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Thursday 17 July 2014

Lipsticks of the Week

By Tindara

Well I don’t know about you, but I think it’s about time for another Lipsticks of the Week. This week, it’s a summer mixed bag, pinks and corals and you guessed it, a tomato red. I’ve also been on a spending spree and bought a few new lovely lippies that I feel like raving about.



Last time, I mentioned my favourite go-to deep pink, Bobbi Brown’s Cosmic Raspberry. Since we’re talking about the pink hit parade, a close number two is definitely Lipstick Queen’s Hot Rose Sinner. It’s got a real hot edge to it alright. There’s something of the deep but fizzy bright to this, it’s more flirty somehow than pinks of similar tone. It’s also got a lovely moisturising but semi-matte texture. I really like Lipstick Queen products as a concept and this is not the only one from the range I’ll be featuring this week. Hot Rose Sinner is a versatile colour, and works with little eye make-up or a big flick, or tones really well with taupe or goldey browns and greys.


(Hot Rose Lips either full selfie or one of crops, whichever you prefer)

Like me, you’ve probably heard a lot about Estee Lauder’s new Pure Colour Envy lipsticks. I had to see what all the fuss was about and bought a couple. I went for Intense Nude and Impassioned. I really loved the feel of these lipsticks, long-lasting, highly pigmented and satin in finish with a light vanilla scent. Both colours are eminently wearable.


Intense Nude is the perfect brown-pink darker than natural lips colour on me, but I think it could suit lots of skin tones from pale to dark. It works well whether you’re going for an efficient day look or a more of a statement look with lashings of mascara and smoky eyes. Somehow it makes my lips look bigger and fuller. I really love this.

And Impassioned, well, you know how I feel about tomato reds, and this one is glorious. It reeks of glamour, and the satin feel needs a touch more make-up than I sometimes wear with other more matte finish reds. This is not a problem however, these lipsticks feel luxurious and make me want to spend more time on my routine, adding flicks and smudges and highlights. I’m revelling in them to be honest.



And now two coral lipsticks; I love a sheer coral at this time of year, it feels totally right for sipping a fruit-filled Pimms and matching with your pedicure showed off in your gold sandals. Well, Birkenstocks, anyway, I’m not that blooming glamorous. Anyway, the two I’ve been wearing are Tarte’s paper-packaged Soft Coral and Lipstick Queen’s Endless Summer Stoked.

Tarte Soft Coral lipstick is great, a hint of peachy coral in a really moisturising sheer finish with quirky cool packaging. It works well on it’s own for a natural look or with bright blue, turquoise, or navy liner/shadow. This has been in my bag all week and the packaging stands up to being lolloped around a bag on London Transport, even if I don’t in this weather. Lipstick Queen’s Endless Summer Stoked is almost like a deeper coral take on Jean Queen for me. Slightly more pigment, perhaps, but supremely soft, natural and moisturising. I like wearing this with a smudgy navy liner, and my hastily applied dolly blusher in a peachy coral shade with a bit of shimmer.

Well there you go lipstick fiends, there’s mine for this week. Maybe I’ll go heavy on the eyes next time and clear gloss. Adam Ant stripe over the nose? Nah, there will be red, there will always be red.

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Wednesday 16 July 2014

Geometric Nails featuring Models Own, No7 and Seche Vite

By Emily

I’ve got a bit of thing for bare nails with a splash of colour; often I’ll do a French manicure but with bright coloured or multicolour tips. It’s really quick and high impact. This week I wanted to create something a bit more unusual, so got out my Models Own nail tape and created this Modern geometric design. Here’s how:


First up, make sure your nails are squeaky clean before applying the nail art tape. Using two strips of tape per nail, create a triangle shape at the top of each nail. Make sure you keep the tape a bit longer than your nail so it’s easier to pull off.

Then apply your chosen colour to the triangle area. I chose a No7’s Stay Perfect in Me! Me! Me! Your first coat should be light…try not to gloop too much on. Don’t wait too long before you apply the second coat and again try to keep it light while getting the colour depth you need.


Once your second coat is on, don’t wait long before carefully removing the nail tape, using tweezers. If you wait too long you’ll get a jagged edge to your triangle.
Once all the tape is removed you can tidy up any rough edges with remover on a fine brush before applying a good quality top coat. I use Seche Vite, for its speed-dry amazingness.




And there you have it, hipster nails worthy of a trip to Dalston. Undercut and Fixie bike optional.


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Tuesday 15 July 2014

Makeup Revolution: Blushers in Now and All I Think About Is You

By Laurin

In 2007, against her better judgement, Her Gracious Majesty Queen Elizabeth II extended to me an offer of citizenship which I duly accepted. There was a ceremony at Lambeth Town Hall, and I came away with a souvenir photo of me looking like I’d accidentally joined the Hogwart’s branch of the BNP.


To receive this honour, I had to sit the “Life in the UK” exam, thus satisfying the British government that I did indeed know the date that women gained the right to divorce their husbands and what percentage of the population identify themselves as Muslims. There was a study guide! I made flashcards! But to get to the really useful stuff, you just have to learn by trial and error and the occasional raised eyebrow at the pub. Here’s a few of the things I wish someone had told me when I arrived at Gatwick fourteen years ago:
  1. When your friend cancels your plans at the last minute, he hasn’t blown you off, he’s blown you OUT. The former means something completely different and is best not discussed in front of your mother-in-law.
  2. Do not be tricked into ordering Pimms and lemonade simply because the sun is out. It is essentially a non-alcoholic beverage with added hedge trimmings, and you will need to build up your alcohol tolerance if you ever hope to truly fit in.
  3. People will make assumptions about your social class based on the word you use to refer to your evening meal.
  4. People will make assumptions about your social class based on the daily newspaper you read.
  5. People will make assumptions about your social class based on the supermarket you most frequent.
  6. Superdrug is the best chemist on the high street.
The last point eluded me until about six months ago. It only dawned just how much love there is for Superdrug when I realised that people were genuinely excited for their 50th anniversary product editions. It seemed that every woman who spent her formative teenage years in this country had a happy memory of spending Saturday morning with a coven of girlfriends, happily wallowing in the cheap and cheerful nail varnishes and lipsticks at her local branch. I, on the other hand, had pretty much ignored them for the past 14 years, having been impressed by the fact that I could buy a lemon-flavoured yogurt from their main competitor on my first visit to these shores. So exotic! I now see the error of my ways.


Superdrug’s new cosmetics range Makeup Revolution definitely falls into the “cheap and cheerful” category, but that’s no reason for letting the teenaged girls have all the fun. I have, of late, been extremely impressed with the colour and longevity of both their powder blusher ranges.


I tested All I Think About Is You from the Vivid Baked Blusher range (£2.50, above right) and Now from the Powder Blusher range (£1, above left), and found that they performed as well as blushers at twenty times the price. The packaging is nothing to write home about, but for the price of a Diet Coke, I’m not complaining.


Now is a soft, rosy pink with an almost undetectable shimmer, while All I Think About Is You is a brighter candy pink with swirls of tawny gold. They both give a pretty, sheer wash of colour that looks beautiful on my ghostly skin, but without making me look so flushed that fellow Victoria Line commuters ask me if I’m okay. Despite the shimmer, Now actually goes on quite matte, giving it a low-key yet polished look that’s perfect for work or general daytime wear. All I Think About Is You is now my go-to blusher for a fast casual look. It makes my cheeks pop without looking too “done”, and the golden highlights mean I can skip the highlighter altogether. I get a good nine hours wear from both formulations.

I’ve not seen the range in store yet, but it’s available to order online. Get stuck in – cheap make-up is a great way of trying out a new look or colour without worrying about wasting your hard earned cash. Any other questions, give me a shout: I’ll be the girl on the houmous aisle at Waitrose with a copy of the Guardian tucked under my arm.


Makeup Revolution is available at www.superdrug.com.

The Fine Print: Purchases.

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Monday 14 July 2014

La Roche Posay - Rosaliac CC Cream (Daily Unifying Complete Correction Cream)


By Get Lippie

So, after saying the BB Cream craze has largely passed me by recently, I now find myself reviewing a CC cream, finally.  And, I have to say, that I almost unqualifiedly love this one.

La Roche Posay has become something of a cult skincare brand in the UK. Almost ubiquitous in France, it's fairly difficult to come by in the UK, but it's well worth seeking out (even if they don't import my favourite product in the range: Serozinc to the UK at all), as there are very few skin conditions they don't treat, and La Roche Posay is a godsend for sensitive skin.

Redness is my major concern, and Rosaliac CC Cream is designed for redness prone sensitive skin, like what I have got.  It's a fairly thick texture:


But it spreads very easily, and gives good coverage:


On skin it blends easily, melding nicely with the texture of your skin:


And, it is virtually undetectable once blending is finished:


This gives a fairly light coverage, but it does cover redness well, and gives a lovely, glowing satin finish.  It reminds me a great deal of my beloved Chantecaille Just Skin, which is about the highest praise I can give it, to be honest.  There are a couple of caveats to that, which, as Rosaliac CC cream is only a third of the price, are only to be expected.  Wear time could be a bit longer, I do find I have to powder down in the mid-afternoons, but, for the price, this is very good indeed. Oh, and it only comes in one shade, which is frustrating if you're either very dark or very fair.  I'm fairly pale, and this is good for giving me a glow, but if I were any paler, I'd struggle with it, I must admit.

It comes with an SPF of 30, so if you apply enough you won't have to use a separate sunscreen, but as I always use a separate sunscreen regardless, I'd ignore this, tbh.  It's got a great texture, a lovely finish (provided you use powder), covers redness, feels soothing on inflamed skin, and best of all, it's currently on offer for £16.55 on Escentual.com I can't really recommend a tinted moisturiser more highly than this one, without you paying almost £60 for it, to be honest ...

The Fine Print: PR Sample.  Photos for this piece were taken with a Nokia Lumia 1020 lent to me by Microsoft.

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Friday 4 July 2014

Colbert MD Skincare


By Luke

Whenever a leading member in the field of dermatology brings out a skincare range, more often than not it’s a good one. This is good news, because no self respecting member of the strict regulatory bodies that govern this particular field of expertise (such as Dr Colbert), is going to put their name to something that is a) bad for your skin, and b) rubbish.

Dr Colbert MD is a bit of a celebrity’s celeb too. He designed an advanced facial that had the Hollywood elite queuing at the door, the Tri-Facial. This gently and effectively uses light laser abrasion, and soothing botanicals to increase the amount of collagen in the skin, and as it has minimal down time it fast became dubbed as ‘The Red Carpet Facial’ with A-listers popping in to quickly get their fix before they donned a posh frock and strutted down the carpet in front the eyes of the world.

Dr Colbert then got asked to produce a serum for a celebrity whilst on a film set (where is often spending time making sure that his clients look incredible), which he pretty much knocked up athere and then, and has been using it ever since. Then he made a facial oil that gave the skin not just an extraordinary radiance that photographs beautifully, but also treats the skin too.
From that point on, the range expanded, there are currently nine products available in the UK, and is now a fully comprehensive range that will knock your socks off. It did mine.

I was asked to try the Colbert MD range about a month ago and have been mightily impressed with the simplicity of it. There are no complicated procedures, or multiple products to get confused with. I have even had the chance to put some of the products to the test when working on other human faces than my own, and with rather excellent results.

At the core of the range is the QuSome technology, which put simply is patented delivery system for the active ingredients that gets them where they need to be in a stable way and in the most effective manner possible. It does this by encapsulating the active ingredients within an oxygen-proof ‘shell’ that makes them more potent when applied. Daily nutrition for skin, in a pseudo ‘pill’ format? I’m in!

Without giving you a full description of the whole range, I am going to pick the highlights.

The Balance Purifying Cleanser, £38.
This was the first product I used.
I opened it up, and put a blob into my hand uh oh, a gel. Generally I don’t get on well with gel cleansers as they have a nasty tendency to be full of soap and foamy, which leaves my skin feeling dry and at worst flaky.
This, I noticed immediately when on my face, was a totally different texture.
It’s a soft gel that is so light you barely feel it on the skin at all! It doesn’t foam wildly, and certainly didn’t leave me feeling tight or dry afterwards. Difficult for me to say how good it is at removing makeup, as I don’t wear any, but skin was certainly squeaky clean afterwards. I have tried it with a foundation on the back of my hand though, and it seemed to get rid of that with no real effort.
The feeling is also slightly cooling. I am not sure which ingredient this is, and in the recent humidity was most welcome.
In it, there is also lactic acid (one of my favourites) that gently exfoliates, and it has Ginko Biloba which is a natural anti-bacterial. So it’s an all rounder this. And the smell is just gorgeous too. A lovely light citrus scent, naturally provided. Not artificially perfumed.
Do be sure not to hold this the wrong way up when you take the lid off though as it has a tendency to really pour out, when you only need a tiny little blobette. New word. Look it up.

Stimulate The Serum, £115
This was next (it was bedtime).
Claiming to stimulate the collagen production in your skin, this is a bit of an all rounder too.
What I love about this, as with most of the line, is that it is a once a day product. Either AM or PM. Under your moisturiser at night, or during the day, or just under your sunscreen. Wherever you can fit it in. The action of this is in the name also. Stimulate, it is designed to wake the skin up, revitalising the appearance of it, brightening and all the other things we want from healthy looking skin.
It has Caffeine, and glycolic in it, but is ever so gentle. Anyone who is worried about the acid content of this needn’t be as it is very gentle indeed.

The Illumino Face Oil, £100
This, for me, is the runaway favourite product.
For many reason, but mainly because it delivers INSTANT results, and the effect keeps getting better for about half an hour after you have put it on your face.
Again using the QuSome technology, compounded with retinol and vitamin C, this deep penetrating oil was designed to give an almost supernatural glow to the skin, giving the appearance of youth in al its dewiness. It has been used on red carpet attendees for many years, as it is so effective, and really photographs well. Makeup works superbly with it (but be careful, only a tiny drop is needed here) either underneath as a sort of primer, or dabbed over the top.
A nourishing treat too, it contains Argan Oil, Passion Fruit Oil, Marula Oil, Yangu Oil, Borage Seed oil all designed to feed and improve the quality of your skin, and boy does it.

I used this recently when working with some female body builders at the WBFF. The glow emanating from all them was superb, and they all looked fantastic on stage. I would say it would work on any skin except the very oil, spot prone types. But dry skin will absolutely LOVE this as mine does.

There is also an Illumino Body Oil, which is of a similar composition which Dr Colbert tells us is used on all those stunning Victoria’s Secret models for the shows to give them a super sheen.

Tone Control Facial Discs, £65
One of two of these sorts of affairs, they are little textured pads which contain the product on them. The ones I have are the Tone Control variety (as opposed to the others which are re texturising pads, and they're very good ones too). Gentle enough to be used morning or evening, these contain an ingredient called “SymWhite” which targets darker skin pigmentation from sun damage. Designed to give a more even tone to the skin, and diminish any visible irregularities it also has anti inflammatory ingredients that reduce redness.
I have used these for about three weeks, and although I don’t have any real signs of pigmentation on my skin, my redness (which I am very conscious of) is definitely reduced. What I like most about these is the skin conditioning that seems to go on. Skin is very smooth, and really overmoisturised. Although it does say to use a moisturiser afterwards, I found this is not always necessary.



The other thing that I love about these is the little flap that acts as a handle! You don’t get any of the product on your hands, and it is easily put over the face without losing your grip and dropping it on the floor! It happens!


Colbert MD is available at SpaceNK Stores nationwide. 

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