Sleek Vintage Romance Collection

Sleek released this collection for autumn 2013 a couple of weeks ago consisting of a blush (around £4.50) and 12-shade iDivine eyeshadow palette (around £8). I really loved the look of the eyeshadows which I thought looked perfect for autumn but I wasn’t sure if I was going to pick up the blush or not. When I swatched it on the back of my hand in the shop though it was so sparkly and pretty looking I decided to pick it up as well.

The products come in brightly decorated cardboard boxes with a lovely rustic autumnal theme. They definitely say autumn but I’m not sure how well they match the theme of “Vintage Romance”. However the products themselves come in the usual plain black plastic packaging, with the shade names printed on the backs.

I really love the eyeshadow palette which is my current favourite, the colour selection suits the current weather and daylight so well with its selection of decadent jewel and earth tones. The shades come in a finish of shimmer, matte and metallic finishes. As is Sleek’s normal practise these days the palette comes with a plastic overlay with the shade names printed on it. As I usually take a photo of this for my blog I just throw the plastic overlay away as I can always check on my computer afterwards if I want to know what a particular shade name is and I find it quite annoying to have to deal with every time I open the palette.

Maybe the text isn’t so clear in the photo above so I’ll type the names out here for reference.

Top row, left to right: Pretty in Paris, Meet in Madrid, Court in Cannes, Lust in LA, Romance in Rome, Propose in Prague

Bottom row, left to right: A Vow in Venice, Marry in Monte Carlo, Honeymoon in Hollywood, Bliss in Barcelona, Forever in Florence, Love in London

I actually think that the names are quite cute!

Here’s a better shot of the colours in the palette, this time with the plastic overlay removed.

And here are the shadows swatched on my forearm, in the same order as they appear in the palette.

As you can see – wonderful colours, wonderful pigmentation – just wonderful!

I’m not quite so enamoured with the blush, Antique. It’s a very warm brown, but the shimmer is blue and I’m just not convinced that the brown and the shimmer actually go well together. The first time I wore this blush on my cheeks I used way too much and thought it looked awful. Since then I’ve trained myself to start by applying a tiny amount and building the colour up if I want more intensity. The more you buff this colour over the skin the more it acts as a highlighter as the shimmer becomes more apparent. It’s quite an interesting effect, but I’m not sure I’m a fan. Perhaps due to the blue it would work better on cooler skintones (my skintone is very warm). It is very pigmented though so I might try it out as an eyeshadow.

My current favourite colour combination from the eyeshadow palette is Court in Cannes paired with Honeymoon in Hollywood. The purple is so intense that I was worried it might stain my lids but I wear it over a primer and it’s simple to remove with some make-up remover. The shadows last all day on me worn over an eyeshadow base. In the photo below I’m also wearing a tiny bit of  the blush which you can see ever so slightly on my cheekbones and the tip of my nose.

Oh and I’ve just noticed that this eyeshadow compliments the hoodie that I’m wearing which is good as it’s one of my favourites, ha! An added bonus.

Septemberry 3: Berry Nails

Oh dear, my September-berry project seems to have over run by a couple of weeks – I still have this photo of berry nails to share and another berry lipstick look still to post and it’s already the middle of October! I think berry tones still fit the season perfectly though so at least it’s not too late to hopefully be inspired by the photos that I have left :)

This luscious berry nail polish is in Illamasqua’s rubber finish, a strange matte-shine hybrid that really does create the effect of rubber. This is the shade Vice, a deep raspberry red. Two coats gave opaque colour that matched the bottle. I skipped top coat (except for the nail with the rhinestones) as that would have created a shiny finish, but I still wore this for five days with only minor signs of wear. The colour didn’t transfer onto objects that I happened to accidentally swipe my nails across, either, which sometimes happens with bright colours if I don’t wear a top coat.

I dropped some rhinestones onto my ring finger while the nail polish was still wet just for fun and applied a top coat to help them last longer which is why that nail is shinier than the others. Overall I really liked the effect and I’ll definitely be wearing this nail varnish again this autumn.

Double Bright Contrast Eyeliner

Phew, what a name for a post! I think it’s quite apt for this look though. I wore this last week when there were still a few sunny days to remind me of the summer.

I used my Sleek Eau La La liner in Pumpkin to sketch out the shape of the orange flick first then patted an orange pigment/eyeshadow dust on top with a small flat brush. I then used a creamy turquoise gel eyeliner to draw in the lower flick along my lashline. The look was actually pretty easy to do and I was really pleased with how it turned out. I’m looking forward to experimenting with this eyeliner shape again in different colour combinations.

Let me know if you have any suggestions for colour combinations that you think would work well together!

On a side note, my eyebrows are completely grown out now. I haven’t touched them for as long as I can remember so I guess around a year now. Sure they look wispy at the edges but to be honest I don’t think they look that bad and I love how low maintenance they are so I don’t have any plans to change my eyebrow regime in the immediate future.

MUA Cream Blusher in Yummy

Just a quick swatch post today to show a really natural looking blusher that I’ve been reaching for lately.

MUA cream blushers come in four shades and cost £2. The shade range isn’t that interesting to be honest and I think they all end up looking very similar on the face so even though they’re cheap you really don’t need to buy more than one. They’re not very pigmented and just add a gentle, natural looking flush. I apply mine with a stippling brush so that I can push slightly more product onto the skin for more colour payoff.

These don’t last as long on the skin as powder blushes but you can add slightly more product then tone the colour down with a translucent face powder on top – the blush will still show through and should last a bit longer on the skin then, although this method does take away the nice dewy finish you get with the cream alone.

I’m not even sure how well it shows up in the picture above but I’m wearing it on my cheeks and the tip of my nose with a dusting of face powder on top. As you can see, I wasn’t joking about the natural finish!

Time to Believe

Yes, it seems that moisturising, long lasting bright lip colour is possible!

I’ve been playing around with my lipstick collection lately and today I dug out Believe by Lush, from their emotional brilliance cosmetics range. I picked this up last summer but haven’t worn it much so it was a pleasant surprise today to rediscover just how long lasting, vibrant and comfortable this product is. It doesn’t dry out unlike many other long lasting lipsticks that I’ve tried so your lips feel moisturised and it never turns into a crusty film of colour that peels off in flakes during the day (yes, I have experienced that with some other products before and yes, it is gross!)

I applied this over a bright pink lip liner by Gosh and it lasted seven hours on me until I decided to remove it before eating my dinner. Usually I would apply a bright colour like this with a lip brush but you can achieve a good finish with the doe foot applicator that comes with the product so I just applied it using that.

Below: Gosh lip pencil in Glam Pink (left) and Lush liquid lipcolour in Believe (right)

You can see the lovely texture and vibrant colour really nicely in this close up pic below:

I kept my eyes simple by blending an orangey gold across my lids and finishing off with some mascara et voila, the finished look (well, plus a little foundation, blush and face powder too!)

And here’s a quick close up of my eyes just because I took a picture of them so I figured I might as well include it!

Nails to Match the Weather: Autumn 2013 Edition

Brrr, it is definitely feeling very autumnal here in Edinburgh already. I was hoping for a warm autumn but while the sun is still shining it’s been soooo windy here this week! The chill in the air put me in the mood for a grey nail polish and I went for this shade that I’ve had for a couple of years now but haven’t featured on my blog before.

The fact that I haven’t featured this polish before is really an oversight on my part as it’s a great nail polish. It has a perfect consistency, dries fast and lasts for around a week on me without chipping.

Below: Bourjois 10 days No Chips nail polish in shade 23

Septemberry 2: Sparkling Berry

Today’s make-up: sparkling berry toned eyeshadow worn in the crease paired with shiny shiny lips.

Unfortunately I didn’t manage to get a good close up shot of my eye make-up but you can see in the photo below that the berry eyeshadow is very subtle, which makes this an accessible way to wear a berry tone on the eyes. I applied a wash of pale pink cream eyeshadow over my lids to my crease then worked some shimmering berry eyeshadow along my crease from outer to inner corner.

The shadow that I used was Glitter Rock from the Urban Decay Moondust range. They’re basically pressed micro-glitters which have some pros and cons: the fall out is nowhere near as horrific as with Urban Decay’s somewhat old-fashioned chunky glitter shadows but you still get the same sparkly effect, and they’re very sheer which is either an advantage or a disadvantage depending on what you’re looking for. If you hope to achieve the colour in the pan then basically your best bet is to pack the colour on over a (preferably slightly sticky) base and press it on with your finger tips though even then I don’t know if it’s really going to be as opaque. However, if you like the sound of a subtle sheen over your eyelids then you can easily achieve that with these shadows.

I found it difficult to capture the sparkle I was trying to describe in my photos today but I hope you can appreciate some of the effect from the photos below. The pic on the left is a single swipe from my fingertip, while the pic on the right is the same swipe (no extra product applied) blended out across my arm.