Thursday 30 December 2010

Review: Pink Makeup Set by Red Herring at Debenhams


Palette once open

This is a gorgeous find at such a ridiculously low price! It is a makeup set available in both pink and black leather-like covers, and is shaped like a small diary. You can buy it from Debenhams usually for £5, but in their Christmas sale it is now only £3.75! I bought mine with 10% off so I think it was £4.50, which I think is still a low price for the amount of product available in the book.


Front of palette


It has 28 eyeshadows of various colours and pigmentation and 20 lip colours of which I don't think any are lipsticks, only glosses.In the set you also receive 2 double ended brushes, one of which has a sponge applicator and an eyeshadow brush and the other has a lip brush and an eyeshadow brush. Unfortunately the brushes are absolutely rubbish in my opinion, the hairs are constantly falling off, every time I've tried to swatch them on my hands at least, and they aren't very soft. This is all aside from the sponge applicator because it is a standard sponge applicator. However, I wouldn't expect to receive fantastic, high quality brushes due to the price of the kit.


Eyeshadows and Brushes

The shades of the lipglosses and eyeshadows are very varied; for the eyeshadows, they range from dark blackish colours, to browns, to blues, greens, pinks and purples and a single deep pink eyeshadow is also available. Some of the colours are very sheer which becomes annoying as you have to keep layering them on. The shadows are quite soft and for the pigmented shades the colour looks very opaque and pretty. There are shimmery shades, matte shades and I think a few frosted shades too. The colours which really stand out are the darker colours in this palette and my favourite ones are the deep black/grey and lilac on the top row, the gold/brown one in the 3rd row and the blue based grey shimmery one on the 4th row. They all come out very opaque and clear without a primer!


Lipglosses and Mirror

For the lipglosses, a spectrum of different shades again is available, there are sheer glittery glosses, deep opaque matte colours and shimmery opaque glosses. However on the lips none of the shades wear opaque but the colour difference is certainly noticeable. It also comes with a little mirror at the top of the glosses side which is a handy addition to the palette. There is also an "oily" - for want of a better word, smell to the glosses which I don't particularly like.

I think this palette will allow you to recreate a lot of looks for a very little price, but you'll need to experiment and swatch the different shades before placing them on your lips or eyes as part of a look.

The things I love about this palette are, the handy design, very small, so can fit into your purse, it has a fastener, so the shades do not cause a mess and the various shades available to create the looks. Shades present in the palette will allow you to create summer, winter, daytime and evening looks.

Overall I give this palette a 7/10 because of the value of products given in this palette, and I would recommend it as a small stocking filler (for next year obviously!) Or as a tiny gift to a young teenager as they would probably like to play around with the colours. I think it would also be nice if you are looking for something cheap that you can travel with and create quick looks.

Thank you for reading!

Back of palette

Thursday 16 December 2010

Top 5 Skincare Winter Essentials

Hi there,

With all the cold and miserable weather, we certainly need richer and more moisturising products than usual, here are my top 5 skincare items for the winter. It is in no particular order.

1) Handcream! - This is most definitely required many times a day by myself and is vital for keeping your hands comfortable, without it they start to feel very tight and dry as the winter takes all the goodness out of them! I like Soap & Glory's Hand Food, £4.75 at Boots

2) Moisturiser -  this is for night and day, a thicker moisturiser to make sure that your face and neck are getting all the moisture they need, preventing tight, dry skin and dull skin. I find my skin gets a lot duller and paler in the winter and am yet to find a moisturiser that fixes that unfortunately, but for the moment I do like Organic Surge Overnight Sensation Night Cream, which has a rich consistency - however I dislike the rosy/flowery smell...£7.99 at Boots

3) Body Moisturiser! - A must! Dry, flaky skin is unattractive and very uncomfortable, I get itchy and yucky when I'm standing next to the radiators trying to keep warm, my favourite at the moment is Strawberry Body Butter, £5-£12.50 at The Body Shop, keeps you moisturised and smelling A-mazing!

4) Lip balm - another vital item to carry around with you, preventing dry cracked lips, my favourite at the moment are the Carmex lip balms, in a handy tube so your hands don't get covered in it, available at many retailers for £2.59 at Boots

5) Lip Scrub - I hadn't ever used lip scrub before and after reccomendations of Lush's I am now addicted to Sweet Lips Lip Scrub for £4.50

And make sure you keep wrapped up warm and take care of yourself in the miserable weather!

Thank you for reading! :)

Review: Bourjois Une Seconde Nail Enamel (One Second Nail Polish)

These nail polishes and colours are amazing! I had to talk about them on here! Unfortunately I haven't been able to swatch them and I really want to get lots of posting done before the year is over!

Availability: Boots, Superdrug
Price: £5.99
Colours/Types: many!


Shades, L to R, 2, 9, 8
The nail polishes aren't named properly, they have just been given numbers, even though they are absolutely amazing. They claim to dry within a minute or just over and they do! This is shocking news for me because I always manage to get fingerprints on mine regardless of how many claims the companies make about drying quickly.

The flat brush is very innovative and very helpful during application of the nail polish - something I wish all brands would use, it becomes very easy to cover the entire nail in a few strokes and it is an efficient way to save time and yet look pampered.

I also like the packaging and the bottle shape, I think it allows the polishes to stand out from other brands. The colours are all very vivid with just one coat - which again is a pleasant surprise, do not chip for at least a week on me - without any top coat, and of course dry quickly. The texture of the formula itself I find to be nice too, as I don't find it to be heavy or too sticky as I have found with other nail polishes.

Overall I love these nail polishes and wish there were more colours and more brands adapting to the shape of the brush, formula and the quick drying time!

These are most definitely my favourite nail polishes, and at the moment Bourjois are 3 for 2 at Boots! And possibly Superdrug too if I'm correct...

Please do not hesitate to comment below with any questions or comments in general! Thank for reading as always,

Nav x

Tuesday 7 December 2010

Review: Hand Food - Soap & Glory Hand Food Hand Cream

YAY for this hand cream! Its smooth, quick-drying, non-sticky formula has certainly won me over! It retails at £4.75 for 125ml or £2.30 for 50ml, and is available at Boots.

You only need a very tiny bit and it is enough for both hands, keeps them moisturised for about 4-6hrs if you don't have much manual work to do otherwise apply frequently. During school days it lasted me about 4hrs without the need to reapply, but I love the smell so much so I used to anyway!

It contains gorgeous macadamia oil which softens and moisturises hands very efficiently, I love the packaging and the strange quotes and general feel about Soap & Glory, I've also read many interviews with the founder of this brand (and of Bliss) - Marcia Kilgore, a very smart woman who regularly gives skincare tips to magazines and so on.

Overall I love this cream and many more Soap & Glory products, I don't feel there is much more to say...In terms of comparisons, I much prefer this hand cream to Neutrogena's that I recently reviewed due to the creamy consistently of this one, the other in comparison is similar to petroleum jelly now! But I do like that hand cream too.

Thank you for reading!

Monday 6 December 2010

The Beauty Rant: Fake Adverts

Welcome to my new feature on this blog - The Beauty Rant, where I will talk about any products I find to be terrible or any problems I have with anything to do with beauty!

I'd like to talk about fake advertisements, I don't mean spoofs or anything, but brands that advertise their products using fake items and making models look x1000 better by editing in post-production, It does not give a true picture of the product or how it will look when applied, and is very misleading. This could result in disappointment for many people that do buy and try the product, and of course you cannot and shouldn't return beauty products once used as it's very unhygienic.

A typical example of this is mascara. Mascara on television and posters seems to be advertised using fake eyelashes and enhancing in post-production. I see why companies do this - to entice the customer into thinking that their eyelashes will look exactly the same as the woman on TV, which of course is completely untrue as we know thanks to the minuscule, nearly impossible to read writing on the bottom of the screen.

I'd like to think that products are so good that editing or fake eyelashes would not be required, but evidently they're not.

This is just something that has annoyed me for a very long time now and I'd love to know your opinion about  this, especially if you disagree with me, I'd love to learn why.

Thank you for reading,

Nav x

Friday 3 December 2010

Giveaway Update

Hi there,

Just a quick update with regards to the giveaway on this blog, I've decided to postphone it until I have a higher number of subscribers or followers because I don't feel it will be fair as I only have 5 - albeit my treasured 5 subscribers.

I will make the giveaway worth the wait though!

Nav x

Thursday 2 December 2010

New Makeup Launch! : Accessorize

I'm very sorry for the delay in this post but I'm still very excited about it as I still haven't had the chance to try all this out!

This is Accessorize's new makeup range, which has been available since September, I've posted pictures below from Accessorize themselves, please let me know if you have tried any products in particular that you absolutely love now or cannot live without!








Thank you for checking out my post! :) nav x

A HUGE HAUL

Hi everyone! :)

Today I'm going to broadcast everything I've bought that's beauty or makeup related thanks to encouragement from my lovely friend @paige_borda!

Please note, I have bought a lot of items and all that I've bought will be the majority of my makeup collection - as I didn't own very much, and I don't intend to buy anything more (apart from a few lipliners/lipsticks, lip brush, liquid eyeliner and blush!) Then I won't be buying more products until these finish because I already feel I've spent way too much!

I hope you enjoy viewing my blog-haul and I will try and provide as much detail as I can for each item, and hopefully in the near future I will review most if not all of these items for you :)


Urban Decay's original primer potions :)

The palette I have lusted for for way too long!

A very cheap body lotion from Boots, works perfectly though :)
Bobbi Brown's Longwear Gel Eyeliner in Ivy Shimmer Ink - a very beautiful colour that you can just about see in the picture, and I cannot wait to use this! It has tiny bits of shimmer in it too, which make it so pretty!

Bobbi Brown's Metallic Longwear Cream Shadow in Antique Gold - this looks very pretty in real life and I don't think I'd use other shadows with it, a very simple evening look can be done with this I think, layer this on, add eyeliner of choice, brown would probably go best and you're good to go!

Another Bobbi Brown item! It's her creamy lipstick in Rose Brown - I think a very pretty nude colour, that could be worn both day and night

Bobbi Brown's Metallic Longwear Cream Shadow in Chrome Patina - again for evening wear I think, but you could use lots of complementing colours with this bright bold silver and create a gorgeous look!
Bobbi's famous award-winning eyeliner in Black ink!
Mac's Liquid Eyeliner in Boot Black
My gorgeous brushes! By MAC obviously! From top to bottom - 217, 239, 219, 266, 242, 116
17 Cosmetics single eyeshadows, all very pretty colours I picked up quite randomly at Boots!
A slightly used 17 eye trio! Very wearable colours, day and night, brilliant combination and I wear them very often!
17's starry eyes trios especially for the holidays! :D
Lancome's quad of eyeshadows, I bought this because I don't have any smoky eye colours and want to practice and maybe do a smokey eye seeing as I am a moody teenager and all that ;)
These are Lancome's Juicy Tubes! In minature, I bought these in a gift set, they all look great :)
This bunch of items are again all from Lancome, I bought them in part of gift sets too, mini makeup-removers and khol pencils and their Hypnose Mascaras!
I got these as part of the larger set I bought, so an eyelash curler and 2 of Lancome's skincare products
I recieved a free cleanser and I bought the makeup remover within the set :D
OPI Lincoln Park After Dark
I'm sorry for the lack of detail in this, I bought lots of things and I forget prices and the sets that they were in! If you do want to ask something in particular please leave a comment below and I will get back to you with the correct answer, probably from a reciept somewhere!

Thank you for viewing my haul and sorry for the 2 used brushes and my eyeshadow trio I also used!

Please leave a comment below if you are already the owner of one of these items and let me know how they treat you!

Nav x