OPI Japanese Rose Garden

Yes, the time has come again when I change my nail varnish for the beginning of the week!
This week or until it chips really badly, the nail varnish that I am wearing is OPI's "Japanese Rose Garden".  "Japanese Rose Garden" is available in OPI's permanent line, as far as I'm aware it wasn't from a special collection.

OPI describes this nail varnish as "Tokyo's brightest bloom". Personally, that is not much help description wise if I was trying to choose a nail varnish. I would describe this nail varnish as a dusty,mid-tone pink. It's not bright like "Charged Up Cherry" nor is it pale like "Aphrodities Pink Nightie". Think of a creamy, rose pink- that's "Japanese Rose Garden".

In photographs, "Japanese Rose Garden" comes across more of a bright fuschia than a creamy rose, but like I always say, at least you get the idea of the colour.

As usual, the good ole' OPI brush makes it so much easier to apply the nail varnish evenly and all in one stroke. "Japanese Rose Garden" applied OK on the first coat, it was streaky in some places, but on the second coat, all was good and beautiful. Voila! Here's how it looked after a top coat (Seche Vite) was applied.





I promise these will get shorter and a little more helpful as we go along!

XOXO

Urban Decay Naked Palette Review, Photos and Swatches

So I've had Urban Decay's Naked Palette since November 2010 and in just three months, I have completely fallen in love with it! I would say that this palette is the one that I reach for the most in my eyeshadow collection because it has everything I need for day to day makeup. Most days of the week I tend to go for "neutral" eyeshadows, mainly because I am at school and they "forbid" noticeable and heavy makeup but also because I prefer beige/brown eyeshadows to brighter coloured ones. So when Urban Decay released their first ever neutral palette, it was on the top of my WANT list.

Urban Decay's Naked Palette contains twelve, full sized eyeshadow's. Six of them are on the Urban Decay's permanent eyeshadow line, one is a repromoted shade and five are brand new, limited shades to the Urban Decay line. If you are familiar with Urban Decay, you shall know that almost every eyeshadow in their line is extremely shimmery and bright. However, in this new palette it features some MATTES! Yes I know, you're probably thinking "Urban Decay having two matte shadows in a palette of theirs, that's crazy!". What you don't realise is how much you actually appreciate them in the palette, they finish off any eyeshadow look.

The palette has some beautiful, shimmery beige's and pink as well as some highly pigmented matte browns and dark sparkling shades which give you a punch of colour!

Virgin: This eyeshadow is a very pale, shimmery beige. I don't tend to use this eyeshadow as a lid colour because it looks too pale, I usually use it for a highlight colour when I have used alot of matte eyeshadows or I dust a small amount around the tear duct to help make my eyes look more awake on those very early mornings!

Sin: This eyeshadow is typically described as a "champagne" but I personally see more pink in it than beige. This eyeshadow is in UD's permanent line as I have other UD palettes which also feature this eyeshadow. This eyeshadow works well on the lid as a light, neutral colour accompanied with a warm brown eyeliner.

Naked: This eyeshadow is a matte medium-brown. I have to say this is the eyeshadow I use the most out of the entire palette. It is fabulous for a subtle crease as it contours the crease well without looking like you are wearing an overpowering dark brown eyeshadow. It is very smooth to apply unlike other matte eyeshadows which are often chalky and hard to blend.

Sidecar: This eyeshadow is a shimmery (including glitter chunks!) bronze. I love this eyeshadow because I always wanted to get "Midnight Cowboy Rides Again" and never did, but voila "Sidecar". I would recommend not applying foundation etc if you are planning to wear this eyeshadow, as the glitter gets everywhere!! However, once the eyeshadow is on, my, is it beautiful! This eyeshadow was in the first edition of Urban Decay's "Book of Shadows".

Buck: This eyeshadow is a darker, vamped up version of "Naked". It applies just as well as "Naked" and also works great for amplifying the outer third of your eye.

Half Baked: This well-know UD eyeshadow is a light, copper/bronze that has a strong metallic finish. "Half Baked" is a permanent eyeshadow in the Urban Decay line.

Smog: This eyeshadow is a medium-dark bronze with a gilded bronze sheen. This eyeshadow is also permanently available.

Darkhorse: This eyeshadow is a dark, shimmery, chocolate brown with bronze flecks running through it.

Toasted: This eyeshadow is dark bronzed pink, with a very shimmery finish. "Toasted" is permanently available.

Hustle: This eyeshadow is a dark, lusturous chocolate brown with a plum tone to it.

Creep: This eyeshadow is dark blue with a strong black base flecked with silver and teal glitter.

Gunmetal: This eyeshadow is a metallic, blue-gray. In photo's it doesn't capture how nice it actually is, which is a shame. "Gunmetal" can be lightly swept on to the eyelids for a hint of colour or it can be built up for a smoldering smokey eye. This eyeshadow is permanent.

 

A mini "Original" Urban Decay Primer Potion and double ended 24/7 eyeliner (In shades "Whiskey" and "Zero" are also part of the Naked Palette package.

Urban Decay's Primer Potion is vital if you want these stunning eyeshadows to stay put, it is a product that I will continure to re-purchase because it really does do the job.

I had never tried any of Urban Decay's 24/7 eyeliners and I was always curious about them as everyone said they were the business. I'm so glad they were provided with the palette to sample as they are eyeliners that I want to collect more of in various colours. If you don't like using pencil eyeliners because they aren't soft enough, use these! They are so creamy and glide on super easily! The colour "Whiskey" fits with all the eyeshadows in the Naked Palette really well, it's now my "go to" eyeliner!



L-R: Virgin, Sin, Naked, Sidecar, Buck and Half-Baked.





L-R: Smog, Darkhorse, Toasted, Hustle, Creep and Gunmetal.



Overall I would recommend this palette to someone who wants a good quality, neutral palette that lots of different looks out of it without being too overwhelming colour wise.

It is a worthy investment, but good luck if you can find a store that has some in stock because the sell out fast!!

XOXO



OPI Hot and Spicy

Hi everyone! So here is my blogpost of the OPI Collection Series that I have decided to do!

First up is OPI's "Hot & Spicy" from their Hong Kong collection which was released in early spring 2010.

"Hot & Spicy" is creamy peach/ borderline coral. Compared to "A Good Man-Darin" which is another orange shade from the Hong Kong collection "Hot & Spicy" looks alot paler. However when you put it on your nails it still comes across fairly bright! I really like this shade, it is unlike any other peach/orange nail polish I have had before.

Excuse the "claw-like" positioning of my hand, it's the only way I could get the picture! The colour of the polish on my nails looks slightly brighter than in person, but it give you an idea of it's true colour. 

I must say OPI's famous wide brushes really do help with the application of their products. I applied two coats of "Hot & Spicy" to get the colour you see in the picture. The first coats was fairly even with only a tiny amount of streaks and what I didn't manage to get on the first coat I did on the second coat which all nails were completely even with colour. To seal the nail varnish I used Seche Vite's "Dry Fast Top Coat", which is uh-mazing!

Well this was supposed to be short. Is it? Not really...

XOXO

OPI Collection Series

So I decided that as my OPI collection has been gradually growing over these past few months, to be a little help to you nail polish lovers I shall do short (yes, short!) blog posts on each individual OPI nail polish that I have.

These blog posts will feature a picture of the polish (on my nails), a brief description of the colour and my overall opinion on the polish.

Eventually I will do my China Glaze collection and my other polishes of many random brands, but for now I'll stick with OPI :)

XOXO

MAC Studio Sculpt Concealer Review

When I bought this concealer, my main reasons for buying it were for covering up bad acne and redness on my skin as well as using it as an under eye concealer. The price I paid for it at the time was £12.50 but supspect that from the recent VAT rise the price will have increased.

I bought this concealer around March, 2010 and I still have about 3/4's of the pot left! I have to tell you, a little bit goes a long way!

The shade of my Studio Sculpt Concealer is NW15, which for me is almost perfect, maybe just a bit too light for my ridiculously pale skin, but it works well colour-wise in the winter!

The texture of this concealer is very thick, hence why I say a little bit goes a long way. You do not need to pack loads of the concealer onto your concealer brush/ring finger, I made this mistake the first time I used it and ended up with cakey concealer which creased around the eyes. I would personally recommend building the concealer gradually if you are wanting more than good coverage rather than put alot on all at once.

This concealer is really good for covering up all types of acne, believe me, I've had it. It covers up redness of acne extremely well without the need to put loads of the concealer on the acne which can sometimes make it worse. If you are thinking of purchasing this product for an under eye concealer, don't! This concealer is extremely thick and doesn't work well under your eyes. No matter what primers I have tried, none of them have managed to stop this concealer from creasing and looking ghastly by the end of the day, if you don't want it to crease, don't smile or make any expression on your face, I can't do that!

If you have dry skin, this concealer is not for you, Studio Sculpt concealer has a thing to magnetically attract itself to any dry areas on you face and it doesn't look great. If you have oily skin (like me) I believe this concealer is fine for you, with it's texture it's pretty tough to budge of your face even with the oil from your skin!

The product blends well on the skin, but if you are finding it a problem, try using your fingers to apply it as body heat will warm up the concealer and help it blend more naturally, this is what I tend to do everytime I use it.

If you have any further questions contact me via the comment section below or email.

You can purchase this product online at http://www.maccosmetics.co.uk/ if you are in the UK or http://www.maccosmetics.com/ if you are in USA & Canada.

XOXO

MAC Painterly Paint Pot Review

Unlike my MAC Fix+, I did not look up any reviews on MAC's paint pot in the shade Painterly. Yes, I took a risk. However I did purchase the paint pot at a MAC counter, so I was able to swatch the product and compare the shade of Painterly with the rest of MAC's collection of  paint pots. A "paint pot" is a cream eyeshadow that can be used on their own or as a base for other eyeshadows that would be used. They come in various finishes, but most of them are frosts.

My initial reason for buying this product was for those lazy days when I just wanted to wack on some eyeliner, a bit of lipstick and go! I have very fair skin, so my eyelids have slight discolouration due to the veins surrounding and on my eyelids. In words, it's sounds pretty weird but in reality it's most likely only me that notices the discolouration on my eyes, but it bugs me! So I wanted an eyeshadow of a cream formula (NOT CONCEALER!) that covered up the majority of the discolouration on my eyes and at the same time appearing as an even, neautral eyeshadow for underneath my eyeliner.

Other reasons for buying this product were that as an opaque, light, cream base, the paint pot intesifies the eyeshadow that you plan to apply on top of it and prolongs the wear of the eyeshadow. Paint pots are also known for being good eye primers, preventing or reducing creasing of the eyeshadow worn.

Painterly is described as a Nude Beige. This shade literally matches my skin colour, though it may have a slight darker pink tone to it than what my skin does, but that doesn't bother me!

This product applies amazingly well! On myself I use my ring finger to apply the product, this works well because it warms the cream formula as you place the eyeshadow on your eyelids. I found that as soon as I placed my finger into the pot and onto the product, the product starts to melt and feel super silky, which makes it so much easier to apply! Obviously on someone else for hygienic reason, using a brush is a must! I am sure that the paint pot will apply just as well with a brush. I would advise you to use a good quality eye cream every night as this will stop the skin around your eyes being dry and the paint pot clinging and emphasising flaky skin. The paint pot dries fairly quickly after it is applied but I feel that this prevents smudging of the product into nooks and crannies where you don't want it to go!

I will say when you purchase a paint pot for the first time you will discover that the first few times you use it, it is not as creamy and soft as you expected. This is because you need to break through the very thin, top layer of the paint pot; this is done by running whatever you apply the paint pot with over the entire surface of the product everytime you use it. Eventually, the paint pot will be broken in and you will be thrown into it's loveliness.

Paint pots have also been known to dry up after a short amount of time after purchase. This has not yet happened to me, and hopefully it won't! I bought my paint pot in March 2010 and it is still in perfect condition. It could be due to how well you take care of your product, if you leave the lid off for a period of time regularly, then you should expect something like this to happen.

I did try the paint pot as a replacement of my Urban Decay Primer Potion for a couple of days or so. I wasn't impressed. My eyeshadow creased and went all over the place, but with all respect the paint pots aren't promoted as an eye primer, this is just word of mouth that they are good as eye primers. I disagree, this could be because I have ridiculously oily skin. The same product can be different for everyone!

On the other hand, the paint pot is fantastic for what I bought it for; a neutral eyeshadow with good coverage to be applied underneath my eyeliner, to give me that "bright eyed and bushy tailed" appearence!

You can purchase this product online from http://www.maccosmetics.co.uk/ if you are in the UK or http://www.maccosmetics.com/ if you are in the USA or Canada.

If you have any further questions contact me in the comment section below!

xoxo

MAC Fix+ Review.

So before buying MAC's Fix+ "finishing mist", I searched YouTube and the web (specifically makeupalley.com) for reviews on this product, and honestly they weren't too great! Most of the women/men who left negative reviews said that it broke them out, made their skin excessively oily and they ended up throwing the Fix+ away?!

However I took a risk and went to my nearest MAC counter and bought Fix+. I completely disagree with everything that was said in the negative reviews, and I know that it's all a matter of opinion but I found it weird how positive reviews on this product were very sparse! How anyone can THROW this product in the trash I will never know!

First of all the product is very long lasting! I bought Fix+ in March 2010 for £11.50, I still have a quarter of the bottle left and thats with using 2-3 sprays everyday! As an American would say, "You get more bang for your buck!".

The product has very nice scent to it, to me it smells very fresh but not citrus-y. I think this is due to some of it's ingredients; cucumber, camellia leaf extract etc.

I have very oily skin and this is why the second thing I love about this product is that is does not make my skin any oilier than it already is. The main job of Fix+ is hydrate and maintain great appearence of your skin with all the special, skin loving ingredients it has. For example the cucumber in Fix+ eases any inflammed areas on the face and helps reduce puffiness under the eyes and the caffeine in Fix+ helps your skin look more awake and refreshed. So I did worry that being as Fix+ was mainly a moisterising agent it would make the area it came into contact with produce even more oil. That was not the case. It did hydrate my skin, and left it looking radiant! I also had at the time I bought Fix+ very bad acne, but I did not find that Fix+ affected it in any way niether did it increase the amount of acne I got each day. People also said that it made them look like a "grease ball", this does happen if you spray Fix+ too close to your face, but if you spray it at an elbow's length then this does not happen.

This product has many different uses, which is why I think it is a must have item to have in your beauty collection! You can use Fix+ during the summer when the weather is extremely warm (obviously not in the U.K, hah!) and you want your bare, makeup free, skin refreshing. If you are ever worried that your face powder looks too "cakey" or matte, Fix+ is your new best friend! Fix+ takes away that "cakey-ness" without removing the actual use of a face powder. At what stage of your face makeup process you use Fix+ is totally up to you! I used to spray Fix+ over my face powder which was my final stage of my face makeup process but now I spray Fix+ just after my concealer/foundation stage and before my face powder because I use less face powder when Fix+ is applied before it as I feel Fix+ helps adhere the face powder better and easier therefore I use less. If your the type of person who grabs a spritser bottle full of water every now and again because you like to amplify the shade of certain eyeshadows that you feel are "dull" or use it as a mixing medium, then MAC's Fix+ is your best solution. Yes, water is alot cheaper but Fix+ provides the skin with extra vitamins and minerals that water can't as well as doing the job you wanted it for in the first place!

The Fix+ bottle has been designed very well for travelling! The bottle has a slide cap which locks into place after use to prevent any spillage,if placed in a handbag or any other luggage. When the Fix+ is sprayed no extra liquid leaks from the bottle, which means NO WASTE!

You can purchase this product online from http://www.maccosmetics.co.uk/ if you are in the UK or http://www.maccosmetics.com/ if you are in the USA & Canada.

If you have any further questions about this product let me know in the comment section!

xoxo