sales, so when I see them at half price, I can't resist.

This year's fragranced shimmer powder is scented with Guerlain's Liu fragrance. Otherwise it's the same, very very fine shimmer as other year's releases. I usually wear it on my hair and arms, decolette, etc. when I go out and I always get lots of compliments. I wouldn't wear it on my face personally, but it especially looks gorgeous sprayed onto your hair. We're not talking chunky glitter here, not like those glitter sprays you can get from Claire's, this is very fine, luxurious shimmer.

The bottle is so cute, it looks like an old style perfume bottle with the "bulb" on the side that you squeeze to release a puff of powder. Looks great on your dressing table!

You get 17.5 g for £50.50 which is a little bit ouch, but that's why I usually buy a bottle at half price. A bottle will last for years, especially as this isn't something you'd use every day. I don't think it's too over the top for a meal out or for the theatre, but I probably wouldn't wear it for school run.

See more pictures after the jump!

Guerlain Holiday 2012 Collection Haul Part 2 - Meteorites Perles du Dragon

Part 2 of my Guerlain Holiday 2012 Collection haul is featuring one of the most iconic Guerlain products, the Meteorites Perles. This year's limited edition is called Perles du Dragon and it contains 6 different shades: pale pink, beige, white, gold, plum and rosewood.

There are quite a lot of white pearls in the mix, but mine isn't too bad, it also has a good amount of the other pearls. At first the colours reminded me of  Perles d'Or from 2010, but that mix seems quite a bit darker actually. The pearls come in a shiny black tin with removable lid and a black sponge on top to keep the pearls secure. (I'd recommend applying them with a brush, not the sponge though.) The lid has the gold signature Guerlain flower detail. The outer box is the usual black with red inside. Very pretty.

The overall effect is a shimmery light beige powder. I didn't swatch it because it hardly shows up on my skin, but you will see me wearing it in a picture at the bottom of this post and you can see it's quite shimmery. I can see a couple of big glitters on my face, but I'm not entirely sure they're from the powder as on my eyes I was wearing Urban Decay's Kiddie Pool eyeshadow which has got big glitter particles. The overall effect however is quite shimmery, so this wouldn't be suitable for those with oily skin. Having said that, today I'm wearing it on top of the new Parure de Lumiere foundation and Voilettes loose powder and it's not too shimmery. So maybe the key is to mattify first.

Guerlain Meteorites perles cost £37.50 for 30 g (that's another 50p rise since the summer) and Perles du Dragon is a limited edition shade. I bought mine from Harrods, but it's also available from John Lewis, House of Fraser, Selfridges and hopefully Debenhams soon.

See more pictures after the jump and if you'd like to check out my large Meteorites collection, please click here!

Guerlain Holiday 2012 Collection Haul Part 1 - Shine Automatique Lipstick #760 Lou-Ling

Finally it's here, and I have already or will definitely buy almost everything from Guerlain's Holiday 2012 Collection, so I will be doing a series of these posts in the coming week or so.

First up I'd like to show you one of the Shine Automatique lipsticks, #760 Lou-Ling (I didn't buy the gold one (#700 Altoum) because I already have a Chanel gold lipstick and there's really only so many gold lipsticks a girl needs). The colour is a gorgeous deep wine red with lots of gold shimmer. The lipstick comes in a gold coloured case that has a "lever" on the side which pushes the lipstick up through a flap on the top (which of course gets opened first). This allows you to open and apply your lipstick one handed.

Once applied on my skin, the colour is rather sheer, the swatch you'll see below took 5 swipes. Shine Automatiques are supposed to be sheer, so I was expecting this. What I wasn't expecting though is what happened when I applied it to my lips: after just one swipe the colour was bright and vibrant. So this is actually a sheer lipstick that isn't actually sheer. The gold shimmer is noticable, but not gritty, and the lipstick has a gorgeous shine.

Not overly long lasting, it lasts on me for about 3 hours if I don't eat or drink, 2 hours if I drink and it disappears if I eat. It leaves a nice stain behind and fades quite evenly. It feels nicely moisturising as well.

Shine Automatique lipsticks cost £24.50 and you get a decent 3.5 g for you money. I believe both Lou-Ling and Altoum are limited edition.

See more pictures after the jump!

Looks Featuring Urban Decay's Vice Palette and Ocho Loco 24/7 Eye Pencil Set - Part 2

Here's another look I did with my new Urban Decay Vice Palette and Ocho Loco 24/7 Eye Pencil Set. This time I used some of the neutral eyeshadows, which are actually really really nice. Again I felt this would've looked nicer with a more shimmery highlighter, but I wated to stick to the palette.

To create this look I used the following:

Eyes:
Urban Decay Primer Potion in Greed
Urban Decay Vice Palette Echo Beach eyeshadow in inner corner and above crease
Urban Decay Vice Palette Nevermind eyeshadow in outer corner
Urban Decay Vice Palette Muse eyeshadow in crease
Urban Decay Vice Palette Anonymus eyeshadow on browbone to highlight
Urban Decay 24/7 Eye Pencil Hustle on lower lashline and waterline
Cargo Lash Activator mascara (aren't my lashes looking great by the way?)
Mac Show Off Brow Set

Face:
Ginvera Green Tea Nude Cover BB Cream
Guerlain Voilettes Invisible Skin Fusion Loose Powder in 03 Beige Naturel
Mac Dollymix powder blush
Mac Perfect Topping mineralize skinfinish

Lips:
Nars 413 BLKR Velvet Matte Lip Pencil 
Urban Decay Stardust Sparkling lipgloss in Glitter Rock

See more pictures after the jump!

Looks Featuring Urban Decay's Vice Palette and Ocho Loco 24/7 Eye Pencil Set - Part 1

For the past week or so I've been playing with my new Urban Decay Vice Palette and Ocho Loco 24/7 Eye Pencil Set and this is one of the looks I did. I was quite happy with this, although I think it would've looked better with a shimmery highlighter, but since there isn't one included in the Vice Palette, I decided to just stick with what was available.

To create this look I used the following:

Eyes:
Too Faced Insurance Policy
Urban Decay Vice Palette Provocateur eyeshadow in inner corner
Urban Decay Vice Palette Rapture eyeshadow in outer corner
Urban Decay Vice Palette Vice eyeshadow in crease
Urban Decay Vice Palette Freebird eyeshadow above crease
Urban Decay Vice Palette Anonymus eyeshadow on browbone to highlight
Urban Decay 24/7 Eye Pencil Psychedelic Sister on lower lashline and waterline
Cargo Lash Activator mascara
Mac Show Off Brow Set

Face:
Ginvera Green Tea Nude Cover BB Cream
Guerlain Voilettes Invisible Skin Fusion Loose Powder in 03 Beige Naturel
Mac Conjure Up mineralize blush
Mac Pleasureflush mineralize skinfinish

Lips:
Nars 413 BLKR Velvet Matte Lip Pencil

See more pictures after the jump!

I'm Guest Posting Over at Chester Loves MakeUp!

The lovely Chester has asked me to do a guest post for her while she is away (over here in England actually) and I was more than happy to oblige. Please click on the image below to take you to Chester's Blog and enjoy!

Once again many thanks to Chester for asking me to guest blog, it's been such an honour to be asked.

NOTD: China Glaze Deviantly Daring

Deviantly Daring is one of the duochrome polishes from China Glaze released in the Bohemian Luster Chrome collection.It is a bluey green polish that looks blue at certain angles. Reminds me of Sephora Moody Woman polish but this is more blue than green. The duochrome is quite strong, certainly noticable.

Taken without flash in natural daylight

Application was fine, can't remember whether it took 2 or 3 coats, but I probably did 3 for good measures. It did chip on me quite quickly, I don't find China Glaze polishes at all long lasting. It is very pretty though and I change my nail colour every 2-3 days, so it's not a massive deal.

I bought mine from eBay, but in the UK China Glaze polishes cost around £7 (although BeautyBay are selling this for £12.75?) and you get 14 ml for your money.

See more pictures after the jump!

Urban Decay Ocho Loco 24/7 Glide-On Eye Pencil Set Review and Swatches

Another lovely set this holiday season (yes, I know it's only mid-October, but you know make up collections are always a season ahead) from Urban Decay is the Ocho Loco 24/7 Glide-On Eye Pencil Set. Similar to last year's 15 Year Anniversary set, this set also contains full size 24/7 eyeliners in a variety of shades and finishes, both existing colours and some exclusive ones.

24/7 eye pencils are one of my favourite eyeliners, they are creamy and easy to use, but they set quickly and don't smudge. I find they don't last for very long on my waterline, but on my lashline they last for several hours. They also have such a brilliant selection of colours, they always come out with new ones and you often get these great value sets too. I have so many 24/7 eye pencils, I have now lost count. I use them every day and they last for a long time. I think I've only finished 3 of them over the last 3-4 years and those were the tiny travel sizes (0.5 g I think).

Ocho Loco set contains 8 full size (1.2 g) 24/7 eye pencils, including 4 existing shades: Perversion, a matte very dark black, Rockstar, one of my favourites: a lovely aubergine colour, Stash, an antique gold shade, Junkie, a teal with gold shimmer, as well as 4 new colours. Actually, Junkie is new to the UK, it was part of a 5 colour travel set, but only in the US, although I did get it through eBay of course.

The new colours are very nice too, Mushroom is a metallic taupe pewter, Hustle is a medium brown (reminds me of Bourbon, although I didn't compare them side-by-side), Psychedelic Sister is a bright purple shimmer and LSD is a navy with bright turquoise shimmer - possibly my favourite!

You also get a double barrelled pencil sharpener with the set. This set, while still a great value, is less good value than the 15 Year Anniversary set was. This one costs £40 for 8 full size (1.2 g) pencils plus the sharpener, giving you a £104 value for your money (8 x £13) excluding the sharpener. The Anniversary set was £60 for 15 full size pencils which was AMAZING value! But let's not grumble, this is still great, even if you already own some of the existing shades (plus let's face it, you can't have enough of Perversion or Rockstar anyway), you still get 4 brand new exclusive shades for less than the price of 3!

This is limited edition, so if you want it, be quick. You can be sure it won't be available for long. You can buy Urban Decay from Debenhams, House of Fraser, Beauty Bay and Lookfantastic in the UK, but I can't see this set on the latter two websites.

See lots more pictures including swatches after the jump!

Nars 413 BLKR Velvet Matte Lip Pencil

I bought this Velvet Matte Lip Pencil from Nars's recent collection 413 BLKR (released in celebration of Fashion's Night Out). The lip pencil is a blue fuschia colour, it looks pretty bright, but it's actually very wearable.

It's matte, but unlike a lot of other mattes, it's a lovely formula, not drying at all. It's not as long lasting as I thought, probably got through around 3 hours without eating and drinking, but it did disappear more quickly if I ate. I like the jumbo pencil, it's so easy to use, just outline your lips and fill in. All in all, I like this a lot.

You get 2.4 g which is quite a bit less than usual lipsticks size (3-3.5 g) and it costs £17.50. So it's not cheap, especially considering how much you get, but it's a lovely shade and nice formula, so if you don't mind the price, it's well worth checking out. I believe it is exclusive to Nars, so might not be available at counters, however, the Nars website offers free delivery every so often, so it's worth signing up to their mailing list if you're interested.

See more pictures including swatches after the jump!  

My Mac By Request Haul With Swatches

I wasn't sure whether or not to write this post as Mac collections tend to sell out so quickly, there's hardly anything left 2-3 days after release day. This is especially true of online only collections. However, despite being released on Monday, Mac's newest collect By Request is still in stock as we speak, so I thought I might as well show you what I got and do some quick swatches in case you see something you like. I haven't worn any of them yet, so I won't be doing a proper review.

I bought Moth Brown and Guacamole eyeshadows, Moxie and Rocker lipsticks, Bait, Flash of Flesh and Cult of Cherry lipglasses. I didn't get Candy Yum Yum or Jete because I already owned them from earlier releases.

The eyeshadows cost £12, the lipsticks are £14 and the lipglasses are £13.50 each. The collection is exclusive to the Mac UK website. Have you picked up anything from the collection? Let me know in the comments!

See more pictures including swatches after the jump!

Urban Decay Vice Palette Review and Swatches

Urban Decay has come out with 4 different eyeshadow palette for the holiday, I only decided to buy the Vice Palette as the other 3 (Fun, Feminine, Dangerous) only contained eyeshadows that I already own. The Vice Palette supposedly only contains new shades, but I'm sure some of these can be duped with other Urban Decay shadows or other brands.

There are 20 eyeshadows included in the palette:

• Desperation (greyish taupe brown matte-satin)
• Muse (dark reddish brown w/golden and multidimensional shimmer)
• Jagged (matte black base w/gold metallic)
• Blitz (bright gold metallic)
• Penny Lane (bronze metallic w/gold glitter)
• Junkie (dark green-blue w/gold shimmer)
• Chaos (vibrant royal blue w/very subtle shimmer)
• Unhinged (electric turquoise blue metallic)
• Occupy (dark grey-blue metallic)
• Black Market (dark charcoal black matte-satin)
• Provocateur (light greyish pink w/lots of multidimensional glitter)
• Rapture (dark greyish purple w/multidimensional shimmer)
• Vice (dark eggplant w/subtle red shimmer)
• Noise (dark reddish-pink metallic w/big gold glitter)
• Armor (greyish brown metallic w/silver micro-glitter)
• Nevermind (light taupey-brown shimmer)
• Echo Beach (light wheat-champagne shimmer)
• Anonymous (light whitish-pink nude matte)
• Freebird (light peachy-pink w/silver micro-glitter)
• Laced (pinky-taupe matte)

(descriptions taken from the Urban Decay website)

The eyeshadows are not full size (0.8 g instead of 1.5 g of the full size shadows), but they are a decent size. You also have a double ended Good Karma shadow and crease brush included as well as a full size mirror in the lid. The palette isn't as bulky as the Books of Shadows (especially the last one which was massive!), there isn't any unnecessary extra bits and bobs included, no drawers to put out, etc. 

Quality-wise the palette is pretty good. There are some really lovely shades, soft, buttery, well pigmented, and there are some glittery, chunky, powdery ones too. The nicest ones for me are Blitz, Penny Lane, Junky, Chaos, Occupy, Unhinged, Vice, Armor, Nevermind and Echo Beach. The worst ones are Jagged, Provocateur and Freebird. All 3 have a ton of glitter and massive fallout. The rest are pretty good. The brush isn't my favourite, especially the shadow end, the crease blensing end is okay.

All in all, this is a nice palette, but not the best I have ever seen from Urban Decay. My personal favourites are the 15 Year Anniversary Palette and the first Book of Shadows. At £42 it's still great value as you get 20 just-over-half-size eyeshadows plus a brush for the price of 3 full size eyeshadows. If you're a fan of Urban Decay you will probably want it because it's very pretty and there are some really lovely eyeshadows in it. If you're not a fan of glittery, frosty shades, this one is probably not for you as there are only 4 mattes in it and to be fair the two lighter ones are a bit meh.

See lots more pictures including swatches after the jump!

Stila Stay All Day Liquid Lipstick in Amore - Review and Swatches

Stila has released a new liquid lipstick called Stay All Day Liquid Lipstick. I was sent a sample in the colour Amore to try out and here's what I thought about it.

Firstly, let me say that the name "Stay All Day" is actually a terrible name. To me this suggests 8+ hours of wear, minimum. Even Stila only claim this is supposed to provide 6 hours of continuous wear. So putting "all day" in the name is pretty much like putting "miracle" in the name, it puts my expectations so high, the product can only fail afterwards.

I'd say this lipstick stayed on me for 4 hours, but with eating and drinking it quickly disappeared from the inner part of my lipst mostly just leaving a not very attractive rim after a couple of hours. I found application quite difficult as there doesn't seem to be a stopper at the end of the tube, so when you pull the wand out, the doefoot applicator is covered in the product. Therefore unless you wipe it off on a tissue (and wasting loads), you are applying way too much product on your lips. It feels quite nice and smooth when applied, it quickly dries down and feels a bit dry on the lips. I kept wanting to lick my lips as they didn't feel comfortable. It wasn't drying though, but not moisturising either (which is another thing Stila claims this does).

The colour Amore is a vampy plum shade, perfect for autumn and winter. It's actually very similar to my hair colour right now. You get only 3 ml for £15 which actually makes this liquid lipstick more expensive than Guerlain! Their Rouge G L'Extrait liquid lipsticks retail for £29.50 for 6 ml, so double the size of this one. They are actually very similar products, but if I had to choose I'd go for the Guerlain ones, the gorgeous case with mirror is just so much nicer than a see through plastic tube.

All in all I like this, but don't love it. The colour's nice, but the formula isn't the best, it doesn't last as long as it claims, the name is stupid (6 hours is NOT all day) and the packaging is really not great. I won't be purchasing the other colours in this line.

See more pictures including swatches after the jump!

NOTD: Ozotic #730 Duochrome Nail Polish

I have been buying nail polish like there's no tomorrow and one of the sellers/shops I've been using is Llarowe who has a massive amount of indie brands on their website including Ozotic. It's a US based shop but the shipping isn't bad, so I have ordered a lot of nail polishes from Leah Ann who runs Llarowe.

Today I want to show you this gorgeous duochrome simply named #730 from Ozotic. I had heard about Ozotic and really wanted to try it out as I love my duochrome polishes. This one shifts from pink to red to orange. It's really vibrant and gorgeous especially in the sun. I used it alone, but of course it can be layered on top of black polish for a different effect.

Formulawise it was a big disappointment, it was weird, it didn't spread as nicely as other polishes, just sort of stayed where I put it. So it ended up really quite streaky. It took 2 or 3 coats, I can't remember now, sorry. Sadly it chipped on me very quickly (within 24 hours) and I had to remove it after just 2 days as it looked rubbish. Shame really because it's very pretty to look at.

I bought mine for $14.50 from Llarowe. I don't actually know how much you get in the bottle, I'm guessing somewhere around 15 ml, it's a decent sized bottle. Weird that it doesn't say on the bottle at all though.
 
All in all, a nice looking polish, but I'm not a big fan of the formula. Maybe other colours in this line will fare better? Have you tried any of them?

See lots of pictures after the jump!

Chantecaille The Elephant Palette Review and Swatches

I've got it! The gorgeous new palette from Chantecaille is finally here. Isn't it just so cute? I love the little chunky elephants on the eyeshadows.

The colours included in this palette are:

• Ivory: a soft, pearlybeige inspired by the African Elephants tusks
• Grasslands: an on trend green inspired by the colour of the lush savanna grass after the rainy season
• Iron Ore: a glistening deep gray with flecks of gold, mirrors the way the mineral shimmers in the bright African sunlight
• Red Earth: a strong copper whose colour mimics the rich, red African cliffs

There is a shimmery overspray on the elephants, but the rest of the eyeshadows show the true colours. While I have not used the eyeshadows, I did manage to swatch them (not the overspray, but the actual shadows) and I have to say, I wasn't bowled over. I like Ivory and Red Earth, they are both very smooth and well pigmented, especially Red Earth. Grassland and Iron Ore were both quite hard to swatch, they weren't very well pigmented, especially Iron Ore. I must point out, I haven't actually worn these yet, sometimes eyeshadows apply better on the eyes than they swatch, so we'll see. I still love it because it's so beautiful, and one of my weaknesses are Chantecaille powders and palettes, so I'm happy with it anyway.

The quad costs a whopping £74 although I managed to buy mine from eBay for a lot less. You get 12 g for your money and a lovely refillable dark green compact with a full size mirror in the lid. Chantecaille donates a measly 5% of the proceeds to the The David Sheldrick Wildlife Trust, an organization that rescues, fosters and release baby elephants orphaned by ivory poaching. I feel that when charging this much for an eyeshadow palette, they could at least donate a bigger chunk, say 15-20%, but in the end of the day I guess it's better than nothing.

There is also a blush with the same elephant motif that I have literally just bought, so I have not had the chance to photograph or swatch, but I will do it as soon as possible.

In the meantime, take a look at more pictures of the palette including swatches after the jump!

Too Faced Perfect Eyes Waterproof Eyeliner in Perfect Peacock Review and Swatches

Too Faced has been releasing some really nice products lately (including the gorgeous Return of Sexy palette which I will be reviewing shortly). I picked up this gorgeous teal eyeliner during a recent visit to the one and only Boots that sells Too Faced products near me (one of the Debenhams nearby has a tiny Too Faced stand, but the brand isn't available online anymore, so I'm guessing they're also not stocking new products).

Too Faced Perfect Eyes eyeliners are said to be waterproof, budgeproof and smudgeproof and they promise an 8-hour-long wear. Perfect Peacock is a medium dark teal with very fine pearl. It's not really shimmery, but there is a very tiny bit of pearl in it. On the eyes it looks more matte than shimmery for sure. The eyeliner is very creamy and glides on easily without tugging, however it does set quickly and stays put once on. On the waterline I didn't get 8 hours out of it, but it worked much better on my lashline. It did smudge a bit, but it was still definitely there 8 hours later. I really like this eyeliner, it's very creamy, but pretty long lasting as well, removal wasn't a problem and Perfect Peacock is a really lovely colour.

The pencil is double ended, it comes with a slanted smudger at the other end. I have not used this as I don't normally smudge my eyeliner, so can't comment on it. You get 1.2 g for £14.50 which is similar to the Urban Decay 24/7 eyeliner pencils. In the UK these come in 6 colours, but the Too Faced website shows 9 shades. You can buy Too Faced from Boots, Beauty Bay and Lookfantastic in the UK.

See more pictures including swatches after the jump!

Is This Thing On?

Over the past few days I have not received one single comment on my posts, so I started to wonder: are my posts so boring that nobody is interested in commenting on them or is the comments function not working? So to find out I would like to ask you if you have a minute, would you please leave a comment below this post to see if the comments are working? If you can't leave a comment, please could you e-mail me at pleasureflush@yahoo.co.uk?

Otherwise, if it's the quality of my posts that's the reason why I'm not getting any comments, please feel free to let me know if there's anything you'd like me to do a post about and I will do my best to make the blog more interesting. Thank you!

Laura Geller Blush n Brighten in Bora Bora Review and Swatches

I was going to have this review up last night, but I had such a hectic day, I was pooped by 8 pm, sorry. Nowadays I try to do at least one post a day, but some days it's just not possible with 3 children and housework, shopping, other commitments.

Anyway, here we have another lovely blush form Laura Geller, a light peachy pink colour with subtle shimmer called Bora Bora. Once again, it's a baked formula which I really like, it's very similar to the Mac mineralize blushes. This one doesn't have any veining, only some suble light gold shimmer. Very soft, but not too powdery, pretty pigmented and despite it being quite a light colour, it still shows up very well on my skin. It gives a nice natural flush and the shimmer isn't too noticable, so it's a very wearable shade for lighter skin tones.

This one is a slightly smaller size from the usual Laura Geller blush size which is normally 9 g, but I guess that's probably way more blush than you would need in one colour anyway. This one is a 6.5 g size, which is about average. The blush comes in the usual black compact with half a mirror in the lid (the other half is clear plastic, so you can see the colour). I believe this was part of the Glow-n-Behold collection, but I bought it separately from eBay. I paid around £11 including postage which is not too bad, although I have actually seen it for quite a bit less too. 

See more pictures including swatches and a look I did with this blush after the jump!

Bellapierre Cosmetics 9 Stack Shimmer Kit in Pandera Review and Swatches

On a recent trip to TKMaxx I found this kit for under half the original retail price, so of course I had to get it. I have already reviewed another one of these in the colour Fabulous so I won't repeat everything I've said there, if you want more info, please click here.

What you get in a kit is basically 9 little pots of pigment, 2 eyeshadow brushes, an eyeshadow base, a clear lipgloss and an instruction CD. The pigments come in a stack which is pretty cool, although due to the nature of it, can only be carried around as one piece. 

Unlike Fabulous which has lighter, bright colours, Pandera has a darker, smokier colour mix. It also doesn't include any glitters, whereas Fabulous has two glitters in it. The pigments are still very shimmery, but I find that the shimmer doesn't show up that much on the eyes, so they are definitely very wearable. I only got around to wearing a couple of shades, namely the light pinky beige and the medium brown shade (middle of top rown and right one in the middle row - see in pictures below), but they were both very smooth and easy to apply and blend. They stayed on my lids without fading or creasing for 12 hours.

These stacks retails for £59.99, but this set was only £24.99 in TKMaxx. However, I did notice, 6 months ago the same set in different colour cost only £19.99. Still a good deal, but it seems even TKMaxx is getting more expensive! Anyway, I'm happy to pay 25 quid for this, but I do feel that 60 would be way too much. Thank Crunchie for TKMaxx, eh? 

See more pictures including swatches and the look I did with some of the pigments after the jump!

NOTD: Models Own Dancing Queen Mirrorball Polish

Models Own have recently released 5 new nail polishes called Mirrorball polishes in a variety of shades and I have Dancing Queen to show you. It's a clear polish with lots of different colour and different shape glitter including gold, blue, green and turquoise. I used it on top of Urban Decay Mars, a mossy green polish and I really liked the result.

Taken without flash in direct sunlight

I used 2 coats of Mars and then 2 coats of Dancing Queen on top. Dancing Queen was a bit thick, but okay otherwise. It did chip fairly quickly and the surface didn't feel very smooth, even with Seche Vite on top, it had little edges sticking out here and there, but that often happens with glitter polish like this.

Urban Decay Mars came in a set (last year's holiday set), so it's not available separately. Models Own Mirrorball polishes are available from the Models Own website and costs £5 (although is sold out at the moment, but will be available again soon and also from Boots stores/website). You get 14 ml of Dancing Queen and 5 ml of Mars.

See more pictures after the jump!

Too Faced Galaxy Glam Eyeshadow in Deep Space Review and Swatches

I had been wanting to try out Too Faced Galaxy Glam Eyeshadows for a while, but never got around to it, partly because of their price and partly because there were always other things I wanted to pick up. However, on a recent shopping trip I noticed this being sold in TKMaxx and decided to finally get it. I figured at £3.99 I can't lose much even if it's not that great.

Do you know what though? This is actually a good little product. It's basically a baked eyeshadow that mixes 2 colours that you can use dry or wet for more intensity. The shade I got is Deep Space which is dark blue and white mixed together. The blue itself is quite matte, but the white has some sparkles in it. The result is different shades of blue depending on where you swatch it. I tried to use the white alone, but it's not really possible, however you can get some very light blue or mix it with more blue for darker colour.

The texture is really nice, it's soft and well pigmented even when used dry. I did experience some fallout during application, but it was fine once I cleaned up under my eye. It's pretty handy to have several shades in one eyeshadow and I'm such a sucker for baked and marbelised products, I'm really happy I picked it up. I didn't experience any creasing or fading for 12+ hours over Too faced Shadow Insurance primer.

You get 3 g in a compact that looks like a little UFO. The lid screws off and in the lid you have a magnifying glass which makes the swirly product even more space-looking. It's a bit on the bulky side, but it's a fun design. I paid £3.99 for it, but I think it retails (or retailed, it might be discontinued actually) for around £12-14.

See more pictures including swatches after the jump!