Christmas Party - 1920s Inspired Makeup

December is always a month full of parties and events which is great because it often gives you an excuse to dress up or sparkle in your best outfits! A few weeks ago we had my office Christmas party and this year it was 1920’s themed. It wasn’t meant to be a very strict theme but it encouraged everyone to make an effort to look old school glamorous! Most people straight away started planning ‘what to wear’ but as a typical beauty blogger my main focus was on how I wanted my makeup to look for this party. After googling for 1920’s beauty inspiration I came across this image (link) of Charlize Theron which I absolutely loved so I decided to go for a very dark berry lip with a nude/rustic look for my eyes.

This is my finished look of the night:

Products used: 

MAC studio finish concealer NC20 

Clinique stay matte foundation – Shade 9, Neutral (link) 

MAC bronzer in Golden 

The Body Shop – cheek colour in Sweet Nutmeg, an oldie but a goodie! (link) 

MAC Mineralize blush in Warm Soul (as seen here) applied as highlight on cheekbones 

MAC Pigment in Vanilla applied to tear duct & brow bone 

Urban Decay NAKED palette – eye shadow Virgin (all over lid)

Urban Decay NAKED palette – eye shadow Naked (blended into crease area) 

MAC Mineralize Eye Shadow (Duo) - Play on Plums (as seen here)

Applied the plum/burgundy shade along my lower lash line. I really love this limited edition eyeshadow duo and am gutted it is running on empty; can anyone recommend a good dupe for the plum/burgundy shade? 

L’Oreal Super Liner in Black – my current favourite liquid liner pen! (link)

NARS NARS Larger Than Life Volumizing Mascara

Clinique Bottom Lash Mascara (as seen here)

On my lips I'm wearing Berry Vamp by LookBeauty from their Loud Lips range. The packaging of this lipstick is a bit cheap but the colour is really stunning and the fomula is smooth, highly pigmented and long lasting. Not bad for only £7 (link) I have changed from being more of a sheer lip gloss girl to quite loving a darker lip – what do you think of this lip shade?

Jewellery wise I kept it simple and wore these vintage clip-on earrings that used to belong to my grandmother! My hair was done by the lovely Jess from Powder Puff & Pin Curls, who specializes in vintage hair-do's! She came to our office and did the hair of about ten ladies to get us all looking in style for the 1920's party. I will post some more photos of the party in another post :)

Dress wise; I couldn't seem to make up my mind and with December being so busy, I just hadn't had time to find the perfect outfit! Until last minute that was,  because the night before the party I saw this dress in Zara and it was love at first sight! I didn't own a long black evening dress yet so I felt it was a much needed addition to my wardrobe ;) The dress is part of the new collection by ZARA as seen here in their Woman Lookbook Twelve. I adore this recent collection by Zara, it is so classic and elegant.

 ZARA Combined Lace Dress - £69.99 (link)

The dress falls beautifully and the fabric is very soft and pretty. I love how the added touch of the lace in the back makes it that little bit sexier whilst remaining classy. For me, it was the perfect Christmas party dress and I really liked my slightly different to usual look! What do you think of my 1920s inspired look?

ESSIE - Mamba NOTD

Mamba by Essie is one of the nail polishes I picked up when I was in New York but have to say I am still a bit undecided about this shade. Part of their 2011 Spring collection, Essie describes Mamba as a “shimmering café au lait” but I personally think it is more of a warm peachy nude colour with a brown undertone. The polish has a very slight shimmer and the formula is creamy and goes opaque in two coats.

Mamba is a great natural polish that is suitable for every season and appropriate with work or casual wear. However as the shade is quite peachy and a bit similar to my skin-colour I actually think Mamba would look best on people with either really fair or darker skin tones. Overall I’d say it is a good every day nude polish but at the moment OPI’s Tickle my France-y remains my holy grail nude nail polish!

What do you think – do you like the look of Mamba?

LOOK Beauty - Nail Pop in City NOTD

Did you know that UK LOOK magazine has their very own high street make-up range called LOOK Beauty; which is designed, tested and worn by the beauty brains from the magazine? Their collection contains lots of great products for your eyes, face, lips and nails and prices start from only £4 for say an eyeshadow and go up to £18 for a Glow, Bronze and Sculpt Kit. Plus a donation a donation will be given to their cancer charity, Look Good, Feel Beter, for every LOOK Beauty product sold.

The people at LOOK Beauty send me one of their Nail Pop shades recently, which I was more than happy to put to the test! Nail Pop promises hard-wearing, colour perfect nails in 30 trendy shades. I was sent the shade City...



City is a dark taupe grey shade. The formula is smooth, pretty fast drying and easy to apply. I found it was opaque and had a lovely shiny finish after just two coats. Overall I was pretty impressed and I love this shade for winter!

Nail Pop polishes are priced at £5 and you can buy them on the LOOK Beauty website or at Superdrug.

 

Have you tried anything from the LOOK Beauty collection?

 

MUA Blush Perfection - Cream Blush Giveaway!

Back in September MUA Makeup Academy launched four new cream blushes to their MUA professional range. I have to admit that I am probably more of a powder blush kind of girl most of the time, but then again I do love the Topshop creme blushers (Neon Rose being one of my favourites).

Drugstore cosmetics brand MUA proves that makeup doesn't always need to cost the earth and I find they offer a good variety of fun products of surprising quality at a such low cost. The new blush perfection cream blushers come in four shades; Dolly, Blossom, Yummy and Bittersweet and are priced at only £2 each!

The packaging is not the prettiest, but then again for that price what do you expect?

This is the shade Dolly which looks quite dark in the pan but once applied to the cheeks it actually gives you more of a light coral dewy glow. The formula is very creamy and easy to blend, dab it on with your fingers or I like to use a small stippling brush to apply my cream blushers for streak-free application.

The MUA cream blushers can be directly applied to bare skin, layered over liquid foundation or set them with the matching matte blushers from their range (£1!) for an even longer lasting effect.

These blushers are good for everyday wear and for that price they make a nice guilt free and fun addition to any makeup bag. Available at your local Superdrug store and on the MUA website.
Or be in to win now because I am giving away two MUA cream blushers to one of my followers!

Follow the instructions below (via Rafflecopter) to win a set of MUA cream blushers in the shades Dolly and Bittersweet! Entries close Friday November 16 and is open internationally...GOOD LUCK :) x



a Rafflecopter giveaway

Totally Fort Worth It?

When I was in America I picked up a new OPI nail polish that's described as “A shimmery lavender grey that’s so worthy of you.” Its Totally Fort Worth It is from their 2011 Texas collection.

In the bottle the polish looks like a grey with quite a strong pink shimmer through it but unfortunately when on your nails the shimmer hardly shows. This polish has quite a sheer formula meaning that it takes minimum 3-4 coats to get opaque cover. This is after 3 coats...

I found this nail polish a little underwhelming because I just was hoping for a grey with bit more oomph because of the pink shimmer but it turned out to be more a sheer shimmery silver.
So I thought what can I do to make my nails a bit more exciting? I know, add a Essie LuxEffects topcoat! Shine of the Times is a gorgeous multichromatic flaky glitter topcoat which shifts to every color except purple, but the most dominant colors are red/orange and green. There's a heavy amount of flake in here and it provides very good coverage with only one coat.

Tadaaa much better. What do you think?
It's even more gorgeous in real life but the shine was hard to capture on camera.

I think Shine of the Times is a must-have top coat. It looks fabulously pretty on top light polishes or fun and edgy over darker shades. Have you tried any of these two polishes or can you recommend a great Shine of the Times combo? Xoxo

MUA Bronzed Perfection - Holiday FOTD #

Back in August MUA released a new bronzer to their cosmetics collection. Say hello this this monster of a bronzer.....yep this baby is ginormous!! The MUA bronzer is designed to give you an all over healthy-kissed glow by sweeping the product over your face and body. I decided to take this bronzer on holiday with me to put it to the test; could this really provide me with 'bronzed perfection'?

In the tin you the bronzer shows a small amount of shimmer but not to worry this barely transfers to the skin, leaving you with a soft and matte finish. The pigmentation is great but do be aware that the bronzer tends to get quite powdery so don't go crazy with your brush, you only need to sweep across the bronzer lightly to eliminate too much fall out and to pick up the right amount of product.

The shade of the bronzer is a light to medium so I think this would suit fair skin tones for a lightly bronzed look or it can be build up to enhance a deeper tan. Apply the bronzer to the areas of your face where the sun would naturally hit; building the colour gradually to get the exact shade you want. The bronzer can be used all over the face, neckline, arms or shoulders as a bronzer or contour.

I have to say I loved using this on holiday. A quick sweep of the bronzer all over my cheeks, forehead and nose would give me a lovely soft healthy glow. Here a recent holiday FOTD with the MUA Bronzed Perfection Bronzer...

This bronzer contains a whopping 15g of product and guess what, it only costs £3! Now that's what I call a MEGA bargain :) The bronzer is available now from your local Superdrug or at the MUA Online store.

Do you think you will try this bronzer for that warm, healthy complexion all-year-round?

Bourjois Paris Flowers - Summer Trend look+

Back in June Bourjois launched their 2012 summer collection inspired by the beauty of tropical flowers from Latin America with a palette of bright blue teamed with spicy orange.

They created the above look using the following new products from the collection:

Bourjois round pot eyeshadow in no.16, a spicy orange

Bourjois round pot eyeshadow in no.02, a vivid blue (blue canard)

Bourjois 3D effet lipgloss in no.53 Corail artistic (one of my favourite glosses this summer!)

Bourjos Volume Glamour Max Waterproof mascara

I liked this colourful summery look, so I decided to recreate it myself :)

I applied the burned orange eyeshadow (16) all over the lid and into the socket line. Then I dampened the eyeshadow applicator and applied the bright blue shade (02) close to the top lash line for that fun splash of colour!

Other products used in his FOTD:

Clinique stay matte foundation in #9

Vichy dermablend ultra-corrective stick (review here)

UNE BB cream bronzer (review here)

NARS blush in the shade Orgasm

 

What do you think about Bourjois new summer collection? Is this look something you'd ever wear?

 

The full Bourjois Paris Flowers collection is available now at Boots & Superdrug stores nationwide and online.

Healthy Sun with UNE BB Cream Bronzer

We all want a bronzer that is going to give us a natural looking healthy holiday glow and recently I have been loving UNE's BB Cream bronzer to give me just that!

In June UNE released a new addition to their cosmetics foundations range in the form of a BB cream bronzer. Their Healthy-Sun BB cream bronzer is the first compact 'BB' bronzer on the market. For more information about BB creams and their benefits, you can read an older post about that here. 

The BB cream bronzer comes in a re-fillable compact and like other UNE products it has 100% natural ingredients and the packaging is made with recyclable materials. I also love that the front of the compact (after removing the top sticker) is a mirror!

The BB cream bronzer is available in 2 shades: Golden (S05) and Coppery (S07)

The BB cream bronzer has a unique cream-to-powder formula that is blend able, water-resistant and provides you with a long lasting, natural tan that is actually good for your skin!

Some of the ingredients that make this happen:
Organic Shea butter to nourish and hydrate the skin.
Organic beeswax which lends softness and glide to the formula.
Jojoba seed oil to protect the skin and to help it maintain its natural moisturisation.

The BB bronzer swatched (quite heavily) on my hand.

The BB cream is creamy yet non-oily and it just feels incredibly light and comfortable on my skin. It has such a soft texture which means you can easily apply it with your fingers; in warm touches on the cheeks, forehead, bridge of the nose and chin, for that 'after-a-stroll-on-the-beach-healthy glow"

However for an even more fully tanned look I love sweeping the BB cream bronzer all over my face and neck with my favourite Ecotools Kabuki brush (link)!

Other products used for this FOTD:

VICHY Dermablend Ultra-Corrective Stick (review here)

Estee Lauder Invisible Fluid Foundation (review here)

Topshop Neon Rose cream blush (link)

Estee Lauder Bronzed Dunes Eye Palette (review here)

Bourjois 3D Effet Lipgloss in Corail artistic (53) 

The UNE BB Cream Bronzer is available now at your local Boots or Superdrug for £14.49. What are you loving to give you that perfect summer bronzed glow at the moment?

VICHY Dermablend Ultra-Corrective Stick

One of the items that was in my June GlossyBox was a small starter kit for the VICHY Dermablend Ultra-Corrective Foundation Cream stick.  The handy little kit contained 6 sample shades so you could find out what shade would provide you with perfect coverage.

The VICHY Dermablend stick is marketed as a ‘corrective foundation’ to provide the most complete, natural looking coverage for face and body imperfections. It contains 40% pigment concentration which makes it ideal for camouflage of skin concerns such as dark circles, acne marks, scarring, bruising, redness and dark spots. It promises to be long lasting (up to eight hours) and it is fragrance-free, waterproof and smudge resistant.

I think this would be a great foundation for someone with problem skin or if you prefer quite heavy coverage to block out any redness or pigmentation on your face. However for my complexion it seemed a little too heavy and creamy to apply all over my face so I decided to start using it as a concealer instead. And boy am I glad I did, this immediately became my favourite concealer! After trying a few of the shades I found that Nude (14) and Light (13) were most suited for me as a concealer to cover under eyes dark circles, spots and pigmentation; which I (unfortunately) get a lot more of during summer time.

So once my sample kit started running low I decided to buy the full VICHY Dermablend Ultra-Corrective Foundation Cream stick in Nude. It retails for £19 which is a bit more expensive than my usual MAC Studio Finish concealer (£14.50) but the Vichy stick is 12grams in comparison to 7grams for the MAC one so it will last me a lot longer!

It retails for £19 which is a bit more expensive than my usual MAC Studio Finish concealer (£14.50) but the Vichy stick is 12grams in comparison to 7grams for the MAC one so it will last me a lot longer!

Swatched and below blended out on my hand...

I normally just glide the stick under my eye and dab it in gently with my finger (you should never rub too much on the delicate skin area under your eyes) plus I apply it to any other small spots I might have and around the side of my nostrils. I am really happy I found this product so this does show the benefit of beauty box subscriptions like GlossyBox because otherwise I probably would never have tried the VICHY Dermablend Ultra-Corrective Stick.

VICHY products are available online here or you can find it at your local Boots store or Boots.com.
If you want to try the sample kit first to play with the product and to find your perfect shade you can actually buy the little starter kit for £4.99 online, which I think is super handy! (link).

Have you ever tried any other VICHY products that you'd recommend?