Month: March 2014

The Lipstick Tag

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I got tagged to do The Lipstick Tag by Elaine a few weeks ago! I don’t do tags or fill up awards usually (I keep forgetting), but they’re fun from time to time, I think. 🙂 1. How many lipsticks do you own? Not counting glosses, multi-purpose products, lip pencils, lip crayons, etc… somewhere around the 60++ mark. 2. What was the first lipstick you owned? I think the first one I picked out for myself was Maybelline’s Chestnut. The first high-end lipstick I ever owned was a Chanel Rouge Coco in Perlé. 3. What is your favorite lipstick brand? My favorite is Chanel, but I stopped buying from them when I went cruelty-free. Now, it’s Le Métier de Beauté and NARS. 4. What is your most worn lipstick? Probably a NARS Pure Matte Lipstick in Montego Bay. 5. What is your favorite finish? I like sheer/jelly finishes (like the NARS Sheer Lipsticks or the MAC Lustres) and mattes (NARS Velvet Matte Lip Pencil, MAC, Chanel Rouge Allure Velvet are my favorite finishes). 6. What …

Adventures in Contouring: Illamasqua Cream Foundation

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I could never get contouring right. I have been blessed with a really round face, so usually a contour just looks out of place. I stopped myself from buying bronzers when I reached 3 (though I only ever use one for contour attempts), but when I saw this Illamasqua Cream Foundation in a darker shade on sale for £5 from £23, I thought it was worth giving it a try. It comes in a pinched-square standard Illamasqua packaging. I actually looked for the technical term for this… and it turns out it’s just a square… in hyperbolic, non-Euclidian geometry… … so never mind. It’s just a ‘pinched square’ as far as I’m concerned. Anyway, it comes with a full-sized mirror and a sponge that I don’t use because I don’t intend to use it on my face. I got the shade 320, which is just a couple of notches darker than my original skin color. It’s actually a pretty great contour color. I like how the cream foundation stays put. Product Description: “Create a base …

5 Things Friday: Fussy Lip Products That I Just Can’t Quit

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5 Things Friday, it’s been a while. I’m trying to make this series a bit more regular, but lifestuff gets in the way sometimes, you know? Anyway, I’m a self-proclaimed lazy girl, which is probably why it’s surprising that I got into this whole beauty thing in the first place. (Check out my lazy girl face here.) However, there are some fussy beauty products that I can put up with, even with all the added effort. L-R: Le Métier de Beauté Colour Core Moisture Stain Lipstick (Miami), Stylenanda 3CE Lip Lacquer (Boom)*, Illamasqua Matte Lipstick (Immodest), Obsessive Compulsive Metallic Lip Tar (Black Metal Dahlia), Guerlain Rouge G L’Extrait (Orgueil) ONE Le Métier de Beauté Colour Core Moisture Stain Lipstick (Miami) This formula is actually one of my favorites for lipsticks, but this color! It’s so unforgiving. I’m unsure as to why I picked this up, and though I like it a lot, it needs to be “matched” to the rest of your makeup and isn’t as flexible as some of my other shades. It also …

Random Bits from Oslo Cosmetics: Eye Bond Primer Wand and Lip Slick

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I usually ease myself into indie brands by getting their powder products. I feel like it’s kind of hard to mess up loose eyeshadows or blushes. After a spectacular experience with Oslo’s blushes and eyeshadows, I thought it would be fun to venture into their other offerings, so I got a Lip Slick and their eye primer. I got the Lip Slick mini in Hibiscus. It’s a pretty peachy pink that I felt looked a lot like MAC’s Betty Bright. It’s a bit pinker than Betty Bright, but it’s still a rather pretty color, IMO.

Barry M Nail Paint in Countess and Blood Orange

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I got these awesome Barry M nail paints from my swap with Laala! I had never tried them out before, but I always see them in blogs, since I follow quite a few UK-based ones and everyone seems to love these. Laala says that these are probably her favorite nail polish formulas, after Chanel, and that sounds pretty freaking awesome to me. She got me a red shade (Blood Orange) from their Gelly line and a super freaking pretty glitter/textured shade (Countess) from a limited edition collection called Royal Glitter. Anyway, it is beautiful. It looks brown in the bottle, but on the nails it is a magic color. … Apologies for this pitiful picture, lol. The brushes on these splay out a little, which is a bit hard because my nails are exceptionally small. However, they are perfectly fine brushes. I wore both so I can test them equally, and over a base coat, this formula lasted pretty long. Only my right index finger showed any signs of wear as I was vigorously scrubbing …

& Other Stories loot and reviews from my swap with Laala

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My body is all a-tingle! Several months ago, I stumbled upon a new brand under H&M called & Other Stories, which had its own cosmetics line. That was so well-designed that I MUST HAVE THEM. Sadly, they are not available in the US, which is a country from which I can order from pretty easily, so I shoved all most of my desire for it deep down my throat and looked at the other pretties. I posted about a swap with Laala, and this is actually where it all began. In her letter, she mentioned that a lot of stuff was gone by the time she got to the counters (since it was the holiday season), but I think she got me a bunch of great stuff, actually, all of which I will attempt to give a fair review in a single post. For reasons.

Monthly Favorites: February 2014

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Just a few this time around! I was super busy (insanely) this month, so I didn’t have a lot of time for, you know, beauty experiments. I even lapsed my daily update blog schedule and haven’t been replying to comments. 😦 Bad. That is one ‘beauty resolution’ for March. Prompt comment replies! Anyway, here are the beauty things I’ve been loving last month: NARS NARSissist Eyeshadow Palette — This is made of dreams, you guys. You know, I like putting on makeup and playing, so I can’t revert to an eyeshadow duo for one reliable look for an entire month. Which is why this palette is great. Color combinations come to you almost thoughtlessly, but you still get a lot of room to play around in. I used this for most of the month, but you can read my initial thoughts here. (Also, yes, I wrote the shade names on the transparent paper cover it comes with.) Hourglass Ambient Lighting Powder Palette — I played around a lot with this last month, more than when …