A Makeup & Beauty Blog – Lipglossiping

Obviously, this has been out aaaaaages… but ever since I saw the swatches on Jojoba’s blog last month, I’ve been lemming it like a woman possessed.

Since Sephora doesn’t ship to the UK, I have no US friends and I’m not keen on paying £40 on eBay, I’ll just have to suck it up and continue to cry myself to sleep thinking about it until like the beautiful LE item it is, it disappears from my sights forever…

A January essential? Most definitely *sigh*

If you have it, tell me how much you love it!

Introducing Blizzard.  This is such a fab shade… it’s not a grey, it’s not a black.  It’s a pewter.  A true metallic pewter, and I love it.

It has just a hint of subtle sparkle to lift it and is almost futuristic looking on my nails.  I don’t own a shade quite like it.

Application was fine with no major issues to speak of, perhaps a touch uneven on the first coat.. but it needed more than one anyway.

Blizzard is one of HJ Manicure’s winter shades aka, The Snow Collection.  If you haven’t already, head to the website to check them out, you won’t regret it!

I have the cutest little swatch chart here that HJ Manicure provided along with the polish (for potential review) and I’ll see if I can capture it in an image for you to see.

There are so many shades on there that I’m now lemming like a demon incuding the most ah-mazing looking sparkly yellow.  I don’t think I’ve ever seen a ‘sparkly’ yellow for another nail polish company, have you?  Oh, and if you like your pinks (like me) Bauble from the Festive Collection also looks divine, as does Champagne and Cracker… oh and Daylight, a fab looking Grurple – (that’s grey/purple incase you were wondering).  Aqua looks like a potential Spring diamond too….

Can you tell I’m getting excited looking at my swatch chart?  I need to get it online for you guys to drool over too!

I’ve just ordered 2 shades from the website in those cute little 5ml bottles that I wish ALL companies would employ!  Watch this space for some more HJ Manicure reviews!

I’ve been waiting to write this review for a long time, I’ve owned the SK-II Facial Treatment Cleansing Oil since the summer, but was being a good girl and using up my Shiseido Perfect Oil before commencing a new product!

The SK-II Cleansing Oil is another string to the bow of the Japanese Skincare Line SK-II (owned by Procter & Gamble) – the USP of SK-II is a single “anti-aging” ingredient called Pitera which they claim works to allow the skin to rejuvenate more effectively.

For your money (and rather a lot of it, I might add) – you get 250ml of oil, which, thankfully… is a generous sized bottle.  The packaging itself is plastic but at a glance looks like frosted glass.  I prefer the fact that it’s plastic, which allows for safer transportation.

They say:

This delicate oil with Wild Rose Extract and Pitera emulsifies with water and ‘Lifts and Locks’ onto hidden sebum and impurities. The ‘Lift and Lock’ formulation allows oil to transform with water to gently lift away make-up and impurities from the skin. Leaves it soft and fresh.

I never notice any discernible scent when using this (unlike the NUDE Cleansing oil – review to come soon!).  It’s a clear liquid of medium consistency which spreads quite easily over my face.  It’s lighter than the DHC Deep Cleansing Oil but heavier than my Shiseido Perfect Oil.  A happy medium!

I’ve never had to use more than 2 pumps, 1 pump will suffice if I’m not wearing mascara.

As you can see from the above list, mineral oil is the central ingredient… which is a shame, and at over £30 a bottle, I’m disappointed to see that they’re using such a cheap filler that is widely known to cause skin congestion thanks to it’s pore-clogging abilities.  Did you know that mineral oil is a byproduct of the distillation of gasoline from crude oil and that it actually costs more to dispose of it than it does to purchase it?  Now, I’m no Organic junkie… sometimes, chemicals just work and I admit to being endlessly suspicious that Organic products in general don’t work as effectively as their chemical-laden alternatives… but in this case, I’d rather my £32 bottle of cleansing oil wasn’t full of one of the cheapest substances on earth.

But, how does it clean?

It cleans well… It removes all mascaras (inc. waterproof) and leaves my face feeling fresh and (as promised) soft.  As with most cleansing oils… I do however, find it a little drying with continued use.  It also doesn’t emulsify as well as my DHC Deep Cleansing Oil, leaving a slightly oily residue behind untl I’ve followed up with another cleanser (which I always do anyway).

This puts it in the same category as the Shiseido Perfect Oil… but let’s remember… gram for gram (or ml for ml) the Shiseido would work out less than half the price of the SK-II for the same quantity.  The DHC Deep Cleansing Oil also works out cheaper, and thus rendering it still my #1 choice for cleansing oils.

I mustn’t forget the Pitera… and if I were comparing anti-aging night creams, I’d have a harder time eliminating it as a reason for purchasing.. but to be honest, I want my cleansing oil to clean – I’m not fussed about it’s anti-aging, skin regenerating properties.  I’ll save those concerns (and money) for my moisturiser.

You can purchase the SK-II line from Harrods, both in store and online.

Ok… so, it’s totally not but let’s not let reality get in the way of a a good Nail Polish Collection ogle.

Up & Away is China Glaze’s Spring offering…

I love the idea behind it, the carefree association of colourful balloons signalling the end of winter and the promise of summer.

Honestly, I’m not a huge fan of pastels… I am excited about a few of these though – Flyin’ High (the blue at the back), Something Sweet (the pale pink) and Happy Go Lucky (the bright yellow).  I would like to be drooling over more of these shades but I just don’t think they’d be the greatest match for my skintone.  Good for my purse, bad for my polish-loving heart.

Are you excited about this collection? Which shades are on your radar?

When I was in London earlier in the month I headed over to the huge Westfield to throw myself on the makeup.

I was itching to check out the Inglot store that I remembered hearing about on some forums when Westfield first opened.  And here it is! (please excuse the mobile phone pics)

Check out the range of eyeshadows:

and nail polishes:

Not forgetting the lipsticks…

It’s like an explosion in a Skittles factory no?

Beautiful!

Anyway… after that colour overload, I proceeded to choose myself a trio of eyeshadows to fill a small Pro Freedom Palette.  I went for the safe option (I know, boring!)

But aren’t they beautiful?

They’re ultra pigmented… incredibly smooth and I’ve embarked on a full-on love affair with them.

I can’t remember exactly how much I paid (argh! – can anyone help me out?)  I think it was around £14 for all 3 inc. the palette.

It’s called the Freedom System and you choose which shades you want the SA to put in.

The way I understood it is this…

You can choose from a Large Pro Palette (which hold the square shaped shadows, blushes and face powders – you can see the square shadows in my picture above).

or

You can choose from a Small Pro Palette which will hold the smaller eyeshadows (like mine), lipsticks and concealers etc…

Once you’ve chosen small or large… you can choose how many pans you want the palette to hold (I’m not sure of all the available choices).

You can also purchase items individually if you wish.

Hope that makes sense?!

The small shadows (to my eye) are the same size as MAC 26mm pans, but you get 1.8g of product in each pan compared to MAC’s 1.5g.

The range of colours is mind boggling, each with different finishes… I love me a bit of shimmer though!

I also bought a couple of lipsticks and will be back shortly with a post on those.

Have you tried Inglot? What say you?

As part of my Dior haul, I also purchased the Dior Sparkling Liner in the Xmas ’09 LE Shade Sparkling Purple.

I actually had no intentions to pick this up until I swatched it on the stand… oh my.

It’s a beautifully iridescent purple liner with a brush that ensures a precision fine line.  It’s massively pigmented and perfect for winter.

Look at that… it just glows and reminds me of stained glass.  I’ve been pairing this up with grey shadows on my lids and have worn it once or twice on it’s own with lots of black mascara.

I’m so pleased I picked it up!

I think I paid around £20.  Do you wear coloured liners?  Any preferences or tips on shade selection for a chick with grey/green eyes?

The lovely VexintheCity got me lemming this cream just over a month ago when she nonchalantly tweeted that it was time to repurchase for the winter.  Repurchase?!  That’s a word I rarely hear in the beauty community and so it was that my interest was piqued!

When I was in London at the beginning of December I headed to The Garden Pharmacy on Long Acre to check out the Art Deco they stock there, but it wasn’t long before my attention was diverted when I saw the Dr. Hauschka display on the shelves nearby.

Dropping the Art Deco like a hot potato (such is the fickle nature of makeup shopping) I made a beeline for the Dr. Hauschka display and started rummaging amongst the plain-looking boxes to find what I was looking for:

It’s a thick, silky-feeling cream which as the name would suggest… is rose scented.  I don’t find the scent too overpowering, but then, I do like rose-scented things.

You get 30ml of product for a £20 price tag.  Yes, it’s expensive and I balked at the price.

I suffer every winter from dry patches on my face.  My skin doesn’t seem to be au fait with THE RULES.  It’s supposed to know to be oily on the nose and dry on the cheeks… such is the bane of typical combination skin.  My skin SCOFFS at THE RULES.   Crusty and flaky down the sides of the nose and on the chin/top lip line with a great big pimple on the cheek.

It dispenses easily out of the tube, thankfully at £20 a pop it doesn’t pour out too much product when you squeeze the tube.  As you can see from the following picture it spreads itself quite thinly too, so you really only need a small amount of product to get a great amount of coverage.

It has an impressive list of ingredients which (if interested) you can find here.

So how did I find it? Will I be repurchasing?

I loved it.

I’ve tried many ‘thick’ creams in the winter to combat the flaky bits that make foundation look horrific about 20secs after applying and I’ve tried many creamier foundations in an attempt to stave off that crusty, dry, clumpy effect I get over the dry patches.  Nothing worked until I picked up a tube of Dr. Hauschka’s Rose Day Cream.

I was wary about slathering it on my nose… It *is* thick and heavy feeling and I was concerned that my makeup would slide right off, but it sinks in nicely in about 3 minutes.

The singular reason why I will be repurchasing next winter is this…

It’s an instant cure.  I don’t have to apply this a couple of times a day to see the effect a few days down the line (hello Eucerin) – I simply slap a bit of this on and the dryness is gone.  A gentle rub with a dry flannel to exfoliate and remove any dead skin flakes and they’re not coming back for the day once this has sunk in.  And that’s what I want.  I have cuticles like cactus spikes because I’m not hugely dedicated to the cause of massaging cuticle butter into them 5 times a day.  Ooooh I’m gonna try this on my nails too, that was an instant brainwave right there… you’re watching genius as it happens people!

Anyway, I’m really happy with it.  I’m still gonna shriek at the numbers that pop up on the till next November, but when I think of all the money I’ve spent on rich day creams and foundations in an attempt to battle winter skin problems.  For me, it’s completely worth it.

You can find Dr. Hauschka’s Rose Day Cream online on their website where you can even purchase a sample size (although £3.50 p&p charges may make this seem less tempting).

First of all, look how indecently sunny it was on Christmas morning!  After a week of snow and ice, I appear to have woken up in Barbados.  Typical.

Barielle Decadence is the final polish that I was sent by the company.  I wasn’t actually going to show you this one, ‘cos it’s a proper bright jeweled green and I thought that my skintone would do it absolutely no favours.  However, I was looking for something Christmassy and this caught my eye.

Application (as with all the Barielles I’ve tried) was a dream.  It’s a 2 coater and practically applied itself thanks to a smooth formula.  I can’t quite tell if it’s a metallic or a shimmer… I think I’m gonna call it a bit of both.

Check out my glitter tips!  Does this constitute ‘nail art’, have I dabbled for the first time without really meaning to?

Mavala Black Cherry is one of the shades I was sent from the upcoming Mystic Collection (available from January).

It’s a rich black shimmer infused with a cherry sparkle that isn’t quite red and isn’t quite purple.  The sparkle is very subtle and you have to be upclose with the polish to truly appreciate how much it lifts the polish from the realms of ‘just another black’.

Mavala Black Cherry is a solid 2-coater with a great formula that glides on without flooding the cuticles or suffering from drag.

Every dark Mavala shade I’ve tried looks positively amazing once the top coat is added.  Love it.

Apologies for the teeny tiny image, I’m gonna see if I can get hold of a bigger one once the holidays are over, but for now, I wanted to show you the Mystic Collection as a whole.  You can see that they’re all black based with varying degrees of coloured shimmer.

I also have Black Velvet (purple infused) and Mosaic Blue (blue infused) to swatch for you.  I’m ridiculously excited about Black Velvet which, in the bottle looks divine.

You can purchase Mavala polishes online from FeelUnique and GreenHands, they generally retail for around £3.75 for a 5ml bottle.

Do you like or are you getting tired of the dark shades? I must admit that I’m looking forward to Spring, although I don’t know why as I’m not sold on the pastelly shades that inevitably feature heavily in Spring collections.

I’m on eBay hunting down some of the Mavala Diamond collection from AW 09/10… I’m not ashamed to admit that I’ve gone a little glitter crazy!

Since reading this post from BritishBeautyBlogger, my heart has been beating nineteen to the dozen and a few hours later, shows no signs of slowing down.

Check out what Urban Decay has in store for us this March (US Release: 28th December – lucky so and so’s)…

Introducing, The Urban Decay Alice In Wonderland Palette.  Timed to coincide with the new Tim Burton film of the same name.

Do we recognise any of those 16 re-named colours?  I’m completely in love with it, but wonder just how many of those shades I already own…

There’s only 2000 set to be released in the UK, so it’s gonna be a challenge to nab one.

What are your thoughts? Will you be getting one?

I found another Stellar Showlights Lipstick lurking in my local T.K. Maxx… this time in the shade Ra Ra Red.

I was a little disappointed that it wasn’t the same glitter-bomb affair as the last one… but it still has glamour running through it’s veins.

Love the heavyweight packaging of the old style HR lippies.

These lippies are beautifully sheer yet buildable and I also find them quite moisturising… most of all, I love the shimmer left on the lips.  They give a fantastic illusion of fullness.

More, more… must find more!

A cool toned, slightly dirty lavender bursting with iridescence but no sparkles.

Opaque on 2 coats, but needs 3 for a really good finish.  I like it, but I don’t love it.

The formula is good and fairly thin.  It’s easy to apply with no streaking or dragging.  Longevity is fine too with minimal tip wear and thanks to the paler shade you barely notice it anyway.

I think I’d like it to be a little grungier, a little dirtier – it’s a touch princessy for me!