Makeup Haul!

Today I met up with my lovely sister who is my dads other daughter. We had tea at Pizza Hut (which always seem to have soggy pizza) followed by the most amazing dessert in the world, 'Cookie Dough Dessert'. I needed some new foundation, and as I never seem happy with MAC foundation or anything I buy in Boots or Superdrug. I decided to invest in a more expensive foundation that would last me a while and I would be happy with the results. I had a budget in mind of around £25, but didnt want a MAC foundation...... However.... due to my uncontrollable addiction I ended up buying 3 different foundations:

Rimmel- Renew & Lift (100 Ivory)

Estee Lauder-'Double Wear' (1N1 ECRU 16)

Clinique- Blended Face Powder and Brush (20 Invisible Blend)

Clinique- 'Supermoisture' Foundation (02 Linen)

This is on my sisters hand who is alot more tanned than me as I am very fair, as you can see I tend to go for a more pink based foundation with the slightest hint of yellow, I've found that if I go too yellow it almost makes me look sick.

I also decided to try out a clinique loose face powder for the first time just to see what results it gives to my skin.

The problems I find I have with foundations is that my skin tends to look almost scaly on my forehead and around my mouth as the day goes on, and the only thing that stops it is wearing primer underneath. Obviously that is one of the main purposes of Primer, but I always thought it would be nice to find a foundation that did a primers job aswell as being used for coverage. 

As I only bought them today I obviously can't give you a review just yet, but I did some swatches on my sisters hand and the texture and consistency of the double wear foundation felt incredible, even with just a tiny bit on my finger.

Excited Happy Post!

So today marked the beginning basically of the rest of my life.
I enrolled myself at a highly recommended college to begin studying Media Makeup Level 2, which begins in September. 
It's a one year course and the woman said that the level of makeup qualification would mean I could work in salons and counters and things, or if I wanted to do the level 3 afterwrds then that would be more Film and Tv work, which is where I would like to be, especially as I'm sure there is more money involved.
To celebrate I'm going to post a makeup look which I am very apprehensive about as it is very weird, and I cant quite work out if I like it or not, but while I'm on a high I will pluck up the courage to post it.

 My Version of the Katy Perry ET look.

Katy Perry in her ET video.
I did cheat ever so slightly with this look by using 'Paint' for the eyes. It also looks like I have really bad skin on my forehead but it was a pattern which was not able to be picked up very well by any cameras I had.

Hope you enjoy it =/

Best Blog Award

I was awarded Best Blog by the lovely Beth over at www.allthingsbeautiful.blogspot.com.

The award rules are as follows:

1) Link back to the person that awarded this to you. See above!

2) Share 7 random things about yourself.  

• I'm scared of Jam
• I can fit my whole fist in my mouth 
• I had my name changed by deed poll when I was 15
• Everything I say tends to be a line from a song
• I still know the name and birthday of my first ever cabbage patch doll (Burgess Lloyd 28th Feb)
•  I tend to want piercings and tattoos if im feeling stressed or tense
•  I have never weighed more than 7 stone  

Award some blogs

Nichole Coley Cole 

Kawaii Barbie 

Catherine Loves 

Amy Leigh Brown 

Grace

Lorna Rose 

There are so many more that I really like and I honestly go through all of your blogs, most of the time leving pointless comments about something irrelevant :) But I appreciate every single person that looks at my blog and the comments that you leave me :) <3 

4) Answer the following questions:

• Favourite colour? Soft Pinks
• Favourite song? Best Thing I Never Had
• Favourite Dessert? Cookie Dough Dessert Pizza Hut
• What is annoying you? THE GOVERNMENT!!!
• When you are upset, you? Sit in my room and do makeup
• Favourite pet? My dog
• Black or white? Black
• Biggest fear? Spiders
• Best feature? I like my stomach
• Everyday attitude? What have you got to lose?
• What is perfection? Beauty
• Guilty pleasure? Take Aways
  
  
  <3
  
  

Black Swan

This is the second, maybe third most time consuming makeup look I have ever done. I will post the first one in a couple of days :) 

After seeing Black Swan I was just swamped with ideas of things to do and could not wait to try them out! If you have never seen Black Swan then you MUST go and see it. Such an amazing film with a beautiful story.

None of this has been edited, I was sat in a dark room with the light off my blackberry and used my Ipod to take this picture, hense the less than perfect quality.

Im trying to keep this post as short as possible but I have since been asked to do a tutorial on this as it was the first time I ever attempted it and I havent tried it again since. I have never done a tutorial before, I did try once but I just felt so embarassed and self conscious,i applaud anyone who has the guts to do one! If you would like me to do a tutorial then just leave a comment below :)

Thanks lovelies!

Products Used-

Mac Liquid Last Eyeliner (Big mistake when it came to being washed off!)
Mac Foundation (not sure on the shade but it was extremely light)
A cheap green makeup pallet from Superdrug.
And a maybelline lipstick.


Sorry I couldnt be more specific but I did this a while ago now :)
 

Mickey Mouse Look

Continuing on with my Lady Gaga looks this is another look I did from her Video from her hit song 'Paparazzi'. I'd describe it as a sinister take on the Disney icon, Mickey Mouse. I don't know if there are actual reasons and hidden meanings as to why she chose this particular look for the scene where she killed her boyfriend by poisoning his drink, but in my opinion i'd say that the character she portrays in the different versions of the video I've seen are that she's in a pretty volatile relationship, very violent, aggressive and controlling, all on the males side. We see him pushing her off a balcony whilst paparazzi are watching and she is killed. Maybe he didn't like being with a woman of such power? As she plays a famous character known as 'Lady Gaga' in the video. So my theory is that her "wife beaten" character has a dark side waiting to come out, and she disguises herself as a cartoon character who's known for being a cute, funny innocent childs cartoon character that no-one would ever associate with murder... what do you think? Would LOVE to hear your thoughts!

I'm sure I could have worded this better so I really do apologise for the lengthy analysis!

I hope you enjoy this look, I have since recreated it on a model for a photoshoot so will be posting them photos as soon as I receive them from the photographer.

 

No editing has been done on this and I used my blackberry with the flash on to take the picture.

I didn't actually use black lipstick for this, instead I used black eyeshadow applied with a eyeshadow brush, to create a soft powder look effect with a slight hint of white eyeshadow on the middle of my bottom lip to give it a slight highlight. 

If you are going to try this look yourself its important to conceal your lips first to get the best effect!

Hope you enjoy and have fun doing it yourself or on others!

For everyone that has left me feedback and comments so far I really do appreciate it and I always reply and follow every single person that leaves links and comments :) Thankyou soooo much for all the response so far!

Gaga for Gaga!

Alot can obviously be said about how Lady Gaga has changed the course of fashion and broken boundaries we didnt even know existed. With each new music video she has given makeup lovers like myself a new challenge. 

Here is the latest look I would like to share with you. I did this a couple of months back but again it was one of the more popular looks I did so I thought I'd share it with you now.

 
 Hopefully you can guess which Lady Gaga video this look is from...

 As always, my camera quality isnt the best as I use my iPod to take most of these pictures, but I do hope you enjoy them and that it maybe inspires you to create the same look or a similar one from a different music video, if you do make sure you leave me a comment so I can check it out!

xxxx

Loving Leopard!

A while ago I did a quick leopard print pattern on part of my face and uploaded a picture to my facebook account. People seemed to really like it although it was a really amature looking picture with my phone and a mirror. Today I decided to finally expand on the look and make it into as much of a production as possible, I'm not sure how long it took me but doing the pattern was pretty time consuming as I do everything myself.

 A quick list of what I used:

Collection 2000 liquid eyeliner for the pattern as it washes off easily.

A chilli pepper brown eyeshadow which I have had for yearsss, it has an orangey tint to it which I really like but don't really wear on a day to day basis.

I used the Urban decay eye primer in gold around my eyes so that in person it would have a shimmer to it.

For the eyes I used the Barry M black dust as it gives off that jet black look I was going for, that was applied with my short shader MAC brush, i can't remember the number.

A really cheap white thick eyeliner pencil.

A ruby and millie eyeshadow stick, I used the brown to blend in the black on my eyelid and underneath my eye.

A MAC eyeliner to fill in any gaps, it never seems to work on my waterline though for some reason!

And for the brows i used a brown eye pencil as well as a brown eyeshadow and underneath for the brow bone i used a benefit brow pencil.

Apologies for the really weird angle but I was trying to show how much of it there actually was! I'm a bit disappointed with the area around my jaw line but I couldnt reeally see!


Hope you like it!

Superdrug takes on Boots!

When you next go into your local Superdrug you may be offered something called a "beauty card". I went in there today to buy some new concealer and the Barry M nail effects in black. When the lady at the counter asked if I was interested I asked if it was the same as a Boots advantage card and she said it was similar but Superdrugs is alot better.

I read over the leaflet when I got home to see what they were going to offer me as a customer and I was quite amazed.

Boots Advantage Card offers you 4 points for every £1 you spend, and 100 points on your card is equvalent to £1. So you would have to spend £25 to earn £1 back. 

Superdrug Beauty Card offers you 1 point for every £1 you spend, meaning you would have to spend £100 to earn back your £1.

Now I'm no mathematician but it is quite clear to me which one I would rather go for.

The only reason in which I can see Superdrug says their Beauty Card is better is because when you spend your points, which have to be spent in multiples of 100, you also earn them back. So if you spend 200 points on your card which is £2, then you would get 2 points back... I'll try and put this as simple as possible as I have struggled with this myself. To gain 200 points you would have to spend £200 in the shop first, then if you used them 200 points to buy something, you would gain 2p of that £200 back. The lady behind the counter initially told me that it was better because it had a mirror on it.

Its soooooo confusing I know.

The lady initially told me it was better because it had a mirror on it... I think she needs to work on her sales pitch!

 

Whoever came up with this idea thinking that it was going to rival the boots advantage card was seriously mistaken. Maybe boots doesnt offer a system to gain your points back, but I would much rather earn more points immediately as it wouldn't take as long to be able to use the points in store.

Obviously there is no reason to not use the card as it doesnt cost you anything to use it, but my advice would be if you had both a Boots and Superdrug card then go and buy your products from Boots, alot more value for your money!!!

Start earning your points now! (because if you dont start straight away then you will still be trying to build them up well into your elderly years!)

Give a girl the right Eye Primer and she can Conquer The World!

For a good few weeks now I've been meaning to buy the Urban Decay Eyeshadow Primer Potion. About two weeks ago I went into the Urban Decay Makeup Counter in Debenhams and just had a browse around while I was there trying out their eyeshadows, lipglosses, their foundations, basically everything. 
There was nothing I could find fault with apart from their lipglosses.
I dont know why but i hate lipglosses that come in a squeezy tube. I find that they just attract dirt, dirt as in little hairs and things, that might fall off makeup brushes or whatever. I was quite disappointed as they came with a really fancy looking lid, and when I took it off it was like two completely different products. I should have really taken a picture of it but at the time I didnt think on. 
I went there again today to finally make my purchase and I just couldnt seem to find the bottle I was looking for, thankfully there was a very helpful lady working at the counter this time, (last time I was there, there was not an employee in sight and I had to go over to a different makeup counter to make my purchases).
Anyway, I'm not sure how many of you are aware of this but Urban Decay have actually made some changes with regards to their packaging of some of their products.
Many of you will recognise this bottle as being one of the more popular Urban Decay products...

However people were finding that the bottles were smashing far too easily when people were dropping them, I myself have butter fingers. So now... I shall take this opportunity to present to you the brand new packaging for the Urban Decay Eyeshadow Primer Potion...... [insert drum role]...

 As you can see it comes in a squeezy tube but thankfully with aspects of the old bottle as in my opinion it was the bottle that made it so appealing. This new squeezy tube offers you '10% more primer'. I think it is very practical because it means you can squeeze every last drop out of it. This retails at £14.50.
The next thing I'd like to show you is the same primer but in a gold shimmer colour. I cannot tell you how in love with this I am. The gold would work so amazingly with a night time look, acting as a brow shimmer as well as a eyeshadow base.

I purposely left the packaging on one of them just so you know what to look for if you are interested in buying this product. I must stress that i literally put a small blob of this on my sisters hand and there was alot of excess so it should last you a while! And for £14.50 thats exactly what you want!
Hope this helps for anyone who like myself was hoping that this primer wasnt just living off an un-certified hype. But i can guarantee it is definitely worth the money!


Also, just as an added extra thing which may or may not be of any use to you is the sharpener I also picked up. Ive found that everyday normal sharpeners dont tend to work on eyeliners which have that different kind of texture to them which are used to create that smouldering look, and it can sometimes ruin it which recently happened with a new maybelline pencil i bought and had to replace! This retails at £7 but works sooo wonderfully, nothing that I've found with a pencil sharpener before.

My Very First Day

Its my very first day on here, I was recommended by a friend to create a blog. Im a makeup artist and my life revolves around makeup, everyday is a new idea, the simplest things are the biggest inspirations and the littlest detail creates the finishing look.

 From my blog you can expect reviews of what makeup products I'm using. Im not always kind but I am always honest. Just because it has a designer name and a high price tag does not mean high quality. 

The makeup I do reviews for is always affordable high street makeup, I wont always be recommending products that cost £30 a piece.

I would like to point out its not always actual makeup, I do recommendations for makeup brushes and tell you what ways they are best used to get the look you are going for.

On the whole I just hope all the gorgeous women who appreciate makeup as much as I do enjoy reading and interacting with me and others so we can all continue looking a beautiful as possible forever!

To start this off I will post a picture of one of the more popular makeup looks that I did. Please note that every makeup look I have ever done I have never practised before and tend to use my Ipod or Blackberry to take the pictures so the colour intensity isnt always the best it can bem but at least you know it hasnt been airbrushed!

For this particular look I took apart a necklace I bought from a sale at New Look for £2 and used it as a decoration for my hair instead. The following things were used:

• Ruby and Millie eyeshadow stick with Gold and Brown (£10.50 at Boots)
• Liquid Last MAC eyeliner
• MAC Carbon Eyeshadow
• Benefit Thrrrob Blusher
• Rimmel Blusher (comes in a row of three different shades of pink)
• A Pallet of different shades of green for the eyes, available at Superdrug
• Eyelure 140 Eyelashes
• Benefit High Beam

The pattern used at the side of my eye was just a free hand drawing I basically just made up as I went along. I did an initial drawing underneath which I wasnt happy with so did this one on top, it ended up working really well as it created a sort of shadow 3D  effect which made it really stand out and look more fairytale-esque.