Festive Christmas Nails and Swatches - Part 1

I've been thinking about doing this post for a while.  However, when I was putting it together, I noticed that one of my favourite YouTubers Carah Amelie had just done a very similar post.  It must be a case of great minds think alike!

Anyway, I've put together a collection of nail polishes that I think are very festive.  I'm going to hold a little competition to determine which is the most festive nail polish I have in my collection and I'll wear that one on Christmas Day!  All the polishes shown are ones I own and unfortunately, some are limited edition and no longer widely available.  However, some are still around, so hopefully they'll be the ones you like!

From left to right, the polishes are Max Factore Nailfinity in Midnight Bronze, OPI Ali's Big Break from the Burlesque Collection, Illamasqua Veridian, Chanel Black Pearl and Butter London's All Hail McQueen (now available as All Hail The Queen).  I've chosen some reds and greens as well as some golden and silvery tones to balance them out.  Here are the swatches:

L-R, Max Factor Midnight Bronze, OPI Ali's Big Break, Illamasqua Veridian and Butter London All Hail McQueen

L-R - Chanel Black Pearl, Butter London All Hail McQueen, Illamasqua Veridian, OPI Ali's Big Break and Max Factor Midnight Bronze

I've linked to NOTD posts where I've done them for these polishes.  You will see that I actually wore Ali's Big Break for Christmas last year.  Seeing them swatched, I'm thinking that Black Pearl, All Hail McQueen (The Queen) and Midnight Bronze aren't as festive as I first thought.  However, Illamasqua's Veridian and Ali's Big Break both seem to me to be perfect Christmas colours.

Please comment and let me know which of these you think is your favourite festive Christmas colour!

Thanks for reading! xx

Just a little haul...

...or not!  Hi ladies, I’ve had a very busy week, staying away overnight at a roadside Travelodge yesterday, before going to Brighton and back today. Anyway, I had a spare half an hour in Brighton (one of my favourite cities) to pick up a bit of shopping and I managed to stock up on a lot of products.

Beauty addict's paradise... Mac, Bare Escentuals, Aveda, Kiehl's and Shu Uemura

If you’ve never been to Brighton, you will be in for a shopping treat.  I think it’s the best place for shopping in the country outside London, catering for all tastes, including high street, high end and designer, independent and quirky/hippy shops.  In particular, their beauty shops are fantastic. I used to live there when I was a student and I remember a friend coming to stay with me and us spending 3 whole days covering all the shops!  My best friend still lives there, and we always hit the shops when I’m staying with her.

I went to L’Occitane and finally got some Almond Shower Oil which I’ve been meaning to get for ages.  I then popped into Mac to get some concealer and bumped into a former colleague of mine who works there as a MUA – I’ve not seen her for over a decade, so we caught up whilst I also decided to buy Satin Taupe.  Then I went to Bare Escentuals to get some more Mineral Veil.  In Oasis I got a couple of pairs of earrings and Butter London polish in Marrow.  Finally, I went to Superdrug to stock up on bits and bobs.  Some Garnier BB Cream, an Accesorize bronzer, and GOSH cream blush, as well as other stuff.  Phew, that was a lot of shopping in half an hour!

Believe it or not, I’ve not spend much money on beauty products recently, and other than nail polish, I don’t think I’ve bought any makeup all summer!  

NOTD - Butter London All Hail McQueen

Hello all.  Just a quick nail of the day post for you today.  I painted my nails using All Hail McQueen by Butter London, one of the polishes I picked up at the Elle Beauty Event at Harvey Nicks last week.

It's a lovely polish, full of shimmer, but it's subtle, not in your face bling.  I find it really hard to describe the colour.  In some lights it's a touch gold, others it's grey and sometimes it even looks silver.  It's a bit of a chameleon of a shade, which I really love.

In terms of its application, this was one of the easiest and smoothest polishes I have ever used.  It went on like a dream, with absolutely no bubbling or streaking.  I did need to do 3 coats to get a strong colour and to intensify the depth of the shimmer, but it was relatively quick drying (although I did mess up one of the nails on the hand I haven't shown).  I haven't used a top coat, but it's still in good nick one day later.

Apologies for the state of my fingers.  I had a long drive today, and I chew my fingers when I'm bored on a motorway, so they are in a bad way.  I don't normally do that - only when I'm on the motorway! Also, I wanted to photograph my nails today in natural light, but I forgot, so they're photographed under artificial light.  I wanted to show range of colours of the nails in different lighting.

Anyway, I wore this colour to a meeting I went to today, so I think it's a work-appropriate colour, despite the shimmer.

Thanks for reading!  xx

Elle 25 Year Anniversary Event at Harvey Nichols, Bristol (and haul)

Hello lovelies!  I thought I'd tell you about an event I went to on Tuesday evening at Harvey Nichols in Bristol.  It was an Elle beauty event to celebrate their 25th anniversary.  I paid £15 for the evening, with the promise of demonstrations, goodie bags, cocktails and canapes and the Elle beauty team on hand.  The ticket price was redeemable off the price of purchases.

I'd never been to an event like this before, but from reading other people's blog posts about the previous Elle events in Harvey Nichols in London, Leeds, Birmingham and Edinburgh, I was quite excited.  It's a shame that I left disappointed.  Yes there were cocktails and canapes, but as I'm on a weight loss challenge at the moment I had to stick to a glass of OJ and resist the canapes.  But where were the demonstrations?  I was there for almost 2 out of the 3 hours and in that time there was just one proper demonstration, a makeover by Shu Uemura.  All the counters were offering make-overs, but as I hate other people doing my makeup, I decided to resist.  I did have a hand and arm massage from Jo Malone which was really lovely and has made me really want the orange blossom scent from the range.  But other than that, there was little else going on.  At the Nails Inc counter, you still had to pay for a manicure; I would've thought for a special event like this they would have been free.

If you've ever been to Harvey Nicks in Bristol, you'll know that it is very small.  There isn't a huge number of beauty counters, so it was actually quite difficult to spend two hours looking at all the products, even for a beauty addict like me!  Some of the counters had loads of extra staff who weren't doing a lot, whereas others had only one member of staff who was busy and harried (Chanel).

I eventually couldn't resist the hard sell any longer, and got out my credit card (I know I'm supposed to be on a spending diet...).  I bought 3 Nails Inc polishes for £20, but got £15 off from my ticket price.  I then spotted a little shelf of Butter London polishes.  I'd not seen these in the flesh before, but I'd been craving All Hail McQueen, so I bought that for £10.  I also bought two tubes of Sexy Mother Pucker lip gloss from Soap & Glory.  I then decided to buy Chanel Intimitable Intense Mascara... Whoops!

What I was sorely disappointed in was the lack of swag.  I entered a Laura Mercier competition, but other than that, there were no freebies at all.  Where was the promised goodie bag??!!  That's half the reason for going!  There also didn't seem to be any Elle staff on hand, or if there were, they didn't identify themselves.  When I bought my Chanel mascara, the Chanel lady was busy carrying out another make-over, so a different member of Harvey Nicks staff served me.  She asked me if I wanted a bag for my mascara - come on, it's Chanel!  Of course I want a bag for that!!!  She also didn't give me any free samples.  I'd seen the proper Chanel lady filling up her customers bags with freebies!  So I left with nothing that I hadn't paid for.  It was a poor show from both Harvey Nicks and Elle.

Anyway, after my rant, here's my haul:

Nails Inc polish in St John's Wood

Nails Inc polish in Neal Street

Nails Inc polish in Duke Street

Butter London polish in All Hail McQueen

Sexy Mother Pucker by Soap and Glory

Inimitable Intense Mascara by Chanel.

By the way, one of the Nails Inc polishes (Duke Street) and one of the Soap & Glory glosses will be part of a forthcoming 100 followers giveaway I have planned.

Thanks for reading! xx