A Makeup & Beauty Blog – Lipglossiping

So, Tsunimee and I were bitching on twitter that we didn’t really like metallic finishes to our polishes, and of course… that same day one of THE MOST BEAUTIFUL metallic nail polishes EVER showed up in my little ASOS haul.

It has that Quality Street wrapper quality doesn’t it?

Of course I had to apply it immediately…

I love it. And this photo… does not do it justice.  In real life, it looks like someone has foiled my nails with this glorious jeweled ruby red.  It’s perfect.  It looks like there are brush strokes in the image… which is hugely unfair, because I’m squinting at my fingertips now and I just can’t see any.

You pop off the clunky square ‘lid’ with a sharp tug and it reveals an altogether easier to manipulate round handle for application purposes.  Unfortunately, the brush is a STUPID thin thing, like in my Orly polishes… but other than meaning it needed about 5 strokes to cover the nail bed, it didn’t cause me any issues.

Application was *nearly* spot on.  Opaque in the first coat, I needed to go back in for a second just to tidy it up…. however, I did experience a couple of bubbles on 2 nails, which sucked especially as I know I wasn’t applying it too thickly.  Still, it’s so beautiful I don’t really care.  Plus, when the polish had dried (very quickly I might add) I could barely see these two bubbles… but I needed to mention it as bubbling isn’t something I usually experience with polishes.  Longevity is amazing for a metallic, I’m on my 3rd day (with no top coat) and it looks as good as new.

This was my first Butter London and I’m smitten.  They’re not cheap at around £10 each, but I want more…

What are your Butter London favs?

…for easy glitter nail polish removal.

No more endless wiping and scraping to get the glitter polish off your nails.  No more sighing and soaking of fingers in pure acetone till your cuticles shrivel up and you develop hang nails that reach your elbows.

At least, that’s what 2 of my lovely readers promised.  Meganne, and Lisa – to give credit where it’s due.

so it goes something like this…

1). Take your cotton wool and dampen it with nail polish remover.  I like to make it quite soggy… I don’t wanna have to be doing this more than once ‘cos I haven’t got enough remover on the pad yano?

2). Hold the soaked cotton wool to your nails and wrap a bit of foil over the top…

It’s at this point you’re wondering if you’re actually the butt of a big fat joke.

Wait 5 minutes, no less… and then remove.

I can happily report – it works! As ridiculous as you may look with your tin foil tips, it saves a hell of a lot of effort and irritation.

Try it!  If nothing else, at least the aliens won’t get to your fingers.

This is another from Mavala’s recently released Mystic Collection that I was sent last month.

Mavala Black Velvet is a dark purple-black with a very subtle shimmer which unfortunately is more apparent in the bottle than on the nail.

There is a great swatch of it over at HeijastusPinta

I’m in two minds about this collection.  So far, I like how they look individually… but now my nails are getting a bit longer, I think they’re a touch vampy for me.  If you have short, well-groomed nails, this would be a great collection for you.

I have two more to show you and I’m gonna hurry them the hell up, because Spring is nearly upon us… and if you give a fig about staying on trend, you might not want to see them ’till next Winter!

You can buy Black Velvet online at Mistrys Pharmacy – £3.95 a bottle.

A few of you eagle-eyed ladies spotted the manicure I was sporting in my NARS post!  *Looks at Kim, Danielle, Rae and Dee*

It’s the bomb! The Glitterbomb!  I originally had an Orly taupe shade on my nails that was looking a little tired… so I played at “How much glitter can I put on my nails in one go”.

The Miners Extreme Nail Colour is now discontinued I’m afraid, but it’s surely easily dupable?  I paid 99p for it a few months ago from their website. I think they may be sold at Claire’s (or at least they used to be).

I applied 2 coats of the Miners over my gnarly taupe polish and then finished off with a “top coat” of Inglot’s flakes.  A cheaper and more accessible version of the flakes would be GOSH Rainbow. (I can’t find it in my local Superdrug).

Ta-da!

I don’t even bother with cotton pads for removal of these glitter-fests.  I just fill the lid of my nail polish remover with the solution and dip for about 3/4 mins per nail.  That dissolves enough polish for one firm swipe of a cotton pad to do the job.

Have you been indulging your inner 4yr old lately?  Is glitter even remotely on-trend?  Do we even care?

Whilst in London last week, I had the opportunity to check out the NARS Spring 2010 Collection and hear a little more about it’s inception and application on the runways at New York Fashion Week last year.

It’s the first time I’ve ever analysed a collection like this… and honestly, I feel a little “hell, what do I know about ‘collections’ and ‘runways’ and excuse me while I kick off my Mum’s stilletos and get back in my sandbox”.

If I shrug off those insecurities, I’m left realising that I was handing over my debit card at the NARS counter in Liberty less than 20 minutes after being given this bag of samples… and really, what other qualifications does one need?

Let’s start with the actual collection.  Swatches, thoughts and all.

I have to say, I’m not a huge fan of the Catherine Deneuve-inspired promo shot for the collection…

…it just doesn’t ‘speak’ to me.  Infact, before being invited to sample the collection, I’d dismissed it based on this promo.  With that in mind, things didn’t get off to a good start.

First up are two new lipglosses. Ophelia (£17) (Strawberry Nectar) and Easy Lover (£17) (Sheer Hot Pink).

In the tube, Easy Lover is WOW!  It’s a true hot pink that makes you want to grab at it and play (and I did!).  On the lips, I’m disappointed.  It is so sheer, and whilst sheer lipglosses have many uses, I just feel cheated after seeing how it looks in the tube.  Worn alone, it adds no pigment at all to my lips.

Ophelia is more pleasing, I’m loving this over the top of a nude lipstick.  Again, it’s fairly sheer… but as it promises less in the tube, it doesn’t disappoint me in the same way Easy Lover does.

Swatches of both…

Next up is the single lipstick in the collection: Cruising (£17)

When I first saw Cruising in the tube, I can’t say I was too excited by it.  Infact, I don’t think it particularly registered until I got home and attempted a FOTD with the collection.  You know, I own over 48 lipsticks… and this has jumped straight into my top five.

Nude lipsticks are difficult to get right.  Choosing the correct one for your skintone is an unenviable task, so I’m not gonna start shouting that everyone needs to own this lipstick.  I really want to tell you to go and TRY it though.  It is *so* completely unassuming in the tube, I would have passed this by time and time again.

On my dry lips, It’s truly moisturising, glideing on with ease but crucially it stays on.  It gives my lips enough colour so as not to look dead but keeps the focus on the rest of my face whilst giving an overall polished finish to my makeup.  And that to me is what a true nude lipstick should do.  I love this, perhaps too much.

Bains Douches Glitter Pencil (£18.50), the eyeliner in the collection named after the legendary Parisien nightclub is a vivid matte blue infused with silver glitter.  Thankfully, the glitter particles are not particularly chunky and don’t irritate my eyes.  I’m not sensitive to eye irritation though, so you may want to give this a miss if you think it could cause problems for you.  Not only that, but I do have to point out… My God it’s expensive!

I adore the colour, but my first thoughts were that it sits oddly with the rest of the collection.  Until I tried it on the lower lashline with the Kuala Lumpur Eyeshadow Duo on my lids.  POP!  I’m very pleased to add this to my collection… it will see me right through ’till Winter and the sparkle is subtle enough to wear during the day.  I’ve surprised myself liking this so much and I’ll attempt an EOTD with this soon.  It applies beautifully, without need for ‘warming up’ and the glitter gives a lovely wide-awake look when applied along my lower lashline.

Camargue (£23) is a cream eyeshadow duo described as a Golden Moss/Sienna pairing.  It’s a slightly muddy looking combination, but I think it would be amazing on warm medium skintones.

As with all NARS Cream Shadows that I’ve tried, this really needs setting with powder if your lids are at all oily or you’ll be picking it out of your crease in a matter of minutes.  The NARS MUA I was talking to in Liberty recommended the golden half of the Alhambra Duo (which I bought) over the top of the Sienna half of Camargue.  He was right – it’s a beautiful pairing.

Camargue swatches, they look particularly warm against my cool skin tone:

Kuala Lumpur Eyeshadow Duo (£23) is one of the more talked about pieces in the collection:

It’s a beautifully pigmented combination of Rose Gold / Boysenberry.  Yeah, I’m not really sure what a Boysenberry is either… Google Images was my friend.

In the pan, I thought it would be a touch too warm for me, but it works.

The only thing I’d be wary of is that the right hand side of the duo contains enough red to give you that “I’ve been crying for 7hrs” look.  If you usually struggle with these shades, I’d steer clear.  Thankfully, I look neither suicidal nor ill wearing this duo and the right hand side is amazing applied wet as a liner.

Finally…

Purple Rain (£13).  I’ve been hugely excited about this polish ever since I saw nail swatches on Scrangie’s blog.  I tried, but failed miserably at capturing how it truly looks in the bottle… the polish is practically dancing in there.  I can’t wait to do a NOTD with it.

The final item in the collection is D. Gorgeous (£16), a dusty lilac single eyeshadow.  Here’s a stock image:

D. Gorgeous (love the name!) is a matte shadow which got a lot of love at New York Fashion Week, especially applied under the lower lashline.  Uneducated pleb that I am, I keep looking at the images thinking… “Tsk, that makes her look like SO tired”.  I didn’t have this in my goody bag so can’t offer an alternative (more educated) view!

So, that’s my run-down of what NARS has to offer us this Spring.

The single thing that strikes me is that I’m favouring the pieces that on first look, didn’t draw me in.  The slightly brown-looking lipstick, a bright blue eyeliner and an “I’ve been sobbing” eyeshadow duo… whoulda thunk it.  Not me.

If you’re not sure the NARS Spring 2010 collection is for you, go have a play.  It’s left me pleasantly surprised.

I’ll leave you with a FOTD:

Eyes:

~ NARS Kuala Lumpur Eyeshadow Duo on the lidand blended underneath the lashline.
~ NARS Camargue Cream Duo blended up above the crease (washed out in this image sadly)

Cheeks:

~ NARS Crazed Blush
~ NARS Orgasm Illuminator (applied over blush, bridge of nose, cupids bow) – review coming later today!

Lips:

~ NARS Cruising Lipstick
~ NARS Ophelia Lip Gloss

All items from this collection are available at NARS counters nationwide and online.

What say you? Is anything from the NARS Spring 2010 Collection capturing your attention?

Spring is coming, can you feel it?  The evenings are just starting to get the teeniest bit lighter and I for one, am pretty darn excited about it.

Beauty-wise though… Spring, for me, is the dullest season collection-wise.  I don’t really ‘dig’ pastels… they wash me out.  I have to wait nearly a whole year for my favourite to come round again – A/W FTW!

My Spring blues were lifted somewhat though when I saw this post on Cosmetic Candy.

To put it simply, Barielle’s Spring 2010 Wildflower Collection looks hawt.

Comprised of 6 shades, it’s screams: “Hey, I’m doing Spring… but I’m doing it my way!”

The stand-out shades for me are A Bouquet For Eva, June Bug and Daring Dahlia.

Myrza’s Meadow captures my imagination, but I can’t imagine it looking good on my skintone.

Here’s how Barielle describe them:

A Bouquet for Eva – A cool Caribbean blue
June Bug – A teal with fuchsia glitter
Blossom – An opaque peach
Daring Dahlia – A deep fuchsia with a hint of silver metallic
Snap Dragon – A metallic sea foam green
Myrza’s Meadow – A light lime green with silver glitter

Barielle Shade’s polishes are available to buy from the Barielle UK Website and are priced at £8.00ea.  No sign of the Spring Wildflower Collection yet though… Hurry up Barielle, it’ll be Summer soon!

Any of them on your radar?

I received a press release a few days ago alerting me to a store called ToxicFreeBoutique.

To be honest, I didn’t pay much attention to the email.  As soon as I saw the name of the store I was all “yeah, yeah… organic… dull… where did I put the biscuits…”

It was only a few days later at about 2 in the morning, when any normal person would be tucked up in their bed that I remembered the email and opened it up to have a look at what ToxicFreeBoutique was all about.

As it happens, it’s far more interesting than I initially gave it credit for.

They have bath tea bags! Tea Bags! For your bath!  I love it, it’s quirky and cute and I want one.  I love all things ginger (except cats), therefore “phew” has my name written all over it.

The website is kinda sucky (sorry, but it is) but I was well and truly snared when I read the following…

Mezaya water-based nail colours are an innovative concept to traditional polish. If you are used to traditional polishes you will immediately notice some differences.  Mezaya polishes do not have the potent smell usually associated with nail polish.

Wait.. what? Non-stinky polishes? Admittedly, I’m not hugely knowledgeable about nail polishes… I love ’em in a very shallow un-learned way.  But this is news to me!  Not only that, but the day Mr L. doesn’t nag me about the smell painting my nails creates, is the day the world will fall of it’s axis.  This sounds like it would give my ears a welcome rest from his “GOD, that stinks!” declarations.

Of course, I’m sure there are other “health” type benefits from toxic-free nail polish… but meh, whatever… just stop the nagging already.

My 3 favourites from the collection: L-R: Pink Tea, Navy Angel, Big Kisses

They also have some transluscents… but they just annoy me.  If I wanna see my nails, I just won’t wear polish.

I also have to give the company props for the images… it’s nice to see “swatches” of shades next to the product information.  How many times have we been disappointed when a colour has applied NOTHING like how it looks in the bottle?  Too many, that’s how many.

Also… for the love of God.  Tell us!  Is it a cream? is it a sheer? metallic?  There’s honestly not many things that annoy me more than getting home a gorgeous opaque (in the bottle) shade only for it to take about 12 coats to achieve opacity on the nail.  So thank you for including the finishes in the description Mezaya. Kudos.

Something had to go and spoil it though didn’t it… I looked at the price.  £12.95 for a 10ml (not even your standard 15ml) bottle of toxic free polish.  And then they want £3 to post it to you.  £16… for a 10ml bottle.  That’s 26 of your US Dollars… for a bottle of nail polish.  That doesn’t even smell of nail polish 😉

They’re a bit too rich for me, even if they would work better than earplugs.

Back in the days of stumpgate, the wonderful Sirvinya kindly offered to send me a spare pack of her Nailene false nails that she’d received for review purposes.

I was tragically distraught at the state of my tips and would have ripped the packet out of her hands given half the chance.  Living a good many miles away from her she was saved that fate and I had to sit on my nails instead, waiting (impatiently) until the postman dropped them through my letterbox.

I’m not used to false nails, I can count on one hand the number of times I’ve donned a set of these.  I remember one occasion, I’d not long met my soon-to-be husband… we were young and cavalier back then.  He lived over 300 miles away from me and we’d sneak weekends together whenever we got the chance.  My 19yr old self obviously wanted to look my best, and I invested in a set of falsies (nails not tits) from Superdrug.  I remember they were red. *roarrrr*

They kept falling off.  Before my coach had even arrived in County Durham, I’d re-stuck them on about 50 times.  The weekend was wonderful… we laughed, played Super Mario, drunk Lambrini and ate many slices of Salami pizza (you’ll be pleased to hear I’ve retained my classiness).  I was demure, elegant and altogether rather swishy.  That is until his mother told me a few years later that she’d found at least 6 of my stick-on red nails tangled in his bed sheets and thought her son had developed a “thing” for ladies of the night.

So, that was my very short lived affair with false nails… it was over as quickly as it had begun and I haven’t even considered them since.  Until now.

These sounded as if they’d be easy to apply… but judging from the instructions, I could tell that removal was gonna be a pain in the backside.

I was right on both counts!  I had no problems with application, no air bubbles, no visible glue, and boy do these buggers stick!  I couldn’t resist doing that thing before removing them… yano, the ‘lifting’ thing.. seeing how much strain I could put on them, waiting for that satisying popping sound as they broke free from my nail bed.  In hindsight, I’m freaking grateful it never came.  I mean, what the hell was I thinking?  It’s like spot-picking… you know you shouldn’t, but that doesn’t stop you.

Here they are in action:

They look… false, don’t they? Mannequin hands…  I didn’t like how they looked on me.  I have quite narrow nails, and these made my hands look pretty chunky and squat.  Sizing was the issue, I couldn’t find one narrow enough to fit my index fingers properly.  Can you tell?  In the first picture I think it’s obvious that the index fingernail is too big.  Not only that, but although it seemed to just about fit on the nail bed, I noticed that it started to hurt the cuticles about 12hrs later, so it was definitely too large.

Removal was… tedious.  Worse than tedious.  I soaked as instructed.  What I failed to realise was that my Sally Hansen Nail Polish Remover was coloured blue.  10 minutes of soaking later, I emerged from my dip bowl with blue fingers up the knuckles.  And they stayed that way for a couple of days.  I think I preferred stumpgate.

What can you take away from this review other than the fact that I’m an idiot who was once mistaken for a prostitute?

Well, the nails are fine… if you like the look of them.  They’re easy to apply, a bitch to remove and might not suit you if you have narrow nails.  Look… I could have just saved myself about 3204 words right there.

Nailene So Real False Nails are available… actually, I’m not sure where they’re available in the UK… Boots? Superdrug? If you’ve seen ’em let me know so I can update!

A lovely greyed-out lavender.  It’s one of them dirty colours… I love me a bit of grunge.

This is my first Orly polish and I’m torn.  I found the formula easy to work with… a little thin, but I don’t mind thin polishes as long as they dry quickly and evenly, which this did.  The above shows 4 coats… 1 more than I would have preferred… but it’s ok.

However, I dislike the brush intensly.  It’s super thin and bendy.  Maybe I’ve been spoiled by the OPI Wide Brush that covers a nail in 3 clean strokes… this took about 6/7.  I think I can live with it, but only because of the thin formula.  Painting thicker polish with a brush that weedy would be a nightmare.  Are most Orly polishes fairly thin?

Longevity has been fine… medium amount if tip wear, but no chips.

What do you think of the shade? Are you a fan of grungey colours?

It is love.

I was hugely excited to find OPI – Absolutely Alice in my latest parcel of goodies, although I can’t pretend I’d forgotten I’d ordered it… I have been pacing like an expectant father ever since handing over my Visa deets!

Absolutely Alice is amazing, a true blue and the sparkles? Oh my… the sparkles are breathtaking.  I couldn’t stop twirling the bottle in the light, watching the glitter dance and flash blue and silver.  Fantastic.

Photographed in daylight..

Photographed in artificial light.

Photography doesn’t really capture the sparkle that emanates from this polish, but the hue is true to life and you can see how great the coverage is from 3 coats.  The glitter is suspended in a sheer jelly base, so I’m pleasantly surprised at the opacity I was able to achieve.

Dear god, I’m not looking forward to removal.

Do you like it? I’m trying to stop myself from buying OPI – Mad as a Hatter, but  I know I’m gonna cave when I see you UK girls start swatching it…

Screw it, I’ve just ordered it.  Man I’m a good enabler!

EDIT: Rhamnousia reminded me, I forgot to say… This definitely needs a couple of coats of top coat to make it bearable to touch!  Gritty glitter!

EDIT EDIT(!): You can purchase this online in the UK from Lena White

EDIT EDIT EDIT(!!): How many edits can I get on a post?

Ok… shouldn’t really add this but before you think I’ve gone completely mad.  Let me explain something about focus.

You focus to achieve optimum sharpness within an image.  That is a given right?  If your focal plane is off, you will achieve blurriness, but a pleasant side effect of blurriness is a little something called ‘bokeh’.  Bokeh is the technical term for the out of focus areas in a photograph and a very pleasing aspect of Bokeh are the discs of light that appear at the source of any highlights in an image…. it could be true light sources or reflections that cause this kind of bokeh.

Are you with me?

See the discs?  Every reflect from the sparkle on my nails are causing those… so you can see that from tip to base it’s sparkle-rama *admires nails*

But yanowot?  I don’t feel like a child in this polish.  And we all know that I suffer ‘hand-hiding’ syndrome if I feel at all silly in a polish.  But this shade and sparkle makes me feel amazing.  High praise indeed, but I realised it was true this afternoon, before this edit.  I simply couldn’t shop showing off my fingers when I was in the supermarket.  I was rocking it!

I was pissed at the snow and the miserable post-Christmas aura surrounding January.

In a two fingered salute, I daubed the most obnoxious summery colour I could find on my tips.  I said tips.

HJ Manicure in Blonde.

I was worried I’d look like I smoked 60-a-day or at the very least had a kinky penchant for bananas, but thankfully this shade just misses looking horrendous.  It’s not the most suitable shade for my skintone, but remember… I’m being aesthetically antagonistic in my shade selection.  And as a bonus, it makes the inlaws wonder what their son ever saw in me.

I even received a few compliments wearing this.  To be fair, one was from the checkout girl in Wilkinsons who didn’t look a day over 11 and a half and the other was from the lady who served me a sausage roll in Greggs, but let’s be honest, a compliment is a compliment.

Again, I’m loving HJ Manicure’s formula.  Yellows are the problem children of the nail polish world and one of the reasons I chose this shade was to put the brand to the test on their formula.  It coped admirably.  My only complaint was with opacity.  This was 4 coats, and you could still faintly make out the tips… If it’d had been fully opaque in 4 coats, I would have been satisified.  As it is, it’s a slight issue for me.  Thankfully, each coat was a smooth quick-drier.

Most yellows appear to be cremes, this is a shimmer… it has a slight sparkle to it that would make it such a great choice for the summer.  Longevity is fabulous, no chipping and minimal tip wear despite not adding a top coat.

Are you a fan of the brights?

HJ Manicure shades can be bought online from their website in 5ml (£3.50) and 15ml (£8.50) sizes with free P&P on every order.

…On All Lacquered Up’s fantabulous blog.

I submitted my favourite “mannequin hands” polish and got featured – whoop!  Only other sad bastards will know how exciting this is, so if you don’t ‘get it’ – it’s ok, you’re officially cool.

If you do… I’m sorry, there must be a support group out there for us somewhere right?