Phytoplage Sun Protectant Hair Oil and Recovery Mask

Sharp-eyed readers might have noticed there's a bit of a theme this week ... holidays!  This is because I'm preparing to head off into the sunshine for a while, and, in typical "me" fashion, I'm concentrating on the products I'll be packing instead of the clothes ... (I hate summer clothes generally, it's always a problem when you basically dress in black all year round!).

I actually trialled both of these during my honeymoon in 2013, and thought they were so marvellous that I'm taking them along with me during this year's holiday too.  I have coloured hair, and it is also rather curly, so hot climes and saltwater tend to do a lot of damage to what I laughingly call "my hair" when I'm away.  The oil spray protects from pool chemicals and UV rays from the sun during the day, meaning you can both swim and sunbathe without worrying about your hair frying, and the hair mask (which I use as a normal conditioner when abroad) helps soothe frazzled strands after a hard day in the sunshine.

They smell delicious too. There's a matching shampoo, but I don't bother with that, usually just taking whatever I normally use, but it's hard to beat these two for hair protection in the sun.

It's that or a hat. And I look like an idiot in a hat ... Phyto haircare is available now, and these two products will set you back £16 each.

 
The Fine Print: PR Samples


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Nuxe Huile Prodigieuse Shower Oil

 Last year Nuxe released a perfume version of their cult Huile Prodigieuse, which I liked a great deal (and reviewed it here), and this year they're releasing a Shower Oil version, which, I'm not going to lie, I like a great deal.

Smelling identical to both the oil and the perfume versions of Huile Prodigieuse, it's a creamy floral, suntan-lotion scented shower oil in a slightly balmy-texture. It has a slight golden shimmer (similar to the Huile Prodigieuse d'Or version) throughout, which will leave your skin with a slight gleam, but not looking like you've showered with a drag queen.  It lathers up nicely with a shower puff, and leaves skin feeling clean and moisturised, without drying or dragging.

All in all a very nice product, I'll be packing this one to take away with me this year.  After all, if you can't smell like you're on your holidays when you're actually on your holidays, when can you?

It'll be instore soon.

The Fine Print: PR Sample


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Guerlain Reissues Terracotta le Parfum for 2015

Last year, to celebrate the 30th anniversary of their iconic bronzing range, Terracotta, Guerlain released a limited edition tiare-inspired fragrance Terracotta Le Parfum, and to say it was a hit would be a mild understatement.  It sold out in what seemed like moments, and I kicked myself hugely for not hunting down a bottle as soon as I saw the press release. So this year, when I discovered it was being re-released, I wasted no time and literally had a bottle in my hands the day after I found out it was back ....

On first spray, you're enveloped in a cloud of white flowers and sunshine. Tiare always smells tropical to me. Waxy and fat, it's an ingredient I used to have trouble with after overdosing on LouLou in the eighties, but it is something I'm slowly re-learning to love, and love it I do, now.  Anyway, here the tiare is surrounded by jasmine, ylang-ylang coconut and vanilla, and the effect is like expensive suntan lotion on hot skin initially, bringing to mind beaches and cocktails, and sun-warmed sand.  Once the tiare flowers wear off a little, there's a creamy and milky musk with hints of orange blossom left behind that wears close to the skin, and reminds you of holidays in warmer climes than the UK.

It's a lovely bottle too, a flat gold-embossed flask with a wooden top.  I'm actually taking this away with me on my summer holidays this year, but if you can't afford a holiday away, the bottled sunshine of Terracotta le Parfum might just be an acceptable substitute ... 

The Fine Print: PR Sample



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Juliette Has A Gun - Gentlewoman

At a lunch last week with Romano Ricci, the creator of Juliette Has A Gun, I was surprised that he thinks Gentlewoman is all about almonds, because to me, Gentlewoman is green, all the way down, and when it is not green, it is citrus.

Conceived as a masculine-style fragrance for women (and as a woman who used to wear aftershave, because I couldn't stand the sugary-sweet confections the high-street called perfumes for years, I totally get where that impulse has come from), JHaG Gentlewoman is a real treat if you like cologne-style fragrances with lasting power, and without that particular "sporty man smell" that some cheaper aftershaves specialise in.

Opening with bittersweet neroli and bergamot with wafts of deeply green petitgrain, Gentlewoman is sharp and exhilarating at first sniff, threatening to become totally heady and off-balance, but this is soon offset by an almost soapy orange blossom scent (soapiness in a perfume being something I happen to adore, but your mileage might vary), and there is just a hint of a marzipan accord which adds a little sweetness to take the edge off the headiness. It's not overly nutty, or sweet, but it just takes the scent in a slightly different direction to how you would expect after the almost straight-forward cologne-style opening, adding a little creamy depth to the ode to orange in all its forms in the upper notes of the fragrance.  In the dry-down there are musks and woods, but the marzipan and orange-blossom stay all the way to the end, and it lasts incredibly well on the skin.

It's rather discreet, staying close to the skin, and yet it is subtly sexy, reminding me of hot, soapy skin after a long and steamy shower (rugby player optional).  It reminds me, in the best possible way, of Jean Paul Gaultier's classic Fleur Du Male, which attempted to play with gender roles in a similar way albeit from the opposite end, creating a feminine fragrance that men wouldn't be afraid to wear (only they were terrified, and JPG FdM was discontinued a couple of years ago), but whereas Fleur du Male's take on orange blossom was very much of the soapy barber-shop shaving-cream variety, Gentlewoman does have a slightly lighter and fresher, in spite of the unusual nutty creaminess, take on the note.

Romano mentioned that the marzipan note was inspired by the French version of PVA glue, scented as it is with almonds, and, for him, this accord is the one that he smells most of all.  Having worn it a few times now (for, since this turned up, this has been the only fragrance I've wanted to wear, despite only having had it a week), the marzipan note definitely gets more apparent the longer you wear it.  I'm genuinely slightly in love with Gentlewoman, and I never expected that. Is it original?  Not particularly.  But it is bloody, bloody lovely.   I lack the vocabulary to tell you how much I HATE the damn box though.  It's cheap and nasty foam, and it takes up three times the space it needs to, for no reason whatsoever. So, there's that.

Gentlewoman, for when you want to smell like a hot sexy man, but can't be bothered nicking his aftershave.  Currently a Selfridges exclusive, for £75.

The Fine Print: PR Sample

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Chantecaille Autumn/Winter 2015 - Protect the Wolves Collection

Every August, Chantecaille release their autumn charity collection and this year it is wolf-themed.  5% of the proceeds of each "Protect the Wolf" collection product will be donated to the Northwest Conservation group.  I love the animal palettes, and this years collection is a nice one:

A nude lip, a smokey eye palette and a peachy blush, it's bang on trend for a winter palette (well, if you can wear nude lips, it is).  Let's take a closer look:

From left to right in the eye palette, we have Evergreen, which is a sparkling blackened pine green.  Then there is Timber Wolf, a beautiful metallic old gold taupe, and finally Midnight which is a slightly shimmering soft black.

The taupe (for Chantecaille are the queens of taupe) is perfect for every day, and you can use the black and green either as liners for a daytime look, or smoke them out for a more dramatic night time look.  If you use them without a primer, you will get a very subtle look, but the above has been swatched over primer.

Macro close-up of Evergreen

Macro closeup of Midnight

Pretty and versatile, and will cost £65 when released in August

The Lip Chic is called Patience, and is the usually balm-y feeling wondrous texture of the lip chics. A soft, peachy nude, it's sheer, but not unpigmented. Sadly, this particular shade is one that makes me look like death warmed up, so I won't be wearing it out of the house.  It'll cost £30 when it is released in August, however.

A good companion to Patience Lip Chic is the Ella Blush, which comes complete with an embossed wolf head, as does the eye palette.  Another soft peach, this is a perfect complement to the smokey eye palette, and is a good match to the lip colour.  It will cost £33 when it is released in August.

Here's the entire collection swatched - Ella blush at the top, Patience Lip Chic at the bottom. and with the eye palette in the middle.  It's a well thought out. and tightly edited collection.

Will you be helping Chantecaille save the wolves this year?


The Fine Print: PR Samples - collection released in August 2015.


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Jo Loves: Candle Shot

There's no doubt whatsoever, that Jo Malone is the queen of packaging, every brand she has been involved with has understood the power of making boxes and bags so pretty (for every purchase, at every price point) that they're ideal for gifting, making the concept of "gift wrapping" totally redundant in the process.  The latest launch in her newest brand, "Jo Loves" takes the concept up a notch, allowing you to create a "bespoke"  shot candle in a very simple process (which was actually three years in the making), and have lots of fun doing it, too.

Tucked away in the back of the brand's flagship store in Elizabeth Street in West London, is the Jo Loves Shot Candle studio, and here you pick a "base" scented candle, and a complementing "shot" to go with it.  The two are then fused together in one large candle jar, and presto, your own bespoke scent!

In the glass is the base scent, and you pick a "shot" to go with it

The bases are available in four varieties: Mint Mojito a fresh and bright minty scent, Charcoaled Lemons, which is both authentically citrus and slightly smoky, Tahitian Gardenia, which is flowery, waxy and almost bubblegummy in the glass, and finally Fig Tree, which reminded me of nothing so much as Diptyque's Philosykos in candle form, it being green and figgy and woody and rather delicious.

You then pick a shot to complement your base scent.  You can either choose from the four bases as already mentioned. or from three other "shot only" scents, Mango, an almost photorealistic slice of mango, lemongrass (something my nose didn't like at all, sadly) or petitgrain, which is reminscent of orange blossom, but with an added hint of wood and leafy greenness.

Once you've selected your base and your shot (you're given the scents to smell on painted canvas tiles), your candle is created. Using a blow torch to melt the base candle, the plug-shaped "shot" is pushed into the jar, and pressed down to create your "bespoke" candle, then the whole caboodle is packaged up ready to either burn for yourself, or to pass along to someone else as a present.

Whilst there's nothing particularly new about separate cores in candle making (it's a particular bugbear of mine when you buy a "handpoured" candle, only to find when burning it that all they have done is "handpour" a tiny amount of fragranced wax around a separate - unfragranced - core and wick.  It's why many people don't think scented candles actually smell of anything when they're burning. I shan't name names though) the presentation here is beautiful, and as both the shot and the base are scented, it's actually a rather nice present for anyone, including yourself.

If you can't make it to the Elizabeth Street store, you can make your own shot candle online at http://www.joloves.com/shot-candle/ where they will cost £75 each.

As for me, I chose Tahitian Gardenia and Petitgrain.  But I'm rather coveting Charcoaled Lemons and Fig Trees for my next one ...

 The Fine Print: PR Sample


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Helena Rubinstein Wanted Stellars Lipstick - 304 Cosmic Purple

 And now for something you definitely can't buy in the UK (there will be more next week, don't worry), Helena Rubinstein Wanted Stellars Lipstick in Cosmic Purple.  It's not really purple, it's really a sort of bright berry shade, and I fell in love with it at the airport and refused to leave without it.

It's another sheer shade, but not unpigmented, and one packed with beautiful gold and blue micro-shimmers:

I miss Helena Rubinstein cosmetics a great deal, part of it is sentimental attachment, Helena is a beauty idol of mine (she was short, fat, sarcastic, and didn't have any time for the more frou-frou elements of the beauty industry, she's been a huge influence on my blog. She was also a genius, sadly, I can't even slightly claim to follow in her footsteps there), and Helena Rubinstein the company was responsible for many of the beauty innovations we take for granted today, mascara in a tube with the brush built in, anyone?  They withdrew from the UK a good few years ago now, and it's only when I go abroad that I can stock up.  So I have ...

Anyhoo, back to the lipstick:

It's another glossy one, as you can see here in the post-swatch pic.  It's a bolder colour all-round than the Dior lipstick we featured on Monday, and it's rather lovely, if less subtle:

Here you can really see the micro-sparkles catching the light, but here's another swatch from a slightly different angle:

On the lips its a deep rose, or berry shade, made multi-dimensional from the sparkles.  It doesn't feel gritty on the the lips at all (as you might expect looking at the amount of glitter in the bullet), and it doesn't look "glittery" in wear either, you just get a bit of a blue flash, or a gold gleam, depending on which angle you're looking at it from.

It's beeeyootiful, and I'm kicking myself right now for only having picked the one of these up, believe you me.  Anyway, next time you're near a duty-free, check out Helena Rubinstein, you could do a lot worse ...

The Fine Print: Duty Free.  I love a bit of duty free.  Sorry.  Not sorry.

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