MAC Art Supplies - Pro Longwear Lipstain Markers

The Lipstain Markers were what really drew me to this collection, I have been swithering over buying a Givenchy Lip Stain marker for a couple of months now, but they are only available in two colours and are rather over-priced at £18 a go, for something about 2/3 of the size of the new MAC ones. So when I saw that Art Supplies included not only lip stains in pen form but 9 different shades I had to have a look.

Here’s what MAC says:

“Just as Art Supplies for Eyes invokes the vision, Art Supplies for Lips speaks to the ultimate in sensuality… Luscious lips drawn from innovative new Lipstain Markers and Lip Pencils to use like a modern multimedia artist would – design and discover! Incorporating the concept of art tools into the world of MAC makeup, these pencils and markers create dramatically different lip looks. New Pro Longwear Lipstain Marker has the doodle fun of a pen, but with sophisticated, light and long-wearing results. It’s all about artistic freedom!”

First off I need to clarify, this is a marker pen, for drawing on your face, a proper felt tip marker pen! That alone was selling me and then I swatched the colours. I left 5 minutes later with 3, I went back the next day for a fourth. I am already beginning to wonder if I should go back and double up on my favourites as they are limited edition.

Here’s what I got:

* Full of Flare – Bright yellow/orange-coral
* Stylesetter – Bright hot pink
* Point of View – Light-ish neutral with brown tones to it, darker than I expected
* Run way Ripened – Berry plum-red



I adore them, they are exactly how I hoped they would be and better. So simple to apply – it’s a pen! You just draw on your face with it!! – and they really do last, they are a proper stain which sinks into your lips and does not budge. They are supposed to last 8 hours, they don’t, but you can get a good 4 hours out of them with no touch ups and after that I find if I add a few dabs here and there the coverage is perfect again. They’re ideal for me, I like to do my face and then leave it and with the lip stain markers you can.

There have been reports of them being drying but I don’t find that, however I have been apply a clear or lightly tinted gloss over mine which is the suggested way to combat the drying issue. I’m not sure I would wear them totally alone but with even a touch of lip balm over the top they are fantastic.

And I am still not over the fact that I can now actually use a felt tip marker to draw on my face, it’s like MAC went in my head and picked out the best thing I was imagining. A pen, to draw on your face?! And it works! I’ll shut up about the pens now, but go buy some, they’re amazing.

MAC Art Supplies - Pearlglide Intense Eyeliner

MAC’s Art Supplies collection launched at the beginning of April in the UK, I have been very good recently and not really looked into the new collections at all, mainly because I get hideously sucked into the hype and end up feeling like I won’t be complete until I buy it all, so it’s easiest all round if I just stay clear of MAC. This collection was different though, mainly because I saw a review on You Tube of the lip products and decided I had to try them (more on them later). While I was in it would have been rude not to try out the eyeliners, here’s what MAC says:

“Paint it, scribble all over, Art Supplies is everything you need to paint the ultimate self-portrait: Different styles of art pencils create eye looks that are expressive and individual, for a new kind of PowerPoint presentation. The pencil portion of the collection focuses on a Greasepaint Stick in eight fabulous, limitedlife shades… the ultimate inky colour payoff is an homage to the success we had with Style Black and DSquared² last season. Use as a Shadow or Liner: ludicrously long-wearing, transfer – and water-resistant, flexible and five-star comfortable. New Pearlglide Intense Eye Liner with an exciting new shimmering sparkle effect, will also launch in limited-life, featuring six slick, smooth, sextronic shades.”

I tried the Greasepaint sticks and wasn’t too fussed, the colours are all too dark for me and I don’t think I’d get much use out of them, the Pearlglide liners however. :swoon:

I ended up with 2, as I was trying to be good.

* Industrial – A gorgeous blue, grey which takes on iridescent lilac tones in certain lights
* Petrol – Deep dark navy blue with a hint of shimmer



Industrial is like nothing I have tried before and absolutely gorgeous, it’s very versatile and changes colour depending on what you wear it with. I love it! Petrol is what I hope Binge from Urban Decay would be like, a erally dark, proper navy, again I adore it.

I also adored:

* Designer Purple – Dark shimmery violet/purple
* Undercurrent – Blue, green, teal, peacock shimmer

I am still torn over Designer Purple, I love purple on my eyes and it was a gorgeous colour but very similar to a couple of UD liners I have so silly to double up, Undercurrent is the same slightly different from UD’s Covet but not enough to justify the money. The other two Almost Noir and Blackline, cn be duped exactly with UD liners I already have, so silly to buy them. More on the colour comparisons later.

The pencils go on beautifully, really glide on, as the name suggests and the colour lasts brilliantly all day. They remind me a lot of the UD 24/7 pencils which is no bad thing in my book and unfortunately means I may have to check out future collections if they release nice colours that I don’t already have. They are very soft but I don’t find that an issue as I am careful when I sharpen and don’t use pencils if I want an exactly defined perfect line.

As I mentioned, the colours can be duped using Urban Decay pencils so I have done some comparison swatches to show that but I’ll put them in a separate post to keep it neat.

All in all, I really rate the Pearlgide liners and I almost wish the colours were slightly different so I could have more!

Nail Varnish

I used to be very into my nail varnish, but laziness and having short stumpy nails for climbing has put me off in recent years. However, of late, I decided I didn't have enough stuff to spend my hard earned cash on and have become a big fan again.

So hopefully, from now on, I will have lots of lovely nail swatches to add too, for now here are some recent shades:

*sigh*

So it appears the being able to post from work was a glitch in the Matrix and I actually still can't 99% of the time.

I have a load of stuff to upload and ramble on about, for now have a look created using the new MAC Art Supplies line which I am currently in LOVE with.







Back later with more Art Supplies details.

Illamasqua Vow pencil

I really am a marketer’s dream, I read a few reviews and watched a couple of YouTube videos recently which mention one of Illamasqua’s medium pencils; Vow, a nude shade which can be used on eyes, lips and face, wherever you like really as a highlighter and particularly in the waterline to brighten your eyes up instead of a white pencil which can give a really stark look. So, needless to say, I had to have one, although I wasn’t exactly sure what I was going to do with it.

I’ve been wanting to try out some Illamasqua products for a while, also based on various reviews, as the colours look fantastic and they are supposed to be pretty good quality, so having a different type of product to try seemed like a good idea for starters.

The pencil was £12.50 and on first impressions it looked like it would be really good, however when I got it home I was slightly disappointed that using it in my waterline wasn’t much better than white at all and still made me look a bit odd, with freaky light lining around my eyes. All was not lost though, I tried it out on my cupid’s bow and around the lip to see how that worked, and it was fantastic! It looks really subtle, not like an obvious line, but it makes my lips look twice the size – in a good way – and properly pouty! A definite winner on that front.

It’s also handy as an under brow highlight, I struggle to get eye shadow to look natural as a highlight and don’t really like to pull it all the way up to my brows anyway, for fear of looking a bit too drag, so a nice thin pencil which can be smudged just under the brow is ideal for me.

Overall, not as successful as I’d hoped but definitely shows promise. Maybe with a bit more trial and error I’ll get it working right on my eyes too.

OCC Lip Tars

These are (one of) my new obsession(s). Here's what they have to say about them on the OCC site.

A stunning new innovation in lip color, OCC Lip Tar combines the longevity of a lipstick, with the ease of application of a gloss. Goes on slick and moist, and dries down to a satin finish. Ultra-saturated in color, Lip Tar contains an unprecedented amount of pigment - a little goes a very, very long way! An intense yet featherweight layer of color that stands up to the scrutiny of Hi-Def Video and Digital Photography, without ever looking (or feeling!) heavy. Meant to be mixed, Lip Tar comes in concise array of colors for a limitless selection of shades made by you!

Like all of our products, OCC Lip Tar is 100% Vegan and Cruelty-Free, and is also free of parabens and other harsh preservatives. A simple, elegant formula that contains Hemp Oil, Peppermint Oil and Vitamin E, OCC Lip Tar feels as good on the lips as it looks!

There has been loads of hype about them on the web, and until recently they weren't available in the UK, so when they did become available to buy online I had to purchase a couple to check them out.

I ordered two:
Hush
Grandma

They are very opaque, probably a bit too opaque for a lipstick phobic like me, but they do work well as a stain if you use a tiny amount with gloss, so I have been using them like that. I am not totally sold, and wasn't 100% about the colours, but when the site selling them sent me a £5 gift voucher and had an extra 15% off I did have to go back for another couple:

Uber
Demure

Needless to say, as soon as I had ordered these they put the colour swatches on the site (they had silly, tiny circles of the colours before) and now I am unsure as to whether I have made the right choice *panic*. However, before ordering, I did do a lot of research online and looked at plenty of videos and swatches, so hopefully the colours on the site are not exactly as they are in real life, I'm not quite sure I can pull off Uber if it is a muddy brown as it appears look?!

They are made to be mixed, so I am hoping with the four I now own I should be able to make lots of lovely colours. So far, even with only two I've found I prefer the colours I've created by mixing to how they originally come out of the tube.

Next on the hit list, annoyingly not an option when I ordered the previous 2;

Memento

It would be rude not to, it looks just my colour and they are giving money to cancer charities with each sale, so technically it's like charity, not buying more make up.

More on the Lip Tars later.

Sorry.

I have been hideously remiss in updating. Not that I haven't had anything to say, but I have, until recently, been unable to update from work and haven't had much time in the evenings. Hopefully now I have day time access I will be a little better at updating.

crazylibellule and the poppies

Good name, huh?

Makers of The Crazy Sticks, little solid perfume sticks, which I have just acquired 4 of. They come in very cute, handbag-sized packaging, perfect for carrying about with you.



There are 4 collections; Les Divines Alcóves (love stories), Poule de Luxe (vanilla based foodie scents), Shanghaijava (oriental, exotic scents) and finally Les Garçonnes (paying tribute to free women, apparently). All come in similar styles the same adorable packaging.



The four I chose were:

The Kiss which is sweet vanilla, violet and iris fragrance. I love violet, but not this violet, sadly this one is really not my thing and will be getting passed on, it's too musky and old smelling for me. I found it very clawing and had to wash it off after a couple of hours. Not good.

In Love is rose, berry and sandalwood. It's lovely; powdery, sweet and soft smelling. It smells quite old fashioned to me, but in a good way.

Vanilla Pom d'Amour as the name suggests is vanilla and apple, red apple I think, with a spicy hint to it too. It reminds me a bit of a festive scent as it settles, definitely a warm winter smell. Not something I would say is typically my kind of smell, but nice for a change.

And finally, my absolute favourite, Ananas Impérial smelling of grapefruit, pineapple, peach and lime. It's gorgeous, so fresh and juicy and sweet. It's a proper mouth watering scent and I love it, definitely my favourite.

Of course, now I have tried a few and looked on the website, there are at least another 5 I have to have. Most of them in the foodie range, which all sound delicious.



These dinky little scents are not cheap, mine were £6 each at half price which isn't bad, but normally they are around £12 each, which is quite a lot for such a small amount, especially as they currently only seem available online, it's a lot to spend without being able to try them out first.

They seem to last pretty well, and there are apparently hundreds of applications in each tube, so I guess time will tell on a value for money front, I'm certainly quite content with getting mine at 50% off.

Overall, I would say for the cuteness and delicious scents they are definitely worth a try, provided you avoid The Kiss.

Stila Lip Glaze Sticks

These arrived from eBay the other day and I am really please with them, a good selection of colours presented in a funky and easy to carry packaging. The pencils are really very similar to a highly pigmented gloss but slightly less runny. They go on nice and smoothly and give a good colour.



Whether they are really any better than a million other lip glosses I wouldn't like to say but the pencil style is very cute and easy to carry about and they do look great on, although I found a couple of the darker shades quite dark for me, I'm never really sure about wearing darker colours of lipstick.



Apparently they are supposed to be flavoured and scented similarly to their names but I haven't really found this to be the case, Gingerbread definitely has a cinnamon hint to it but the rest are just generic sweet fruity flavoured like most gloss products, pleasant but not different enough to distinguish.

Overall I'm glad I got them to try out ad I will definitely use them, but I certainly would pay the $16.95 advertised on the box for one!



Colour swatches:


Grapefruit on lips:

Jumbo Eye Pencil Update

I finally received my package form America, containing 10 of these beauties and was desperate to try them out. My first reaction was massive excitement as the colours are fantastic and they feel super creamy and lovely to apply.

Colour swatches:


Now that I have had a chance to try them out in a couple of different ways I have a few reservations. They do go on fantastically well, really smoothly, they are easy to apply, easy to blend and very blend-able. The one small drawback I am finding at the moment is that if I use them too generously in the crease they do tend to crease quite badly after a while, even when applied over a base (UDPP), saying that, it's not really bad creasing and can be re-blended throughout the day with a finger if necessary, it's just that I would rather that wasn't necessary. I also need to try out applying them using a brush as I think that might help.



However, they are fantastic for making the colour of eye shadows or pigments really pop, the colour pay off applying product on top of these is great, almost too great, I have yet to managed anything too subtle yet, they really do make every colour bright.

What I do love them for is as a liner under my eye on the lower lash line, they give a really soft, blended look down there with minimal fuss and look great. I also found them great for a quick splash of colour, apply your chosen colour all over the lid, blend upwards with your finger and then seal in with a similar colour of eyeshadow, I did this look at the weekend, it took 5 minutes and looked really nice, so definitely handy for days when there isn't time to do a proper blended look with shadows.



All in all I am really pleased with them and will continue to use them and see what application technique works best for me, so far it definitely seems that less is more and they have to be well blended to stop immediate creasing.