Product Picks For A Summer Face

When it comes to face makeup I can't get enough. I love trying new primers, bases, bronzers and highlighters. The whole shabang. As it's been absolutely gorgeous weather over here this summer (past few weeks have been sunfilled and hot hot hot - talking 30 degrees) I haven't been wearing much on my face most days, but on makup days the following has been my go-to mix for the face:

To prep and give my face a bit of colour and glow I use Clarins Instant Smooth Self Tanning and my well loved Laura Mercier Radiance Foundation Primer. If I feel the need for foundation I will go for Chanel Vitalumière Aqua and then go over the under eye area and any spots with my MAC Studio Finish Concealer, some days though I skip the foundation and just go over with some studio finish.

To shape things up I reach for Too Faced Chocolate Soleil for some bronzing and contouring as I find that this product has the perfect colour tone for me for the summertime. For blush I tend to go with MAC Extra Dimension Blush in Seduced at Sea unfortunately this is limited edition from the Alluring Aquatics Collection but I do believe you can still get it online. If not Benefit Rockateur is a good dupe. To finish it all off I use the highlighter in the Urban Decay Naked Flushed palette and I have to say - this is probably my favourite highlighter of all time. 

So that's it, my go-to summer face makeup for the days I feel like putting on a little something something. I'd love to know if you have a few products you reach for more during the warmer months! Let me know in the comments!

Love, Emilie 

Top 3 Summer Lipsticks

MAC Show Orchid / MAC Lady Danger / Chanel

 I have been a 'beauty gal' for quite a few years now but its only this past year or so that I've found a love for lipsticks. I am still not a fan of the lipgloss and don't really see that changing any time soon but lipsticks, oh yes. 

The only thing with me is I don't go for the typical nudes and pinks. If I wear lipstick it is more often than not a bright or bold one, and if I do go for a nude it is one out of the only two I own. A post all about my two nudes is coming right around the corner so stay tuned if you're a nude lips kind of girl.

Anyway, back to my point. Bold and bright lips. I love my MAC Rebel but sometimes I feel like something 'happier' as Rebel is sometimes a bit dark especially for summer and it is then that I reach for the three above. 

Show Orchid has been on my wishlist since I read about it on Becky's blog(One you definitely need to check out if you haven't already. She's a top girl that one) and I finally got my hands on it at the pro store in London. It's a MAC amplified so it is super opaque and has a bloody brilliant staying power. All 8 hours of my shift with only one teeny touch up to be precise.

Lady Danger was all Molly's fault (another top girl right there), although I do thank her for making me buy it as it is the most perfect matte, orange toned red I have come across.

As for the Chanel Mélodieuse - Who can say anythng bad about chanel?  This bad boy has got the mix of peach and pink just right so that I don't feel like a barbie doll nor a wannabe fruit. It has a very moisturising consistency and bit of a stain-like finish which I think is perfect for the summer months. I got mine in my Marie Claire beauty bag and it has been living in my bag ever since.

What are your go-to summer lipsticks?

Love,

Em

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'Back to Bases'

Yes, I changed the look of my blog again. Only slightly though, but I have to admit the whole blog design thing is something Ifind hard to get right. It is like I'm never fully satisfied with what it looks like. But enough about that.

As I've already covered my favourite primers I thought I'd move on to what usually comes next; favourite bases. I'm a massive fan of finding nice bases, especially natural looking ones that will still even out my skin and cover what needs to be covered. The following ones range from light to full coverage but if applied right will all look very skin-like, flawless and natural.

Lightest first, the Diorskin Nude BB Cream has been mentioned on here more than a few times so I won't go on too much about it, but for a light, everyday base that evens out the skin and gives it a light glow - this is your best friend. Read a full review here. Available for £30 at Feelunique.

Chanel Vitalumière Aqua is a much loved foundation in the beauty blogging world. A light to medium coverage that stays in place, looks like skin and creates a flawless, glowing complexion. Very light feeling and hydrating but not at all oily. For best result I like to use my fingers to apply it. Available for £33 at Boots.

One I'd never heard of until I had a browse on cultbeauty quite a while ago is Alison Raffaele Reality Base Foundation which has the most appropriate name ever. It looks like skin, feels like skin (actually the product feels a bit like applying water to your face but once it's on it feels like skin), stays all day and  has a buildable medium to full coverage. Only downside is the slightly funny smell but that goes away once its set. The finish is very natural so not overly glow-y or matte but somewhere in between. Available for £35 at BeautyBay.

Last one is my newest addition and also the one I will probably use the least. Not because I don't like it because I really do (it wouldn't be in my 'favourite bases' post if I didn't), but because I just don't tend to go for full coverage products unless it is a special occasion or I'm going out - which is what I bought it for. Laura Mercier Silk Creme Foundation is another favourite in the world of beauty and it is not without reason. It gives flawless, longlasting, full coverage without looking cakey. I use it mixed with other, lighter foundations or with a damp beautyblender. Available for £34 at SpaceNK.

I know these are all high end products and I'm sorry I didn't include any high street ones, but when it comes to face products I do find that my skin prefers higher quality products. I'm not saying high street ones are bad, just that I haven't found a favourite there yet.

I would love to hear what your favourite face products are so let me know in the comments! Also love finding new blogs to read so pop your link in as well and I'l have a look. If you want to follow my blog you can do that here.

Love,

 Em

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Give Me a Chance... or Three?

As you saw in one of my most recent posts (Duty Free Haul), I am a bit in love with the Chanel Chance perfume(s). The thing is I am this obsessed with them:

And you see the big empty original one to the left? That is my third one of the eau de toilette. I know, I am a bit of a crazy one, but look elsewhere for an apology because these three babies are the best smelling round glass bottles anyone could ever dream of and you are missing out if you've never had a sniff.

I won't attempt a detailed description of what exactly the Chance scents smell like, but I will insert what the people Chanel say:

Eau de Toilette 

It's your chance . . . TAKE IT! A decidedly young scent for those who dare to dream. A light, subtly sensual fragrance, filled with vitality and energy, evolves from one moment to the next, each wholly unique.

Eau Fraíche

CHANCE Eau Fraîche, a vibrant incarnation of the unexpected fragrance, now takes on a sparkling freshness. The unexpected floral bursts with a lightness and zest as notes of citrus, Water Hyacinth and Jasmine Absolute are highlighted and energized with woody notes of Amber of Patchouli and Fresh Vetiver.

Eau Tendre

CHANCE, the country’s bestselling fragrance family, reveals its newest facet, CHANCE EAU TENDRE. CHANEL Master Perfumer Jacques Polge reimagines the decidedly young scent in a constellation of tender and vibrant notes, at once delicate and airy, with an intoxicatingly light,fruity trail.

So to sum it up it is a slightly sensual fragrance that is filled with energy and youth. Eau Fraíche, which is limited edition I believe, has some added citrus as well as hints of floral and woody notes. Eau Tendre is definitely the lightest one and in my opinion quite floral, but it remains fresh, clean and youthful. I love all these fragrances and doubt I'll be roaming the shelves for any replacements anytime soon. I highly suggest that you ask for a little tester next time you're at a perfume retailer ;)

What is your favourite fragrance?

Lots of Love,

Em

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Duty Free Pick-Ups

Alright, so I am back from Scotland and T in the Park (which was amazing and epic by the way), and with me I bring a few sneaky treats from the duty free's great selection. 

I have been eyeing the Chanel perfume for ages now as I am already a fan of the original eau de toilette version as well as the eau tendre, and I finally got round to actually getting it. A fresh, female and flirty (but not sweet) scent that it seems like everyone tends to like. I suggest you go have a sniff at it the next time it crosses your path :) Next I got the Dior Diorskin Nude BB Cream, and boy do I get what the hype's about! I'll do a review on it, but hold on to your horses because this is a knock out! Then as a last minute 'throw it in your bag before its your turn to pay' pick up I found the OPI nail polish in 'Red Lights Ahead..Where?' in a box next to the check out. Hate it when they do that - I always end up buying things just because they're there not because I necessarily want or need them. Luckily this wasn't one of those products, but rather a real home-run that I have been sporting since the moment I got home. A gorgeous coral with hints of red and a name that I happen to love.

I am very satisfied with the three goodies I got, although my bank account might feel otherwise... Anyway, new post will be up in not too long!

Lots of Love,

Em

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Saturday Skin Talk - The Glow

 

I decided to try something; A few posts set to specific topics and days. One of them will be Saturday Skin Talk, however I will not do one every saturday and some saturdays I might put up something else. But when I am in the mood for making a post about skin (foundation-tips/highlighter/ bronzer/blush/skincare etc) I will do it on a Saturday :) I will also come with a few more of these, although I haven't decided on which ones so if you have a suggestions or a request then let me know in the comments and I will be sure to read through them!

On today's agenda is "the glow". I know dewy and glowing skin has been huge on the SS13 runways this year, however it is not always easy to know which products are the best to use for different skin types/tones as using the "wrong" products and the application of them can sometimes lead to a shiny disaster...

Therefore I bring to you, my lovely readers;

Glowy Summer Skin 1-0-1!

I am no expert but I do know the basics (I am sure many of you do to), so to break it down for you into Do's and Don'ts:

Do use bronzer on the areas of your face where the sun would naturally hit you (forehead/hairline, cheeks/cheekbones, bridge of the nose and on your chin.

Do apply any shimmer/highlighter to the high-points of your face only. (E.g. Cheekbones, nose-bridge, cupids-bow).

Do make sure to blend the bronzer/highlighter or blush well enough for it to look natural.

Do choose colours that suits your skin tone. 

Do use cream products if you have dry or normal skin. Be careful with creams and too much shimmer in the products if you tend to get oily as it might end up looking very shiny - and that is not in a good way. (Powders are good for most skin types, except maybe very dry skins as they might end up looking patchy/flakey)

Don't use colours that are too dark for your skin tone. If they are slightly darker, make sure to blend properly and consider taking it lightly down your neck to make the transition seamless and natural.

Don't contour with your bronzer (at least not if it has any shimmer). Choose a cooler toned bronzer or an actual contour product instead.

Don't apply bronzer/blush in bad lighting. Try to get as natural light as possible, and if you do not have a lamp that provides this, apply your make-up near a window!

Don't take your blush too high/low/close to your nose as that will look unnatural and is less likely to be flattering than if you focus it on the apples of the cheeks and take it up along the cheekbones toward the temples.

Product Recommendations: 
Oily Skin: Go for powders that have little to no shimmer and apply them after you have set your foundation with a setting powder. Finish off with a setting spray such as MAC Fix + or one of the Urban Decay ones (e.g DeSlick). This way your glow will stay on better and longer, as  well as looking more natural than if you would skip the setting spray.

TopShop do some great powder highlighters that would be perfect and for blush and bronzer pretty much any brand has some good powder formulas these days but to mention some: Maybeline (the Dream Terra Sun Bronzer - i think- is supposedly very nice), Too Faced Chocolate Soleil, MAC blushers, Sleek blushers. 

Dry Skin: If you have dry to very dry skin, keep an eye out for cream products! They will give some moisture to your skin whilst adding life and sheen to the face. No need to set your makeup with a spray/powder, just apply foundation and go straight into your bronzer, blush and highlight! 

You all know how much I love the Chanel Bronze Universal cream bronzer, and for someone with dry skin this would work very well! Try one of the TopShop Cream Highlighters or maybe go for one by MAC - I know the colour Pearl is on my shopping list! Revlon do incredible cream blushers and so does Stila I have heard, so I suggest having a look at those if you want non-sticky but still creamy products!

Normal Skin: Here comes the lucky ones! If your skin is fairly normal/combination then all the products mentioned above will most likely suit your needs. Just get the application right and know what your skin needs regarding setting powders/sprays and you will be well off. 

Those were all my do's and don'ts and tips for getting glowy skin this Spring/Summer! I hope this helped some of you, and if it did or if you have any points you would like to add then please let me know in the comments! :)

If you have any requests for future posts of this kind (any beauty/fashion/life related topic you would like some help/information about!) let me know and I will try do it as one of the next "specialised" posts.

I wish you all good luck with getting your glow on! :)

- Em

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Everyday Shadows

It is not everyday that I actually take my time to stop by the step of applying eyeshadow in my makeup routine, but sometimes I get the urge to whack on a little somethin' somethin'. Yesterday I went to a concert with my mom so I decided to give a new shade a whirl. MAC Soba, in you come.

I started off with the base, the Maybeline Fit Me foundation in 120 to be exact. This foundation is pretty darn great, it has one of the best colour ranges, louminous finis, natural "barely there" appearance, whilst still giving a medium coverage that is buildable. Any extra concealing was done by Maybeline's Fit Me concealer in 15. A little bit of Chanel's Bronze Universal over the cheeks, nose and forehead and a light dusting of Topshop's highlighter in Cresent Moon, and face was done.

Then came the eyes. I used my trusty, personalized MAC quad containing Espresso and Omega, together with the new little baby under the name Soba. Soba all over the eyelid, Espresso in the outer corner and blended into the crease and  then Omega to blend any edges, was all I did to give a little depth to my eyes. For eyelashes, I curled them, then coated them with L'oréal Telescopic mascara in waterproof and Maybeline Illegal Lenghts mascara (also waterproof). 

Only one more thing left, and that's lips. I used MAC's Rebel lipstick which is one of my favourite lipsticks of all times. A coat of this, blotted with a pinkie finger and voilá! Done, and done.

I hope you liked this rundown of my FOTD (Face Of The Day - yesterday). I am trying to mix things up on my blog with a little bit of a lot of things within the beauty and fashion business, including some travelling, so I hope you don't mind the variety. As always, just let me know with a comment or tweet if there is anything you want to see, or don't want to see or just something you want to ask :)

- Em

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ChanelChanelChanel

So that was a strange title, but I have a reason for it. Chanel was my inspiration a few weekends ago when I created the make-up look that my good friend Siren is wearing above. You see I have been applying to universities and a few of them require a creative portfolio. Now I am not very good with sketching, drawing and all that stuff so to have something to put into this portfolio of mine, I ended up doing some of my friends makeup, and well...with one of them I became quite a lunatic and took my inspiration from Chanel's famous glitter brows from the Autumn 2012 Runway. 

It was a friday and I was going shopping for the bits and bobs I would need for this look I was going to create, and 1st if all - I am one to stick with high street products as I don't really have a budget for all the high end products out there, so to go into the more "luxurious" make-up stores was quite fun. Very fun actually - just imagine me as a little kid in a candy shop and you've got it! Secondly I had no clue as to what exactly I was looking for so I had to come up with something as I went along. But oh well, with Karl Lagerfeld's out-of-the-box brow designs in the back of my mind, I stepped into the streets of Stavanger and started this quite exciting little hunt which in the end led me to this:

Make- up Store had quite the selection of loose glitter, and such a gorgeous range of cream highlighters!  (I will add the name of the products later today as I am not at home right now)

Eyeshadow palette from Accessories which has surprisingly good pigmentation! Care for a review?

Smashbox HD complexion set with a travelsize foundation, concealer, primer and powder.

Very good sizes for the price (£30) and the quality is extremely good so I will definitely do a review of these soon!

I am not sure if any of you are interested, but here comes a quick run-down of how I created this look: I primed her face and eyelids, then used a pritt-stick to "cover" her brows (just remember to wipe away any of the glue that might have come outside the brows). I then applied the Smashbox foundation in Light all over her face. Next came the "Very Berry" pencil from Make-up Store which I used to outline and fill in the brows with. I then added eyelash-glue on a cotton bud and spread that on the eyebrows (one at a time) before I applied the glitter, gradually moving from pink to green/blue (I created a mix of the two colours for the middle part so that they would fuse together naturally. Then I cleaned up any fall down of glitter with a tissue and then applied some concealer where it was needed, which was pretty much nowhere :) (a tip is to make your model hold a  tissue paper under her eyes while working with the glitter to reduce the amount of "cleaning" needed. )  For the eyelids I applied the cream highlighter from Smashbox and a swipe of the eyeshadows Copper and Bootycall by Urban Decay (Naked2) all over with some mascara on the lashes just to keep it subtle and natural. To finish off the face I used my Chanel Soleil de Tan Bronze Universal (Review Here) to warm up her complexion and do a little contouring, and the Smashbox highlighter on her high-points set with the TopShop highlighter in Crescent Moon. And that was it, as simple as that. Well it did take me about 2.5 hours so I guess it wasn't that simple but its not too complicated, just very time consuming.

I will leave you with a few more pictures of Gorgeous Siren and the completed brows, and if you want to know anything more about the products, the procedure or just have any questions or comments then don't hesitate to write them below or send me a tweet :)

  

Have a lovely weekend!

-Em

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The Review: Chanel Bronze Universal

Before I applied it, and after. Below is with blush and contour as well. Apologies for the yellow light in these, I know that distracts from the true colours, but I did this in the morning so the lighting was bad... 

Ok so I admit that I have been cheating a bit with only posting polyvore creations for the past week, but honestly I don't know where the time went! All I can say is that I will try to resume to my somewhat more normal content, starting with my Chanel Soleil De Tan - Bronze Universal review which is coming just below the next paragraph.

As for what I have been up to, there's not much to tell other than that my birthday was last Thursday which meant a celebration was in order for Friday, then a birthday party for a friend of mine on Saturday - and then a visit to my grandparents on Sunday.

So here it is, the long awaited review of my beloved (yes I attach quickly) Chanel Soleil de Tan, Bronze Universal. I showed you a quick glimpse of the actual product in this post so I will skip that part today and stick to the fun stuff, which is how it works.

This product is raved about on quite a lot of beauty blogs and in even more beauty videos. It is a staple for many make-up artists and on the runway it happens to be one of those “instant bronzed face” staples. So how does it work for us non-models? At first glance it looks like someone popped a big dollop of chocolate mouse in a Chanel jar, with the consistency of cold, hard butter. But once you actually get some on your little synthetic brush (I use this one) and apply it on your face it blends into a smooth, velvety creamy bronze glow that doesn’t look cakey, powdery nor too “creamy”. In a way it disappears, leaving only a nice glow and some colour, because it is quite pigmented and has a slight shimmery finish (although nothing too overpowering). As for the colour, it is more on the orange side than the grey-ish brown,  so please, if you have a skin tone close to mine (I’m MAC NW20) then use it as more of a bronzer, and not so much a contour product as that can easily look fake and not so flattering. In the pictures above I have applied it just above where I normally apply my contour and then blended it upwards and slightly down to the hollows of my cheekbones. This does create an illusion of a contour but not a super obvious one. I then applied some of my Sleek Contour Kit in Medium (only the contour colour) to shape my cheekbones and my temples. To finish off I used a swipe of my Sleek Blush Trio in Lantern.

The lasting power for this badboy is quite impressive, at least on me and I have combination skin. It lasts a good 10-12 hours without too much budging and it’s only when I wear it for longer that I notice it going slightly patchy.

All in all I love this product and it is now an everyday staple in my make-up routine. I just love how it gives my face that little bit of colour and healthy glow.

Have you tried it or du you want to give it a go?

- Em

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