Nars Make Up Primer

I bought this primer a couple of months ago in attempt to beat my pesky oily skin into submission and give a longer lasting effect for my make up.  It was £24 from HQ Hair.  I wanted the one with the SPF in it but they'd sold out so I went for this instead.  You get 51ml of product in the tube, and a little goes a long way, so in terms of value for money in this sense, it's pretty decent.

It has a light, not too runny, consistency, like a cross between a gel and a cream, and it goes on very easily.  It smells a little bit like lavender, which personally I don't mind but I know some people won't like this.  I smooth it on over my moisturiser.  In terms of performance, I can't honestly say it's made much difference to my skin or make up longevity.  It does give a nice smooth base for make up application but really not much better than my moisturiser on its own.  Similarly, I'm not completely convinced that it does a decent job of making my skin less shiny and my make up stay in place.  I'm currently using a mineral foundation - maybe it would do a better job with a liquid product?

I'm going to keep using it until it's gone, mainly because I paid £24 for it, but also because it's not doing any harm, but I have to say I was expecting a more noticeable performance from a Nars product.  It's my first experience with a primer and it hasn't exactly put me off, but I do wonder if it's a step in my routine I can really do without.

Essie Mint Candy Apple

Latest addition to my nail arsenal.  Essie's Mint Candy Apple - seemingly an excellent dupe for the Revlon Minted, which is modelled beautifully here by Zoella, and now doubt easier to get hold of too.  This is only one, very hastily applied, coat, with a sweep of Seche Vite on top.  Love it.  Wasn't sure it would suit me but I absolutely love how Spring-like it looks, and it makes a lovely change from pinks and nudes and reds.  Beautiful.  This is the first Essie polish I've truly loved.  Very happy I bought it.  Picture shows it to be slightly bluer than it really is, so don't be scared off by my rookie photography!

Collection 2000 Perfecting Minerals

We're stepping away from the OPI madness for a moment, to look at a surprisingly excellent mineral foundation from Collection 2000. It's called Perfecting Minerals, and promises to be a "Silky, luminous mineral powder" with "Foundation-like coverage". I got this a couple of months ago from Superdrug when they were running a 3 for 2 offer on various make-up ranges. It was £5.99. We'll come back to this later. I know a lot of people aren't, but I'm a huge fan of mineral foundations. My skin is oily with large pores and potential for raging breakouts, and I'd always struggled to find a daily foundation I could use that wouldn't irritate my skin. The first (and only other) mineral powder I used was Laura Mercier's, thought to be one of the best, so this one had a lot to live up to.

And I am delighted to be able to say that it has more than matched up to its much more expensive rival. Beautifully easy to apply (although I binned the little brush it came with that you can see in the picture and use my own), good coverage, lovely satiny, glowing finish, and stays put all day. I could not be more impressed with this product. A little goes a long way so it's even better value for money.

Oh, have we talked about the fact that it's only £5.99? £5.99!!!! Amazing. I love it. Best thing I've bought so far this year.

A moment.

Before I stick up more reviews on here, I wanted to have a brief chat (to my keyboard) about some things on the topic of beauty that get on my buffed wick. Let me be clear, I am in no way a beauty or skincare expert. I write this blog because I love three things dearly, apart from the family/friends nonsense, and they are beauty products, books and magazines. Books, we shall visit at a later date, but this is my first foray into blogging and so it made sense that I write about something I genuinely like.

At 26, I have been experimenting with make-up and skincare for the best part of 15 years now, which I suppose awards me some sort of ‘experience hat’, albeit one I’ve fashioned for myself out of a page of Vogue and a dream, but then pretty much every woman who uses make-up and skin products can say the same. And make themselves a pretty hat. My third (but rapidly waning) love is magazines. I just love nothing more than a brand new shiny issue to flick through once, devour twice. Love it. Especially the beauty pages. It’s where I get, or got, the majority of my news and product information, would see looks that I thought were interesting – although have never been someone to sit and copy a look from a page – and generally soaked up all the beautiful goodness in the hope that by basically sweeping the page across my face I would be revealed as a poreless, glowing vision. Sure. That happened.

About 18 months ago, I became a blog trawler, that is I started actively seeking out, or coming across, a number of different blogs, some beauty-related, some not, and ever since have spent large swathes of time reading and watching with interest as I found genuinely honest reviews about products I had or was considering buying. It was a revelation. People actually said they didn’t see what all the fuss about Touche Eclat was about. I knew I wasn’t the only one that was ambivalent! Yes! Beauty twins were found every day.
Then it dawned on me, although deep down I knew this already working in publishing myself, that the majority of the beauty reviews in magazines were not always honest, but were there either because the PR agency had paid for them to be featured, or because the brand was a big advertiser and so the team were obliged to feature (positively) a product from a particular range. I had always known this, but just didn’t want to accept that a lot of what I was reading was nothing more than product placement or basically a lie. It annoys me so much that these magazines, which do wield quite an influence over consumers’ buying habits, don’t always do a genuine review or recommendation of a product, if for no other reason than a lot of stuff that they do feature is not cheap.

What I really wish is that they make it totally clear that although a product might be good for certain things, it won’t necessarily have that effect on every skintone, every skin type and every person’s actual face. I can’t count the number of times I’ve read that such and such a lipstick is *the* colour for Spring, or that this moisturiser will transform your skin from grey lizard to peachy peach, so rush out now and snap it up before it’s gone! It’s just not possible to prescribe a beauty product that will suit all, or give the same results to everybody, and consequently, women will waste hundreds, or, hopefully not, even thousands of pounds, buying products because a chi-chi publication has promised results and after two uses they have to stop using it because it’s doing nothing for them, or making things worse.

I cannot stress highly enough the importance of testing every single item you buy. Obviously, you can’t do this with drugstore skincare usually, and although you can test make-up colours on hands, it’s not really the same, although spending £4 on a lipstick that isn’t perfect isn’t quite as galling as spending £20 on one. So, if you’re wanting to buy any product from a ‘counter’ brand, i.e. Clarins, Lancome, Shu Uemera, ask for samples and testers of everything, or ask the assistant to apply the make-up so you can see what it looks like, wear it for the day to test durability and removability, and see what it’s like in different lights, conditions, etc., then you can at least return to make the purchase if you’re satisfied with the results.

For skincare or foundation, I absolutely will not buy something higher end without at least a three-day sample to take away with me. It’s totally unreasonable for cosmetics companies to expect you to part with £30 for a foundation that you can’t even try out first. Any stand or shop that won’t offer this, I wouldn’t buy from. Another thing to do is if you are, like me, an avid magazine reader, keep your eyes peeled (I hate that saying) for the foundation samples. There’s usually at least one in every monthly mag up for grabs, and if you buy the same magazine, often a brand will run an ad for two or three months at a time and give out the same sample. So, what I do, is save the sachets, get one of those little clear pots from Muji or somewhere, and decant all the product into it. If you open one sachet to do your face each time, I find there’s often too much product for one application so it dries out and you have to throw it away. I collected three months’ worth of Chanel Vitalumiêre recently, and managed to get 10 days’ worth out of the pot. Not bad, for a foundation that would set me back £31 if I bought it straight out. I liked it, and luckily the colour was an ok match, but it made my oily/combination skin a little too shiny and ‘slidy’, to use the technical term. It just didn’t perform well enough for me to want to purchase a whole bottle. So the test was totally worth it.

Having read so many good things about that foundation in magazines and on blogs, I was going to buy it, but saved myself £31 and got 10 days’ wear anyway. The only problem with doing this is the colour issue. It’s rare that I find the samples match my skin tone, but what I do, rather than throw them away, is apply them when I’m not going anywhere for the day, so I can see not the colour, but the texture, finish, durability, etc. If I like the overall effect, I will then go to the counter and test the colours so I have already got a good idea in mind of how it will work for me. Again, I still ask for samples of my colour to take home, and make sure it’s truly going to be worth the money spent.

Sorry this is such a long post, I just really want to emphasise that whenever you read about a product, really think about if it will work for you. Get to know your skin type. If it’s oily, don’t rush out and buy something that’s recommended for making your skin glow as you’ll end up looking like you wash with chip fat. Similarly, don’t get, say, a mattifying primer if you have dull or dry skin. Hello crocodile face! Just try, try, try, before you buy, and if you can’t, walk away and find somewhere where you can. You can try your clothes on in shops, you can try your shoes on before you totter out the door (and get blisters as soon as the receipt’s in the bin), so why not do the same with your beauty products? You’d be surprised at the difference – not to mention the money saving - it makes.

OPI – Bastille My Beating Heart

ANOTHER OPI POST.  If only I was sponsored by them, I wouldn’t be furtively scribbling these reviews on a very minimized window at my very non-OPI day job.  But I digress.  Again, I’m afraid, I’m disappointed.  No, wait.  Not disappointed.  Well yes, disappointed.  But not in the product.  In me.  I LOVED the look of this colour in the bottle when I saw it in Liberty a few weeks ago, and so purchased from www.nailsandthings.co.uk along with my You Don’t Know Jacques a couple of weeks later.  I still love it in the bottle, and I love the application and the colour, but I do not love it on me.  It’s beautifully glossy and opaque (only one, *very* hastily applied coat; sorry for mess) and is a true deep red, BUT…but but but but but.  It’s shot through with a fuschia tint which you can catch in the light, and whilst a lot of you will love this, it’s just not for me.  It’s a satin-y finish, which is nice but again not what works for me in a varnish.

I’m not going to criticize on that basis though because it really is a lovely polish, and I do love the name.  In fact I love all the OPI names, but this one is a particular favourite.  I imagine it will do my toes proud though so am going to give that a go later this week, although don’t expect to see any snaps of my long old toes on here.  No Siree. 

The picture sort of does it justice but it looks gorgeous in daylight; again, just not on my paws.  Damn my paws and their inability to take any shade!

Je recommende.*

*Clearly, I won’t be getting a job at OPI coming up with polish names either.

OPI – Passion

This turned up in the post yesterday; had forgotten completely that it was on its way to me so that was a nice surprise. It’s the first pink I’ve had in my collection since I was about 15, and so I was a bit apprehensive about it, and after application remain so. It’s a true baby sweetie pink in the bottle, but not in a bright, trashy way. It is very subtle. Application, as with all OPI, was fine (picture is 2 coats) but I just don’t know what I think of the colour. My camera isn’t sophisticated at all, so the flash hasn’t done me any favours here, and the colour comes out a lot ‘whiter’ than it is. Looking at it on my nails now, it’s quite sheer (I can still see the tips of my nails) but it is a real pink sheer. It almost looks as if my nails have grown brand new baby-coloured nails overnight; they’re like my own nails, but shiner and more pink. And I don’t really know if I like it. In some lights it’s a lovely sheer, glossy rose hue, but in others you can’t see it at all. When I’ve got the time, I’ll swatch again with three coats to see what difference that makes, but I have a feeling it’ll end up a bubblegum colour, which, although good for some, doesn’t work on me. I don’t do pink. Usually.
The other thing is it’s not really a true reflection of the bottle colour either. If it was more opaque on application I think it would make a difference, i.e. if it was more obvious, but it’s almost as if the nail polish is apologising for being pink and is trying to tone itself down by being so sheer it might as well be clear.
Obviously I’ve gone mad now, creating some sort of cripplingly shy nail varnish with issues expressing itself, but I really don’t know what else to say. I’m just not impressed or unimpressed. It just is. I don’t know…maybe it would show better on darker skin tones? I just might as well have used a pinky base coat and be done with it. MEH.

OPI – You Don’t Know Jacques

I am going to write about things other than OPI nail polish, I promise.  Or maybe I won’t, who knows.  It is one of my most favourite things ever.  I do have quite a few and plan to review all of them over the next week or so, so if you’re not interested then I suggest you turn around and walk out of my life until at least the 20^th March.  But do come back afterwards, I shall miss you terribly otherwise.

Today’s colour is You Don’t Know Jacques, a lovely mushroom grey colour; not quite the ‘greige’ of this season but close enough to look on trend and a nice way to segue into Spring from the black days of winter.  For this manicure, I cut my nails as short as I could, mostly in a concerted effort to achieve a longer finish than usual.  I applied this on Saturday morning, and two days later it’s going strong, which is something of a record for me.  There were two thumb disasters yesterday whilst I was involved in a massive baking extravaganza, but the varnish came off in a sheet rather than a chip.  This is because I have used, for the first time, the hallowed Seche Vite.  I will do a whole separate post about that little gem.

I digress.  Again.  You Don’t Know Jacques was one of the standout colours from OPI last year, and, being on the ball as usual, I purchased it a couple of weeks ago.  I love it.  It’s totally different from everything else in my collection and is the darkest shade I own.  I’ve never felt that dark shades suit me, so have always stuck to nude and bright shades, but I am a total convert.  I think it helps that I have very short nails right now; I don’t see this working on anything longer.  It’s chic, sophisticated, ‘grown up’ and not at all to be confused with anything dark that one might find on the tortured talons of a teenager or Twilight fan (they’re not mutually exclusive).

It’s a shade that goes with everything, clothes-wise, and is so much more interesting that a nude shade, which I normally rely on (see last post).  I’m very delighted I was brave and selected this colour; I wouldn’t wear it on my toes though.  Coverage wise, the photo above is one coat, on a clear base with Seche Vite over the top.  It was a bit streaky on application but I got the hang of it after the first hand.

Love it.   Available from Liberty, or http://www.nailsandthings.co.uk/ where I got mine. 

OPI Barefoot in Barcelona

So, my very first attempt at a swatch!  Did I do good?  I am unsure.  It's the best I could manage with a phone camera and a dim light!  I love OPI polishes.  They always, to my mind, have the best range of colours, the nicest brush and packaging, and a good, non-runny, formula that isn't too tricky to apply.  I have totally uncooperative nails when it comes to polishing and the like - they're quite wide (it takes three brush strokes to cover them) and when you look at them side on, they're pretty curved.  Even when they're at they're shortest, as they are in the picture above, the tip still protrudes (just) beyond my finger, and I think this is why I have problems keeping my nails chip-free for longer than about 10 minutes.  Over time, I have honed my application routine and technique, and would say I'm pretty good at it now - I file regularly, use cuticle oil and hand cream, do the base coat, two coat, top coat thing, and still, they're chipped within a day of finishing, usually less.

I have decided that it's my nails or me, not the varnish.  It would be unfair to post a review of every varnish that chips on me because that's all of them, and I know that other people don't have this trouble, so I shall take that out of the equation.

The polish in the photo is a recent-ish offering from OPI called Barefoot in Barcelona, from their Coleccion de Espana (which also features the TO DIE FOR Here Today Aragon Tomorrow which I am desperate for).  Barefoot in Barcelona is the perfect nude (for me).  I find that all OPI varnishes are pretty much the colour on the nail as they are in the bottle, which is great if you're purchasing online.  I got mine from hqhair.com where OPI varnishes go for £9.95 each.  I know some people will raise their expertly plucked brows at this price, but honestly, it's worth paying for.  For a start, a little goes a long way in terms of coverage (the above is only one coat) to achieve opacity.  Also, I am yet to come across a cheap (I would say sub-£5) that gives coverage, colour and finish as well as any other slightly more expensive range.  If you wear polish everyday, as I do, I don't think £9.95 is too much of an investment, especially for the more wearable day shades.  Fine, I probably wouldn't spend that on a jade or yellow shade if I was doing a nail for a particular occasion, but I've worn this shade everyday for the last 3 months, save a couple of flirtations with red, so cost per paint is super cheap!

My skin tone is fair/medium, so this shade works well as a nude, but a noticeable nude, if that makes sense.  It gives my hands a finished, professional appearance, and doesn't clash with any outfits at all given that it is totally neutral.  In terms of the chipping issue, to give it its due, it's only chipped on a couple of nails and that's because I type all day pretty much, so I wouldn't really expect any varnish to withstand constant tippety-tapping on a keyboard.  Even so, the chipping isn't that noticeable, another bonus of the nude shade.

I highly recommend this for anyone who wants a nude polish without succombing to a girly, sugary pink or something you can hardly see.  This is a beautiful, sophisticated alternative that I'm sure would suit anyone, short or long nails.