*REVIEW* - Collection 2000 Glam Crystals

Hello :) Sorry for the absence lately..but I have a review for you today...
These are the Glam Crystals glitter liners from Collection 2000 that I stumbled across one day in Tescos and have since bought more!

I now own 4 of these liners... the colours are (from top to bottom) Dig it (15), Dancing Queen (8), Shake It Up (11) and Funk (3).
PRICE AND AVAILABILITY:
These all cost around £3 and Collection 2000 is available pretty much everywhere...in most big supermarkets, Boots and Superdrug. This price is pretty great and one the reasons I have been back to get more of these liners!

PIGMENTATION:

 

It was pretty hard to get decent photos of these as the lighting wasn't too good...

They are in order of the second picture (left to right): Dig It, Dancing Queen, Shake It Up, and Funk.

Dig It: Probably the most unique and easiest to wear as this is a black base with gold sparkle in it; it makes a really nice change from a normal old black liner on the top lash line! :) There are different sized chunks of glitter in this one but I really love it, it's really pigmented and comes off well in one swipe (as do all of these to be fair.) This is my favourite in terms of the colour.

Dancing Queen: This is the first liner I got, this looks amazing put on top of a matte pink liner. This is  a pink base with purple, blue, gold, pink and goodness knows what else in there. This is again really pigmented and looks really bright and interesting because of the different colour glitter in there.

Shake It Up: Another one of my favourites! This is a purple base with blue, green, silver, red, and purple glitter in there. It looks really great lined over a black base...Again...very pigmented.

Funk: This the best gold liner I've tried! Most of the others I've tried/swatched are patchy and weird. This one has as slightly different texture and seems to have slightly finer pieces of glitter so it's less chunky and seems to go on smoother with less gaps where there isn't as much glitter.

TEXTURE:
There isn't a huge amount I can say about texture for theses...as expected with glitter liners they feel slightly gritty and chunky (with the possible exception of Funk) but this doesn't bother me and to be honest what can you expect from a liner that is packed with glitter?? These are so pretty and I don't have any problems with the texture.

WEARABILITY:
These will last around 8 hours on me but I will loose a little bit of glitter in that time, mainly on the inner corner where I tend to rub my eyes more..(must stop doing that...) however these aren't incredibly long wearing...I have ended up with a small amount of glitter on my face but I'm not too bothered about that. These also remove really easily for anyone who has a hard time removing eye makeup well.

OVERALL:
I really like these! (I hope you can tell seeing as I've gone back and ended up with 4!) my favourite colours are Dig It and Shake It Up, as they are really pretty and quite unique. I mainly love these because of how packed with glitter they are and they are really pigmented. I've tried other liners that just end up a clear gel base with the occasional bit of glitter..you can really easily see the base colour of each liner with these.

Would I buy again? Yes definitely.

Thank you for reading! I hope you enjoyed my review!
Libby x

*REVIEW* - MUA Liquid Eyeliners

Hello :) I have a review for you this afternoon...

Today I'm reviewing the MUA Liquid Eyeliners, of which I have currently 3 shades.

(from top) Shade 2, Shade 5 and Shade 3

 

 

PRICE AND AVAILABILITY:
These all currently cost £1 from some of the bigger Superdrug shops that stock MUA. You can now also buy MUA products from their website (http://www.muastore.co.uk/). I don't think you can beat that price even for drugstore products! :)

PACKAGING AND BRUSH:
I will admit this...the packaging isn't that great. However for the £1 price tag you can't complain that much really. The packaging is simply a little pot with a very tall want for all of the shades, but the long handle doesn't screw into the pot very well and it feels quite flimsy. Especially on my black liner (Shade 5) the packaging feels quite delicate and that I feel it may break at some point because the brush doesn't screw too well into the pot.
The sizes of the brushes of these tend to vary slightly in these liners...

 

For the black liner (Shade 5) and the electric blue shade (Shade 2) the brush is fairly thin, stiff and quite small, however for the bronze shade that I have (Shade 3) the brush seems to be actually like a sponge, and it is quite a bit larger:

I'm not 100% sure why the brushes vary, but it does mean that you can't get such a thin, precise line with this shade but that's not too much of a problem.

COLOUR AND PIGMENTATION:

Swatches from top: Shade 2, Shade 5, Shade 3.

Shade 2 is a bright, electric blue that adds such a fun pop of colour. This is one of the most unique liners I have at the moment :)
Shade 5 is your everyday standard black liner, it's a nice deep black with no shimmer.
Shade 3 is also pretty unique, ad is a mid-toned bronze with shimmer. With the different brush tends to apply a bit too much product sometimes (although the swatch above was a bit of bad luck) but if you go back over it , the colour blends out and doesn't appear as thick as it does in the swatch above.

All of these shades are nicely pigmented and I have no complaints about the colour payoff :)

WEARABILITY:
These generally last quite well on the lid providing you leave them alone...I find that if at any point during the day I rub my eyes slightly the liner crackles and does come off a bit...and also if they get wet they crackle too. They are easy to remove however, and for a normal day I don't have problems with them fading, but like I said they can crack and fall off in little bits if you don't leave them alone.

OVERALL:
Generally for the price, these liners are pretty amazing! You can't get much more of a budget price for makeup than £1, and for everyday use these are very good. There are quite a few more colours that I'm interested in picking up, as the price means you can pick up a few at a time ;)

Would I buy again?
Yes, definitely.

Thank you for reading! I hope you enjoyed my review!
Libby x

*REVIEW* - Miss Sporty So Clear Pressed Powder

Hello :)
I have another review for you today - The Miss Sporty So Clear Pressed Powder.
The shade I have is 001 Transparent but I haven't seen any other shades so I'm assuming that this is the only one.

This has quite a few claims on the back, which was one of the reasons I was attracted to it in the first place. It claims to have 4 "anti-blemish actions", it promises "up to 7 hours healthy looking skin" and "flawless and healthy looking finish" among other things.

The whole Miss Sporty line seems to be generally catering to teenagers and most of their powders/foundations ect have similar promises to look after young skin.

PRICE AND AVAILABILITY:

The price of this seems to vary slightly but I've never seen it go for more than £3, making this a total bargain. I think I bought this for something like £2.89 or similar.

I've seen Miss Sporty in most Boots and Superdrug, and I think one or two supermarkets too so it's quite widely available.

 

PACKAGING:

 

This comes in quite a sturdy blue case which has a sponge and a mirror in it, although the mirror is permanently covered in powder which makes it pretty useless and I don't really like using sponges for powder, so I use a brush instead. It would be useful for emergencies though. The packaging does feel pretty sturdy and I wouldn't have any worries about taking it travelling. You get 9.4g in this but I seem to get through powders quite quickly so I've already hit pan on it...

TEXTURE AND COVERAGE:
Something I like about this is the fact that the texture feels quite light; I have a few other powders that definitely feel heavier than this. It doesn't give a huge amount of coverage but just enough to set my foundation and concealer well and add a little bit of coverage.

The colour is quite light, and this means that if you have quite a dark skin tone it might look a little frosty. The thing I like the most about this is how soft it makes my skin feel when I apply it. It really does a great job of absorbing excess oil and it makes my skin feel so clean yet soft at the same time.
It also does last pretty well, a good few hours but then again I don't have massive problems with oily skin anyway as my skin is quite dry.
I also like the fact that this makes my skin LOOK clear too, I'm not quite sure what about it does this, I think just the thin texture adds quite an airbrushed effect which seems to do a good job of blurring out imperfections.

OVERALL:
Generally I really like this powder and its the one I use most often. I like the way it gives my skin that soft feeling, and I have actually already rebought this because it is my second one, and I've already hit pan on it! I think for the price it's amazing too.

Would I buy it again?
Defintely, I probably will buy it again when this one runs out.

Thank you for reading! I hope you enjoy my review!
Libby x

*REVIEW* MAC Eyeshadow in Satin Taupe

Hello! :)
I have a review for you: the MAC Eyeshadow in Satin Taupe. This is one of the frost finishes, and I bought it a while ago now - It is my first MAC Eyeshadow! :)
 

 

 

PRICE AND AVAILABILITY:

This costs £14.50, which is quite expensive (like all MAC shadows) so I did think about which shadow to buy for quite some time before I bought it as I knew I wanted a shadow I would be able to get a lot of use out of.

I bought this from the Debenhams website, but you can also get it online at the MAC website too; MAC is also available in some department stores in the UK and shops.

 

PIGMENTATION:

I've been really pleased with the pigmentation of this shadow, especially considering purple/taupe shadows are notoriously hard to get well pigmented.

The swatch above is with a primer on the top swatch, and without a primer on the bottom swatch.

As you can see the shadow works best with a primer and something to cling onto, but it's not a bad swatch without a primer.

Satin Taupe is a plum/taupe colour with gold/bronze shimmer; it makes a really nice colour for an everyday look!

 

TEXTURE:

The texture of this seems to be fairly hard, though not the hardest shadow I have. It seems to be quite well pressed and doesn't kick up a load of powder like some others I have. It's not a creamy type of shadow by any  means, but the texture doesn't seem to get in the way of the pigmentation.

 

WEARABILITY:

This shadow seems to last quite a while on me and I haven't noticed any creasing (though I generally don't get a huge amount of creasing with other shadows anyway). This lasts around 8  hours on me but I do get it starting to fade slightly by then.

 

OVERALL:
Generally I'm really pleased I have this shadow, and I'm glad I chose this to be my first MAC shadow ever! :) It's a colour I can use on an everyday basis and it always looks really pretty.

 

Would I buy again?

Yes, and I plan to investigate buying other MAC eyeshadows (I always get distracted by their concealers!)

 

Thank you for reading! Hope you enjoyed my review! :)

Libby x

 

Pretty Jewellery Storage/Display!

Hello :)
I have something a little different today...as I recently bought something that was just too pretty not to show you!
I had all of my jewellery in boxes before, which was ok, but it meant that it wasn't out on display and so I forgot to ever wear it!
I was looking on Amazon recently for a jewellery tree to display my favourite necklaces/rings/braceletts ect and came across this!

 

I think this looks so pretty sat on my desk, and because my jewllery is on display, it means I see it a lot more and I've been wearing it more too!
It isn't massively stable so I wouldn't risk overloading it but it still looks so pretty and is a great way to display all the jewellery that I wear most often.

I got this from Amazon (http://www.amazon.co.uk/Pretty-Metal-Earring-Jewellery-Tree/dp/B003RB9SR0/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1362845944&sr=8-1) and it is around £10.

If you're looking for a new way to display your jewellery, I'd definitely recommend you trying this out! :)

Thanks for reading!
Libby x

NOTD: Kimono (08/03/2013)

Hello:) 
I have a Nail Of The Day for you...
This is a really interesting shade I found in Superdrug last time I was in there by a brand I've never really investigated before, Look Beauty.

 

 

This is the Look Beauty Nail Pop in Shade 6, which is called Kimono. It retails for £5.

I really love this shade, I think it's definitely one of the most unique and interesting shades in my collection at the moment. It shows different colours in different lights..sometimes leaning green, bronze or even a yellow/gold.

I really love complex shades like this!

 

I'm really glad I saw this in Superdrug, because I wasn't looking for it, but when I stumbled across the colour I knew I had to get it! I think I might investigate the brand more and see what other colours they have on offer.
I also love the fact that this dries pretty fast, lasts well and isn't expensive!

Thank you for reading!
Libby x

*REVIEW* - Accessorize Primer

Hello :)
 
I have another review for you today...this time it's a primer I've had for a little while, the primer from Accessorize.
This simply says "primer" although due to the size I'd assume it was a face primer (it says it "primes the skin for makeup application") however in emergencies I have used it as an eye primer and it has helped the colour and durability of my shadows somewhat, so it may be useful to note that. I wouldn't chose to use it over my other eye primers but it does do the basic job.
 

 

 

PRICE AND AVAILABILITY:
Accessorize products are available from certain Superdrug stores (usually the bigger ones) and this primer was around £9 which did feel a little expensive, especially since the packaging of the primer seems to be largely filled with air. You supposedly get 30ml of primer in this product, but I'm pretty sure I didn't get that amount.
 
TEXTURE:
This primer is simply a clear gel, this doesn't have silicone in it so it doesn't disappear and blend into the skin as nicely as I find silicone primers do, but some prefer that. It's definitely a gel, but I find it tends to sit on the skin and feel a bit greasy. Other silicone primers I have almost vanish into the skin leaving it soft, and while this does make my skin quite soft, it feels like it leaves residue and feels slightly greasy. This does nothing to alter the colour of your skin as it's colourless.
 
WEARABILITY:
I haven't noticed that this increases the durability of my foundation much, though I think it does help smooth out your skin a bit, making foundation blend slightly better, but not last longer.
This doesn't do anything amazing to help the way my foundation wears during the day.
As I mentioned earlier this did slightly improve the pigmentation and wearability of eyeshadows when I have used it as an eye primer.
 
PACKAGING:
I love the packaging of all the Accessorize products, it's always really pretty and has butterflies on it! :)
However...an aspect of the packaging is what I hate the most about this product.

The opening of the tube of this is ridiculously big for the size it needs to be. This causes the primer to leak out often and makes a huge mess all over the place, as well as wasting primer that isn't very cheap. It's nearly impossible to get out any primer without squeezing out half the tube. It really annoys me as it wastes so much of the product and makes a huge mess.
Just to show you an example of a different primer that in my opinion has MUCH better packaging, here is the 17 Photo Flawless Face Primer which DOESN'T make a huge mess all over the place...

 

 So although the Accessorize packaging is pretty, it is very impractical.

OVERALL:
Overall I don't like this primer much...I've been using it a lot simply to try and get rid of it. I hate the mess it makes and it doesn't really prolong the wear foundation or concealer. It does smooth out the skin a lot, but that isn't enough of a reason to buy this, I also don't like the price much as my 17 primer is £5 and I feel does the job much better.
I love all of the other Accessorize products I have (I have some nail polishes, an eyeliner and a baked eyeshadow) but this is just a waste of money for me.

Would I buy again?
No. However it hasn't turned me off Accessorize products in general as I love some of them.

Thank you for reading! Hope you found this review useful :)
Libby x