A Makeup & Beauty Blog – Lipglossiping

Here comes the older, more glam sister…

Urban Decay Primer Potion in Sin has been out in the US for over a year now, and I’ve been cooling my heels ever since I saw it pop up on Sephora many moons ago!

It promises all the benefits of the original UDPP with a little added pizazz.

They Say:

~ Use it alone; it’s a crease proof shadow!
~ Maximise it’s potential by using it as a highlighter, dab on brow bone, eye corners and cheeks for a radiant finish.
~ Sin works perfectly with any eye shadow and doesn’t show through, experience vibrant colour all day, with absolutely no creasing!

I received the sample of this last week and as a fan of the original, I was keen to see exactly why I’d want to purchase this one instead.

The new-fangled angled (I’m a poet) wand which promises to reach into each dark primer-potion filled corner of your tube.  I was initially sceptical about how putting an angle on the wand would *really* help, but having had a little play at ‘scooping’ from that very bottom jutting out bit, I think it might just work.  I don’t like how it makes the wand more difficult to remove from the tube though, I keep thinking it’s gonna ping primer at me as it pops free.

Swatched beside the original UDPP you can see that it’s a champagne cream with a metallic looking shimmer.  I instantly liked it… what with being a fan of metallic neutrals with a bit of shimmer n’all  😉

It’s quite heavily pigmented and the first thought that struck me was that it may do a better job at evening out skintone on pigmented eyelids better than the original.  I’m only speculating here as I don’t have a particular issue with red eyelids, but it makes a nice neutral base that sheers out well depending on how much you blend.

I really like this worn as a cream eyeshadow combined with a powder crease colour, as you would imagine, the staying power is rather marvellous.

The two primers blended out a little (not completely).

You can see that Sin retains it’s champagne shimmer whilst the original UDPP is well on it’s way to blending invisibly.

I’m an idiot and forgot to take a photo demonstrating how the same eye shadow looked applied over both primers.  I promise I’ll do it before the week is out and just pop up a quick comparison post.  Basically, if you’re applying a shadow over UDPP Sin… it ups the shimmer.  I <3 it, but it’s important to see as it may put you off completely.

I find that staying power for eyeshadows applied ontop is pretty equal for both primers, if there is a difference, it’s not discernible to me.  Blendability is still hard work over Sin and I’m a bit disappointed about that as it’s the only thing I really would have loved to see changed about the original UDPP.

D’yanowot… I’m on the fence about it with regards to my original question: “Why would I purchase this one over the original?”

Don’t get me wrong… I  really like it, there’s nothing for me not to like.  I like neutral, I like shimmer…

Might I sometimes want some of my shimmer eyeshadows even more shimmery… Possibly!

Do I want all my eyeshadows turned a bit shimmery by using it?  Probably not…

Do I want a lovely champagne cream eyeshadow practically guaranteed not to budge in the summer? Yes please!

Would I purchase?  I dunno!  Stop asking me hard questions!!  What say you?

Urban Decay Primer Potion in Sin is due out next month, priced at £11.50.

I just got mine, well… Leila’s.

Remember, SHD1 for free delivery and PE5P will give you10% off (yeah, I found that one AFTER I ordered)

…I’m cultivating it gently… I don’t want to go all out and mega haul, I’m dipping my toe 1 product at a time.  eBay, QVC, my mother’s makeup collection… nowhere is safe.

Oh hai Laura Geller!

I’m loving your baked goodness!  I’m the happy owner of the above 3 Laura Geller eye products.

L-R: Pink Icing/Devil’s Food Duo, Bewitching Bronze, Eye Rimz Fire Water.

Out of the three, the pink icing duo is my favourite… it’s the most beautiful combo for a neutral eye.

Bewitching Bronze is lovely too but I’m slightly disappointed with the Eye Rimz, as it’s mostly glitter that doesn’t stick too well either as a shadow or a liner.  It’s a gorgeous colour though.

All Laura Geller baked shadows can be used wet or dry, so they’re pretty darn versatile.

Laura Geller are a brand I don’t hear too much about.  The fact that it’s stocked exclusively by QVC in the UK may have something to do with it, rendering it fairly inaccessible.  I’m looking forward to continuing my exploration into the brand.

Are you a Laura Geller fan?  Anything I *must* try?

I’ve received clarification from Urban Decay’s PR representative in the UK.

You’ll be pleased to know…

Debenhams.com will be restocking the Alice in Wonderland on their website. They’re hoping to have this done within the next 2 days, but can’t give an exact time frame.  Advice is to simply keep checking.

The palette will then hit Oxford Street Debenhams on the 28th of February.

On the 1st March, the palette will roll out to Debenhams stores nationwide.  Check to see if your local has a UD counter because if you pop down to your local counter, you’ll also have a (no purchase necessary) chance to win a pair of tickets to see Alice in Wonderland at the cinema.

Please refer to this post for further shopping details.

I hope that eases the confusion x

….As of 12.30am on the 21st Feb, the Alice in Wonderland Palette is out of stock on Debenhams.com.  That’s about 12hrs after it was first released right?

How do I know this?  ‘Cos I’ve been umm-ing and ahh-ing all bloody day trying to decide whether or not to purchase the one I’ve had sitting in my basket since lunchtime to keep as a little makeup heirloom for Leila.

At 12.30am, I decided to go for it!

BUGGER!

Hurry up and come back Alice!  Will it be there when I wake up in the morning?

I guess it didn’t want to be late, for a very important date! *groan*

Click the image for more info!

Enter code SHD1 upon checkout for free UK delivery.  P6MP will give you 5% off your order too, bringing the total to £26.60 delivered.

Huge thanks to Yuen-Ting for the heads up and Lady Gray for the 5% code – good going ladies! xx

I was recently sent two products from Sleek Makeup‘s range, focusing on a couple of shades that are suited to this year’s Spring trend.

On the left we have the Dip It in Pastel Green and on the right, an Eye Dust in Livid Lilac.

I’m a beauty addict with eclectic tastes and try not to discriminate based on price or accessibility of products.  So, I approach this review with a fully open mind.  Even when I held the Dip It pot in my fingers, twirling it…. marvelling at how incredibly cheap Sleek had managed to make it look.

The eye dust packaging doesn’t fare much better.  I mean, they’re both obviously plastic, but they’re SO lightweight I’m surprised that they’re not defying the rules of gravity.

Having said that, I ultimately only really care about how it looks if I’m gonna be seen in public with it (shallow soul that I am), how about the actual contents?

How ABOUT those contents…

Well, there they are.  In all their ‘spilled across my new desk cos the sifter fell out when I tapped the bottom of the pot’ glory.  You can only imagine how much I was loving that purple Eye Dust at this point.

When I grumbled about my little dust-spilling incident on Twitter, it turned out that I wasn’t the only one who had nearly ended up with a lapful of Livid Lilac.  Something for Sleek Makeup to investigate perhaps?

Anyway, the colour is pretty… it’s more vivid in the pot than it is swatched, a good thing seeing as it’s called ‘Livid Lilac’ afterall and looks thoroughly ‘Royal Purple’ in the container.

The top swatch shows the Dip It liner in Pastel Green.  It’s an opaque mint, and really does look like a fabulous shade for Spring.  Livid Lilac is far softer once swatched (dry) and slightly metallic.  I was really impressed with the choices for this season’s shades.

Application of the Dip It was a bit tricky.  The wand and narrow tip allowed for a precise sweep across the eye lid, but as I was drawing the line, I found that the applicator dragged at the pigmentation leaving the line of colour less pigmented in the centre than at the edges.  To be fair, nothing that a second coat didn’t remedy.  The liner dried almost instantly without transferring to the hooded part of my eyelids.

I had no issues applying the Eye Dust, it blended smoothly and the colour depth was nicely buildable.

Here’s a FOTD, don’t laugh… the shades are a bit bright for me, but I enjoyed playing!

Unfortunately, that’s where the fun ended, 20 minutes later, I looked in the mirror and saw that the eyeliner had begun to flake…

Bits of Dip It kept getting caught in my eyelashes, so I ended up using an eyeshadow brush to work back and forward until I’d dislodged all the flakes.  I wasn’t left with much.

Fast forward to bed-time and my cleansing routine.  I cleansed with my ever faithful cleansing oil and a blob of Cetaphil to finish, towelled my face dry and then shrieked at the mirror when I saw a matching pair of pink-dyed eyelids looking back at me.  I would have photographed them for the comedy value, but it was kinda late and I’m kinda lazy so you’ll just have to use your imagination instead.

On the plus side, it showed that my sense of symmetry has improved.  Those dyed patches were perfect.

Overall, I was disappointed at the quality of the 2 products I was sent by Sleek Makeup which is a shame, because in the past I’ve been mostly impressed (how ’bout them 12 pan palettes eh?).

Sleek Makeup products are available from selected Superdrug stores, the Eye Dusts and Dip Its both retail for £2.99 each.

I’m about to lock away my foundation brushes, stippling brushes and buffing brushes.

I’m doing a full-on swap for these:

The infamous Beauty Blender!

I bought 2 of these a while back and have used them a couple of times when I’ve been away from home and not wanted to carry too much makeup with me.  They’ve performed well, but as soon as I’ve gotten home they’ve been washed and popped back in the drawer whilst my full attention returned to my brushes.

I was going to review them as is.  I’ve used them 5/6 times… washed them, gotten a feel of how they work best for me and I really, really like them.  But if I like them SO much, why are they not in constant use now?

Over the next week, I’ll be limiting myself solely to these and asking myself the simple question: Why would I recommend you buy these when a brush works so well?

I don’t know the answer yet, I just know I’m pleased I bought them.  Anyone have any specific questions about the Beauty Blender that I can help answer whilst trialling?

Can I also draw your attention back to the questions for a Benefit MUA post?  I’m compiling an email for her this weekend, so it’s your last chance!

So, I downloaded the Cosmetifique app for the iPhone about a month ago and am back to share my thoughts on it.

Firstly, it looks and feels kinda clunky.  It takes a large amount of effort to manually enter all the ingredients from a product ingredient list into the app and out of the 7 different products I tried, Cosmetifique’s database was missing at least 2 ingredients from each product, so after all that effort, I didn’t feel like I was getting the full picture anyway.

I was actually expecting to be able to simply enter the name and brand of the cosmetic item and watch as the app downloaded all the relevant INCI (International Nomenclature of Cosmetic Ingredients) info from it’s own database.  I didn’t realise I had to manually enter each ingredient into the app myself.  What a palaver!

The app is designed to be used whilst shopping, so that you can input ingredients into the program and in a matter of seconds discover the quality of the INCI rating.  This sounds promising, but the app uses a hugely simplified traffic light system to rate the quality of the ingredients where RED = BAD, GREEN = GOOD and YELLOW & AMBER = somewhere inbetween the two.

This over simplification doesn’t appeal to me, I want to know *why* Limonene is a YELLOW, even just a small paragraph would do.  I also compared the results from Cosmetifique to Cosmetics Database and got conflicting results on some ingredients, which confused me further.

Let me give you a working example using my Revlon Colorstay Foundation:

There you go. Any wiser? No, me neither. Apparently my foundation is a bit bad and it’s a bit good… even Cosmetifique describe it as:

Quality of Ingredients: So so… be careful.

So So? That’s useful, thanks.  What am I being careful of? Skin Irritation? Tentative links to cancer? Not blending my jawline adequately?

I just don’t really ‘get’ anything from this app and the sketchy knowledge it provides me, it doesn’t give me enough information to make any informed choices and the lmited information that it does display on my screen is often incomplete anyway. What’s the point.

I give Cosmetifique a big fat

I picked this little set up at IMATS (I gave up on the collective haul post – they’ll be coming at you one by one I’m afraid!) from Guru Makeup Emporium who were offering a very decent discount!

5 mini versions of the very popular Aqua Eyes Pencils housed in a litle collector’s tin.

Colours included are: Matte Black (0L), Pearly Brown (2L), Blue with Green Highlights (12L), Shimmering Plum (4L) and Champagne (23L).

The pencils are heavily pigmented and apply smoothly on the waterline.  The champagne will make a lovely eye-brightener, and the blue is simply to die for.  They don’t budge from my lashline and sick to the waterline for a good few hours.

These are my first ‘pencil purchase’ since I went through my stash binning everything that wasn’t GOSH. I won’t be binning these 😉

Do you wear coloured pencils?

I paid £10 for the set.  MUFE Aqua Eyes Pencils retail in the UK for around £11.95 each.

Whilst up in London for IMATS, I had lots of trouble dragging myself away from Inglot in Westfield.  I was in there searching through the lipsticks for AGES!  Such a variety, but despite this… nothing was really catching my eye.  And then I spotted a small group of maybe 12 lipsticks off to one side, and immediately, 2 shades popped out at me.

I asked the SA to tell me about these taller, thinner lipsticks that bear more than a passing resemblance to the MAC Slimshines.  The SA explained that these were their new Slim Gel Lipsticks which have a lighter, more moisturising feel to them whilst still retaining a good colour payoff.

Sold to the lady with the mega dry lips!

I purchased #61 (left) which I would describe as a mauve pink… it’s a medium toned pinky nude on my skin, proper nude… not concealer nude.  I also purchased #41 which is a brighter, more vivid shade bordering on the coral *eek!*

I love both of them, they are moisturising… they’re also a teeny bit sticky, which does wonders for their longevity.  One application of these happily lasts me through to lunch time.  They have a glossy, shiny finish and I love the hardwearing metal packaging that houses all of Inglot’s lipsticks.

I do have one concern though… they don’t seem that steady in the tube.  If you do buy one of these, make sure you don’t wind the product up too high when applying.  I really think that unless you take considerable care, these would be prone to snapping.

Left: #61, Right: #41

I’ve also noticed that I seem to be going through the tubes at a rate of knots!  You only get 1.8g of product per tube, compared to 2.3g in a MAC Slimshine or 3g in a standard MAC Lipstick.  I threw away the receipt but I think I paid around £9 each for these.  So quite expensive gram for gram I think.

I shall forgive Inglot this time , these are beautifully easy to wear lipsticks and I’m very pleased I made the purchase.

… I realised I hadn’t shown you the lovely Underland from the Urban Decay Alice in Wonderland Palette.  It’s a beautiful shade although I do wish it were a bit more pigmented… it’s not that it’s NOT pigmented… ‘cos it is.  It’s just not as heavily pigmented as say Alice or Oraculum.  It’s more along the lines of Absolem/Homegrown, that pretty green that was in the BOSII, remember?  Alice swatches are here if you want reminding.

Face:
~ Maybelline Dream Satin Liquid – so quick to apply and blend with a lovely finish, but staying power is kinda sucky if you’re at all oily.
~ Illamasqua Blush in Rumour
~ NARS Orgasm Illuminator on the cheekbones

Eyes:
~ Urban Decay Primer Potion
~ Drink Me. Eat Me across the entire lid
~ Underland applied lightly from the inner 1/3  gaining strength towards the outer corner.  Also swept under the lower lashline.
~ Jabberwocky lightly applied along the lashes to line.
~ Rimmel Glam’Eyes Lash Flirt Mascara

Lips:
~ MAC Speed Dial Cremesheen Lipstick
~ NYX Round Lip Gloss in Whipped to tone down the lippie a touch.

Hope you can’t see my rotten nose crusties *blows nose*… I moisturised and picked at ’em like a demon before attempting a FOTD…. TMI?