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!