Lash Squee!

Check these bad boys out!

All shadows are lovely lovely Inglot!

These are bloody enormous! These were kindly sent to me by KKCentreHK which has *all* of the lashes. All of them. Peacock lashes, anyone? I have a list that’s three miles long from there… hopefully before Hallowe’en I’ll have some more cash so I can get hold of some more of the crazier styles! After I wrote my post on how to wear enormous lashes, I realised I’d never tried actual feather ones so I was very pleased to be able to get my hands on some. They’re not as pliable as normal lashes, so they took a long time to apply and they’re still not perfect... they keep lifting on the inner corners but I'm too scared to trim these ones down! But whatever… an excuse for blue brows, no? I'll get around to doing a better look with these once I've got the hang of them.

*flutter flutter* Have you ever worn feather falsies?

Silk Naturals Lip Products: Review and Swatches

Recently the ladies at Silk Naturals contacted me and asked if I’d like to try some of their products. Having been looking at some of Phyrra’s swatches that same day, I said yes and a week later, a parcel of lipstick dropped on my doormat. Hurrah!

Ohhhh, am I ashamed of myself. I managed to stain Roxie by putting in the pocket of my new black jeans, which them got soaked… and I put the bottom one in a tiny weeny pocket… with my key. Silly me. Everything else has held up to my abuse very well though!

Silk Naturals carry lipsticks, balms, tinted balms, stains and plumper-style balms. I’ve got five of their formulas to take a butchers at, so let’s dive right in.

Lip Stain in Roxie and Doll

                                                      

                                                                        Silk Naturals ‘Doll’ on the left, Benefit Benetint on the right.

Roxie is a deep brown (gorgeous! I really like browns on me and this isn’t too early 90’s Friends extra brown) and Doll is a lovely fuchsia-pink. At first I thought it was similar to Benetint, but as you can see Benetint is more rosy and has a much more watery consistency. This kicks Benetints ass as it actually stains and gives me a colour on my lips which the Benetint does not.

After dinner, a glass of juice and (not going to lie) a bit of a snog, Roxie held up pretty well. It was a bit of a lipstick ‘ring’ situation. Without eating these seem to last indefinitely but my lips feel dry toward the end of the day. Pretty pleased with these all in all and would recommend them, although I would also tell you to exfoliate your lips before applying, which as you may be able to tell I did not. I also need to try patting them on with my finger as I’m not sure that the hard edges the doe foot gives you quite work with the look of a stain. That's down to my application though, I'm sure.

Organic Lipstick in Bombshell

Gorgeous, huh? Pretty much in love with this one. It’s a very glossy formula, blue-leaning enough to be nice and vampy and very pigmented. I’d perhaps recommend a liner with this one if you’re a bit fussy with your red lips, as it’s not very long lasting. I’d certainly check out more of these.

Vegans take note, this is vegan!

Amplifying Lip Glaze in Pretty Please

I always worry that plumping products will be super-stingy, but this one is just tingly and has a pleasant peppermint smell. Some peppermint in lip products can be synthetic smelling but this is quite nice.

I love the colour of this – more often than not I wear peach blushes, so this is a perfect everyday colour for me. Very interested in Glacier, though, which is a sheer teal, and Fanfare and Blaze. Mmmmm, orange. Really enjoying everything I received from SN,  but this is my favourite of the bunch by far. I just love it.

Kisser Slicker Flavoured Lip Gloss in Nectar

Kisser Slickers are their most moisturising glossy formula. There’s over 45 shades of these so… lots of choice there! This is supposedly a dupe for Clinque Black Honey…. *crickets*. As I’ve noted, I like a shade with a hint of brown to it –this is a nice browny-red neutral – I wore with just mascara and liner on a lazy day and still felt nice and polished. Has a light, sweet coconut smell and taste.

Buttercream Lip Glaze in Hibiscus


Sadly I suspect this is not as edible as actual buttercream (which I find extremely edible). These are billed as ‘creamy, long lasting color plus a bit of shine.’ It’s hard to compare this to the Kisser Slicker as I only have one of each, but I’d say this is a little less pigmented than the Kisser Slickers? I find them fairly similar on the lips, but this one doesn’t have a taste.

This is a glossy, sheer hot pink. I’m finding it quite moisturizing as well – it’s a lovely tinted balm.

A few notes on the website, as Silk Naturals is new to me. There is a LOT of information there. Each lip product is rated on its formula, colour family, tone, finish, shimmer scale, depth of colour, opacity, and whether it’s gluten or dye-free. There’s also a related product tab so you can see what other products they have that will go with that lip product. I don’t think that that would necessarily work for a company that does a lot of more out-there colours, but I really think it works on this site and it’s a nice touch. With my package, I got a pamphlet with all their products ingredients (which is good as they’re not on the packaging) and instructions regarding mixing their mineral foundations.

In in all, lovely colours, nice packaging and formulas, and good, easy to navigate website with lots of info.  Most of the lip products are just under $5, and while I’d like personally some more out-there lip colours – an purple  in the Organic range would be cool! - I don’t really have anything negative to say about what I received at all, and I’d certainly purchase from Silk Naturals.

Do you wear Silk Naturals? Any recommendations?

Disney Collaboration with Fierce Nerditude: Kevin from Up

Vijaya gave me Kevin from Up to do as my character this week and I’m so happy because I love her! (Yep, Kevin is a she!) I gave Vijaya the Cheshire Cat to do from Alice in Wonderland this week, so go check that out too

Eyes: Inglot yellow and teal, teal eyelid, silver browbone and both crease colours from Wet and Wild Blue Had Me At Hello Palette, Fyrinnae Bite Me and Electro Koi, pink from Sleek Circus, Barry M Opal Fine Glitter Dust, and probably also some other stuff….
Lips: Silk Naturals Butter Cream Lip thingy in Hibiscus
Cheeks: Inglot AMC Cream Blush 83

Man, this was challenging! I don’t know why I felt the need to do a cut crease because they never look good on me, being that I have enough more than enough crease to go around and that my eyes are very asymmetrical. And I used ALL the colours. But… if you don’t look too closely, I kind of like it! And I have something to practice now as well!

Sleek Circus Palette Tutorial

I promised Rachael from The Beauty Spot  I’d do a Circus palette tutorial for her, and I’m not a liar so here it is! If you don’t have the Circus palette, you could do something similar with the Acid palette instead and substitute the purple on the lashline for black. You could also do something really similar with the Sugarpill Burning Heart palette if you have that as well.





This look is really simple with fairly minimal blending.  I actually only used two brushes, a flat shadow brush and a slightly fluffy pencil brush! Letsch get schtarted….


First, I primed my eyes with my normal primer (I use Urban Decay Primer Potion) to prevent creasing and then I applied a cream shadow (NYX Jumbo Eye Pencil in Milk) very lightly all over the lid, inner corner and lower lashline. Use this sparingly, as if you use too much it can crease.



Then I took the purpley-pink from the top right hand corner of the palette (Pretty, innit?) and packed it on with a flat shader brush on the outer two thirds of the lid.


Wiping the flat shader brush clean (I flicked off any pigment and then wiped it on a tissue), I then applied the yellow onto the inner corner of the eyes. You’ll need to go over this a couple of times to build up the colour depth – yellow can be a bit of a bugger sometimes.


I swept the yellow colour lightly inwards, with the shader bush, to blend it with the pink and then drew in toward my crease with a pencil brush with the yellow, stopping about halfway.

Using the same brush I then applied the orange to the outer half of my crease, blending the harsh line between the orange and yellow above where I blended the pink and yellow. Make sure you bring the orange around the outside of the eye and stop around where your waterlines meet.

Clean off your pencil brush again and apply the deep, metallic purple from the palette to your lower lashline. It might take a few times to build up the depth with this shade and you will get some fallout so be careful – if you’ve already applied your foundation pop a bit of powder under the eye and you can sweep it all away again afterwards. Then line your upper lashline with the purple. I went in on the top with my flat shader brush as it’s thinner, but that's just my preference.




Line your waterline in black pencil and set it with the black from the palette. Add a little black to the corners of your lashlines if you want to – if you are just using two brushes, make sure you only use one for the black as it’s hard to get off your brushes quickly and you’ll need a clean one for the next step.




I forgot to take a separate photo for these two stages, but take the white on the fluffier of your brushes and just go over the edges of the orange and yellow slightly so they don’t look so harsh. Add a little more white under the browbone, bung your eyebrows and a truckload of mascara on and you’re done!

I finished the look with a light peach cream blusher on the cheeks and lips, but you can go as bright as you want! If you want to keep it all Sleek, Pinkini Pout Paint would look awesome!

Let me know if you guys try it out!

Same meat, different gravy

Ever do a look and then accidentally do almost exactly the same thing the next day? Well… I wasn’t intending these looks to be *this* similar, although I had intended to do two easy neutral Fyrinnae eyes. Oh well, two neutral eyes, peach cheeks and pink lipped looks for you it is!

Eyes: Lid, Fyrinnae Moon Child. Crease and lower lashline, Fyrinnae Fire Opal.

Cheeks: Evil Shades blush in Ravishing, BeautyUk Baked Blusher in Peaches Cream

Lips: Morgana Cryptoria Vegan Lipstick in Valentine

Eyes: Lid, Fyrinnae Nijiro. Crease and lower lashline, Fyrinnae STFU.

Cheeks: Darling Girl Fantasia
Lips: CoverGirl Siren.

DERP THEY LOOK THE SAME. Must be more imaginative next week!

Inglot Seminar with James Vincent

I was lucky enough to be invited to a seminar with makeup artist James Vincent at Inglot in Westfield London today. As I work in Westfield it was pretty easy for me to say yes. It was my first ever ‘event,’ so I was a bit nervous and didn’t know what to expect.

James has literally worked with everyone…. Lady Gaga, Pink, TLC, Joan Jett, Blondie, Reese Witherspoon, Rose McGowan, The Black Eyed Peas, Marilyn Manson, Pamela Anderson and even Barack Obama! James also helped launched MAC in a lot of the States and Urban Decay as well.

So after a glass of wine and a play with all the lovely Inglot products, he sat a  - rather lovely – model down for us and showed us a few simple tricks which were actually all really, really helpful!

-We got talked through how to fill in brows using pencil, powder and gel liner to draw in individual hairs. He also talked us through the importance of not getting stuck in your ways with your brows (as an MUA) as they change a lot with fashion. And he also bemoaned the ‘angry MAC brow.’ Ha ha!



-He talked us through using matte shadows and told us buying a good palette of matte shadows is a great purchase as you can contour with them too. I just bought a mostly matte neutral Inglot palette so I felt pretty smug at that point.

-He showed us where and how to use illuminating concealers, as well as where to not! He also talked about using powder on the face – he applies it with a very small fluffy brush, if he has to at all, as he says powder doesn’t look natural. James powders women more than men, as it looks very un-natural indeed on a man! He spoke a lot about men's makeup which was cool.

-He showed us how to properly prep lips – including colour correction – and how to properly apply gloss over the lip to emphasise it. Just in the middle of the inner lips, as all gloss can actually look quite flat – if it’s all reflecting light, there’s no focal point. Makes sense, right?

-He then used the same bright pink lip colour on the apples of the cheeks and blended it out with a peach blush, and talked us through basic facial contouring.

-He then talked about highlighting with a contrasting colour on the lips – so for example, if you do a blue-based red lip, you can used an orange based red in the centre to give it a bit more oomph! Cool, huh?

I could literally write an essay on everything he spoke about, but I learned some fabulous tricks and he also gave us a really great pep talk - as there were a lot of MUAs who are just starting and trying to break into the business - which was wonderful.

I’m definitely going to be using some of his tricks so I’ll explain them all if I use them in upcoming FOTDs but here are a few:

-Milk of Magnesia is great to stop sweating. Never powder over sweat – prevent it and use a foundation that won’t budge in water so people can sweat through it

-If your model has pigmented lips, a green colour corrector can work wonders. I never would have thought to colour correct the lips!

-Always work in the same direction on the eyes – either toward the nose on both eyes, or away from the nose on both eyes, and make sure you always place your brush down in the same spot on both eye so colour is deposited evenly.

Seem like obvious tricks but there are just some things I’d never thought of.

I had a wicked night, I learnt a lot and I got my pro Inglot card! Hurrah!

Men in Makeup

If you don’t want to look at men with a lot of slap on, then I wouldn’t read this post. If, like me, there is nothing you like better than plotting how you are going to marry said men, then read on. I won’t lie to you, this is like porn to me.

Davey Havok:


The prominent-chinned, devilishly fabulous lead singer of AFI. Aside from being a massively, astonishingly talented singer, he looks fab. IN GLITTER EYESHADOW. Yeah.

Ville Valo:



Lead singer of HIM, he doesn’t wear as much slap as he used to, but if you want to see a guy in hot coral lipgloss, go and watch the Join Me In Death video.

David Bowie:




Need I say anything more? Dude’s been wearing slap since the dawn of time. Legend.

Eddie Izzard:



Beautiful, funny, outrageously intelligent, and looks fabulous in makeup without looking comedy drag. I like his brand of transvestism very much.

Brian Molko:



My favourite androgynous boy! Red lipstick on men FTW.

Nicky Wire:



The Manic Street Preachers are my favourite band, and their glam-rock, leopard print and lipstick phase was beautiful. The Wire still rocks the glitter and rhinestones some 20 years later. Respect.

Special mentions: Boy George, Antony Hegarty, Marc Bolan, Robert Smith, Gerard Way and Adam Ant. Oh, and Joey:



Who is your favourite man in makeup?

Playing with Water Decals

I've seen water decals on a lot of nail blogs and You Tube channels and always thought they were adorable. They remind me of the stick on tattoos that you'd get in sweet packets (and, er, lick to stick on your arm. Just me? Liars.)

This set was sent to me for review by Born Pretty, which has 10 bajillion nail art things on it. It costs just over $4, but there are also tons of designs on eBay, including full nail designs, starting from about £1 so they're pretty inexpensive. I've just bought these corset ones and am lusting over all the French tip ones. Not so much the JLS ones though!

These are super easy to use - at least in theory. You put cut them out, take them off the plastic backing, soak them in water for around 30 seconds, slide them onto your finger and then place them onto your nail. I followed Leanne's tutorial here. Where I had trouble was placing them neatly onto my nail. I started using tweezers to place them after the first two times, which is fiddly and you can rip the decals, but in my opinion, its better than wonky nail art. I might try putting them onto the rubber Konad stamps next time as well.

Edit: ndrcvrngl tells me that coating your tweezers with wax helps to stop them tearing the decals.

Pros:

-Cheap
-Tons of designs
-Wear as long as your top coat does
- They sit flat on your nail

Cons:

-A wee bit fiddly

-Some of the decals I recieved are enormous - not a massive con to me, but if you have tiny hands it is!

-Can't really wear them over dark polish as it will show through the decal.

Have you tried water decals? What nail art have you been sporting lately?

Disney Collaboration with Fierce Nerditude: Jane from Tarzan.

I love Disney's version of Tarzan. I will even say, without a trace of irony (or shame) that the Phil Collins soundtrack is awesome. Plus I love Jane's dress sense. I would totally wear a tie and gloves to the jungle.

Eyes: Lid, Inglot AMC 60. Inner lid and to blend lid colour, Darling Girl Mojo Jojo. Lower lashline, Inglot AMC 379. Inner lower lashline, Hi Fi Between the Stars. Liner, Inglot matte gel liners in 84.
Lips: Boots 17 Twilight Tease
Cheeks: Evil Shades Pouty and Darling Girl Yes Virginia.
Fiance says: 'You look like you've been punched in the cheek' and 'the yellow is really yellow.' I love him :D

I'm not going to say too much about this look (because Blogger already ate this post once) other than HOORAY, I love yellow, and BOO, I should have put some falsies on.

Vijaya got give Pascal from Tangled today which I cannot wait to see so go and check it out!