Lippie Wedding Update - We Need Help!

 Nothing really goes smoothly during wedding planning, hmn?  At this time last week, we had everything set, the ceremony was booked, the reception was booked, the invites were printed, the guest list was drawn up, the cakes had been ordered, the photographer booked, the hairdresser arranged, the bouquet picked out, the band arranged, practically everything! Not to mention that I had literally just bought my wedding dress!

Then, a week ago today, we got  the email (well, one them, anyway) that every about-to-be married couple dreads. Our reception venue has gone bust, and can no longer honour our booking.  Now, on the one hand, we're very lucky, we still have nine months left to arrange everything , and we hadn't had to pay a deposit, so financially we haven't really lost out - okay, we have lost the money on our now useless invitations though, but we'll live - but I can't even begin to express what a kick in the teeth having to start the planning stages all over again is.  I'm heartbroken, truly.  Especially when you consider that it took me FIVE attempts just to book a damn register office!


The major problem is that our budget is very, very tight, and our guest list is long - we're having a tiny ceremony, and having only one reception that everyone is going to, no wedding breakfast, just one big party for all of our friends - so this is where you guys come in.  We need help finding a venue for our wedding reception.  I'm begging you, please help me out.


Here's what we need from the venue:


DATE:

February 16th 2013


MUST:

be able to hold 150-200 people - standing buffet-style, not all-seated.
allows live music - we already have a band arranged
allow children - just a few, but it's non-negotiable
have a minimal hire charge - we can guarantee a (very) healthy minimum spend on the night, but if one more venue gets in touch saying "Hey, we're cheap" only for me to discover that their hire charge starts at £3,500 to hire for the evening,  I will cry.  More than happy to pay a deposit too, by the way.
be in West London - we are getting married at 4pm, so travelling across London at that time won't be fun!  Chelsea/Kensington/Fulham/Hammersmith/Shepherds Bush area as a first choice, but we will consider further afield if the need arises.
Can either cater, or allow us to bring in our own food

Basically what we want is a bar, a nice comfortable bar that will let us take over the place for the evening, and let us do our own thing, essentially.  No formal wedding meal, no bloody toastmasters directing the "ceremonies",  nothing too formal.  What we're keen to avoid is a community hall, or a more traditional "wedding banquet" venue. Well, at the moment, we are, anyway!


So, please get in touch with wedding@getlippie.com if you think you can help, or if you can put me in touch with someone who can help, we'll be ever so grateful!  

I got in touch with FIFTEEN venues last week myself, do you know how many replied to my simple request for information?  One.  ONE.  There's a recession on, don't people want to take my money?

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

Benefit That Gal Limited Edition

Oh, now this is cute. To celebrate the Jubilee and the Olympics, Benefit are bringing out a limited edition version of their popular That Gal primer.  The product remains the same, but the packaging has had a "British" (read: London) - centric makeover.  Let's take a look:

 

It's certainly cute, and continues onto the tube itself:

But this is Get Lippie, and I'm all about what's inside.  I don't think I've reviewed this before, so here goes.  That Gal is a pink facial primer, that has brightening effects when used.   The rube has a wind up mechanism, and you apply the product to you face, direct from the tube, even though it's a liquid product:

Don't tell me I'm the only one thinking about the playdo barbershop, right now.

On the skin it's slight tint helps even out skintone, and leaves you looking glowing, allegedly:

You don't need a huge amount to cover your whole face, and this is best used under your foundation, but you can also add a dab to areas of your face on top of your base to add a little glow too:

It's a nice product, but ... I find it smells unearthly sweet so tend to use very, very little indeed and then can't bring myself to put it all over my face.  


But hey!  Pretty box ...


 The Fine Print: PR Sample.


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

Benefit Sun Beam

You might have noticed a theme this week - summer.  Yes, I know the last few weeks have had lousy wet weather, but I am determined to make things a little summery right now!  With that in mind, I'm happy to show you Benefit Sun Beam, the latest addition to the "Beam" collection, alongside "High" and "Moon", both of which I happen to adore, but can't find right now ...

Anyhoo, Sun Bean is described as a golden bronze highlighter it's actually very pretty, and a lot more versatile than I thought it would be on first opening the bottle:

Almost an "antique" gold shade, this would be flattering on many skin shades, from the palest through to very dark olive, I suspect.  I'm extremely pale at the moment, and even I find it wearable:

See the pretty speckles?  I'm glad to see that it's not too orange, as that would be very difficult for a lot of people to wear, I think.

As with the other liquid highlighters in the range, Sun Beam is easy to blend, and leaves a lovely glow, without glitter.

It's pigmented just enough to leave your skin with a pretty sheen, and will look great on tanned cheekbones if we ever get any sun this year!

Benefit Sun Beam will be available from June. 



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

Tom Ford S/S 2012 Cream Colour for Eyes in Platinum and Spice

Following on from yesterdays peek at the new metallic collection from Tom Ford, I'm going to show you what I would have purchased from the collection if wedd-onomics (what?  It's totally a word) and common sense hadn't kicked in first. Those are the cream eyeshadows in Spice and Platinum.

Love the packaging, (with one minor caveat) from the mock-croc boxes:

I like bar codes, what's your problem?

To the heavy-weight gold-etched glass pots:

To the off-centre sticky labels on the top of the pots.  Hang on!  Crooked sticky labels?  Oh, Tom.

But never mind, it's what's inside that counts, right?

Oh, my, these are lovely.  A silvery taupe, and mid-tone coppery brown, just up my alley!  Let's take a closer look:

Yes, I swatched before snapping.  BAD beauty blogger!

In the pots, Platinum seems much more metallic, and stiffer a consistency than Spice, but this isn't really the case.  The formula for both of these is feather light, lighter even than the bouncy Chanel's we've had recently, and definitely lighter than the Armani Eyes to Kill shadows which have been out for a while now.  They're so light that initially I thought they wouldn't wear well, but I'll get onto that shortly.

The shades are multi dimensional, and rather complex on skin, here are some swatches:

Simple finger swatch:

Macro shot:

The same swatches blended out.

A little of this formula really does go a very long way, especially with the more pigmented Spice, they blend very easily, I created a very nice smokey eye look with these in about 30 seconds flat just using my fingers (something unheard of for me, I'm dedicated to my brushes), and I was very impressed with the finish.

At £28 each though, these are on the pricey side, and, when it comes to that sort of price, I want things to last, so do they?  Yes, actually, I was very surprised at how well these lasted on an extremely damp day recently, they got through eight hours of heavy wear (there was a bit of eye-rubbing), with minimal creasing and very little fading indeed.  Considering you can barely feel you're wearing them at all, I was extremely impressed indeed!  I think Platinum is very quickly going to become a staple for me, as I'll be able to create a simple pulled-together look very quickly on those mornings where thinking is impossible*.

* Weekdays.  Every other weekend.  The weekends inbetween.

The Fine Print Makeup fairy delivery.Don't tell me they don't exist.  I'll cry.

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

Tom Ford S/S 2012 Gold Dust Lip Lacquer and Gold Haze Nail Varnish

I am a jammy so-and-so, I freely admit it.  The last couple of weeks have been pretty tough for a variety of reasons, but, nothing lifts my spirits more than an unexpected parcel, and if said unexpected parcel contains a variety of items from the latest collection from Tom Ford, well, it's a very cheery thing for this knackered accountant indeed!

I had been pawing this latest collection of metallics in Selfridges a couple of weeks ago, but wedding economics are now LAW in the Lippie household, so I managed to restrain myself, contented my lemmings with a few swatches, and, after a bit of sighing at the unfairness of the universe, I left the pretty behind.

Right, that sorry tale over, on with the pictures!  Today I'm going to show you the lipgloss and the nail varnish, and tomorrow you'll be able to see the cream eyeshadows.

I'm not a huge fan of gold cosmetics, they don't really suit me, but I do admire a lot of gold makeup, in particular "old gold" shades, neither of these quite fit that description, but they're lovely nonetheless.

First up, Gold Haze Nail Varnish:

It appears quite a "sandy" sort of shade in the photos, but on my nails the brassy quality of the shade shines through making it a rather difficult wear for me, as it makes my skintone rather "lobster-ish".

Horrific application on crap nails, I'm very sorry

That said, it's a lovely, multi-dimensional shade, that I think will look amazing on warmer skintones than mine.

Pictures show three coats of polish, applied by a ham-fisted muppet.

Now onto the lip lacquer:

I love the rather matte effect you get from the tube, and thought this was going to be rather more opaque than it actually turned out to be:

The shade is actually a rather warmer colour than the nail varnish, something I'm trying (and failing miserably, but hey, it's good picture of my ring) to show below:

A little bit of this goes a long way, it's lightly vanilla scented, and you can't really feel the glitter on the lips, I think it'd make a great layering shade over darker lipsticks, to give them a bit of depth and dimension.

I think it's really pretty, but, in all honesty, it's not a shade I'd ever wear alone!

The Tom Ford Spring Metallics collection is available now, and the nail polish and lip lacquer both cost £25.

The Fine Print: a PR surprise, and a most welcome one.
 
This post originated at: http://getlippie.com All rights reserved.

Elizabeth Arden Rose Gold Collection

Ignore the chintzy, and slightly dowdy, boxes, this is a beautiful, beautiful collection from Elizabeth Arden this summer, I've been very pleasantly surprised with what's in these boxes this year:

Yes, a collection of rose gold compacts, and lipstick. These are gorgeous, and really tactile.  What we have here are two bronzers, a highlighter and a lipstick:

You have (clockwise from left), Rose Illumination, bronzer in Soft Radiance, bronzer in Warm Radiance, and lipstick in Rose Aurora. 

A closer look in the same order:

  

And  swatches:

I'll be honest, it's been a long, long time since I picked up anything from Elizabeth Arden's cosmetic range (I've been a long time devotee of Green Tea though, and get through a bottle a year), and, I have to say that I've been exceptionally pleasantly surprised by the quality of these products.  

The powders are finely milled and very silky, which, despite some sparkles visible in the pans, are very easy to wear, and blend well on the skin.  The rose illuminator in particular is very flattering on the skin, and would suit a wide variety of skintones.  It was also nice to see different shades of bronzer - I've been using the soft radiance to "warm up" some of my winter foundations, which are just a shade too pale for this time of year.  The warm radiance would be a better choice if you've a more olive skin shade than me though.

The lipstick is creamy and emollient and very easy to wear, the shade, if I'm entirely honest isn't entirely right for me, but the formula is lovely.  And, I love, love, love the packaging!  A slightly better shade for me is Tulip, which is in slightly different packaging, but is a gorgeous bright pink:

 And just to show the difference in colours:

I just wish they'd done a translucent powder in that gorgeous rose-gold finish so I could carry it with me year-round!

Think you'll be picking anything up from Elizabeth Arden this summer?

The Fine Print: PR Samples.  There may have been a bit of squealing "ooh, it's PINK!" when I opened the boxes.  I'm *such* a girl sometimes.

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

Engagement Bling II - Monica Vinader Mini Luna

I was devastated when the original engagement rings MrLippie and I had decided on turned out to be ... not as high in quality as we would have liked, two of them kept dulling, and marking my finger, so, it was with some regret that we decided to replace them.  I'd had my eye on the rings at Monica Vinader for a while, and initially had my heart set on the Medina Faceted ring in Labradorite, but, when we got to the store yesterday, it just looked wrong on my tiny, stumpy fingers, we we went for the Mini Luna ring in labradorite instead (which is the one on the left in the photo above).  But, because I never do things in halves (I'm an accountant, I fear fractions), we had to buy the amethyst version too ...

Personally, I love the chequerboard faceting on both rings, 

And the hammered finish on the bands:

 I also love how snugly the bands fit together, too.  Making them extremely comfortable to wear.


Best of all, when we were instore on Saturday, Monica Vinader had an engraver in-store, so MrLippie had one of them inscribed:

It reads: "Love Without Limit"

As they're stacking rings, I've been able to add one of the rings from my original set back to these two, here's how I've been wearing them recently:

And, because I've found it next to impossible to capture the blue flash in the Labradorite ring with my "real" camera, here's a bonus instagram pic (from the iphone) that does capture it:

I love these rings!  And, best of all, there's an entire store FULL of bits and bobs to mix and match with.


Yes, M, that is a hint ...  Oh, and Monica Vinader have an engraver in-store every Saturday ...


More wedding stuff soon, lots going on!

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