Christmas Countdown - Gift sets

This week, I'm mainly going to be showing you a mixture of stuff I'm getting for people for Christmas, and the odd piece of random stuff that I want for Christmas myself ...

For Him:

Neals Yard Smooth gift set:

Yes, I'm starting of with a present for a male, I thought why not?  Costing £27, this set includes face wash, moisturiser, body wash and shaving cream, and is an ideal way to introduce organic and natural products to the men in your life.  The smell isn't too overwhelmingly "aromatherapy", they're rather neutral, in fact, but this remains a good value set filled with award winning products from Neal's Yard, I swear by their Frankincense Hydrator at this time of year, and this little box is definitely ending up under my tree for someone this Christmas!

For Her:

Sanctuary Spa Kyphi and Mande Luxury Body Treat Set.

Costing just £20 this is an ideal set for someone who can't make it to The Sanctuary themselves, filled as it is with a selection of The Sanctuary's signature spa treats.  The set contains:  Sensuous Body Souffle, Sensuous Bath Creme,  Sensuous Body Scrub all  in the Mande Lular scent, alongside Kyphi Honey & Lotus Nourishing Bath Creme, with some Kyphi Shea and Almond Body Lotion.  They kindly add in a "Spa Skin Body Polisher", which is a shower puff to you and me.  Personally, I love the good-sized red vanity case you get with this, just hoping the recipient this one is going to this year.


 For Me:

Tom Ford Black Orchid gift set:

Yes, I've mentioned this one before.  But I still want it.  A lipstick, a nail varnish and perfume, all named Black Orchid, this is a gift set to treasure.  And, I promise, I will...

The Fine Print: No samples harmed in the writing of this guide - all links provided for imformation purposes only, and are not affiliate links.

NotD: Deborah Lippmann - Hit Me With Your Best Shot

Deborah Lippmann is famous for her glitter polishes. I don't like glitter, alas, but this shade (created for Pat Benatar) is, as they say: "right up my street".

A glorious "blue steel" shade (why yes, I am doing my best Zoolander impression as I type this!), this was a total dream to apply, silky, not too thick, and opaque in two coats:




In some lights it's dark blue, in others it's grey, and in still others it's a gloriously twinkly delight:





Love it. I'm wearing it for a board meeting later today. I think Pat Benatar would approve.

Pics show two coats over Orly Bonder base coat and Seche Vite on top, which accounts for the tipwear. Deborah Lippmann polishes are available exclusively from House of Fraser Apothecaries in the UK.

Browhaus

I am genetically incapable of plucking my own eyebrows, I make a mess of it leaving them uneven and prone to bald spots.  Add in my general poor eyesight, and the fact that I'm a total cack handed muppet anyway, and it's mainly just a recipe for disaster, so I just pay someone to do it for me.  I can't leave them to their own devices, as then I would look like this:

For the last few years, I've been a regular at Malika in Westfield, as I've found that in there it doesn't matter who you see, you always get a damn good threading.  I do not, under any circumstances, ever get my brows waxed anymore after being left once with the most surprised expression in the world for several months after a therapist got a bit over-excited with the spatula!

Last week, however, I was invited to pop along to Browhaus for a complimentary threading (and a bit of a tweeze) in their newly opened premises at Floral Street in Covent Garden, and, I have to say that I was very, very impressed.  Housed in the same building as the Ministry of Waxing, the entire complex is devoted to depilation of every kind, and they do it very, very well. 

My therapist, Ellie, was very friendly, and very obviously knew precisely what she was doing, and I'm happy to report that it was the most pain-free threading I've ever had.  Whilst the girls as Malika also know what they are doing, they can be a little ... erm ... brusque in style, bless 'em!  I also loved the heated chairs, which were perfect for falling asleep in.  Well, they would have been had someone not been, you know, ripping tiny hairs out of my face ...

Browhaus also had some great offers on, normally a brow-threading will cost you £15, but if you buy ten (and I'm tempted, believe you me) it will only cost you £100 - which you can pay in two instalments - and you can just pop in for shapings as and when you like.  They also do lash extensions, which I'm also really, really interested in.  I love my new eyebrow shape, which is a little rounder and softer than what I'm used to from Malika, and I'll definitely be back, especially as it's just on my (work) doorstep.

Thank you Browhaus!  Just wish you didn't have the visual cliff on the way in, it's an horrific entrance for vertigo sufferers!

Top Shop Lipsticks

 I'm a makeup snob.  I know it, and I rarely make any apologies for it!  However, I do like a little look around makeup from the high street every now and again.  Now, I am old enough to remember TopShop's original range of makeup (which, if memory serves was based around rip-offs homages of Nars Multiples, I still have both the silver and the gold one around somewhere, which, as they must be almost 15 years old now is rather disgusting now I come to think of it), and I was under the impression that Top Shop's makeup range wasn't for me.  Well, it turns out I was wrong.  And right, but more about that later ...

I was unexpectedly sent two of the latest lipsticks from the range, and I've been rather pleasantly surprised by the quality.  Ruthless and Beguiled are bang on the "goth lips" trend for this winter, Ruthless being a deep purple, and beguiled being a red:

Swatched, here's how they look:

As you can see Beguiled swatches rather lighter than you'd expect from the bullet shot, and Ruthless isn't actually black ...

On the lips:

Love Beguiled, and I've worn it a lot since it appeared.  I find the texture velvety and moisturising, and it's non-staining too.








However:

Ruthless won't ever be worn outside of the house, unless I want to give MrLippie a shock, he nearly had a heart attack when he saw me in this!  All I can say is that ... well, it didn't look as bad as I anticipated, but ... I don't think I'll be wearing it for work any time soon.

All in all a definite two thumbs up for the formula - and I like the quirky packaging, though for some reason I was under the impression that these were originally presented in cardboard tubes, mine are in matte metal tubes - but, as I suspect that the only things in Top Shop that would fit me are the lipsticks, I don't think I'll be picking any more up, unless you can buy them online!

Lipsticks are £8 each and available from Top Shop stores now.

Chanel Ombre D'eau: #757 Splash

I love a bit of Chanel.  Some of my more regular readers might have noticed.  I'm also a massive fan of their Ombre D'eau eyeshadows, finding the colours gorgeously complex (in the main), and also rather more long lasting than Chanel's powder shadows.

The latest release in this format is number 757,also called "Splash".  It's the second one I've purchased this year, the first was Torrent (a beautifully sludgy khaki shade with beautiful iridescence) from the Spring Kaska Beige collection, and that's been in heavy rotation ever since.  Splash is a bronze-y taupe, with a metallic sheen:

It's rather more dark-seeming in the bottle than on the skin, but it's a very wearable shade - if you like sludge colours!  On swatching, it seemed rather familar, so I swatched it next to my beloved Shu Uemura Brown 805:

As you can see, the Shu (on the left there) is rather lighter, and a little more shimmery.  Then I thought that it reminded me of Chanel's Taupe Grise, and so, I swatched that too:

In the bottle, Splash looks a lot more like Taupe Grise, but once on the skin, it definitely loses the greyish cast, and takes on more bronze.  As you can see, the Taupe Grise (far right) looks far more grey, and definitely has a touch of purple in the undertone.

Under slightly different lighting conditions, you can see the differences more clearly.

I like to wear the Ombre D'eaus sheered out on the eyelid, and this is how it looks after six or seven hours on the eyelids:

I'm wearing it here with Guerlain Oriental Metal on the waterline.  I didn't really have a burning desire to pick up any of the rest of the Chanel holiday collection - it was a bit too PINK for me - but will you b getting any?

An open letter to a hairdresser ...

When I made my first visit to a hairdresser for blogging purposes last year, I wrote this:

"I find the thought of trying out a new hair salon pretty terrifying, I've been known to hang around outside salons for ages trying to pluck up the courage to actually walk in and make an appointment!   As a result, it's entirely possible I don't visit the hairdresser as often as I might."

And, even this year, when I've been to many hair events, met many hairdressers, and even judged a national hairdressing competition, I stand by those words.  I've met, talked to, and had my hair done by many amazing hairdressers this year, and for every individual who has worked miracles with my insane thatch, sadly, I do still find the ones that reduce me to a quivering jelly of inadequacy and incoherence.  In fact, I do - still - find the thought of walking into a new salon absolutely terrifying, because, not only do I live in fear of the Bad Haircut, I also live in fear of the Bitchy Stylist.


In all honesty there is only one thing worse in a hair salon than the Bad Haircut/Style/Colour and that is the hairdresser who, if you draw their attention to the problem, makes it feel like it's entirely YOUR fault.


This, therefore, is an open letter to every hairstylist who has ever belittled a client in the name of protecting their own reputation:


Dear Hairdresser,


In today's recession-hit times, a new hairdo becomes an even bigger investment of both time and money for your clients. A new client walks over your threshold in a strange mixture  of anticipation of an hour or three of pampering, and utter terror that things will go wrong.  We save up our pennies, and hope that this time - oh, this time - will be the time we come out of the salon with the haircut of our dreams, that we will, in fact, come out looking like Nicole Kidman, Nigella Lawson or Kate Moss, and not like the frumpy knackered accountant who walked in.  Ironically, we all know it won't happen, but, under the circumstances, we'll generally settle for "looking better than we did when we walked in".  It's a compromise we'll usually all be happy with.


Occasionally, things do go wrong, and, when they happen, I'd like to suggest the following steps not to take when the disgruntled customer walks over the threshold:


1) Do not greet the customer with the words "What did you do?".  Nine times out of ten, the only thing the customer will have done is exactly what you told them to do.  The only thing this question will elicit is the feeling that you have assumed the customer is an incapable idiot.  It will also make them anxious, and, also, make them defensive.  Things will not go well during the conversation if you make the customer uncomfortable just for walking through the door.

2) Do not, whatever you do, sneer at whatever the customer says in response to the question posed in step one.  It's bad enough that you've already made the customer feel incapable of looking after their hair, do not then compound that feeling by making your dislike of the poor creature with the terrible hair you created plain to see, as well.

3) Do not then use any of the following phrases: "well, it's not ... horrendous/dreadful/terrible/disgusting/awful/as bad as you think".  What this phrase actually means is that whichever adjective you've chosen to describe your clients hair as "not" being, is the first word that sprang to your mind, and now you're denying it to yourself.  If your client has plucked up the courage to complain about what you've done to their hair, and the best thing you, the stylist who created the situation can think of to describe it is "not horrendous" then, well ... it suggest that actually, you've got a pretty dreadful hairdo, to be honest.

4) Please, please, please at this point, do not patronise the client.  If you've already committed the errors in points 1), 2) and 3) then patronising your client at this point will just put the tin lid on things.  Calling her love/darling/sweetheart or anything of that ilk is just going to make your client angry.  You know her name, please use it.  Also if you can possibly avoid it, try not to contradict your client at this point too.

Things you might want to do:

1) Apologise.  No one wants a disappointing haircut/style/colour.  But, if your client has taken time out of their day to come show you their disappointing hair, then the least you can do is apologise for them having to come back to see you.  Clients, particularly upset ones can indeed be a pain in the backside to deal with, but I guarantee that the majority of people who do complain are in genuine distress about their hair, and it would be nice to show you have some empathy with them.

2) Listen to the client.  Why are they unhappy?  Is it something that can be fixed quickly, there and then?  If it is, offer to do it.  Are they unhappy because it genuinely is something that went wrong, or is it something very simple that won't take much to sort out.  If you do not listen to what your client is telling you, and assume that everyone who comes back into your salon is purely after something for nothing, then you are just going to make the clients with genuine problems very, very unhappy.  Remember that no one knows their hair like the person attached to it, and if they say there is a problem with the condition, then it's likely that they are right.

(We all know the statistic that a happy client tells one person about a good experience, but an unhappy client will tell seven people, right?)

3) Be prepared to offer the client a second opinion.  And if you do, be prepared for that client to want the person who offers a second opinion to fix the situation - particularly if you went through the stages 1-4 above.


4) Be gracious.  Please don't treat a complaining customer like a criminal. 

5) fix the problem.  I think this one is fairly self explanatory.

Love and kisses,
Lippie xx

An open PS to clients: Don't be a pain in the bum when complaining, stylists are only doing their job, remember?

So there you have it.  Does anyone else have anything they'd like to add?

Shu Uemura - Pleasure of Japanese Bath

Shu are (in)famous for their cleansing oils, but did you know they also have a range of bathing oils?  I didn't until recently, and I spotted these little bottles hiding out in a corner of the Shu store in Covent Garden a few weeks back, and had to try one.  First released 10 years ago, the oils are back, and they're a little different to a lot of other bath oils I've been trying recently.

First of all, the scents veer away a little bit from the traditional "aromatherapy" scents, which is nice.  There are four varieties: Hinoki, which is cypress-scented, Sakura which is cherry blossom, Shobu is iris, and Yuzu is a kind of Japanese citrus.  They're not overly scented, but they disperse beautifully in the water, creating a milky opalescent bathing experience.  My bath has LEDs in the bottom, and when they're combined with the milky water, it really makes for an unusual light show!

They disperse completely, so there's no oil-scum left and it doesn't leave for a slippery bath.  My oil is the Hinoki, which is vaguely herbal-smelling, and with a hint of pine, I find it relaxing to bathe in, and the oils leave my skin soft and moisturised without feeling at all greasy.

The bath oils cost £22 and are available direct from Shu Uemura shops and concessions, sadly, I can't find anywhere that stocks this stuff online in the UK, if you find somewhere, will you let me know?

The Fine Print: PR sample.  Kinda.  I offered to pay!