EOTD and Product Review - Revlon ColorStay Quad in Silver Fox

I was really excited to get this Revlon ColorStay quad in Silver Fox, which is part of the autumn/winter range.  I really liked the mix of colours, especially the mint green colour.  I also like the fact that the quad includes a highlight colour so that you can do a full eye look from one product, unlike some (yes Urban Decay BoS III - I mean you).

I've done an eye of the day using just this product.  The light grey colour is all over my lower lid, the grey/plum colour in my crease and outer-v, the white as a highlight for my brow bone and inner eye, and the mint under my lower lashes.  Apologies for the mascara failure onto my lids - I should have covered it up with eyeliner!

So what do I think of this product?  Well for £5.99 it's not a bad price and I like the colours.  BUT, and it is a big but, the shadows are not very good quality, although they are quite pigmented.  Maybe I've been spoiled by Urban Decay and Mac, but I found them to be flakey, powdery and full of fall out.  They are also really hard to blend and to get an even application.  I found myself over-blending which left me with a slightly muddy look.  I also found that even using UDPP, they tend to separate out a bit as the day goes on.  

So on the plus side, it's a cheap and cheerful quad, with lovely colours and you can do a full look from it.  However, I'd expect better quality from Revlon, and ovarall, I wasn't impressed with this.

What are your experiences with Revlon?  I find them a bit hit or miss myself!

Thanks for reading.  xx

No 7 Colour Rebellion Palette and EOTD

One of the nicest things about blogging is that there's such a nice community of people, and lots of generous peeps who buy things out of their own hard own money to offer to their readers as giveaways!  I've been very lucky, winning two giveaways in a month.  Last week I won the No. 7 Colour Rebellion Palette from the very lovely x Diamonds and Pearls x.

I had been tempted by this palette, and I love the bright, vivid colours, and gorgeous funky packaging.  But, having been naughty and spent too much money on makeup recently, I decided to resist.  So it was a lovely surprise to find out I'd won the giveaway!

I've been experimenting recently with brighter colours, especially after I got my Urban Decay NYC BoS, so this is a great addition to my eye shadow collection. I think my favourite colours are the Chrome Green and Purple Haze, as well as Red Lead - very autumnal.  I'm less taken with the Indigo Blue - it's just a bit too bright for me.  But I can use it under my lower lashes to give an extra pop of colour.

I've had a bit of a play with some of the colours.  I've used Chrome Green on my lids, which has a lovely finish and Red Lead on the crease and outer corner.  I then used the blue and purple to line my lower lids.  The colours are pretty good quality and quite pigmented.  I found them easy to blend and to work with, although I don't think I chose the best combination of colours.

I'm really sorry about the quality of both my makeup application and my photos.  My boyfriend was hanging on the bathroom door whilst I was trying to apply it, and my camera just wouldn't take a good photo.  I think I'm going to have to make sure I take all my pics in natural light, as it just doesn't like artificial lights...

Many thanks again to x Diamonds and Pearls x for holding the giveaway - and go and check out her blog if you haven't already - it's very lovely!

Thanks for reading!  xx

Urban Decay NYC BoS 3 - Another EOTD

Hello ladies.  When I first got my Urban Decay Book of Shadows 3 I was worried I wouldn't use it often, so I blogged a couple of times here and here about some looks I came up with that were wearable.  But since then, I haven't touched it!

I went to a gig yesterday so I decided it was a perfect opportunity to dig out the palette.  By the way, I went to see The Vaselines at The Thekla in Bristol.  They were fab, and probably the closest I'm ever going to get to seeing Nirvana live (and yes I have seen the Foo Fighters before).  So it was a good night.

Anyway, here are the pictures of my eyes.  I decided not to go for a full on ultra-bright look, as that's just not me, but did go for a much bolder look than I would normally go for.

My camera has washed out some of the colours - it was much bolder in real life, I swear!

Check out that glitter!

So I started with Money, and used it all over my lower lids.  I like the colour, but it is quite glittery - probably a bit too glittery for me.  I then decided to rock purple colours, and went for Psychadelic Sister on my crease and at the outer corner of my lid.  I really liked this shade - it's not too dark or as scary as it looks in the pan, and it's very easy to blend out.  Best of all, it's not glittery!  I used Rockstar in my outer-v - well I was going to a gig afterall wasn't I?  Again, this was a lovely and easy to use shadow, very blendable.  As with all the Urban Decay shadows, I find that a little goes a very long way.  I was literally just touching my brush onto the pan to load up.

One of the problems with this palette is that there isn't a good highlight colour.  I used Uzi, which would be a good highlighter if it wasn't so ultra glittery.  And the glitter is really large glitter as well, which I really don't like.  I used it, but there was still glitter on my face after removing my makeup last night, and I even still spotted a stubborn bit of sparkle this morning!

I finished the look with a bit of Bordello under my lower lashes, and used the black liner (Zero) on my upper lids, and waterline and the purple line (Ransom) under my lower lashes.

I'm still not 100% impressed with this palette.  I fear it will be sat gathering dust under my bed, rather than getting regular use like my Naked palette is.  Some of the shades are just uber-glittery which really puts me off, as they are lovely colours.  And I hate the fact I can't do a complete eye from just one palette without cracking open the glitter.  But some of the non-glittery colours are great!

Thank you for reading!  xx

More Urban Decay NYC Book of Shadows - Eye of the Day

Hello ladies!  I've been playing around with my Urban Decay NYC palette again.  Tonight, I've tried out a really bold look using only two colours, Haight, a fantastic metallic teal colour, and Money, a shimmery mint.  The colours show up slightly more blue than they are in real life, unfortunately.

I used Haight all over my lower lid and crease - I really packed it on.  Then I used a small amount of Money in my inner eye and to slightly blend out Haight just above my crease at the outer part of my eye.

Finally, I used the Zero eyeliner on my lashline and waterline and mascara. I think that a liquid or gel eyeliner would be better on the upper lids, as it would give more of a contrast.

This look is a lot bolder than I'd usually go for.  Even my boyfriend commented on it (and he usually never notices my make up)!  I was thinking that it would be perfect to wear to a gig, especially to a loud, raucous rock or punk gig!  What do you reckon - where would you wear really bold make up looks?

Thanks for reading xx

Urban Decay NYC Book of Shadows - Eye of the Day

Hello all.  I've had a long, hard day today, so when I got in this evening I decided to play around with some of the colours from my new Urban Decay NYC palette to cheer myself up a bit! 

I've seen quite a few posts from fellow bloggers celebrating their palettes (which made me lemming like mad!), but very few on actual 'looks' yet, so I thought I'd try a wearable look.

For the base all over my lower eyelid I used Bordello.  This is a reddish, brownish shade with a sheeny shimmer - it's not too glittery and is probably the most neutral colour in the palette.

I then applied Last Call through my crease and the outer quarter of my lids.  This is similar toned to Bordello, but darker and more pinky. It's also more shimmery than Bordello. For some reason, it appears to be lighter in my swatches, but I swear, it's darker in real life!

I then used Rockstar to darken up the outer crease and outer V of my eye.  I love this shade, it's a very dark, plummy, purpley shade.  I could see myself doing a maximum impact look with this all over my lower lids with loads of eyeliner!

Smudged under my lower lashes, I used Haight.  This is a gorgous metallic teal shade with a brilliant sheen.

For a highlighter under my brow and in my inner eye, I used Uzi.  This is uber-glittery, so I used it sparingly under my brow.  This is probably a bit too glittery a highlighter for this look, but I wanted all the shades to come from the palette, and there's not much more choice.

I finished off the look with Zero eyeliner on my lashline and waterline and loads of mascara.

L-R Bordello, Last Call, Rockstar, Haight, Uzi

By the way, the shadows are very soft, so be careful with them.  Look what happened to poor Money, and I've not even used it yet!  That happend when I was just getting the liner out of the box!

 

What do you think?  It's probably a bit too full on for a day in the office, but I would definitely wear it for a night out!  Have you put together any looks from this palette yet?

Thanks for reading! XX

Eye of the day

I thought I'd do a quick eye of the day.  But first off, another confession.  After blogging about my makeup and beauty kit for my weekend away, I snuck in another couple of shadows - Shale and Nocturnelle both by MAC.  And I used both of these in my look for my friend's baby shower.

Excuse the mess I made of my winged eyeliner!

First off, I used UDPP.

Then Shale on the lids

Mystic Moss by Elf in the crease and the outer corner

In the outer corner, I used Nocturnelle by MAC

A random No. 7 shadow as a highlighter

For liner, I used MAC's Smoulder on the waterline, and Blacktrack on the upper lids.

Finally, I used my sample of Chanel's Inimitable Intense on my upper lashes (I need to get this).

For the rest of my face, I used:

Technic Hide It! concealer paletter

Prestige Skin Loving Minerals foundation

Rimmel Powder

Body Shop lip and cheek stain (on lips and cheeks)

Bourjois Brune on my cheeks

Rimmel Nude Pink on my lips

This was all topped off with a glittery bindi, as all us girls attending the baby shower were given one as a present!  I loved it, and everyone looked so cool with them on - I might try and incorporate it into my look again!

Ooops - I'm a bit shiny here - it was the end of the night!

Thanks for reading!  xx

Eye of the Day

Yesterday, I went to my friend’s Cuban-themed party as a revolutionary, wearing a military style outfit, with a camouflage hat.  For my makeup, I thought I’d try out a version of this gunmetal, smoky eyed look that the fabulous Carahamelie03 posted on YouTube this week.  I had to substitute some of the products and adapted it slightly to try to get a more military toned look, whilst introducing some bronzy colours to the rest of my face.  I wasn’t very pleased with how it turned out initially, as I found it difficult to stop the colours getting too muddy, but actually after looking at my photos, I think it looks quite good – let me know if you agree!

I first of all primed my eyes with Urban Decay Primer Potion.  I then used the lightest colour from the Revlon Illuminence Creme Shadow palette in Wild Orchids as a base, all over my lids.  I followed this with Shale by MAC, again all over my lids and into the crease, bringing it up at the outer corner, as Carah suggests.  For a highlighter, I used a yellowy, sparkly colour from the Coastal Scents Warm 88 palette under my brow bone and in the inner corner.

Lightest shade of Revlon Illuminance Creme Shadow on the left

I used Smoulder by Mac as a thick messy liner on my top lash line, waterline and under my lower lashes, which I smudged using a pencil brush both under and over my lashes.  Using the same pencil brush, I used a sparkly olive green colour from the Coastal Scents palette over the top of the smudged black liner, bringing it up towards the crease at the outer third of my eye, as well as just under my lower lashes.  This was the bit I had a lot of trouble with – I thought that it looked quite muddy, and found the shadow quite difficult to blend.

L - R, Revlon Creme Shadow, Shale, Coastal Scent Highlighter, CS Green

For a liner, I used the MAC Fluidline in Blacktrack, applied with the 210 MAC brush.  I decided not to go for falsies, but used Prestige My Biggest Lashes as mascara.  I used the 17 eyebrow pencil in natural brow for my brows.

On my face I used Elf bronzer in Warm and Elf blusher in Mellow Mauve.  I opted for Thrills from MAC’s To The Beach collection on my lips.  This is a fantastic orange toned red shot through with shimmer and I love it!  It’s still available on the MAC website under goodbyes, and I thoroughly recommend it!

Warm Bronzer and Mellow Mauve Blush

Thrills by MAC

Thanks for reading x