Skincare of the Week: 17.10.2015

 

I've been beauty blogging a long time, well over six years now, and in that time my interests have changed. From basically wanting to catalogue my lipstick collection (where the name came from), to learning to love (and grow) my fingernails, then COLOURS, COLOURS, COLOURS, and finally to where I am now, which is obsessed with skincare.  Mostly I'm too lazy to spend hours every day applying my face - though I do wear a different lipstick every day still - so my skin needs to be tip-top at all times, hence the obsession.

My skin is combination-oily, prone to redness and sensitivity, and it is full of pores.  I suffered horrendously from adult on-set acne in my late twenties too - which I mainly cured through getting my skincare right. I'm in the "mature" skin category these days, but a lot of anti-ageing creams are too heavy for my oiliness, so I'm constantly on a quest to deal with my redness rather than my wrinkles (of which at the moment I have thankfully few, but the ones I do have grow slightly more entrenched every day - I'm learning to love them).  These Skincare of the Week posts are my way of diarising what I'm trialling, what I really love, what works - and if you see it disappear after just one use or two - what doesn't work at all.  So read on to find out what's been on my ugly mush this week.

Mary Kay Autumn Collection Competition

I love autumn, don't you? And I love autumn because makeup-wise it means we move away from the (unwearable to me) pastels of spring, and the bronzers of summer into lovely berry shades and gorgeous sludgey shades of makeup, which I always find so comforting.  This coupled with snuggly blankets on the sofa, long evenings drinking red wine, and the prospect of Christmas on the horizon thrills my cynical little heart.

Other things thrill me too. I went to tea with the Mary Kay company recently, and was amazed to discover that they're one of the best-selling makeup companies in the whole world, and they're one of the top ten skincare sellers in the world too!  It's criminal that we barely know they exist here in the UK - my US readers are always emailing me asking what I think of the products, and until recently, I didn't even know you could get them here!  Well, you can, and in the new year, they're going to be launching a fab new way of getting hold of their products, which I'll tell you all about nearer the time.

Meanwhile, in order to celebrate autumn, and the soon-to-be increased visibility of Mary Kay here in the UK, I'm offering one lucky reader the chance to win the entire autumn collection of Mary Kay products that you see pictured here, which includes four nail polishes, three lipsticks, one eyeshadow quad (and a palette to put it in), three CityScape perfumed products (a shower gel, a body oil and matching perfume) plus their brand new exfoliating kit which will retail for £50 once it's on sale later this month. All in all the prize bag is worth almost £200!

To enter, just follow the guidelines below, and bear in mind, I will be checking the entrants carefully!  Sadly, because the prize contains nail varnish, this competition will be open to entrants from the UK only.  Sorry about that!

a Rafflecopter giveaway


The Fine Print: PR Samples


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Cover FX Custom Cover Drops in P40

I was agnostic about Cover FX Custom Cover Drops, to be honest. I thought they couldn't possibly work, and thought the hype about them "mixing with everything" was just that.

I was wrong, and happy to be proved so to be, because Cover FX Custom Cover drops are ace, and I love them an impossible amount.  And, even though I have found something they won't mix happily with (because I'm nice like that, I am), I still think they're brilliant.

The idea behind them is one of those which sounds simple in theory, but that I suspect cost a fortune in R&D to actually make happen.  Essentially, these are bottles of pure pigment and you select the amount to add to the moisturiser, primer, oil or serum of your choosing to get the coverage you need.  One drop for a sheer veil of colour, two for medium, three for medium-full, and four for full-on opaque coverage.  And believe me, they're not lying about it being a drop, or two or three!

The shades are divided into Pink, "Golden" and Neutral undertones, and the sensible numbering system is easy to figure out. As I'm rather cool-toned, I was matched at Harvey Nichols to P40.  I was actually matching myself to P30, but I do think that would have been just a little too pale for me.  Altogether there are 24 shades to be matched to, and they really do range from the lightest to the darkest, which is great.

P40 is great match to my skintone, and I've tried mixing Custom Cover Drops with oils, moisturisers, serums and primers with great results all-round.  I like two drops (not being a sheer kind of girl, as discussed previously) and this gives me more than enough coverage mixed in with my normal amount of moisturiser or oil that I use for an application regardless, but I find the best results are when you mix it with a primer, as this just gives it a bit of bounce that you don't get from a moisturiser or oil, and allows it not to settle into pores as much as it might.

What Cover FX Custom Cover Drops don't like being mixed with is "hydrating" serums, or anything that is designed to stay "wet" on the skin.  I found mixing this with Pixi H2O Skindrink left this dripping off my skin, and felt very odd, but it's an easy enough mistake not to make again.  Oils give you a gorgeous dewy glow, moisturisers most resemble a traditional foundation "satin" finish, and using a primer (I really like this with Sunday Riley's primer, btw) will give you whichever finish the primer is designed to give you.

Lasting time is great, I haven't noticed any fading, but you will need a larger than average application of moisturiser or oil if you're thinking of using four drops of this for daily wear, as the powder pigments will make a small application look rather cakey and artificial.

It's official.  I love these.  They've more or less made my (rather extensive) foundation redundant.  Bravo Cover FX!  They cost £33, and my bottle came from Harvey Nichols.


The Fine Print: Purchase


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Burberry Kisses Sheer in 297 Midnight Plum, 249 Hydrangea, and 241 Crimson Pink

If 2014 was the year of matte lips, then 2015 has been the year of sheer glossy ones (it's also been a banner year for eye crayons, but more on that another time).  Now, I'm normally a full-on opaque kind of girl to be honest, but I'm always happy to play with sheers, as long as they're still pigmented enough to show up on my lips.  Luckily, these are, and they're gorgeous colours too.  More after the jump.

Fenwicks Global Beauty Icons

I love Fenwick of Bond Street, truly I do. It's clean, it's quiet, it's sensibly laid out, the staff are lovely, and there's a frankly astonishing range of brands there now.  I was invited back to their store last week to celebrate both the relaunch of their newly redesigned beauty hall, and the launch of their #FenwickBeautyIcons and #GlobalBeautyIcons campaigns, and, I admit, it was a little slice of heaven in there.  There's something so wonderful about a beauty hall before it opens to the public, all the products laid out like jewels, promising beauty and delight, just waiting for the customers to come along and take their pick, it's rather magical.

I was invited to create my own "edit" of products both old and new from the new hall, and here's what I selected.  I wanted to create a classic red lip and black liner look, so used that as my theme, and I chose both products I've used before, love an immoderate amount and desperately wanted backups for, and new products that I've been lusting after for months now.

I went a bit mad in Charlotte Tilbury (seriously, the Charlotte Tilbury counter at Fenwick really does have to be seen to be believed), and picked up both the Magic Cream and Wonder Glow as I've been curious about them since they launched.
Chantecaille Just Skin Tinted Moisturiser is a holy grail product of mine, and I couldn't resist picking up a backup.  I also picked up one of their Liquid Liner pens, because, you know, Chantecaille.
Also a classic, and a can't live without product is Acqua di Parma, which I finished my bottle of last year, and have been living without ever since. I adore the soapy-clean fresh scent of this, and I've been wearing it all the time since we've been reunited.
I had to pick up a Lipstick Queen product, and the Lip Parade had my name written (almost) all over it.  A three pack of classic lip colours: Red Sinner (divine), Saint Wine (DIVINE) and Metal Nude (er ... slightly less divine, but lovely for people who like nudes nonetheless) I made a beeline for them.
I actually let out a little "SQUEE!" of happiness when I spotted that Fenwick are stocking Artis makeup brushes! Look, I need to get out more, I know, but I did.  So they HAD to go into my "edit", I can't wait, seriously can't wait to give them a proper try.
I've been lusting after the new Bobbi Brown Greige eyeshadow palette too for what seems like forever (actually: probably about a fortnight) now, so I couldn't pass that up, either.  It looks fab for my colouring, and I'm torn between wanting to swatch the whole thing, and just sitting gazing at its prettiness.
And finally a couple of things from some brands I don't know much about, the Colbert Balance Purifying cleanser, and Face Matters 24/7 Collagen Balm (who donate a percentage of the proceeds of every sale to Refuge, the women's charity, which is a wonderful thing for a tiny UK brand to do), because sometimes, it's good to try something completely different.

I could have literally spent hours in there, but I was in a rush to get back to the office, so I will be back to investigate the rest of the counters more thoroughly at another point quite soon (I probably only got around a third of the hall before I had to run away!). There will be some more in-depth reviews of these products coming up in the next few weeks, but what would you have picked up ofr your "beauty edit" at Fenwick?

The Fine Print: PR Samples


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