Illamasqua Gleam Highlighter in Aurora

I love me a highlighter but I haven’t used a cream or liquid one for a very long time – not since Benefit discontinued their Moonbeam highlighter and I swore never to buy from them again (lies!). But everyone I know who has tried Illamasqua’s Aurora has raved about it, so I thought it was about time I gave it a go.

 

 

Standard Illamasqua packaging – beautiful! I still love the pinched shape, it's so elegant.



Aurora is a pale 'beige champagne iridescent' cream – there’s not too much pink or too much gold/yellow in it, so it should a decent variety of skintones from pale to medium. This is swatched heavily on the left and blended out on the right.



All Illamasqua products except my mascara and eyeliner – Illamasqua Neturals Palette, Skinbase in 03, Sangers lipstick and Touch lipgloss, Eyebrow Cake in Peek.

As you can see, it’s a really subtle effect on the skin – you’ll have to zoom in to see properly, but I’m just wearing the highlighter here – no blush or contour. In my opinion, a highlighter usually *should* be subtle. I love a strong look, don’t get me wrong, but most of the time, you probably don’t need a strong highlighter (or contour, but that’s another post in itself!) at all. The soft glow you get from this product is still beautiful and gives you a lovely dewy look. If you wanted, you could certainly build it up more, like in my swatch above, but it is quite an emollient feeling product so bear in mind that if you do build it up, that may affect the longevity. With a normal light application though, this lasts pretty well - better than most cream blushes I’ve tried - so I’m not afraid to wear it to work or on a busy day when I won’t have time to touch up. It feels very lightweight on the skin and the formula is very thin, but it doesn’t feel greasy or like it’s sitting on top of your foundation, ready to smudge and smoosh everywhere. It really is a fab formula!

It’s not a super cheap product at £18.00 , but the finish in my opinion is well worth the money. Definitely one to check out if you’re near an Illamasqua counter soon, and like all products, if you get the chance to test it on your face, do.

What are your favourite champagne highlighters?

 

MAC Magnetic Nudes Collection: Autoerotique and Fairly Precious

As soon as I saw the promo images for the Magnetic Nudes collection, I knew that Autoerotique was coming home with me! I love a peach toned anything, and I LOVE a MAC blush. Blushes are one of my favourite items MAC do –I’ve never had a dud from them, the range is fantastic, the finishes are fab. I also love the one other Extra Dimension Skin Finish I have (Whisper of Gilt, holla!) and I picked 'Fairly Precious' from the collection in the hope it would become a new favourite for me.

MAC Extra Dimension Blush in Autoerotique.

MAC describes this as a “dirty coral rose.” That’s pretty bang on – I had it in my head it would be a little less red and a little more peach than it is. I’ve never tried this formula of blush before and in the pan, it almost looks like a plastic blush – it looks very hard and smooth! It’s a little stiffer than some blushers but still picks up well and blends onto the face. MAC also says this is “a liquid-powder blush with prismatic reflections.” Um… okay? I guess this is referring to how the blush is made, because there's nothing liquid about it - it's a powder blush.

MAC Extra Dimension Skinfinish in Fairly Precious

 

Again, MAC describes this as ‘liquid-powder.” I really have no idea what that is supposed to mean. This highlighter is “Peach with a dimensional pearly sheen.” Like other Extra Dimension Skinfinishes, this has a buildable shimmer and can really be piled on into a strong sheen on the face. If that ain’t your thang, it work well subtly applied too.

These are swatched fairly heavily here – there’s good pigmentation without them being crazy, a good thing in a blush in my opinion! The texture of Fairly Precious is smooth with no chunky glitter or shimmer and I had no problem with getting good payoff from Autoerotique despite how hard it looks in the pan.

 

 

I’m wearing both here and I love how they look! Fairly Precious is actually pretty pigmented on it’s own on my skin colouring - I actually wear this on it's own as a blush most of the time, but I do like to buff a little bit of Autoerotique in the middle which is how I'm wearing it here. I've been wearing one or the other of these pretty much since I recieved them, which is a good sign of them becoming favourites as I don't normally go more than two or three days without reaching for Sleek Suede blush.

According to the site, Autoerotique claims six hours of wear, and Fairly Precious claims ten hours of wear. I’d give it MAC on both of those – I can put these on at around 7am and they'll both be hanging on when I got home at 7pm. So long wearing, check. Gorgeous, check. Annoyingly limited edition, check.

Did you pick up anything from this collection? What are your favourite highlighters?

Quickie Review and LOTD: e.l.f Studio blush in Gotta Glow

e.l.f recently had one of their nifty 50% office sale (I picked up some of my favourite brushes which you can see here) and I decided to throw ‘Gotta Glow’ into my basket to see what all the fuss was about. Famed for being an inexpensive dupe for NARS Albatross which I was drooling over instore with Rachael recently, I was really excited to try it out. I love golden highlighters, and the ones I had before this were either a really warm, yellow gold or more of a champagne-gold, and this one is more of a white-gold.

 

 

You can really see where the NARS comparisons come in! The compact had a decent heft to it and doesn’t feel cheap. The small mirror is a little pointless in my opinion – I wish it took up the whole lid, but then I do like that you can see the product without opening the compact.

 

 

 

I’d click to enlarge those photos and see the product close up, but as you can see, it’s actually a really lovely and subtle highlighter! I was initially worried at first that it would be too ashy or chalky on the skin it kicks up a lot of powder when you swirl your brush in the pan, but luckily that didn’t translate on my cheek. I’ll hazard a guess you don’t get that with the NARS version but I don’t have a problem with it really, especially for the price point. It also builds quite nicely into a stronger highlight if you want to double it up on the inner corner of the eye.

All in all – a lovely highlighter and a lovely bargain! I’m tempted to try some more of e.l.f’s blush range if they’re all this pretty– any recommendations?

The studio blushes cost £3.50 from eyeslipsface.co.uk

LOTD and Swatches: Etude House Minnie Touch Highlighter and Minnie in The Nails Polishes!

It’s taken me a long time to really dip my toe into the beautiful waters of Asian cosmetics – I’ve bought a few bits and bobs here and there but between the total cuteness of some Korean brands and the exciting luxury of some Japanese brands I’ve mostly tried to stay away. However, as a Disney fan, this adorable collection really caught my eye and I had to get a couple of items! From the packaging, this looks to be an official collaboration with Disney. As well as the polishes and highlighter I’ll show here, there’s also a blush, loose glitters, two lipsticks and some false lashes.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

First up is the Minnie Touch Highlighter. Isn’t this beyond adorable?

 

 

 

Face: Missha Signature Wrinkle Filler BB Cream, Illamasqua Loose Powder.
Cheeks: Etude House Minnie Touch Highlighter, Etude House Cherry Tint (pink)
Lips: Etude House Cherry Tint (pink)
Eyes: Darling Girl Spectral Shift in Ramblin’ Rose, MAC Just Before Dawn , Etude Houe Minnie Touch Highlighter

 

 

It’s SO hard to capture this in photos (and swatches where I could only capture it as white), but with all the shades swirled together, it’s a very iridescent, smooth cool pink highlighter. If you’ve tried the MUA Undress Your Skin highlighter or like the sort of shade of MAC Strobe Cream then you’ll really like this. It’s very smooth to apply with no chunky glitter or shimmer particles, and a little goes a long way although it's pretty buildable.

 

 

It’s quite a soft powder, so I don’t think that the lovely Minnie embossing on the powder is going to last very long, but the compact itself is so adorable I really don’t mind. I’m debating whether to get the blush or not as it has a different drawing on it, and the cute drawing style is what really drew me to this this product.

 

 

This powder was approximately £10 from this eBay shop, which has free shipping and they threw in some lovely samples as well.

 

 

 

I also checked out the polishes from the range – they have two gel colour polishes, and four glitters. Two of the glitters have the shape of Minnie’s bow in the polish, but the ones I chose have the shape of her (or rather Mickey’s) head as I didn’t think the bow shaped glitters were that obvious. I love the Mickey Mouse symbol so couldn’t resist! I got shades #3 Minnie White Face and the rather awfully named #6 Minnie Black Face.

 

 

 

 

 

Once again, the packaging is absolutely adorable. The sticker sealing the lids down is Mickey shapes, and they have have the Etude House logo moulded into the tops of the caps, which again have the Mickey motif on.

 

 

The polishes themselves were a bit of a pain the butt to apply – I had to fish for the face shaped pieces of glitter in both shades and the shade with the black Mickey glitter I had to place the glitter on. The one with the white faces was much better and seems to have a lot more glitter – large and small pink and white matt hex glitters with square copper glitters, small pink tinsels and some shimmer as well as the matte white Mickey face. The one with the black Mickey faces in has small and large pink and white matte hex glitters and small black matte hex glitters in. The base polish is really glossy with both of these, and while they were a pain the butt to apply, they’re just beyond cute and I don’t find the large pieces are too large to sit flush on the nail which is great!  If you want an alternative to polishes, there are also some loose glitters in the range that are shaped like Minnies and bows for around £3 each.

 

 

I got these from the same Korean eBay seller for about £3.37.

 

 

 

 

I also got a few free samples – I’m wearing the BB cream in the photo above (thankfully it was an ok match!) as well as the pink cherry tint. I love getting samples from eBay seller, especially when they’re brands I’ve never heard of, let alone tried! I've got three uses out of the BB cream and have fallen in love with it... D'Oh! I also quite like the Cherry Tints - they smell like strawberry laces! I'll have to update you all on what on earth 'the smim' is though!

 

 

Will you try any of this range? Are you a Disney freak like me?

Quickie Review and Swatches: Darling Girl Spectral Shifts

Darling Girl is a wonderful indie company with a huge range of amazing shadows and blushes – genuinely something for everyone! In my last order from them I got several of their ‘Spectral Shifts’:

“Spectral Shifts are silky, sheer, iridescent, multipurpose shades that can be used as eye shadow, face highlighters, or depending on your complexion, blush.  Don't let the colors fool you -- the shift makes them very wearable.”

I have to say that the description is spot on – these are super soft, finely milled shades with a beautiful lit-from-within look to them. Where they’re so fine, you can pack them on or use them as a soft wash, and they work really well layered other other products like eyeliners and eyeshadow.

 

L-R: Razzles, Mystique, April Showers, Ramblin’ Rose, Double Bubble.

My swatches are pretty poor compared to the ones on the site which show up the shifts beautifully, but I hope you can tell how pretty they are! Originally I wanted to get more pinky-peach colours so I could use them as highlighters but ended up falling in love with a couple of blue colours. Razzles is a really interesting periwinkle  colour with a reddish shift – I’m keen to use this in a smokey eye soon. Mystique is made up of soft cotton candy blue with a pink shift and is the most adorable colour – it layers over blues really well. April Showers looks lovely on the lid – very subtle indeed on it’s own but adds a little somethin’ somethin’ I really quite enjoy! Ramblin’ Rose is the one I would tell everyone to go buy – a dove grey colour with a reddish-pink shift, it’s an absolutely stunning eyeshadow – but Double Bubble is my absolute favourite – it’s so cheerful!

Here I’m wearing Mystique as an all-over cheek highlight for a ghostly sort of look. It’s not an everyday look by any means of course, but shows off the subtle glow you’ll get from the Spectral shifts.

This wonderful display of makeup artistry sis what happens when you do your makeup on the tube. Mascara splodges aside, I’m a bit in love with way April Showers looks on the lid. So subtle and yet so pretty! It reminds me of a softer, girlier version of one of my favourite Fyrinnae shades, Damn Paladins.

Available at darlinggirlcosmetics.com, a petit jar of these – which goes a long way! - will set you back a staggeringly measly $2.50!

Have you tried Darling Girl? What are your favourite highlighters?

Quickie Review: Soap and Glory Bright Here Bright Now

 

I picked this up on a buy two, get one free Soap and Glory offer a good while ago and it was a surprisingly good little find. I do like a bit of Soap and Glory, I must admit. Their scrubs and shower gels last for ages and are pleasingly enormous to boot!

Rather annoyingly, I believe Soap and Glory have changed a lot of their packaging, so if you’re looking for this in store, I think it’s now a white plastic tube. I actually prefer this sort of ‘metal’ tube as you can get every last bit out.

Bright Here, Bright Now is a soft golden champagne colour in a fairly thin, lotion-like formula which claims to  be ‘brightening, illuminating and radiance-boosting,’  have a ‘tightening and lifting effect’ and that it ‘minimises fine lines & wrinkles, moisturises, smoothes & energises.’

There are really mixed reviews of this product online, which as with any ‘skincare’ item is probably to be expected. The comment I’m seeing most is that it’s balling up/flaking off. It does have silicone in it, so you’re going to want to check what other products you’re using it with it, but I’ve never had that problem when using it at all and find it glides on easily and my foundations play well with it. The tightening claims though? Nah. I never buy into those claims past a temporary effect anyway, but I’ve certainly not noticed anything. However, I do find it lightly moisturising which is a bonus and I really, really like the brightening effect that it has.  I use it all over the face except the T-zone, and have even ran a little down the centre of my legs and my décolletage as well. It’s very subtle, and one of those things that someone else wouldn’t notice, but I do personally notice it and I really like it. Being so subtle on the face, it’s really hard to capture in photographs….

…See? You’d have no idea I was wearing it, but rest assured*I* did! A nice subtle illuminator is a mini confidence booster.

I’ve become really accustomed to wearing an illuminator under my foundation and this has become my go-to. I’ve been wearing it with Revlon Nearly Naked or Dr Jarts BB Cream for the last couple of months, and I’m interesting to see how it plays with Revlon Colorstay which is my winter foundation of choice.

For £12 this is a nice little product, and a nice find when many high street illuminators seem to be very pink! I really recommend this little lovely for winter, and if you keep your eye out in Boots, Soap and Glory are quite often on offer.

Quickie Review: Make Up Store High Tech Lighter in

Make Up Store have been a brand I’ve been aware of for a long time but only recently started to explore, which I really regret as they have some beautiful products! Make Up Store is a Swedish brand and they have two stores in London, one in Soho and one in Westfield London. The price point is pretty similar to MAC, so not cheap, but not high end.

The packaging for MUS products is gorgeous – this is a screw-top matte black casing with a transparent M showing your the product inside. The container is sturdy and doesn’t feel cheap.

Make Up Store says:

This creamy product can be used for many things. Either to light up and accentuate certain features of the face or be directly applied on your lips or combined with lipstick or lipgloss. You can fixate glitter with High Tech Lighter or use it as a primer to your Eyedust. You can also mix the product with your foundation for a lustrous effect.

 

The product itself is a thick cream and you only need to use a tiny amount.  This particular shade is one we probably all have something similar to in our stash – it’s a light, pearlescent pink, the finish looks quite similar to MAC Strobe Cream, but more obviously pink. For my first High Tech Lighter I wanted to get a shade I knew I would use often! this shade would be amazing mixed in with foundation for a pearly glow. I’ve not tried it yet, but the consistency makes me think that this would indeed be quite good for an eyeshadow base – the bronzes and blues in the range make me think that they’re used for this purpose a fair bit.

I’m wearing it as an inner corner highligher here (click to embiggen!). I like how it’s a different texture from the rest of my eye products.

I have it as a cheek highlight here. It blends out really subtly considering it looks almost white in the packaging and it’s a lovely glow.

Basically… I really love this product and will certainly be getting more! At £14 it’s not that cheap, but it’s not breaking the bank either as it will last you forever! I’d certainly pay a lot more for a product this nice.

Have you tried anything from the Make Up Store?

Quickie Review: Boots No 7 Vital Enlightening Highlighter and Vital Brights Cream Blusher in Blossoming Pink.

Alright. My no-buy is pretty much off the cards, but I’m still using up products. I guess it’s not really P10P if I’m still buying, but I think I did well.

Anyway, Boots No 7 recently released their Floral Brights spring collection, created by the Mary Poppins of make up, Lisa Eldridge. Now, I’m not usually a No 7 fan – I don’t think I own any of their products apart from these – but when I saw the cream blushes on display, I got sucked in. The colours really spoke my name – or yelled it while beating me over the head – so I had to go in for a closer look. The collection consists of two lippies, two cream blushes, a highlighter and an eye palette – I picked up a blush and the highlighter.

I’m not sure what I think of the packaging – it’s chunky and sturdy and feels really good quality. The design isn’t really up my street though, which is a shame, but nice not to see plain ol’ black-and-white and I guess it’s nice and spring-y.

Ahhh, don’t you want to smoosh that highlighter? Just me? Okay…

I couldn’t capture highlighter nicely blended out, but trust me, it’s beautiful. If you have a champagne highlighter shaped hole in your collection you could do a lot, lot worse. It doesn’t have chunky particles, blends out onto the cheekbones smoothly, and it’s a good size at 10g.

I meant to pick up the more coral-y colour of the two blushes, but decided I had enough corals so went for Blossoming Pink, a lovely rosy-fuchsia. Ladies, do yourself a favour – get this blush. I’ve never had a cream blusher that has such a nice cream-to-powder formula, it’s just wonderful. It still doesn’t last as long on me as powder blushes do, but there is a time and a place for cream blushes and this is a must have.

The Vital Enlightening Highlighter retails for £13 and the Vital Brights Cream Blushers go for £10. They’re currently on 3-for-2 so worth going and checking out before they’re gone!

Pokemon nails and more bargains!

Heathers Shiro Cosmetics review got me thinking that I should do some more Pokemon nails....(and watch about 10,000 of the old episodes online...) so I did!





Bulbasaur! Yay :)



And Jigglypuff! When my boyfriend saw them, he asked if I used stencils, so I guess that means they're good! I couldn't get a good picture of Jigglypuff though. Also... I hate Seche Vite. My polish is chipping in like, half a day. Not impressed.

Anyway, Primark, which is a budget clothing store in the UK has a make-up range which is blatantly ripping off Benefit - on the surface, at least.



Benefit 10 on the right, Primark 'The Happy Couple' on the left. I love Benefit 10 and its the only Benefit powder I've actually used so much I've repurchased it. The pink side is a lovely highlighter and the brown is a really nice bronzer with no orangeyness to it whatsoever, and its not too dark for a pasty-faced ginger like me. But its also about £23. So when I saw this Primark 'dupe' I picked it up because it was £2.50. Both have ten grams, just one costs ten times more than the other.



Benefit on the top, Primark on the bottom. Toootally different - and thats because they actually are. 10 is a bronzer/highlighter and The Happy Couple is a blush/bronzer. I don't use the bronzer of Happy Couple on its own because its a little too orangey, but mixed together with the blush, its great. I really like the blush on its own, too.

Happy Couple really is an excellent product. I still love 10, mostly because it lasts all day and its the only shimmery powder highlighter I have - I see no reason to buy another one (although my NYX Pearl Mania in Pearl is a pretty close dupe, but more shimmery). The Primark doesn't last as long but for the money, you'll be really surprised. Its just not a Benefit dupe - just a rip off of Benefits pop-art/retro packaging. The Primark brush is super soft, which is surprising, but it does nothing. I know some people hate, but I actually really like the Benefit box brushes - they're nice and dense and pretty soft.

And lastly, I bought some Rimmel pencils for about £1 each in my local beauty supply:



Loveable Lilac, Forest Green (omg!) and Cool Blue. I've always used Rimmel kohl pencils and while they suck a bit on the waterline, they're pretty darn good for the price.

Thats all kids! I'm off to read Bobbi Brown Makeup Manual which I got in the post today. Mmmm, I love that new book smell!

x

More Nyx-y goodness! (And my red lipstick collection!)

Hooray, hooray, hooray! I got some more NYX in the post today which I've been waiting for for a while. Lots of swatches for you today guys.

So first up are five be-a-utiful Nyx Round Lipsticks:



From left to right, Margarita, Medusa, Narcissus, Louisiana and Hebe.

And some close-up, excitedly applied (read: sloppy) swatches:



Margarita. A slighty frosty, yet warm coral. I was expecting this to be a little more orangey but we all know how hard it is to find accurate swatches of these lipsticks online. Didn't think I would like this when I opened the tube but I love it! Going to be great for summer. As usual, its super creamy and applies well.



Medusa. A gorgeous, deep aubergine, perhaps with slight brown undertones. I don't know when I will wear this, but I just wanted it! It applies slightly streakily which you can see in this swatch, but this is a problem I often experience with creamy lipsticks - which this is. I applied it better after I took this pic, so it is workable. I just wanted to show a more 'honest' swatch. A must for any goth chick and I bet it would look amazing on really dark skin tones too.



Narcissus. I'd been after this for a while but the site I buy my Nyx from is often sold out of it. And now I know why! An absolutely perfect clean, bright, bubblegum pink. In love.



Louisiana. I was expecting this to be a darker version of Narcissus. I don't really know how to describe it other than a warm pink, ha ha! Whatever. I love it.



Hebe. A totally frickin' awesome, slightly metallic, deep blue-based red. Been told to get this for ages and am soooo glad that I did!

When I got my package this morning and opened the lipsticks, I was immediately disappointed at all of them except Medusa because I thought I had dupes for all of them already. And my fears were unfounded:



The top row L-R is Margarita, Narcissus, Louisiana and Hebe. The bottom row L-R is Rimmel Soft Coral, MAC Viva Glam Gaga, MUA shade 8 and Barry M no 141 Royal Raspberry. This is an awful comparison because they all look the same, but the Rimmel is much lighter and more peachy with small glitter particles in, Gaga is a lot paler and more blue-based, the MUA is a deeper raspberry colour and the Barry M, while similar to Hebe, is slightly darker, berryish shade with a little gold shimmer in.

I also bought two single eyeshadows which I wanted for highlight colours:



Left is Frosted Flakes and right is Super Creamy. Aaaand neither of them are good highlight colours! (This pic is slightly washed out and I don't know why I thought silver would be a good highlight anyway...) Super Creamy is a beautiful light, warm gold and Frosted Flakes is a taupe-y silver. Looking forward to trying Frosted Flakes as a lid colour with Barry M Oyster Grey in the crease. These eyeshadows are really beautiful, wonderfully pigmented and not as soft as I have been led to believe. I'm going to have to try some brighter colours next time.

And finally I got the Nyx Mosaic Highlighter:





Bare skin on the top left, Mosaic powder on the bottom right. I haven't tried this on my face yet, but it looks like I'm going to love it. It is NOT matte, which many reviews I have read on this product say it is. It IS, however, low sheen, with no glitter or shimmer particles. I do like a disco ball look, but not for everyday, and especially not now the sun is supposed to be out!



A little while ago, RaeRae (if you're not following her blog, why not?) asked us all if we could ever have too many red lipsticks? Clearly the answer is no. I don't have that many but here they are:



Nyx Round Lipstick in Hebe, Barry M 141 Royal Raspberry, Maybelline Royal Red, Mac Viva Glam Cyndi...




...Nyx Round in Fire, Nyx Round in Femme (ok, ok, maybe this is a coral), Rimmel Scream...




Helena Rubenstein in Magenta (had this for years, very sheer but I love it) and Make Up Academy shade 8.

I think the only true red I have here is Maybelline Royal Red! Any suggestions for reds I should add to my collection? And I would love to see all your reds too :)

Love and kisses,

Robyn