Illamasqua cream pigments & medium pencils

I made an Illamasqua order a couple of months ago. I think I was feeling sorry for myself after hurting my foot and not being able to attend the event. So I bought a cream pigment in Hollow, a medium pencil in Fidelity and the #1 blending brush. I've wanted to try out the medium pencils for a while now and I'm so glad I got one, they're so easy and quick to apply. They blend so easily, are buildable and last really well. These are totally kit worthy, I'd love to try a few more and create a whole eye look purely with these. Such a good tool if you want a quick defined eye. I'm now a massive fan of these pencils. The blending brush is also equally amazing and goes hand in hand with the medium pencil, they work perfectly together, creating soft blown out eyes.

I bought Hollow cream pigment as I heard it was a great contour colour. It is just that, but if you're looking to use this as contour I would say to be careful and not to over load as it is quite a cool shade and can turn a tad mucky with too much product. Other than that it blends with ease, even over powder which doesn't always happen with cream products, a great contour for cooler paler complexions when you find some bronzers to be a little too warm.

The picture above shows Hollow cream pigment next to Fidelity medium pencil blended and unblended.

What do you love from Illamasqua?

Sleek Mediterranean Collection

I'm going to come clean, I've never owned a Sleek palette. I'd seen the hype, I was tempted but I never really bothered, after all I have palettes full of colours & draws full of pigments. That & I've always been a bit of a makeup snob. Bite me. I will however, eat all my words as the pigmentation in these products are incredible. In fact as I type I struggle to get an eyeshadow swatch off my hand.

The collection is inspired by vivid colours of the Mediterranean, very on trend with pop colours for S/S11. There's also a nice mix of neutrals in there, I've been reaching for the orange tones to create a colourful eye but still soft & wearable. I have to say Santorini blush scared me a little, being a make-up artist that sounds incredibly pathetic but I'm not a fan of a strong blue pink, but again I'll eat my words & say this, if applied properly (blend people!), it looks beautiful.

Monaco i-Devine palette: £6.49
Santorini Blush: £4.29.
(You know where to find these by now! Superdrug or at sleekmakeup.com)

TOPSHOP makeup

So everyone has been talking about it in the beauty community, at first I wasn't too interested but curiosity got the better of me. I swear I should have been a cat. My local Topshop stocks the range, so I popped in to have a quick look, ummed and ahhed and then went off to Boots. It must have been the multiple Topshop bags sporting 'Topshop makeup' that made me go back. I love the packaging, very quirky, my kind of style. However, I don't see it lasting very well & staying nice and clean in a makeup bag. I can see the paper cover on the lipstick getting a little tatty. We shall see.









So, this is what I fell for. Desert lipstick, a looovely peachy neutral colour. I'm very much a peach girl so this was a must. It's got a lovely creamy texture, a lot of coverage and a nice sheen/gloss, a little like a cremesheen. Yummy, yummy, yummy.

The next product is an eye crayon in the colour Satchel. It's a gorgeous cool brown with very obvious but beautiful fine gold glitter. They're surprisingly creamy and nice to blend, I was half expecting them to be similar to the Barry M crayons that I feel pull a bit on the skin unless warmed up.

Finally, the liquid liner pen. Hmmmm, I love the fact that this gives a glossy finish, something I've been wanting for years from an eyeliner. However, it moves. You'll see in the final picture that at the end of the day the line isn't as crisp and it definitely transferred to my crease at some point. I'm going to give this another try, but with only a base on my lid and lots of powder on my crease. Another note on this eyeliner, it doesn't like going over product very much, I had to finish off the flick with another liner as the Topshop one needed a rest.

It was more of a smoked line at the end of the day...hmmmm. & I've got end of the day eyebrows, lets ignore that, ey!

Overall, I'm quite impressed and plan to try more products, especially the lipsticks.

Favourite thing right now

Currently I'm loving mixing my blushers. I've been doing it for a while now & can't just be happy with the one! My new favourite is mixing MAC Melba with Illamasqua...erm unrequited? I'm not too sure exactly as the sticker has come off (fab!) but it's a very light, cool bluey pink. Love it. Mixed together these give a gorgeous coral. Missed out on Ripe Peach? Try these two or very similar blushes, seems like an exact dupe.

also wearing:

Face:
a mix of MAC studio tech & fix fluid.... I'm a foundation mixer too!
MAC fix powder
Golden Refined bronzer
Melba & Illamasqua love mix
Soft & Gentle MSF

eyes:
Soft & Gentle MSF
Kid e/s
Diorshow blackout mascara
#7 lashes

lips:
Ravishing l/s
Fold & Tuck l/g

Giveaway update

I'm afraid you're all too kind & I'm now changing the prizes. I'm now giving one main prize & a runner up. So here's what you could be getting in the post!

First

Wishbone necklace for all the best luck in 2010 (from This Charming Girl).

Your choice between:

Under your spell mineralize duo, or

Devil-may-care mineralize duo

AND

Your choice of a MAC eyeshadow or lipstick. This can be a pro product or from the permanent line. Eye shadows can be pan or pot form.


Runner up will get the remaining mineralize duo
AND
Your choice of a MAC eyeshadow or lipstick. This can be a pro product or from the permanent line. Eye shadows can be pan or pot form.

Contest ends THIS Sunday (10/01/2010)

(note: credit for images unknown, found through google images.)

Review: Benefit silky powder eyeshadow in Guess again

I was contacted by the lovely Joyce at www.beautyjudge.com about a month ago. It's a great site to go to for reviews of products, because they're true reviews & Joyce explained how she didn't mind if the review was bad or good, a review is a review & we need to know the bad ones too!

Needless to say I really like this product. I am not a Benefit type of girl, purely due to the price of their products, so I'm glad I was sent this because otherwise I wouldn't have chose it myself & it's actually a lovely eyeshadow.


What Benefit say

Love Your Look "makeup to match your lifestyle" introduces nine new silky matte powder eye shadow shades that "smooth" on for even coverage to enhance and contour. They blend effortlessly with the love your look creaseless cream shadow/liners so you can mix & match for guaranteed gorgeous.

What you get for your money

£12.60 for 3.50 g Net wt. 0.12 oz It's quite a big eyeshadow so I think it's actually an ok price.


What I think

The colour reminds me of a matte Satin Taupe, it's got that purple undertone to it that goes really well with my blue eyes. The powder is very finely milled & is super silky, so it lives up to it's product name 'silky powder eyeshadow'. Because it is so silky & I want to say creamy because it just feels like it, the blendability of this eyeshadow is amazing. Pigmentation as you can see is amazing, that is one swatch from my finger, I haven't layered it at all. It claims to be creaseless, & I haven't had creasing from it at all, but I have always put it over a MAC paintpot as I wouldn't apply eyeshadow without a base. I actually place this colour in my crease & have had no problems with it creasing at all. I honestly can't get over how blendable, silky & pigmented this eyeshadow is, it's fantastic & I've never actually come across a texture or colour like this one before. I would definitely give this top marks overall, I really love it!

I love this in my crease & outer corner as it's buildable, so for a really quick look, I can just pat on my usual paint pot & then blend this into the crease for a really quick but slightly smokey eye.


No picture really captured it that greatly, because I was in a rush to get out the house I couldn't keep trying for a better one. But this is just Guess Again really lightly in the crease along with MAC Rubenesque paintpot.

Go have a look on www.beautyjudge.com for more reviews, you can also join up to give reviews on products too!