My Recent Kiko Haul, Review and Swatches

I wasn't sure if I wanted to do this post due to my bad experience when ordering from Kiko a while ago (if you don't know what I'm talking about, read this post, but basically their customer services based in Italy were a pile of cr@p), however, to be fair to Kiko, despite their non-existing customer service their products are actually very good and the staff in their Westfield store have only ever been helpful and nice. I still won't be ordering from their website, but it's worth checking out their store if you're near one.

On a recent trip to Westfield London I picked up four of their water eyeshadows, one long lasting stick eyeshadow and two nail polishes. The nail polishes were in the sale, I believe they are from the holiday collection which I never saw because I stupidly forgot to pop into the Kiko store when I was in London in December, and one of them is even holographic (I believe there were four of them in the collection)! The water eyeshadows are permanent and the long lasting stick eyeshadow is limited edition (although there are also some permanent shades in different packaging).

I haven't tried the nail polishes yet, so I won't be reviewing them in this post. I have tried other Kiko nail polishes and they were fine, but they come in lots of different finishes and colours. I got shades 402 and 404. Kiko nail polishes cost £4.90 for 11 ml, but I think I paid £2 each for the ones I got in the sale.

I have reviewed the long lasting stick eyeshadows (permanent line) before, if you want to read my review, it's here. The new limited edition shade I bought is 31 Hypnotic Iris Blue which is a bright blue with purple duochrome. It gave me a very hard time as my camera just couldn't pick up the beautiful duochrome, so I had to use my phone to capture the true colour (as a result I have to I apologise for the bad picture quality). It's such a beautiful, vibrant colour though, I had many compliments while wearing it. I used it over Too Faced Shadow Insurance primer and it lasted very well without fading or creasing. It was easy to blend out and stayed put without smudging. The product come in a twist up pen like many other cream eyeshadows. Long lasting stick eyeshadows cost £6.90 and you get 1.64 g product.

The water eyeshadows are basically wet and dry eyeshadows with an excellent texture and colour payoff. They come in 32 shades and I chose 4 of them: 212 Emerald Green, 221 Cyclamen, 225 Indigo Blue and 224 Lavender. The latter was also a troublesome shade, it has a gorgeous purple duochrome to it and of course that didn't show up properly either (cue bad quality phone camera photos). The eyeshadows are a little bit like the gelee powder shadows Estee Lauder and Mac have come out with, very smooth, easy to blend, almost creamy, but with the non-creasing advantage of powder shadows. They are quite shimmery and a bit metallic, but not glittery at all. I wore them on top of Too Faced Shadow Insurance primer and they lasted all day without creasing or fading and with no fallout. I seriously love them, they are gorgeous. They come in mirrored black compacts and have a design that resembles ripples on water. The water eyeshadows cost £8.90 each and you get 3 g for your money.

See more pictures including swatches and looks I did with these products after the jump!

Top row: 212 Emerald Green, 221 Cyclamen
Bottom row: 225 Indigo Blue, 224 Lavender
Taken with flash

Top row: 212 Emerald Green, 221 Cyclamen
Bottom row: 225 Indigo Blue, 224 Lavender
Taken without flash in natural daylight

This is the colour my camera thought the stick eyeshadow looked like:

Long lasting stick eyeshadow
Taken with flash

This is what it actually looks like:

Long lasting stick eyeshadow
Taken without flash in natural daylight

212 Emerald Green, 221 Cyclamen, 225 Indigo Blue, 224 Lavender
Taken with flash

212 Emerald Green, 221 Cyclamen, 225 Indigo Blue, 224 Lavender
Taken without flash in natural daylight

212 Emerald Green, 221 Cyclamen, 225 Indigo Blue, 224 Lavender
Taken without flash in natural daylight with my camera phone for better colour trueness

Long lasting stick eyeshadow

Finally here are the two looks I did. First one with Cyclamen, Indigo Blue and Lavender water eyeshadows, the second one with Hypnotic Iris Blue stick eyeshadow (once again apologies for the bad quality camera pictures).