Anastasia Beverly Hills DipBrow Pomade – Review

After years of over plucking our brows many of us (including myself) weren’t ready for the fuller brow trend. DipBrow from Anastasia is one of the most popular products from last year since the eyebrow craze took over as it promises to transform those little sparse hairs above your eyes into brows that even Brooke Shields would envy.

Dipbrow pomade is described as an eyebrow colour used to sculpt brows which glides on effortlessly and stays on even against heat and oiliness. Anastasia Beverly Hills is not readily available in the UK but luckily there are a few online stores like BeautyBay (they delivered my package the very next day with no delivery cost) who stock this brand. DipBrow comes in 11 different shades to match different hair colours from light blonde to jet black.

When choosing a colour I knew that I didn’t want anything too dark as dark brows don’t look good next to my small eyes. There are quite a few brown shades to choose from, In the end I opted for Ash Brown. From the swatch below you can tell it’s a very cool brown shade and is perfect for shaping my brows for a natural daytime look. I think I’m going to purchase the colour “Chocolate” next, for when I want my brows to have a bit more drama.

This product is best applied with an angled eyeliner brush. I find the consistency to be very smooth and moussey. I was under the impression that this would be very difficult to use and actually I couldn’t be more wrong. All it takes is a few swipes of this product to shape and fill in my brows. I use concealer afterwards to clean up any mistakes. Admittedly I’m not great at shaping my brows in general, but they’re meant to be sisters, not twins…right?

The staying power of this is incredible. It lasts all day even with my greasy T-zone, humidity and water. Impressively, when I rub my fingers over this lightly it doesn’t budge. Removal is easy with an oil based make-up remover.

Overall, for £15, this brow product is a great investment. It is great if you do not have any eyebrows as it allows you to create a new shape but also great if you just want to perfect and fill in your brows. The ease of application along with the staying power truly makes it one of the greatest brow products and it wholly deserves its beauty cult status.

Jay x

MAC Sheertone Shimmer Blush – Ambering Rose – Review & Swatch

When I saw this tutorial on Youtube I knew I had to buy the blush that was being used on the model. Ambering Rose from MAC is a Sheertone Shimmer Blush which I believe is one of the most beautiful colours available for darker skin tones.

The colour is difficult to describe, I would say it’s a very warm muted rose colour. It doesn’t appear garish or bright on the skin. There is a shimmer but nothing overwhelming. I love wearing this colour with pink lips during the Spring/ Summer, it adds a nice fresh warmth to the cheeks.

This blush is extremely pigmented and has to be applied with a very light hand. I would say it almost exclusively suits medium tan to deep/dark skin tones, however don’t quote me on that if you’re lighter and love this blush haha! As with all MAC blushes it doesn’t fade, move or change colour during the day.

If you’re around my skin tone or darker you must, must check this out, you will not regret it!

Jay x

MUA Elysium Palette (Naked 3 Dupe?) – Review and Swatch

If you’re a fan of the Urban Decay Naked 3 palette then this is palette from MUA is going to be a winner for you. It has a mix of pink tone eyeshadows both shimmery and matte. There are 4 mattes and 6 satin-shimmers in this palette and it also includes a double ended eyeliner pencil. The best part? This cost just £6.00 from Superdrug!

These colours blend so beautifully with eachother. The shimmers need a fixing agent like Fix + to give their full intensity. This palette would probably suit lighter skin tones the best but nonetheless is very pretty on darker tones. You can get a variety of daytime and smoky looks with this palette. I also like the light pink pencil in the kit to blend under my eyebrows and inner corner of my eyes.

When worn with my Urban Decay Primer Potion the colours last a full 12 hours on me and even survived a sweaty gym session! I didn’t experience any fallout with this but there was a bit of fading throughout the day.

Now onto the swatches:

Until next time peeps!

Jay x

 

Stila Stay All Day Liquid Lipstick (Amore) – Review

I’ve been on the hunt for this lipstick for a while since seeing a swatch of it online. I bought this from Marks and Spencer for £15. It’s a beautiful mauve-plum shade of lipstick which follows the 90’s lip trend. In the tube this has a slight shimmer which is very subtle and doesn’t look overly glittery.

Stila Stay All Day Liquid Lipstick is a creamy-matte, opaque lipstick which has at least 6 hours of wear. It has vitamin E in it to help hydrate the lips. This formula is so creamy and velvety on the lips and the doe-foot applicator makes application smooth.

L-R: After application, dry (flash), dry (no flash)

Once applied the lipstick is shiny and quite a dark colour, it dries down to a lighter fully matte finish. This lipstick lasted the full 6 hours on me and didn’t require a lipliner as there was no bleeding, but I do love pairing this with Soar lipliner from MAC. It does transfer even after it is dry and there was some fading at the end of the day but it faded evenly. Also this was a little bit drying on my lips but I could apply lipbalm on top. This lipstick does require make-up remover to remove completely

I really like this lipstick. It’s a great way for those with darker skintones to try out the 90’s / Kylie Jenner mauve lip. I really want to try some of the other shades from the range now so watch out for more swatches 🙂

Jay x

Maybelline Instant Anti-Age The Eye Eraser Concealer (Nude) – Review

Hey lovelies! I picked this concealer up in Superdrug the other day for £7.99. To be honest I’m a bit confused because I’m not sure whether this concealer is the same as the much talked about “Instant age-rewind concealer” by Maybelline, but perhaps they’ve change the name for the UK? If anyone knows comment below! The colour range for this concealer is a bit dissappointing, there was only two to choose from and this is the darkest.

This concealer is said to instantly conceal dark circles and fine lines because it contains goji berry extract to care for the skin around the eyes.

To dispense the product you have to twist the top until product comes out of the sponge. Initially I wasn’t sure about the sponge as it could harbour bacteria in it, however on the packaging it says this  concealer has an anti-microbial system which doesn’t require any cleaning. The sponge applicator allows a nice even distribution of product.

 L-R: Without concealer, application, blended out

As you can see from the pictures above the colour is a little bit too light for me but it is very highly pigmented and managed to conceal all the darkness. I like that this colour has a yellow tone giving my undereyes a highlighted effect. Once I applied my powder to set my undereye the colour evened out a bit more to match my skin tone. What was really impressive was that this concealer didn’t crease at all under my eyes throughout the day. There was also not a lot of fading throughout the day.

I think I’ll be using this concealer more for highlighting purposes because of the light colour, it blends easily and gives nice coverage for such a lightweight forumula. Definitely a great drugstore concealer.

Jay x

Jane Iredale Amazing Base SPF 20 Loose Mineral Foundation (Latte) – Review

Spring/Summer is coming! This is my favourite time of the year but my skin doesn’t always agree with the heat. I have combination skin and even during the coldest weather my T-zone gets so oily you could fry an egg on it. During the summer any liquid foundation just melts off my face making my skin look and  feel gross.

A lot of oilier skin gals use mineral foundation during the warmer months.  I needed something that has a matte finish, fragrance-free,  contains physical sunscreen and doesn’t contain talc. Cue Jane Iredale Amazing Base!

I bought this foundation from Treat Your Skin for £29.95. There are 17 shades to choose from with cool/neutral/warm tones, I am an NC44 in MAC and I chose the colour “Latte”.  Luckily this is the perfect match for me.

Taken from the Jane Iredale website Amazing Base Loose Powder Foundation is:

“A loose mineral foundation that gives a sheer to medium coverage. Made from micronized minerals, free of synthetic chemicals, oil free and weightless. A foundation, powder, concealer and broad spectrum sunscreen with SPF 20 UVB/UVA. Conceals redness and diffuses appearance of fine lines and pores with soft focus effect.”

Packaging: This is probably the worst part of the foundation. I poked holes in the top of the sticker like advised but find the product difficult to dispense. If I take the sticker off, too much product will fall out.

Formula: I am really impressed with this formula. The sunscreen components are Titanium Dioxide 14%, Zinc Oxide 6% which gives broad UVA and UVB protection. There is Dimethicone present to give the foundation a nice application.  Plankton Extract, Algae Extract which soothes and nourishes skin. Also the product is Vegan friendly, cruelty free.

Fragrance: There is no added fragrance in this powder making it suitable for sensitive/ acne-prone skin.

Texture and application: This powder has a semi-matte finish but is surprisingly pigmented, you can get between light and medium coverage. With mineral foundation it’s good to work in layers so dispense a bit of product and build up coverage.  I used my Bobbi Brown Face Blender Brush (not a great brush by the way- too scratchy and falls out).

Finish: On the skin this powder feels dry on my cheeks within the first hour of use until the natural oils come through, then it looks and feels amazingly skin-like. This foundation doesn’t looks ashy on my skin but actually gives it a nice warmth.

Longevity: This product lasted around 8 hours on me before it started fading, it did allow oil to come through on my T-zone after 4 hours but not nearly as much as normal.

I must admit I was skeptical about the coverage I could get with just a powder but I am fully converted. During the day-time I want something to even out my skintone but not look heavy or clog my pores, especially in hot weather. I reckon this little tub will last the duration of the British warm weather ( which isn’t too long to be honest). I 100% recommend this to anyone who is oily/combination, acne-prone, sensitive and wants to use a light-coverage mineral foundation with natural and effective ingredients.

Below are some pictures of me wearing this foundation today.

Jay x

No flash

With flash

Drugstore Haul

I went to Superdrug today for one item and well …this happened LOL. I found a couple of cool make-up things that I’m excited to try.

1) MUA Pro Palette Elysium £6.00. This palette has a nice mix of matte and shimmery eyeshadows leaning towards the pinker side. It also comes with a double ended eyeliner/highlighter pencil. I’m really excited to try this palette to create some girly spring looks. If you like Urban Decay Naked Palette 3 then this might be a nice dupe.

2) MUA Eyeshadow Palette Heaven And Earth £4.00. This is also a nice neutral shimmer palette again fantastic for the daytime. There’s lots of pretty golds in here which would look really nice in the sunshine ^_^

3) Maybelline Colorstay Stripped Nude Lipstick 728 Honey Beige £6.99. I got this lipstick as I actually don’t own any nudes in my collection. It’s a nice brown-nude with a satin finish.

4) Bourjois Volume 1 Seconde Waterproof mascara £9.99. I need a new mascara and I got this after a recommendation from a friend who said it was amazing. Will probably do a full review later.

5) Maybelline Eraser Eye Concealer Nude £7.99. This concealer gets a lot of love online, I’m interested to see if it performs better than the Maybelline Fit Me concealer, I will probably do a full review on this too.

6) Sleek MakeUp Brow Perfector DARK BROWN £4.99. This is my first eyebrow gel ever! I’m intrigued to see what kind of a difference this makes to my eyebrows.

I didn’t go too wild at the drugstore today thankfully, I’m so broke now it’s unreal (come on payday!!!)

What products have you been buying at the drugstore recently? Comment below and let me know!

Jay x

MAC Soar Lipliner – Review

Evening lovelies 🙂 Just a quick post here.

As soon as Soar lipliner from MAC came back into stock I rushed to buy it. Pinky-brown lipsticks have become really popular over the last year and I wanted to try the trend myself. Soar lipliner is a creamy, matte, long-wearing liner. I would describe the colour as a pink with a  brown undertone, on my lips it pulls more nude compared to lighter skintones, nonetheless it looks very pretty. What I also love about this liner is that it really brings out the shape of your lips. Soar is great to use as a lipliner under a lipstick, or just filled in on it’s own.

Until next time ❤

Jay x

Etude House Color Lips Fit (Perfect Fit Red) – Review

Summer is coming to an end here in England 😦 but I bought one final summer lip tint which I’m going to review for you today. I received Etude House Color Lips Fit in Perfect Fit Red from an Ebay seller BringBringShop for £4.49.

 

The lip tint comes with 10g of product which I think is quite a lot for the price that you’re paying. Although the name “Perfect Fit Red” suggests that this is a red colour, it is not. Much like the promotion pictures, it is more of a dark hot pink with a red hue.

Doe-foot applicator

The doe-foot applicator allows the tint to be applied smoothly and evenly. The product itself has a really nice sweet fragrance. When applied on the lips this tint has a thin cream consistency which dries matte. I prefer to dab a bit of product in the middle of my lips and use my finger or a cotton swab to blend out the product and build up cover if necessary. This tint is also perfect if you like doing the gradient lip trend.   

L-R: No flash, flash

The lip tint has really good staying power and is non-drying if you wear a lip balm underneath. It lasts up to nearly 6 hours but I had to top up after eating if I wanted to maintain the opacity of the tint, it does fade to an even tint after around 8 hours which is still really pretty. I do find that if I apply the tint as a full coverage lip-stick with the applicator it causes the colour to bleed, so it’s best to apply this tint in layers.

Overall I’m very happy with this product. It is a cheap, long lasting, comfortable lip tint which can be used to give sheer or full coverage.

Jay x