LUSH Colour: Drive lipstick

Hello! It's been quite a while since I posted, and I do apologize but I don't have much of an excuse apart from life being a bit rubbish and taking over completely. I've been busy and stressed, but I feel like things are settling down now and I'm excited to be able to get back into blogging again. I promise I won't slack off this time!

As most of you will know, Lush recently launched their Emotional Brilliance cosmetics range back in July. As part of this, there is a colour range called Word Up which contain eyeliners, lipsticks and eyeshadows. The great thing about these is that they are multi-purpose and super versatile, so you can use the liquid lipsticks as cheek colour, etc. I won't go too much into the rest of the range or I'll be here for days but if you're interested, then take a look here to spin the wheel and discover what your colours mean.

Now, I'm really not one for bright or bold lip colours. I never ever thought that I would wear a purple lipstick, let alone like it! Drive is quite a vivid purple, but on the lips it is much more wearable than I originally thought. The formula is gorgeous! Because these are fresh, handmade colours they do not contain preservatives and the main ingredient is jojoba oil, meaning that the colour is super hydrating. To me, it feels like applying a lip balm because it's so hydrating, but the colour is highly pigmented and once it dries, I forget that it's there which I love. It's also really long-lasting, I find it wears really well even through eating and drinking. The one downside is that it costs £14.50 for 5g of product, which is quite pricey! But I think the fact that it's a multi-purpose product does justify the price, for me at least.These are also 100% vegan, which is great.

I think Drive is the perfect shade for Autumn/Winter nights, and I'll definitely be picking up more of these fresh, handmade colours because I just find the formula to be so lovely!

Have you tried any of the emotional brilliance range? What do you think?

Monday Wishlist #4

1, 2, 3, 4, 5

This dress from Miss Selfridge is making me seriously want to go shopping! I love the collar detail, the colours, the style, everything. I feel like it could be a great transitional piece for Autumn too - I'm picturing ankle boots and a leather jacket! I've heard that Hydraluron is great for dehydrated skin, which I feel that I have since my skin feels dry and flaky once I've washed it, but gets really oily throughout the day. I'm still venturing into using eyeshadow more often, so I'm sticking with neutral colours and this Stila In the Light Palette seems right up my street! I did want the UD Naked palette, but I can't justify shelling out £30-odd quid at the moment. I still don't own a MAC lipstick but I spied Vegas Volt and I'm in lust. Do I really need another coral lipstick? Yes, the answer is always yes. Finally, I made my very first Origins order last week and I want to try so much more from this brand already. The Clear Improvements mask is definitely next on my list because I do suffer from clogged pores and again, I've heard great things about this mask.

What are you lusting after this week?

MUA Lipsticks

It seems like everyone is going mad for budget beauty brand MUA recently. With most of their items priced at just £1 and receiving great reviews, it's hard to resist! I picked up a couple of their lipsticks in shade #15 Juicy and #4.

First off, the packaging doesn't excite me. The lid on shade #15 is very loose and keeps falling off - not great! They have black plastic packaging with silver writing - not the most glamorous, but what can you expect for £1? The one thing I do like about the packaging is that at the bottom there's a small pot of the lipstick which screws off, and you have a little extra product there! And it means you can see the actual lipstick colour rather than a label representation.

On to the actual product... I have to say, I'm disappointed. Maybe I hyped these up too much from reading such great reviews, but I'm really not a fan. Shade #15 is much more pigmented than #4 and it's a gorgeous colour, but the staying power isn't there for me. This barely lasts an hour for me and if I eat or drink anything - forget it. However, I do love the colour so this one is worth the constant retouching just for that.

As for #4, I'll probably never use it. The pigmentation is non-existent. It looks okay swatched on my hand, but I tried it on my lips and it just looked like a balm. I could see no colour at all on my lips which was a shame as it looked like a gorgeous colour in the tube.

I hate to write a negative review, but I really was disappointed! The difference in pigmentation between these 2 lipsticks was massive, and it does make me a little hesitant to try more of their lipsticks in case I come across another #4! I feel like I shouldn't complain because they were only £1 after all. It does have to be said that MUA have some star products like their eyeshadow palettes, and perhaps some of the lipsticks have better pigmentation than others and I just got unlucky with #4!

Have you tried any of the MUA range? What do you think?

Revlon Just Bitten Kissable Balm Stains

L-R 010 Darling, 040 Rendezvous, 015 Cherish

Firstly, I have to say that this is my first post in TWENTY THREE DAYS. This month has been super hectic for me - I've been working a lot, I started college this week, I moved into a new flat and I've also been crazy ill this week. But I'm feeling heaps better now, and I'm so excited to be writing a new blog post! I've missed blogging and the entire community so much in the past month, and I'm ecstatic to say that you lovely people have still been leaving me comments, following my blog and tweeting me - thank you so much.

On to more pressing issues (!) - Revlon's new Just Bitten Kissable Balm Stains. Not the catchiest name for a lip product, but there you go. I think these launched a good while ago now, and the blogging community has been going wild for them. I'm a little late to the party, but I have to say I'm in love.

So far I have 3 of the 7 shades available here in the UK. I believe there a few more shades which were released in the US (Charm being one of them, which I'm gutted they haven't released here!). I bought all of these whilst they were on an introductory offer of £5.99 (usual RRP is £7.99) at Boots and Superdrug. I think the offer is still on, but please don't quote me on that.

The first shade I have is Rendezvous, which I can only describe as orange. It looks more red in my photos, but on the lips it comes across as quite a bright tangerine when applied heavily, or it can also be applied as a sheer wash of coral if you apply it lightly. I think that might be what I love the most about these - they're so versatile. I'm not a bright lip girl, so I love the fact that I can build up the colour to something I'm comfortable with. The second shade I got was Darling, which is a lilac-y, blue-toned pink. Very different to everything else in my lip product collection! My most recent shade purchase was Cherish, which is more of a bubblegum pink to me.

I find the formula quite moisturizing, definitely more than most lipsticks but I do still apply a little touch of lip balm before I use these (sort-of defeats the purpose of a 2-1 product, whoops...). I've also heard of people complaining about the smell/taste. They do have a slight minty scent but I find it really refreshing and it doesn't linger too long for me. The pigmentation is really good considering these are essentially glorified lip balms, and the staying power is just amazing. I always forget that I'm wearing it, then I check my face hours later and the colour is still going strong!

So to summarize, I definitely approve. If you haven't already tried one of these balm stains, or if you're looking for a cheaper alternative to the infamous Clinique Chubby Sticks, you've found it. I wanted to try a Chubby Stick but since finding these, I seriously begrudge paying £16 for something which I can get for less than half the price which does a great job.

Have you tried the Revlon balm stains? Are they worth the hype?

June Favourites!

L-R, top to bottom: Bioderma Crealine solution, L'Occitane Angelica Hydration Cream, ELF HD powder, Caudalie Beauty Elixir, Benefit Sugarbomb blush, Benefit Porefessional, Essie Fiji, Topshop Lip Stick in Powder Room

Firstly, I can't believe it's July already! This year is just disappearing for me! I thought I'd do a post rounding up my favourite beauty products from June. A couple are skincare products, and the rest are make-up products.

1. Bioderma Crealine H2O Cleansing Solution - if you haven't already heard of this product, where have you been?! I finally bought this cleanser after reading so many rave reviews online, and I'm so glad I did. I got mine on eBay and it was about £12 including P&P, which is very reasonable consdering it's a huge 500ml bottle. It's a micellar solution and it basically breaks down the make-up, meaning you can just wipe it off! I use a small squirt of this on a couple of cotton pads, and ALL my make-up, including stubborn mascara, is gone within a minute. Perfect for us lazy girls!

2. L'Occitane Angelica Hydration Cream - I previously mentioned this in my LIB box post (which you can find here) so I'm not going to say too much about it. It's £29 for 50ml, and I have a 15ml sample pot. I have oily skin, but I also have dry patches around my nose so I like to use a moisturiser which is really nourishing but not too heavy. This is perfect for that! I only use it at night and my skin is always so soft and replenished by morning. Smells gorgeous, too!

3. ELF High Definition Powder - I use this once I've finished doing my make-up, and it adds a lovely soft-focus, matte but not chalky finish. I just love it. I've read some reviews saying that it can give a ghost-face effect in flash photography, but that hasn't happened to me yet. You have to be quite light-handed with it, and the packaging is quite messy but the actual product is great, and it's so affordable! It costs £6, and is also available in a corrective yellow colour, and a shimmer colour.

4. Caudalie Beauty Elixir - this is another seriously hyped up product, and I was worried it would disappoint me. But it definitely hasn't! I bought the 30ml size which cost £8.80 from LookFantastic. I've only had it for a few days and I've already used about a quarter of the bottle.. whoops! I love the scent, it's very herbal and almost medicinal, but it's so refreshing. I spritz it after using toner, and then throughout the day to freshen up my make-up.

5. Benefit Sugarbomb Blush - this is my favourite blush I've ever owned so far. It's not highly pigmented, so I do use quite a lot to get a good colour, but I love how subtle it is. It gives such a gorgeous glow, and even if I use this alone without foundation, concealer or anything else, it instantly perks me up and makes me look healthier. It retails at £23.50 which I find quite expensive for a blush, but I've used it daily since I got it and it looks like it'll last me a long time. It has 4 colours (a dusky pink, light pink, lilac and peach) and you swirl all of them together, or you can even use them on their own. It smells amazing, too!

6. Benefit The Porefessional - I received this sample size tube in Glamour magazine last month and was really excited by it as I've heard great things! This instantly helps to minimize the pores on my nose, slightly blur any imperfections and provides a great, smooth base for my foundation. It has a slight beige tint and a really creamy consistency so it blends like a dream. It retails at £23.50 and I can definitely see myself repurchasing this once I've used up my sample. 

7. Essie Nail Polish in Fiji - AAAH! This is definitely my favourite nail polish I've ever owned. The colour is the lightest, barely-there opaque baby pink. It applies beautifully, I love the fan brush and it's completely opaque in 2 coats. The colour just looks so sophisticated and dainty, and if you can't already tell, I am in love. I can't help gushing about it. The only problem is that because it's such a light colour, any little mistakes are really noticeable. I'm not the best at applying nail polish YET, but I'm sure I can find the time to practice!

8. Topshop Lip Stick in Powder Room - I literally just bought this yesterday, and it's already a firm staple in my handbag. It costs £7 from Topshop, and it's basically a lip crayon. Full review here.

So, that's my June favourites! Have you tried any of these products? What have been your June essentials?

Topshop Lip Stick: Powder Room

Topshop Lip Stick in Powder Room

Continuing my foray into the realm of lip colour, I decided to purchase a Topshop Lip Stick in shade Powder Room. I actually really wanted shade Coy, but my local store was out of stock so I settled for Powder Room. I'd also like to apologize for the picture quality, my digital camera is broken so I'm having to make the best of my resources - Blackberry camera and a webcam! It's really hard to get the true colour to show up, but I've tried to catch it in the best light I can.

Topshop Lip Stick in Powder Room

The packaging is gorgeous, as expected from Topshop. It looks really cute in my make-up bag and I just love it.

Topshop Lip Stick in Powder Room

I thought the colour would be a dusky sort of rose pink, but when applied it's actually brighter and more of a baby pink. Very summery and easy to wear!

Swatched on back of hand

 Application wise, I love the fact that it's a chunky crayon because I find regular lipsticks to be quite fiddly to apply. You basically colour in your lips and I also like that the colour can be built up from quite a natural flush of pink, to a brighter colour. The formula is matte, so it is a little drying and I found that I had to give my lips a really good scrub before I used this, or my lips would look really dry and horrible.

In terms of longevity, I found this to be amazing. I applied it at 12pm yesterday, went for lunch, got caught in the rain, smoked, ate and drank and the colour still looked freshly applied at around 7-8pm. This really surprised me because every other time I've used a lipstick, I've had to retouch every hour or two because it just wiped off. I think because this is a matte formula it's much better at holding the colour to the lips.

I can safely say that I love this product! I'm still on the hunt for Coy, but I'm really glad that I bought Powder Room because it's going to be a staple in my make-up bag. Topshop Lip Sticks retail at £7.

Have you tried the Topshop make-up range? Do you have a favourite product?

Superdrug/Boots haul!

Today I finally landed myself a job after 4 months of trying. So I decided that was reason enough for me to have a little shopping spree! I've been lusting after SO many products for months now, so I finally got my hands on certain bits and bobs that I've been wanting.

First up is the Sleek i-Divine Au Naturel Palette. Sleek is a brand I had never really heard of until I started reading beauty blogs, and I've been dying to try one of their eye palettes ever since! I bought this from Superdrug and it cost £6.99, which I think is very reasonable considering there are 12 shadows inside. I opted for the natural palette as I'm not a huge eyeshadow wearer anyway and when I do wear it, I prefer neutral, understated colours. There are 8 matte colours and 4 shimmer colours, so I think there's something for everyone! Really excited to use this, it might even convert me to the "dark side" and I'll be going eyeshadow crazy!

The second item I bought was from Boots, and it's the Clean & Clear Blackhead Clearing Daily Scrub. I have never been a huge fan of Clean&Clear, Clearasil, etc etc, as when I was younger I used a lot of their products to try and battle spots, but they ended up making everything worse. However, I have read some great reviews on this and I've noticed that my nose is full of blackheads which refuse to budge despite numerous attempts using pore strips and various other scrubs! It cost £3.99, but I think Boots have a 3 for 2 offer on at the moment!

The next thing I picked up was the TRESemme Liquid Gold Restorative Complex which cost £6.99 from Superdrug. I received a sample of Berber Oil in a Glossybox and I've loved it, but it is a little pricey for the full-size bottle so I thought I'd try this more affordable version! My hair is flat, fine and very dry at the ends due to years of bleach abuse, so I need all the extra moisture I can get.

I also picked up a Revlon Lip Butter in Tutti Frutti from Superdrug, which cost £5.99 as it was on offer. I think they're usually £7.99. I was really after the Peach Parfait shade, but both Boots and Superdrug were sold out of it so I went for Tutti Frutti instead. I've only recently gotten into lip products, I've always been a lipbalm-and-go kinda girl, but now I'm venturing into lip colour! I'll still be keeping my eye out for Peach Parfait, as I think it looks right up my street colour-wise.

The next item I bought was the Collection 2000 Lasting Perfection Concealer in shade Fair - 1. I'm worried this may be a little too pale for me as even though I'm quite fair, this looked reeeeally pale when I swatched it. Again, I've heard amazing reviews about this product and I'm really excited to see if it lives up to the hype! It cost £4.19 from Boots.

Next up is the Topshop Lip Stick in Powder Room. I fell in love with the shade Coy after seeing Kate wearing it on her blog, and I just knew that I HAD to have it. So off I went to Topshop today, desperately scouring their make-up stand and Coy was nowhere to be found. :( But I found Powder Room and thought it looked gorge, so I purchased that instead and I'm very glad I did! Not going to say too much as I want to do a full product review on this. It cost £7 from Topshop.

The rest of my purchases were a variety of nail polishes! Again, I've never been into nail polish really. My nails have always been short, bitten and naked, but after seeing so many pretty nails on beauty blogs, I've decided that I need to start prettifying mine! First up is the Barry M Nail Paint in shade 317 Blue Moon. I thought this would be a gorgeous pastel baby blue, perfect for summer. I also bought Barry M Nail Paint in shade 318 Peach Melba again a lovely pastel shade (I adore pastels right now!) of coral. I also threw in my basket a Barry M All in One Basecoat, Topcoat & Nail Hardener because I don't even own a topcoat polish! Each of these polishes cost £2.99 and can be found in Boots and Superdrug.

Another product which was brought to my attention by beauty blogs is the nail polish brand Essie. I'm aware that they have only recently launched in the UK, so I bounced into Superdrug today like an excited little puppy to see if I could find my most coveted shades (I wanted Mint Candy Apple, Tart Deco and Fiji). Much to my disappointment, my local Superdrug had no Essie stand at all! So I gave up and went to Boots, but I was very pleased to see a brightly lit, gorgeously inviting Essie stand in there. I spied Fiji straight away and as it was the very last bottle, I snapped it up. I decided against buying Mint Candy Apple, as I had already purchased the Barry M blue moon and felt that the shades were quite similar. Tart Deco was sold out, sniff sniff. :( The Essie polishes retail at £7.99. I also quickly popped into TK Maxx and found a little trio of Essie polishes for only £7! Bargain. Although I have no idea what shades they are. After intensive googling, I think the brown is Little Brown Dress, the pearly topcoat is Kisses & Bises, and the amber clear coat I'm still not totally sure on.. But hey, a bargain's a bargain!

Finally, I picked up a Models Own Nail Polish in shade Golden Peach. The golden shimmer of this coral polish caught my eye instantly, and I beelined for it. This cost £5 from Boots, and I'm very excited to try this. I think it'll look ace with a tan!

So, that's my haul and first blog spot conquered in one! I'm very excited to use all of my new products, I think I'll be painting my nails 3 times a day just to use all of my polishes! I'm planning on writing full product reviews for these once I've given them a good trial run.

Have you tried any of these products? What do you think? And most importantly, WHAT SHADE is that clear amber Essie nail polish?! Seriously, I don't even know what it's for!