Pink Guava

A look at my collection of Korres Guava lipsticks:



Left to right:

Natural Pink 13, Pink 17, Nude 34




Swatches:

When swatching them I realised they were very similar to the 3 MAC Mattene lipsticks I have from Fall'07...



The difference is that the Mattenes are truly matte and were heavily pigmented with 1 swipe, while the Korres lipsticks have a slight sheen and took 2 swipes to get to the same level.

Also the MAC Mattenes do have more product and cost less (around US$15) while Korres Guava lipsticks cost about US$22 for even less product.




Lip swatches:

Natural Pink 13


Pink 17


Nude 34



Overall impressions:

Price 7/10
Slightly pricey considering the small quantity you get, but for someone like me that doesn't ever use up a tube of lipstick it won't matter. These are a better deal if you get them from sets - Korres puts out some excellent value for your money sets every now and then.

Performance 8/10
Highly pigmented, recommended for pigmented lips. I think Nude or Natural Pink would work well as a lip concealer for brighter colours on top. Only issue is that it does emphasize fine lines and dryness on lips so you do need to exfoliate or use lip balm before wearing these.

Packaging 8/10
Super sophisticated and sleek, easy to carry around in a purse.

If you missed out on MAC Mattenes from 2007 I'd recommend these. The colours are a lot more wearable than the newer dark gothy Mattene lipsticks. Or if you're just bored of sheer lipsticks that don't show up the way they appear in the tube, these would be perfect for you. Just remember to moisturize lips before using and add a gloss on top if you like.

On another note, please check out my sale blog as I'm planning to move (hopefully) and need to cut down on some things. Feel free to email me with questions, whatever and I'll do my best to get back to you as soon as possible.

Urban Decay Box of Potions

Here's my quick review of each product:

Pore Perfecting Face Primer

What its like: Has a slight silicone-y feel (probably does contain silicones). Texture isn't very fluid, more like a thicker lotion.

Results: Made my mineral makeup look cakey and uneven :/ Didn't make my pores look smaller or anything magical like that by itself. Meh, I'd rather use something like Smashbox Light Primer instead.


Brightening Face Primer

What its like: Smells like glue, looks like glue. Goes on (fortunately) not like glue - Feels like a cross between a lotion and a gel. This apparently is silicone-free.

Results: Didn't really moisturize my skin or prep it (Korres is better in the silicone free primer department). Doesn't make my makeup last longer, but most silicone free primers don't do that anyway.


Lip Primer



What its like: Goes on quite clear, doesn't mute natural lip colour. Texture is quite hard and dry, leaves a waxy feel on lips. Has an annoyingly sweet caramel-vanilla smell (like the Sephora birthday gift vanilla shower gel from last year)

Results: It seemed to help lipstick last a bit longer when I tried it but it won't help if you're eating or drinking. I guess its ok if you don't mind the texture and the scent.


Eyelash Primer



What its like: White coloured mascara base, supposedly with fibres. It isn't that fibery (can't really that many on the brush) so my eyes aren't irritated, unlike say *cough* Majolica Majorca "cough*

Results: Made my lashes flop! :( It may have made my lashes a bit thicker than with just mascara only, but because of the floppage factor Shiseido mascara base is much, much better. This also left a white residue that wasn't always easily covered up by mascara on top.


Eyeshadow Primer

The only gem in this kit. Since most people already know about it or have tried it, I'll be covering this a little differently in a separate post, by comparing with another eyeshadow primer.


Oh and I updated my blog sale! Please email me (don't comment) with questions or orders because I don't monitor comments there. Thanks! :)

Kose Sekkisei soap review

I've been testing out this product for the past couple of months and finally feel ready to write a review about it.

The product basically looks like a bar of translucent black soap:


(stock pic)

Don't worry though, it doesn't lather up with black foam, just normal clear bubbles :P

Performance:

First I noticed the soap is rather drying, so I had to keep it to just once a day and use another more moisturing cleanser in the morning. It leaves a slight tight feel on my skin which I wasn't used to, but I guess most soaps will do that. So keep in mind it will probably work for mostly oiler skins and not dry to normal skin types.

Due to the fact it is a soap bar the product isn't too expensive. It costs almost USD29-30 online for the full size, but that can probably last you longer than a normal tube of cleanser. My travel sized bar lasted me 2 months before going down to half the size (so it'd probably last 4 months before being used up completely).

Results:

The Kose Sekkisei line is supposed to provide a whitening effect on the user's skin so I was hoping to find improvement in the tone / clarity / acne scars on my face. After about 2 months using it I think there may be a subtle improvement in my skintone, it seems to stay fairer than usual but the difference is very slight. With acne scars though it didn't do anything to fade or reduce their appearance, which is my biggest skin complaint at the moment.

Its possible that I would've had a better effect if I had used the entire Sekkisei range together. Unfortunately I don't know if the results would be good enough to justify the cost of buying the entire line.

Overall:

The soap is good value for money and seems to be well suited for oily skins. However the whitening effect is very minimal, and it fails to fade uneven skintone / scars for me. However I have read other great reviews of this product and product lineup so it probably just depends on your skin.

Price: 4/5
Performance: 3/5
Packaging: 4/5 Ok
Repurchase: No

Lipsticks galore

Hope you had a great weekend! I went to Montreal and ate so much...and I'm missing the food now - the bagels, smoked meat, coffee, french food...etc...ahhh :) Pictures will follow once I have time to edit them.

Anyway I figured this would be a good time to catch up with some of the products I've acquired over the past few weeks/months but never posted...in this case mostly lip products.

First I picked up some more Joe Fresh lip products:

Matte lipstick in Nude
Sheer lip crayon in Candy



Also got another cream lipstick in Coral



The cream lipstick packaging is very similar to Shu Uemura's, but the matte lipstick is just basic white.




I also picked up some MAC:

Costa Chic lipstick from Euristocrats II
Brave New Bronze lipstick from Style Warriors
Dainty Mineralized blush




Closeup of Dainty:



Its a pink blush with subtle shimmer - I fell in love with it when I had my Sugarsweet makeover so it had been on my 'to buy' list ever since.

For some reason I forgot to upload a closeup of Costa Chic...so I will update this post later with it. It looks like a bright coral with orange tones in the tube but swatches less orange and more coral pink.

Brave New Bronze and Joe Fresh Nude look quite similar in the tube, though Nude is slightly darker:




Swatches:

Joe Fresh Coral



Like the other colour I reviewed (Strawberry), the colour is pigmented and goes on smoothly with a hint of shine. It is a neutral colour with hints of coral, not a bright coral at all.

All the others as labelled:


(JF = Joe Fresh)

The Joe Fresh sheer lip crayon is sheer but can be layered for intensity. It goes on smoothly like a gloss even though it is in pencil form. Candy is a bright pink with fuschia tones. I like the sanitary pencil format, but because it is a pencil the formula does leave a slightly waxy feel on the lips. Here's a lip swatch just to show you how glossy it is:




Moving on, the Joe Fresh matte lipstick is very matte and intense. It definitely neutralizes even the most pigmented of lips, but you need to prep with lipbalm before as it really emphasized dryness / lip lines.

The Joe Fresh cream lipstick in Strawberry has already been reviewed but I swatched it just for comparisons sake :) And the one on the far right...I really can't remember what it was....something random I picked out of my collection to compare as well.

Brave New Bronze is a neutral brown-pinky colour similar to the Joe Fresh lipstick but a bit more creamy in texture. It is a satin formula though, so having lipbalm on underneath would still be best.

Costa Chic swatches very bright coral shade, almost bright pink actually. On my lips it shows up as bright pink. I wish it were more coral though as it looks almost orange in the tube but nowhere near orange on my lips.

I hope that wasn't too confusing...and hope those swatches help anyone looking for those products! Will be reviewing the Korres lipsticks soon, I took pics but then lost the swatch pictures and I think posting the review would be useless without swatches...

Sales, Annabelle contest, and MAC Photorealism

Sephora sales:

- Sephora has the CK Beauty line at on clearance.
- They also have some of the Too Faced Smurfette collection for 50% (Swatches and review)
- and the Stila Precious Pearl palette half priced as well. (Swatches and review)

Annabelle Makeup Junkie Contest:

Also just wanted to let Canadians know about the latest Annabelle contest - the Ultimate Makeup Junkie contest. Basically its open to all residents of Canada, where you submit a picture of your best makeup look and a confession about your makeup addiction. There will be five winners every week and each one will receive a professional makeup case stuffed with $1000 worth of Annabelle Cosmetics goodies! The contest is based partly on votes and also by Annabelle (I think its 50-50%, can't check though as the website is down at the moment). Feel free to enter or to cast your vote! I might enter if I have the time to do a look for it :)

MAC Makeup Art Cosmetics collection - Photorealism:

So last weekend I stopped by MAC to pick up the Photorealism quad, mostly due to hype I admit. The colours were definitely the most pigmented and smooth out of the 3 quads released in the collection.



I think its the first time I've seen quads like that from MAC where the colours are from the same colour family. Reminds me of the direction Dior went with their Designer Artistry quints and the green Jewelling Eyes palette from Majolica Majorca.

Swatches



I wasn't too happy with how the colours looked on my skin to be honest, they are quite light, and almost unremarkable in my opinion.





See, the colours don't show up that well...even with eyeshadow primer.

Still, I've seen some pretty looks from Stephie and Phyllis of Makeup for Life so I guess I will give it another try. I'll use more of the darker colours this time, with the grey-green all over the lid instead and more of the dark green colour. That way the colours should hopefully stand out more against my complexion.