January Nails #three

I know I haven't been keeping up, but I've not been well, so I'll try and getstarted again :)

This evenings nail is my newest polish, Illamasqua's infamous Raindrops. And gosh, I know why it's so popular. It's beautiful! I can't stop staring at my nails! Lol. 

Anyway, I hope you are all having a lovely evening :) x 

Revlon Super Lustrous Lipstick: Really Red & Pink Storm

Hi! :) I was in boots today, desperately searching for a perfect red lipstick, as I actually have none! (I have a formal to go to tomorrow and no other lipstick suits my dress than red.) I can't stand the colour red, and avoid it at all costs, but I was still surprised to find a lipstick hoarder like me to be lacking a red lipstick! Oh well. I found a perfect red in the form of Revlon's Really Red, and seeing as it was buy one get one half price, I couldn't resist buying a second lipstick hehe :3







Both Really Red and Pink Storm are Matte shades, and I find Revlon's matte shades to be a really lovely formula. Non drying, highly pigmented, long lasting and easy to apply! What more could you ask for? (Except maybe a wider range of shades...)
One niggle I have with this range of lipsticks, (one that is, admittey, completely benign) is that I really dislike the packaging. The black and gold/brass just don't mix well with me. As Revlon is quite a high end 'drugstore' brand, I feel they would look a lot nicer if they were silver or chrome instead of the brassy colour. (Though really, it doesn't matter at all. They're wonderful products)











Thanks for reading <3

Ps, sorry for the current low quality photos. I'm using a terrible camera at the moment :(

Purple lipsticks (part 1)

Hey! I thought I'd share my no.1 beauty vice: purple lipsticks. I've so many, I had to split up this into two sections! In part one, I will be sharing and swatching my 'light purple' lipsticks :)



(Ps. They are in no particular order)

No.1: Barry M lip paint in 127 (palest lavender

This is a milky lavender that has quite a sheer coverage, which is quite unlike the rest of Barry M's lip paints. Anyway, I have a review of this earlier on in my posts Here!




Mac: Viva Glam Nicki 2
This is an amplified finish mac lipstick, and as such has wonderful pigmentation, however, probably as it is such a light colour, it does not last as long as most amplified's would. It is a very pale blue toned lavender. It definitely needs reapplied ever few hours, as it is so pale (yet so striking) when it bleeds, it doesn't look so great!




Revlon Just Bitten Balmstain: Darling

I adore this! It actually transfers onto my lips quite pink, but it's just the perfect low maintenance lip product. I know a lot of people have been put off by the smell, but I adore it, it smells lovely and minty fresh. The stain element is not as noticable as other balm stains, but it still lasts a good few hours - Nearly all day!




Lime Crime: Airborne Unicorn

This is very similar to a Mac Amplified lipstick in duration and pigmentation (and smell?) and while I love it, and the name, and the packaging (unicorns 4 life <3 data-blogger-escaped-a="" data-blogger-escaped-and="" data-blogger-escaped-br="" data-blogger-escaped-colour="" data-blogger-escaped-different="" data-blogger-escaped-hand="" data-blogger-escaped-in="" data-blogger-escaped-is="" data-blogger-escaped-it="" data-blogger-escaped-lights="" data-blogger-escaped-lips="" data-blogger-escaped-looks="" data-blogger-escaped-my="" data-blogger-escaped-not="" data-blogger-escaped-onto="" data-blogger-escaped-or="" data-blogger-escaped-s="" data-blogger-escaped-strange="" data-blogger-escaped-the="" data-blogger-escaped-totally="" data-blogger-escaped-transfers="" data-blogger-escaped-tube="" data-blogger-escaped-under="" data-blogger-escaped-what="">


Mac Sheen Supreme: Asian Flower

This, along with Relvon's darling, is my perfect every day lip product. It is quite a pinky purple, and so it's not too striking yet it is really nicely pigmented. It lasts 3-4 hours of normal wear (without eating or drinking) and it has a lovely scent (typical Mac vanilla smell) what's not to love!






Swatches: (l-r) Barry M 127, Viva Glam Nicki 2, Revlon Darling, Lime Crime Airborne Unicorn, Mac Asian Flower.

I hope you enjoyed my post, stay tuned for my 'dark purple' post soon :)

Thanks for reading <3 data-blogger-escaped-br="">

GOSH x-ceptional wear foundation

I'm going to review what is, for me, the ultimate foundation for pale skin: GOSH x-ceptional wear in porcelain.




I'm sure anyone reading who has pale skin will sympathise with me that it's next to impossible to find a foundation that is suitable for pale skin that doesn't leave your skin with a orange tinge.
I've tried mixing white foundation to tone down normal foundations, I've tried expensive brands, I've tried cheap brands. It took me seven years to find something that suited my skin tone.
For reference, I'm about NW10 or maybe a little paler.

I came across GOSH's x-ceptional wear in porcelain whilst just browsing through superdrug, and was pleasantly surprised when I swatched it on my hand - it was almost a perfect match for my skin! Leaning a little on the pink side, I wasn't phased, anything was better than that dreadful orange tinge. So I picked up a bottle two years ago and haven't found a foundation that betters it yet.

It has a light to medium coverage, smoothing out skin tone and gives your face a lovely smooth and porcelain look to it. However, it won't cover blemishes or dark circles, so you'll definitely need a good concealer to team it with.




Although it looks quite orangey here,


It blends out into a lovely pale tone that matches and smooths out my skin tone lovely.

It is available in most superdrugs for a measly £8~ so it's definitely worth checking out :)

Thanks for reading <3

MAC NW10 Studio Fix Foundation Powder

Hi! :) so, as I promised, I've got a review and swatches of MACs nw10 studio fix powder.
The product is a foundation powder, which would be ideal for oily skin. Personally, I have combination (but mostly dry) skin, and I will use the powder to bus coverage over my primer/foundation, which only offer a light to medium coverage.
It comes in MACs standard packaging, which I think is lovely, very minimalist and distinctive. The compact has a mirror and a space underneath with a sponge.








The powder is really blendable, smooth and offers a really good coverage for a powder, I'm actually quite surprised at how good the coverage is (and I've tried powder foundations before!) so kudos to MAC for making a great product.
As for the shade, in indoor light, it looks like the perfect shade. I always wanted to try MAC but even NW15 was too dark for me. So hopefully going 5 points lighter will leave me with the perfect pale powder!
It really smoothed out my skin, and it seems to have light reflecting qualities as I look quite... Illuminated (sparkly? :p) while wearing the powder.
As for staying power, I would say it would last a good few hours, but it would definitely need reapplied a few times a day.




Thanks for reading <3

MUA haul

So! I'm a fan of MUA on facebook, and, as I'm sure everyone knows, they finally had their amazing 50% off everything offer, and I picked up a lovely selection of goodies :)

(I'm sorry the picture isn't the best quality, I took it last night when I got home) 

Anyway! I picked up the Fixing Mist, which I actually used last night, I must say I'm impressed! I'll definitely be doing a proper review of it soon

I got the undressed pallete, the eye-primer, two blushers, a powder blush in shade 4, and a cream blush in Blossom, a Kiss-Proof lipstain in Kissalicious, Sugar Lips lip balm (both of which are lovely products), eyebrow pencil in Blonde, and then three nail products; Gemini nail constelliations, Jellyfish mystical glitter and Rose Dust fairy dust polish. Finally, I got the F3 Concealer Brush, I was planning on getting pretty much the entire range of brushes, but unfortunately they sold out! 

After the 50% discount, ALL of this came to only £16, which is absolutely amazing. It was such a generous offer, and I'm so glad I was able to avail of it :) I've tried a few of these out already, and I'll definitely be reviewing quite a few, so stay tuned! and a big thank you to MUA ^_^

x

MUA Glamour Days Palette

I'm so sorry this is really late >< I've been crazy busy with college work and haven't had a chance to update my blog. I'm trying to fix that though!

Anywayy, back in Novemer, I won a competition with MUA and was sent their gorgeous Glamour Days eyeshadow palette. :)

The palette has twelve gorgeous colours which I found to be creamy and very easy to blend, all together really lovely.

As you can see they aren't mega pigmented, but you can build them up to create a stronger finish. I feel the glittery / sparkly shadows have a stronger pigment to the mattes, but as I said, they are all easy to blend and build upon to create your preferred finish.

My favourites are: 1, which is perfect for highlighting, and the bottom/last four, as they're perfect for the autumn/winter time. 

Overall, Glamour Days is a lovely palette and the quality really impressive considering that it only costs £4

<3

Urban Decay V MUA: Eyeshadow Primers

I've seen a lot of comparison between Urban Decay's Naked palettes and MUA's Undressed and Heaven and Earth palettes, and as I've heard rave reviews about MUAs palettes, I thought I'd compare my favourite Urban Decay product, their Primer Potion, with MUAs version. 

Urban Decay's Primer Potion retails at £14.50 for 11ml of product, whereas MUAs Eye Primer retails at £2.50 for 7.5 ml. 

A comparison between packaging is pretty redundant here as I have the old style potion pot, which I always thought was terribly flawed. Now UDs primer comes in a squeesy tube. I do think that MUAs packaging looks more professional and, in comparison to the old style bottle, it is a lot easier to actually get the primer out of the bottle

They also both have doe-foot applicators, and this would be my preference over the new UD style as well, as this applicator is effective in spreading out the primer over the lid.

On the left, which you can barely see, is UDs primer potion, it has barely any pigmentation at all, and only leaves a slight sheen. It also dries quickly and so it isn't the easiest to blend it over the eyelid. MUAs primer is a lot more pigmented, and is so much easier to blend and spread, as it takes quite a while to dry in. 

Here I have a comparison of eyeshadow over no primer (at the top), UDs primer potion (on the left), and MUAs eye primer (on the right). It's obvious that MUAs primer gives a much more intense pay off as opposed to UDs primer potion and bare skin. 

I tested the two primers out under eyeshadow for a day (about 6 hours of wear) and MUAs primer came out on top, it kept my eyeshadow intense and vibrant all day, without creasing or fading away, and while my UD primer potion did this too, the colour intensity wasn't the same as with MUAs primer. 

MUAs primer surprised me with how good it was, easily more effective than Urban Decays, and although you get 3.5ml less product than in UDs, but, being £12 cheaper, I don't think that matters too much.

<3