Another trip to Inglot

So on Monday I went to Westfield shopping center with the intention of going to Inglot and getting a 10 pan eyeshadow palette full of very bright colours that I wouldn't normally wear. Normally the 10 pan palettes are £35, which I think is brilliant value for money anyway, but when I got there I was told that they actually have a sale on, 20% off! So I managed to get a 10 pan palette for £28, I was very impressed. Anyway here is what I got.

So as you can see I got some very bright colours, and a mixture of mattes and colours that are matte but have particles of glitter running through them.
I'm not going to do any swatches on this post because what you see in the pan is what you get, but if you do want swatches just let me know. They eyeshadows themselves are lovely, quite buttery and super pigmented. The only downside to these eyeshadows is that you sometimes get a bit of fallout.
I also want to comment on Inglots customer service as it is fantastic. All the Sales Assistants are very friendly and knowledgeable, and they don't have the stuck up air that some shops have. The lovely lady who served me remembered me from my first visit to the shop, which I always think is lovely as you feel like they are making a effort.
As for the freedom system, I think it is brilliant. There is always a colour in a palette that you don't like, and this eliminates that as you get to pick all the colours yourself. They also make lovely gifts as you can pick a mix of eyeshadows, face powders etc and make a really nice customisable palette for someone.
The only issue I have with the freedom system is that they products are not named. I have a pretty bad memory and can't remember what colours I picked up last time, and I was worried that I would pick up a colour I already had. Luckily I didn't but I feel like this is a mistake I will make in the future.
So yea, lots of Inglot love from me, its such a shame there is only one in the UK, but I am grateful I live in London. Whilst I was in Westfield I had a cheeky spend in Mulberry too, so maybe I will do a post on my new baby in the future....

Bright Eyes EOTD

Yesterday I went to Inglot again and got some very bright eyeshadows. I don't actually own many bright shadows and felt like experimenting, so here is the eye look I came up with.

This was very out of my comfort zone to wear, but I really liked it when I looked in the mirror and one of the first things my friend said to me when I met up with her is how she loved my eye make up, I am still undecided, what do you think of this look? Is it too much and do I look like a hooker or is it still wearable?
Sorry for the lack of face, but I forgot to pack my foundation so all I did today was my eyes, I couldn't even be bothered to sort out my eyebrows!
Expect a post tomorrow about my experience at Inglot and what I got there.

MAC brushes

So about a week ago I was having a very bad day, so to cheer myself up I went to MAC and decided to get this brush set:

If I remember rightly it was £40 for the five mini brushes, and it came in a cute tartan bag. The five brushes are:

• 187, this is the duo fibre brush and I have used it for my foundation a few times and it gives a lovely flawless finish.
• 168, I have been using this for my blush and I find it blends out very nicely.
• 252 This packs on colour really well, in fact I have never had a brush that transfers this much colour.
• 219 A pencil brush which once again transfers a lot of colour. I actually have the sigma version of this brush, and I have to admit the MAC one is slightly better, more colour transfers and although the hairs are just as soft on both, the MAC one is slightly denser so they don't move as much, which is what you need if you are being precise in the crease.
• And finally the 209, a eyeliner brush. This is the only one I haven't used as to me it looks quite thick. I will give it a go though with my trusty Bobbi Brown gel liner and see if I can get a nice thin line with it.

This is my first experience with MAC brushes. I own a set of Sigma brushes which I have owned for two years and are the only brushes I use. As much as I love my Sigma brushes and think they are good, the MAC ones are slightly better, but then again they are a lot more pricey aswell.

A couple of the Sigma brushes I have are the same ones as the ones in the set, so I can do a proper comparison if anyone is interested, so you can see the difference in the way it applies shadow and how it looks.

I am quite happy with this little set and I think it was a nice way to try out a few MAC brushes for a cheaper price. Does anyone have a brand that they would recommend for brushes? I am really loving my Illamasqua ones too so I think I should branch out.

A little update

So for anyone who doesn't know, I work in retail, so this is the busiest time of the year for me. I am currently doing five 9 hour days a week, some days are going for longer then that so this is why I haven't been posting that much.
On my days off I am very tired and ill and can't really be bothered to post which makes me sad. I am also getting frustrated at having to use my iPhone for pictures as the quality is so poor.
Basically what this all means is I won't be posting until after Christmas now, when hopefully I should get a camera as well, yay! I actually get a full 4 days off for Christmas, which is a lot in retail so hopefully I will come back rested and with more inspiration.
Happy holidays everyone!

New Glasses, yay or nay?

So bit of a different post today. For Christmas my nan is paying for me to get a new pair of glasses as I have been wearing the same pair for the last 4 years.

I went glasses shopping with my friend, and she is very into the geek chic glasses and encouraged me to get a pair. I ended up getting this pair, but I am unsure.

It may be that I am not used to glasses this size? I think the square shape suits me, but I am unsure. What are your opinions? And sorry about the reflectiveness of the lenses, they are plastic at the moment, need my optician to put in prescription lenses for me!

Also excuse my face, this is after a day of work with very little make up!

FOTD with orange eyeshadow

So if you didn't know, I am attempting to experiment more with colour. I think orange is quite a experimentation! I used the orange from the Inglot palette I got the other day and toned it down by using more neutral colours. Anyway here is how it turned out, I actually really love this look!

Face

NARS Sheer Glow - Mont Blanc

MAC Moisture Select Concealer - NW15

MAC Blush - Melba

Eyes

Inglot Orange

MAC Wedge in crease

MAC Twinks to darken crease

MAC Blanc Type as highlight

Illamasqua Precision Ink

Illamasqua Brow Cake in Storm

MUFE Smokey Lash mascara

I have bare lips in these pictures but in the end I decided to wear Jazzed lipstick from MAC. Oh and for those that asked last time, these are my natural lashes, but I think it shows that the LiLash is working!

So what do you think? I love this and think it is quite wearable, considering it's orange!

Girly FOTD

So I have decided recently that I am still young and I should be experimenting more with my make up, so yesterday I went for the girly romantic look.

I used my normal Sheer Glow foundation with MSF natural to set it and my Moisture Select Concealer. For the eyes I used the pink and purple from my new Inglot palette with MAC Dazzlelight as a highlight. I also used my new Illamasqua Precision Ink and Brow Cake, I love the brow cake so much! For cheeks I used Oh So Fair, and finally for the lips I used Viva Glam Gaga lipstick and gloss.

This is very girly and quite young, but I had fun wearing it so enjoy!

Tacky NOTD

So I love a bit of tackyness, and you can't get much tackier than pink and purple nails, so here is what I came up with.

I'm quite impressed with how neat the tips are considering I never do French manicure style nails. The pink is China Glaze Sugar High and the purple tips are Sephora by OPI Domestic Goddess. I used two coats of the pink and one for the tips. It didn't last long however, by the end of the day I had major chips.

Inglot Haul!

So after going to Illamasqua on Saturday, I decided whilst I was in London I should check out Inglot. For those of you who don't know, Inglot it a Polish make up company that has been around for over 25 years, but we only have one in the UK and it is in the Westfield Shopping Center in London.
Above is the two palettes I got. The top one is from the boyfriends parents to me for Christmas so I can't swatch it, but the bottom one is for me to do more girly looks with. The palettes where £20 each, which for five shadows I think is brilliant. They have different styles of palette, I opted for the magnet style ones that you can stack up but they had your normal on a hinge style palettes that had a mirror in the top.
The palettes are not pre made with the shadows. Inglot have a thing called the Freedom System. Basically you go in the store, they give you a flat metal board and you pick from the hundreds of shadows which ones you want to go in. They have colours ranging from neutrals and pastels to the brightest neons and everything in between. The palettes also come in different sizes and you can get circle pans too. As well as eyeshadow you can fill the palettes with concealer, face powder, lipstick etc.
I only checked out the the eyeshadows, and they where all so good. They where very pigmented and felt buttery on the fingers. Below are some swatches of the lighter eyeshadows I got, please excuse the goosebumps!

I had such a amazing time in London on Saturday, and I would really recommend going to Inglot if you can, a 5 pan square palette with the eyeshadows costs £20, a 10 pan square palette with eyeshadows cost £35 and a circle pan palette costs £32 so great value for money and a brilliant place to go if you don't own any palettes! I think if I ever manage to get to 50 followers I will have to do a giveaway with one of these palettes because they are amazing, but I know how awkward the limited location makes it to try them out.

Illamasqua Haul

So following on from yesterday, after meeting Alex Box I had £30 to redeem and I also had some extra tax money so I picked up a few things in Illamasqua.

I got the eyebrow cake in thunder, the precision ink in abyss, intense lipgloss in petulant and a eyebrow brush and blending brush.

The eyebrow cake looked really good in the demonstration, and I am a bit obsessed with eyebrows. Normally I just use a eyeshadow to fill mine in so I thought why not treat myself to a product designed specifically for the eyebrows. Mika the lovely sales assistant matched me up with a shade, he did one eyebrow for me then gave me the brush to see if I liked how the product applied when I did it myself.

I used the eyebrow brush and fell in love with that too. It is a lot wider then any angled brush I have seen and Mika showed me how its the right width to just turn at the end of the eyebrows to give them a really neat finish. I use angled brushes a lot so I decided whilst I am there I may as well get one.

I also got the blending brush because I only actually have one blending brush, and I think it is a brush that you definitely need more than one of! The Illamasqua one is very soft, a bit softer than my Sigma one, and it is also a little thinner than my sigma one. All my brushes are Sigma so I am quite excited to try some high end brushes.

Last but not least is the intense lipgloss. I got it in the shade petulant, which is a lovely blue pink. I got one of the intense glosses because they are so shiny, they look like glossy paint on the lips as they are very pigmented. Be aware with the glosses though, they look different in the tubes to what they do when swatched so try them out!

I am very happy with what I purchased and got to try it all out before I buy it. I also recommend that you visit a counter if you live near one. The MUA on the counter may look intimidating, but unlike some MAC artists I have come across, the Illamasqua ones are very lovely and want to help you, not show off.

Meeting Alex Box

So for those of you who don't know, Alex Box is one of my favourite make up artists ever, so when Illamasqua posted a blog saying how she would be doing a masterclass in the London Selfridges store I knew I had to sign up!

It was £30 for a 2 hour masterclass, but it is redeemable against product which I think is a fabulous price because I wanted to get some bits anyway.

It was a fairly small group, 20 or so women with varied backgrounds in make up. We went to a conference room away from the crowds and took a seat as we watched Alex create a master piece!

She had a model with her, and asked us what we would like to see and decided to do a normal look, but take contouring to the extreme to show us how we can push make up. Rather than trying to teach us make up she was demonstrating how she does it, as she is very into taking the products and being inspired by them instead of laying out set instructions.

She took questions as she was going along and also explained some more technical things about make up and how the eye sees things and why you do what you do with make up. She also talked about make up periods and how to make make up more glamourous or editorial.

After her demonstration she answered questions about make up in general and the brand Illamasqua. I went in not really knowing what to expect, I know some arty people can be stuck up their own arses, so I was very glad Alex was lovely and encouraging as apposed to thinking she is the bees knees (which to me she is).

We then went off in little groups to tables where we had some champagne and got to speak to some of the counter workers. I was in a group with a guy called Mika, who I am a little bit in love with.
After all this we had a little private shopping session in the room the masterclass was in, which is great because it was so packed downstairs in the beauty hall that I probably would've made purchases I regret. I decided I wanted to get a eyebrow cake because I am a little bit obsessed with brows. Mika helped me pick out the right shade, and he also helped me pick out a intense lipgloss as I wanted to try one of them too. In the end I got the ultimate eye liner, a eyebrow cake, intense lipgloss, blending brush and eyebrow brush. I will do a little haul blog tomorrow.

I had a lovely time, and all the staff are real ambassadors of the brand. I would say if they ever run something like this again and you are in the area try and get to it!

I have a few pictures of the demonstration, and a really bad one of me and Alex Box, but I shall include them anyway, enjoy and sorry for a lengthy post!

November Favourites

Reading other peoples favourites is one of my favourite type of blog posts to read. I love reading what other people think is worth buying and using. Unfortunately I don't have that many for November because I have been experimenting with old products and products I overlook, but I do have a few key items that I have been using pretty much daily, so here we go.

So first off we have MAC Cream Blush in So Sweet, So Easy. Its a very bright baby pink, and I love using it in colder weathers because it gives me the effect of being a Ski Bunny. You know the ones in all the snuggly clothes, but sit around the lodge rather than actually skiing? Yea that's me.

We then have NARS Multiple in Orgasm. So this is one of the products that I have rediscovered. I'm still not overly keen on it, but have been using it daily as a cheek highlight. I get a lot of compliments on my skin when I wear this, but despite me using it and it looking good I still don't like it. Not sure why. Bit weird to have a product I don't see the hype in to be on my favourites, but I guess I have been using it.

Next is MAC lipstick in Violetta. I am normally a pink lipstick kind of girl, but it being a bit colder I have moved into more berries and darker colours. This is the perfect berry colour for me, it looks a lot different on the lips then in the tube, but it is a beautiful colour. I got mine from the Venomous Villains collection, but you can get it from MAC Pro, so I don't need to worry about running out!

Then we have a nail varnish. Essie Angora Cardi. I love purple, and purple is such a good colour for November, albeit a cliche one, but I still enjoy. This is a lovely polish with a great formula, you only need two coats and you can walk out the door.

My last favourite is NARS Sheer Glow foundation. I love this foundation. I have used it pretty much every day since buying it, and if I haven't used it it's because I wasn't wearing make up on that day.

So there are my favourites for last month. Can't wait to read other peoples favourites, also I will be talking more in depth about my all time favourites at Lady of the Lanes blog tomorrow so be sure to check that out! I am so glad its finally December because I am so excited for Christmas!