A Makeup & Beauty Blog – Lipglossiping

The U.S. have always been big on their Christmas ad extravaganzas but historically, in the UK… the only way we could tell that it was Christmas in ad-land was when we heard the opening words…  “It’s a magical place, we’re on our way there…” Extra points if you can guess the ad.

Today, things have changed and some of my favourite ads of recent years have been the Christmas specials from companies including John Lewis, M&S, Sainsburys (maybe not Iceland though eh?)

Some of the cutest in recent years have come from Boots and this year’s is no exception.  I was treated to a sneak preview on Tuesday night and it gave me that teeny little thrill down the back of the neck that reminds you CHRISTMAS IS COMING!!

You can experience the same thrill TONIGHT when The Girls go undercover in an attempt to put Christmas on the map in a big way.  The brand new Boots Christmas 2011 ad will be debuting at 8.15pm with a sixty second slot on ITV and Channel 4 during Emmerdale and Beeny’s Restoration Nightmares.  My Dad fancies Beeny.  Sorry, not relevant.

Anyway, my lips have been sealed shut and I’m not allowed to reveal more about the ad but it is a Christmas cutie… don’t tell anyone I’ve shown you the still, I may have to kill you.  Or The Girls may have to kill me, either way, it wouldn’t be very Christmas-sy.

In the spirit of all things horribly commercial (geddit?), what are your favourite Christmas Ads?

Love the name of this cheeky little number!  Butter London’s Frilly Knickers is a definite contender for a super-cool Christmas polish.  It’s a low maintenance sparkler with more bling than your Christmas lights.

Please excuse my yellow nails (yuk).  Over bare nails, it doesn’t look that incredible, although it’s still a pretty touch for those that prefer a sheer sparkle.  However…

Layer a single coat over a black or dark base and you’re cooking on turbo-powered gas!  A multi-hued, multi-faceted gem of a polish that magically saves shitty manicures with a single stroke.

I heart my Frilly Knickers.

Butter London Frilly Knickers is priced at £11.95 and available online from Powder Rooms.

Last month saw the launch of a new highlighter from Benefit, a brand that have enjoyed great success in the past with their highlighting products that mimic how light and shadow play across the face.

Unlike liquid products like the brand’s previous highlighting options: Highbeam and Moonbeam, Watt’s Up! is a twist-up cream highlighting stick in the style of a NARS Multiple.

Packaged to be reminiscent of a light bulb, it’s cute, kitsch and all the things you’d expect from a brand like Benefit.  One end houses the product… the other, a sponge designed for blending.  Something, which in my opinion is a bit of a waste of time.

I find that the sponge does more to rub the product off than it does to blend it.  You’ll be fine just using your fingertips to get a smooth application though I do appreciate it’s existence as it could well come in handy in my makeup bag put to some other use!

On initial application, the product gives quite a warm champagne glow with a lot of reflection but once blended, it softens to a more natural, neutral hue that will flatter most skintones.  The cream has a lovely amount of slip and glides over my skin which ensures that it’s foundation friendly and blends seamlessly with whatever base I’ve already applied.

Once applied, it sets quite quickly to a powder finish and didn’t slide around on my normal/dry skin or slip during the day, oilier skins may struggle with this depending on how you usually fare with cream-to-powder formulas.

Once blended (the above photo shows unblended), I find the overall effect fairly subtle compared to some of the more pearlescent products that I’ve used in the past and I would happily wear this during both the day and for going out.

At £24.50, I think it’s quite pricey for what it is but I can’t actually find too much fault with the product – I would just like to see it about £6 cheaper.

Benefit Watt’s Up! is available to buy online or on counter from Benefit Cosmetics.

We celebrated All Hallows Eve a few days early this year and in our house, it went a little something like this…

Happy Halloween beauty lovers!!  Have a wonderful evening!! xxx

Question of the Week: – What’s your number one requirement for a good mascara?

Answer: An inky black formula.  I’m blessed with half decent lashes but they’re pretty fair.

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Prime Beauty – cozies up with a mug of hot cocoa, a warm blanket and spends a Lost Weekend with BECCA, grab a mug and get lost in this collection too!

Phyrra – reveals the latest multi-tasking wonder, the Korres Quercetin & Oak Antiaging Eye Primer.

Vampy Varnish – shows you the cool new Special Effects from Nails Inc.and thinks you are going to love them!

we heart this – it’s a treat, not a trick: enter to win five BPAL Halloween oils!

Beauty Junkies Unite – Pick out your favorite winter nail colors with these swatches from the Muppets polish collection from OPI!

Clumps of Mascara – has found the most beautiful emerald green nail polish ever! Aaaand, it’s less than $3.

EauMG – reviews a “dirty rose” perfume by L’Artisan Parfumeur that is perfect for this time of the year.

Gouldylox Reviews – PhytoKeratine Serum from Phyto really works. It makes your hair soft, shiny, healthy-feeling. What else do you need?

Nouveau Cheap – Why does Revlon Starry Pink make me feel like a sophisticated princess? Click here to find out.

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What’s YOUR number one requirement for an awesome mascara?

It’s been a while huh?  I’m thinking that the temperature has dropped enough now to kick-start the red lip series again…

I’m easing myself back into the season slowly though with this little number from makeup uber-God Kevyn Aucoin.

Kevyn Aucoin’s The Expert Lip Tint in Dantique is a proper grown-up red that oozes sophistication and I’m completely smitten with it.  The shade reminds me a little of my Burberry Lip Cover in Claret but while the Burberry is slightly more pink-berry toned, this one leans to a rosey/red-brown.  It’s a totally work-appropriate red if you live in fear of wearing your lips a little too loudly.

Genuinely moisturising on my lips and wears down evenly to a pretty stain, I can see myself hitting stump on this shade.

There are currently some Kevyn Aucoin lipsticks for sale on eBay at a very good price, I’m sure they’re old stock but I’ve bought a couple with no problems, otherwise – you can buy online priced at £20 each from MiseBeauty.com

You can’t polish a turd but you can roll it in glitter…

Ta-da!!

Well, it’s not exactly subtle is it?  A warm brown base colour with a whole heap of chunky holo glitter embedded like sparkly shrapnel.  It needs a top coat to get rid of the grittiness and three overall coats to achieve full opacity.

I like it, but not as much as I thought I was going to.  Apologies for the no natural daylight photo – colour is accurate but the holo is obviously looking a little underwhelming.  You need proper sun for that kind of bling and we’re just not getting any at the moment.

What do you think?

China Glaze Mahoganie is priced at £7.99 and available online from RadiantBabe-Beauty.

Following on from last week’s FrontCover set, this week’s Star Gift of the Week at Boots is a Ted Baker Make It Big Vanity Case, picture below:

Until Thursday, 3rd November – the set will be priced at only £19 (regularly £40) and includes:

Butterfly Wings Body Wash (250ml)
Butterfly Wings Body Lotion (200ml)
Butterfly Wings Body Spray (150ml)
Butterfly Wings Body Scrub (300ml)
Origami Bath Foam (250ml)
Origami Body Souffle (300ml)
Origami Body Spray (150ml)

For a closer look at the actual case… you can watch the short video below:

Ted Baker Make It Big Vanity Case is available online and instore at Boots priced at £19.00, though be aware that the GotW’s usually sell out online fairly rapidly.

My first article for Carmine went live this week!  In it, take the opportunity to talk about some of the makeup crimes most of us have perpetrated at some point or other.

To take a read, click the image below…

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What were your biggest makeup faux pas when you were growing up?

Just a quick PSA to let you know that Blistex are giving away 1000 of their new Lip Brilliance daily care lip balms.  If your lips are starting to feel the effects of the colder weather, you could do worse things than popping on over to the Blistex Facebook page this lunchtime.

You also stand the chance of winning some Topshop vouchers but…. meh.  Am I the only one who has never bought anything other than makeup from Topshop?  Don’t say yes…

I’m excited to share this with you… because over the past few months, I’ve been hiding a pot of gold.  A little lab sample of Lady Lamb’s latest launch (try saying that drunk).

Lanolips Golden Ointment is a deeply rich, nourishing balm for ultra-dry skin.  The kind of skin that tears at your clothes and makes your tights feel like sandpaper against your shins… the skin we dread each Winter.  If you’re in need of deep moisturisation and instant relief, this could be what you’ve been looking for – provided in the form of some of the most natural, pure and most-overlooked ingredients in the world.

Smelling like warm, buttered-honey, Golden Ointment has a creamy consistency to match.  The ointment is enriched with Ultra Pure Medical Grade Lanolin, Manuka Honey & Vitamin E, and contains no artificial colours or fragrance (of course).

Simplicity always was the recipe for success.

Lanolips Golden Ointment will launch mid-November EXCLUSIVELY at Victoria Health (waiting list available), priced at £17.99 before rolling out across Boots stores nationwide from February.

Rituals Sunglow Cheek & Eye Glow in Peach is a multi-tasking palette filled with some truly lovely warm-toned shades that work well even on my cool skin tone.

The palette (which contains a generous 9g of product) is currently on sale on the Rituals website and reminds me of a more affordable version of something like Laura Mercier’s Shimmer Bloc or Bobbi Brown’s Shimmer Brick.

A total of five colours that harmonise well together to create some different eye-variations or if swirled gently with a large, fluffy brush will impart a warm glow to the cheeks.

My preferred way of using this is as an eye palette, it’s one of those no-nonsense palettes that does the hard work for you.  The shade placements are pretty obvious and the mineral formula means that these shades blend together effortlessly.

The high shimmer finish means that this won’t be to everyone’s tastes and when I use this on my cheeks, I use just the tiniest touch over the top of my blusher and edging my cheekbone rather than the apple of my cheek.  In other words, I use this more as a highlighter than a blusher.

I’ve got some swatches below and I’ll make this the feature of my next FOTD – it is quite Autumnal after all no?

A comparison with my other peachy shimmer palettes (Prescriptives The Illuminator, Rituals Sunglow Peach, Bobbi Brown Shimmer Block in Nectar)…

Of the three, the Rituals is the most genuinely multi-functional but also the softest-textured, meaning that it imparts a lot of product onto the brush and creates a little dust when working with it.  The Bobbi Brown is hard-textured and doesn’t work anywhere near as well as eyeshadow but is my preferred option for blush.  The Prescriptives?  Well, seeing as you can’t get it anymore… there’s not much point me going on about it!

Rituals Sunglow* also comes in a range of pinks and a bronze-toned version.  Currently on the Rituals website priced at £17.90

* press sample