A Little Bit of Chanel ... Peridot, Illusoire, Epatant and Ebloui

So, I went a little crazy at the Chanel Counter again.  I picked up three of the Illusion D'Ombre eyeshadows, which are a remarkable texture, and, I cracked and bought the nail varnish in Peridot.  I passed over Graphite as it's dead ringer for OPI's Lost in Glitzerland, and Quartz looked too similar to Illamasqua Bacterium for comfort. That said, I'll probably be picking them up anyway ...


So, the eyeshadows I picked up were:

86 Ebloui:

84 Epatant:

And 83 Illusoire:

They're a very interesting texture, unlike the recent Armani Eyes to Kill shadows, they're a powdery mousse, rather than a powder-cream texture, but, similar to the Eyes to Kill shadows, they are very, very, very sparkly.  But, it's a more subtle gleam than the rather glittery Armani formula:

Swatches at the top are over Urban Decay Primer Potion, bottom are on bare skin.  The pots come with a synthetic brush, and you do need it to apply, as using your fingers will just result in the barest wash of un-pigmented glitter, but the brush will pick up a goodly amount of the shade too.


Here's an out-of-focus shot to show off the sparkle:

Rather pretty, I think.  Hopefully, I picked versatile shades.  There was no taupe ...


I also bought Peridot:

Which I had no intention whatsoever of buying, but, I just couldn't resist when I saw it in store.  It's very beautiful.  Alas, it's not the shade for me.  At all:

Yup, on me, it pulls yellow.  Sickly yellow, and not the beautiful scarab-beetle effect you see in the bottle there.

It's not too bad in slightly different light, but man, it gives me lobster hands!  Also, the other shade is the one I mainly get, and it's just so not me ...!  Great to apply, like most Chanel polishes, can't comment on the wear yet though.

So, what will you be picking up from Chanel this season, anything?


The Fine Print: I purchased these.  You would have seen the post sooner, but I realised that the sales assistant had given me the wrong shade of eyeshadow ...


This post originated at: http://getlippie.com All rights reserved.

On Massage with Aromatherapy Associates, L'Occitane and Liz Earle

Lippie Underground HQ - soon to be Lippie Towers, but more about that anon - has been the scene of a lot of massage lately.  For a variety of reasons, it's become a slight necessity, prime among them is the fact that for the last few months I've been suffering from a skeleto-muscular problem, which isn't quite as serious as it sounds but has been causing continuous headaches since April.  Even so, this is all way less scary - and stressful - than the brain tumour I thought it was initially.  I don't recommend worry as a beauty aid.

Anyhoo, a decent massage begins with a decent massage oil, and I've found these to be my top contenders (one isn't a massage oil at all actually, so I hope I'll be forgiven for so heinously misusing it!):

Aromatherapy Associates Enrich Massage and Body Oil.  A glorious blend of Geranium and Ylang Ylang in a blend of olive, coconut and macademia oils, this has plenty of slip, and warms delightfully in the hands to provide a nice scented massage oil, that isn't too heavily fragranced.

I've found that it leaves the skin soft, scented, and wonderfully moisturised without being at all sticky, and, for that, I love it.  One downside is that the frosted glass bottle is a little tricky to handle with oily fingers, and it has been dropped once or twice because of that, (luckily the glass is thick and heavy, so no major spillages!) so I tend to decant in order to use this.  This costs £33 for 100mls, and I'd happily purchase another bottle.

Next up is L'Occitane Lavande Body and Massage Gel, which surprised me by arriving in a large, flat, plastic tub.  For some reason, I'd been expecting a tube. But, no matter, it's already more fit for massage purpose than a heavy glass bottle, even when you consider my heebie jeebies about jarred products.  If you like the smell of lavender (and I do, very much so), then you will love this, and even if you don't, then you still might like it, for in use, this has an odd effect that that in the jar, the smell is pungent, and heady, but on the body, it's a rather light and delicate scent.

As this is a gel, I was expecting it to be sticky, and, it is stickier than the two other oil products, but not unpleasantly so, and not so much that you'll notice it really.  It still gives very good slip, and is great in use.  It can, however, be very, very, very cold straight out of the jar, so this is one that you must warm in your hands before applying it your massage victim partner.  It's a fairly reasonable £20 for 200mls too, so is the cheapest option I'll be showing you today.

And now, my controversial choice: Liz Earle Superskin Concentrate.  Probably Definitely the most extravagant oil here, by far (costing £37.50 per 28ml, or £133.93 per 100ml), this has been a pleasure to use for massage.  Now, ordinarily, this is a facial oil, hence the small bottle and the whopping price comparison, and I wouldn't recommend it for this use as a rule, but, personally,  I adore the neroli/lavender/camomile scent, and it makes for a highly fragrant experience if you do use it for anything other than the recommended usage.  Also, I had a bottle handy nearby. Also surprising is that this tiny bottle (easier to handle than a big glass bottle) actually lasted through around a month of massage!  Excellent slip, and it led to pleasantly scented dreams ...

The Fine Print: PR Samples all, and gratefully received, too.  Thank you very much to all the firms who listened to my pleas for massage products.  And sincere apologies to Liz Earle for misusing her fine facial oil ... As always, the links are here for informational purposes only, and are not affilliate links.

This post originated at: http://getlippie.com All rights reserved.

Andrea Fulerton - Petrol in Water

I have never had as many compliments on my manicure as I have when I wore this last week, I have to say it's a very strong contender for my nail varnish of the year!  I've featured the Andrea Fulerton Colour Layering System before, but the Petrol in the Water combination is by far the one to beat.


Each "system" comes with an opaque base polish, and a sheerer layering topcoat, and you can apply them in various combinations for the best effect.  Petrol in Water looks like a dull brown with a glittery topcoat in the box:

In fact, I'd seen it in store several times, and just passed over it, as I have a bit of a blind spot when it comes to brown polish.  But, even on its own, this is a glorious shade, I discovered:



With thanks to my glamorous (anonymous) hand model, the boy done well.

A rich chocolate shade, shot through with gold, I'd like a bottle of this on its own, for it is beautiful.  Above you can see two coats of each the brown and the white, and you can see just how completely the shades transform when layered (two coats of brown with one of white on top).  It's amazing, a blue-teal duochrome, which shades to purple, with hints of gold when the light hits it right.  No topcoat was used in this pic.

It looks a bit frosty here, which it's not ordinarily, but it does show off some of the colour change.  It's one of those shades that looks lit from within, and you can spend many a happy hour (where you should be concentrating on meetings, say), just staring at your nails and watching the colours change.

On me, this wore exceptionally well, too,  all the pics on this post were taken after around three or four days of wear, and it wasn't until the fifth that there was major damage, and even then I was loath to take it off!  There is nothing particularly special about the brush, which is an old-style round brush with squared off ends, no Pro-Wide or flat bristles going on here, and there's an argument that the dual-bottle style means the brush is a little off-balance when you're applying, but these are minor quibbles compared to the ease of application with the thin polish, and the truly excellent wear.

Andrea Fulerton Trio Colour Layering Systems are exclusively available at Superdrug, and cost £7.99.

The Fine Print: I heartlessly stole this from Oxford Jasmine when she wasn't looking.  I am a bad beauty blogger.  It's okay though, she didn't run after me or anything.

This post originated at: http://getlippie.com All rights reserved.

Lipstick of the Week - Aug 21 2011

Another Sunday, another look at what has been rattling about at the bottom of my bag this week!  It's been an exceptionally neutral week, as we shall see.  Here we have:

 L-R 

Laura Mercier Pink Cocoa
Chanel Rouge Coco in Mademoiselle
Laura Geller lipstick in Berry Banana
Clinique Moisture Surge in Tender Mauve
Dolce & Gabanna in Orchid
Serge Lutens in 03
and at the bottom, Lipstick Queen gloss in Jean Queen

Here are the swatches:

As you can see, the Laura Geller is very, very yellow in my stick, which makes it borderline unwearable.

Oh, and yes, the Serge Lutens is black.  I didn't wear it to the office, that's all I have to say about that one!  It's really a stain, and it's very good underneath reds to deepen the shade.

Oh, and a little more storage porn for you, this is how I keep my lipsticks for the week when they're not in my bag:

Every day, I give myself a lucky dip out of the selection at hand, and arrange my makeup around whatever I pick out.  Once every couple of weeks, I change all the lipsticks in the box.  I have too many lip products ...



This post originated at: http://getlippie.com All rights reserved.

Liz Earle Sheer Skin Tint

Liz Earle is dipping her toes into colour cosmetics this September, and, prior to a full range of colour products coming to market in late 2012, the first product in the line is this, Sheer Skin Tint with SPF15.


Now, I'm a great fan of Liz Earle, she's an inspiration in the beauty business, and I think the idea behind adding a colour-range to the already impressive range of aromatherapy-based skincare is a great one, but I have genuinely mixed feelings about the Sheer Skin Tint.  Described as a pathway into cosmetics from the skincare, Liz describes this a tinted moisturiser, and certainly, the coverage is as light as you'd expect from something described as sheer in the name of it!

However, I find that Sheer Skin Tint is very thick, and can be difficult to blend as a result.  As the resulting coverage is so light, this isn't a big problem.  That said, I do find that I am constantly aware of this product whilst it's on my face, which isn't a feeling that I like very much.  I also find that it takes a long time to "set" on my skin - upwards of ten minutes - and this, very much, drives me bananas.  In the mornings, I'm very much a grab and go girl, and waiting ten minutes for what is essentially a tinted moisturiser to sink in is a bit of a waste of my time.  That's ten minutes I could have had in bed!


Also, when it finally does set, I find myself suffering from the unfortunate condition known as "stickyface". This is where a product makes your skin feel sticky and low-grade unpleasant for several hours after application. It's unusual to find it in a sheer tint! I've spoken to a couple of other beauty bloggers who've suffered from the same affliction though, as at first I thought I just had a dodgy tube. I also found that is has a habit of "grabbing" any powder products I applied over the top if I tried to put makeup over it too soon, which is annoying, because, although Liz herself describes this as a matte moisturiser, it's actually more of a satin (verging on dewy) finish, and owing to being slightly oily-skinned, I find it unwearable without a dusting of powder over the top.

All that said though, whilst I don't think this is a great product for me, I do think that some people will love this, and in particular my drier-skinned sisters (provided they're of the paler persuasion, there are only three shades available, and none of them will really cater for women of colour) are recommended to try it.  It's richly moisturising, and I haven't noticed it clinging to any dry patches of skin.  It does give a nice glow, and will even out your skintone, without giving a heavy appearance of being "fully made up".


Another nice thing about the product is that when you order it, Liz Earle will send you sample sachets so that you can ensure you have a proper colour match without opening the product.  If you find you've ordered the wrong shade, you can return the full-size product, and get it replaced with the correct colour for you.


All in all, it's not a bad product, it's just something I didn't enjoy using, and as such, I'd suggest anyone buying this should do as much research as they can before they splash out the £21 this will cost on release next month.

The Fine Print: PR sample.


This post originated at: http://getlippie.com All rights reserved.

Laura Geller Vanilla Nudes Collection

Following this tip-off from the lovely girls over at London Beauty Review, I cracked and bought my second Laura Geller set from QVC.  I bought one last year, loved it, and totally forgot to review it, so I'm not making that mistake again!

The set comprises:

• Balance n'Brighten Foundation (choice of Tan, Regular, Fair and Porcelain - I bought Fair)
• Baked Cheek Dream blush and highlight compact in Neapolitan
• At Long Lash mascara in black
• Italian Marble Lipstick in Banana Berry
• Baked Eyeshadow and Eye Rimz in Vanilla Toffee and Black Cherry

 Here's a closer look:

Laura's range is based around baked minerals, and I've always found her products to be really high quality.  Last time I bought a Laura Geller TSV, I bought the foundation in Regular, and have found it to be just a tad too dark for year-round wear, so I selected fair this time:

I love the camouflage appearance of this in the compact!  It's a mixture of pigments, designed to correct and cover flaws, and it's delightfully soft and silky on the skin.  It gives light-to-medium coverage, I've found, but you can also use it as a very nice finishing powder.

The highlighter-blush combo is very nicely done too:

These have been swatched very heavily in order to show up on the photo, you have a pale yellow (it's not gold as I anticipated) a strawberry pink, and a browned-berry shade, which makes a good contour colour if used alone.  Mixed together, you get a nice, sheeny medium-pink which is very flattering, but I couldn't get this to show up in swatches.  Suffice it to say that it's a lovely healthy pink shade, which will be suitable for cool skin-tones and paler warm-toned ladies.  If I had a criticism of the palette, I'd suggest that it would have been nice to have a wider strip of the pink so it could be used alone, but it's a minor quibble really.

The Vanilla Toffee  and Black Cherry Eye Rimz is a lovely product with a dreadful name.  On the skin, Vanilla Toffee is a creamy copper shade, perfect for a polished but not too over the top daytime look.  Black Cherry has a slight hint of pink micro-shimmer in with the black base.  It's not too pigmented though, so, again, is perfect for a softly smokey daytime liner look.  Both shades can be applied wet for a more intense "foiled" look.

The Italian marbled lipstick is the one product that gave me pause before ordering, as Laura was making a big song and dance about how the lipstick contains banana extract, and I was worried that the lip colour would be banana-flavoured as a result.  I'm happy to say that the lipstick is actually both scent- and flavour-less.  However, it's a very nude shade on me, owing to all the yellow in my stick, and, as a result, it's about as flattering a thing that is not very flattering.  At all.  It has a nice, light balm-texture though, and is very moisturising, so if concealer-lips are your bag (baby) then you'll love this.

At Long Lash mascara is very wet, and very thin, mascara - I normally prefer my mascaras a bit drier - but it has very good lengthening properties, and it doesn't flake or run during the day.  There was some hoo-ha on the show I was watching that made a song and dance about the mascara having a semi-permanent colouring effect on the lashes, but I can't say that I've noticed my lashes being any darker after removing the product.  The brush is nice and thin, and is shaped well to coat the lashes though, but it is not very volumising, so for me, this is very much a nice "day-time" mascara, for a nice natural look.  You will need to use an oil-based remover when taking it off though, as it's stubborn and likes to stay put ...

Overall, I'm really glad I picked this up and, some minor quibbles aside regarding not enough pink in the blusher, and the lipstick making me look like death warmed up, this is a really nice kit, and well worth the £33 or so I paid for it.  Laura's makeup is always well worth a look, and you can find a collection of her cosmetics on QVC, 

This post originated at: http://getlippie.com All rights reserved.

Braun Oral B Triumph 5000 Toothbrush

Gotta love a toothbrush named after a motorbike, right?

Well, I do, anyway.  After years of slogging away with the cheapest and least powerful of Oral B's electric toothbrush collection (an Oral B Professional Care 500 - which is still pretty darn good, more about that later), and then finally indulging in tooth whitening, I decided it was time to upgrade my toothbrush too.  I'd seen the Triumph 5000 system at a press event last year, and thought it was time to make the switch.

And I'm very glad I have, as this is an excellent toothbrush.  Even from the first brush I could tell the difference from the older, cheaper brush, and I do feel a get a better, fresher clean from the Triumph.  Certainly, it's a lot more powerful!  I also feel it's doing its bit to keep my teeth white, which is all kinds of aces.

The little monitor you get in the kit - aside from being a bit bossy, and telling you where you should be brushing and when - is very handy, as I have a habit of overbrushing certain areas, and also (much worse) I have a tendency to brush far too hard. The "smart guide" has a warning light that lets you know when you're brushing too hard, and I've been astonished at just how little pressure you actually need to apply to brush properly.  As a result, my gums bleed a lot less than they used to, and my teeth still feel good and clean.  The "smart guide" also makes a great bathroom clock.

Having upgraded my toothbrush, I also took the libery of introducing Mr Lippie to the concept of using an electric toothbrush in the first place, so he's been using the Oral-B Professional Care 500 for the last couple of months, and, after some initial scepticism, he's now a total convert.  During a recent weekend away (where we took normal, manual, brushes) he announced that he couldn't wait to get home so he could brush his teeth "properly"!

The Braun Oral B Triumph 5000 toothbrush retails on Boots.com for around £179.00, and the Professional Care 500 retails for £45.95, but is currently on offer for around £22.98.

The Fine Print: PR samples, but the original purchase was my own.  Likewise all my teeth are my own.  Apart from the one that's not.  Do I need to declare this? I have a false tooth.  So there.  To take your mind of that, here's a joke: "Why is 4,840 square yards like a bad tooth ? Because it's an acre".  It's the way I tell 'em.  No really, it is.

This post originated at: http://getlippie.com All rights reserved.