Saturday, August 29, 2015

Easy, Wearable Makeup Look



In my last post I explained how to use the Clinch app and how to create a canvas with it, to come up with different makeup looks. I showed a few examples, one of which was a look based on some of my most used products. It is a very easy makeup look, with a bronze smokey eye, but not too dramatic.  I promised to show you the result and all the products that I used, so here it is! I did add a few products and changed some as well, but it is based around this canvas.



All the products I used:
Face
L’Oréal True Match foundation
Gosh BB Skin Perfecting Kit – light (I used the lightest concealer)
L’Oréal Nude Magique BB powder – light skin tone
Too Faced Chocolate Soleil Medium/Deep Matte bronzer
Beauty UK blush – 4 Rustic Peach
Mac Mineralize Skinfinish – Soft & Gentle
Kiko Face Make Up Fixer

Eyes
LookX eyebrow pencil
Too Faced Shadow Insurance Anti-Crease Eye Shadow primer
Maybelline Color Tattoo 24 Hr Gel-Cream eyeshadow – 35 On and on Bronze
Too Faced Chocolate Soleil Medium/Deep Matte bronzer (I blended this in the crease)
Mac Mineralize Skinfinish – Soft & Gentle (I used this to highlight the brow bone and inner corner of the eyes)
Too Faced Better Than Sex mascara
Sephora Long Lasting Kohl pencil – 07 Infinite beige (I applied this to the waterline)

Lips
Tanya Burr lip gloss – Exotic Island

Brushes used
Foundation - Primark stippling brush
Powder - Real Techniques Multi Task brush
Bronzer/blush - Kiko 103 Face brush
Highlighter - Real Techniques Contour brush
Cream eyeshadow – Real Techniques Deluxe Crease brush
Blending eyeshadows – Real Techniques Base Shadow Brush

I hope you like this easy and very wearable makeup look and let me know what you think!

X Elvira

Friday, August 21, 2015

App review - Clinch



I am so excited to share today’s review with you all! I know it’s very different from my usual makeup reviews, but I think you will like it and enjoy the app as much as I do! And trust me, it is very addicting! Once you download it and start ‘clinching’ you will immediately fall in love with it! Wondering what app I am talking about? It is the Clinch app, which is basically an app to make your online shopping experience even more fun and creative. When you first start out using Clinch, all the different options might be a little overwhelming, so I am here to help you out and explain everything you can do and create.

First off, this is what the main page looks like once you have downloaded Clinch. 


In the search bar you can type in any site you want to visit for online shopping. My favorite is definitely Sephora, because they have so many different brands and the latest bestsellers on their site, so I will use the Sephora site as an example. When you type in the site you want to shop from, it turns into a Google page so you can easily go to your favorite stores.

 When you are on the site, it just works like the site normally would, so you can just browse through all the different products and see everything they have to offer. 
 
So let’s say you find a makeup product that you really like and want to buy in the future. For example, this Becca Champagne Pop highlighter is something I am interested in. 

To kind of ‘save’ this product, I am going to ‘clinch’ it. Just click the button in the top right corner to ‘clinch’ whatever product you want. It will take you to the next screen, where you can choose the best picture of the product, the name, price and description. To make it much easier for yourself to find a certain product back, you can add a tag to it. 


And that’s it! You have ‘clinched’ your first product!


But what can you do with the products you ‘clinch’? Well, you can create your own wishlist of products! 

I love this feature because I like to clinch a lot of products and then go through them to see everything I still want to get, which I think is a lot of fun to do when you are a makeup junkie like me! ;) So you can just keep adding things to your wishlist, or create a brand new one!

Another thing you can do with your ‘clinched’ products is compare them! So let’s say I want this Mac paint pot, but I also really want this Nars concealer... Which one should I get first?

 To make your decision easier, add both to the compare bubble. Now when you click on one of the products, you see the description and the price of the products so you can easily see which of the products is cheaper and suits you better!

Now it is time to talk about my favorite option! You can create your own canvas with all your ‘clinched’ products.

 When you click on the plus button in the top right corner you can add the products you want to use for the look you are creating. You can easily move them and change the size of the products so you can make the canvas look exactly like you want it to! 




I love using this to create new makeup looks so you can see all the products together and see if you like it! I came up with this summer makeup look, with products I found on the Sephora site and are on my ‘to buy’ list. 

I was going for a glowy skin, with a summery bright lip and I love how it turned out! I definitely need to get some of these products now! I also created a canvas with some of my absolute favorite makeup products I have and that I use on a daily basis. 


Stay tuned for my next blog post, which will show you the completed makeup look based on this canvas, with a full description of all the products used!

I hope that my explanation was clear and that you now understand all the things you can do with the Clinch app. If you want to know more about the app, this Youtube video will show you everything you need to know; https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8AlcdAkIKbM
The app is available for the iPad here; https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/clinch/id919810058?ls=1&mt=8

X Elvira

Saturday, August 8, 2015

REVIEW - Too Faced Beauty Experts Darlings



Whenever I go to Sephora I can’t help myself from looking at the cute kits with samples that all the brands make, which are usually quite cheap too! I stumbled upon this Beauty Experts Darlings kit from Too Faced. Being a total Too Faced newbie myself, I was very intrigued to try out these samples and see what I thought of the brand. To be honest, when I opened the packaging I was a little disappointed. When they say ‘samples’ they really do mean samples… The products are tiny, which you wouldn’t expect from the size of the packaging and the size of the photos of the products on the packaging. To be honest I think a lot of people get this without even realizing they are samples. 

Nonetheless, it is a great way of trying out new products and they are perfect handbag/traveling size too!
So what is in it? The kit contains the top 4 favorites, apparently chosen by some of the biggest, most influential beauty experts on the planet. These 4 favorites are; the Chocolate Soleil medium/deep matte bronzer, the La Crème Color Drenched lip cream in the shade Naked Dolly, the Better Than Sex mascara and the Shadow Insurance eye shadow primer.

Chocolate Soleil medium/deep matte bronzer

First of all, I love the fact that this bronzer smells exactly like a chocolate bar! And you know how some bronzers can be orange and glittery? Fortunately, this one is the complete opposite! A super matte bronzer that has a really nice shade to bronze or contour the face with. Also, it is crazy pigmented, but very easy to blend out. So if you get too much product on your brush, you can just blend it out and it will still look good! I really like this bronzer and even though it is very small, it will last a very long time because of the amazing pigmentation.

La Crème Color Drenched lip cream Naked Dolly
I immediately fell in love with the shade when I saw it. It is a beautiful pink-nude color that looks really flattering on the lips. It has a nice satin finish and leaves the lips feeling smooth and moisturized. The formula is really creamy but not sticky, and it smells amazing and has great longevity.

Better Than Sex mascara

This mascara basically has everything you could want in a mascara. It is lengthening, gives the lashes volume and it doesn’t smudge underneath the eyes or looks clumpy. The brush is quite big, but it is not at all difficult to apply and very easy to remove too. Overall I think it is a great mascara and I have been using it pretty much every day since I got it.

Shadow Insurance eye shadow primer
This is definitely the best eye shadow primer I have ever tried! It is quite a thick cream in a nude color to create a nice base for the eye shadows on top. It makes the color of your eye shadow more vibrant and last a really long time. If you have oily eyelids, this is a must have product for you! No more creased and faded eye shadow!

All in all, I love all four of these products and I think it is great value for money. I can’t wait to try out more of the Too Faced products and get obsessed with those too!

The Too Faced Beauty Experts Darlings retails for $20.00

Thursday, August 6, 2015

REVIEW - Beauty UK Blush & Brush in 4 Rustic Peach



The Beauty UK blush in 4 Rustic Peach is a beautiful blush that I have been using for quite a while now. It is a beautiful dark peach shade that will complement a lot of skin tones. The blush is extremely pigmented, so to make it look like a natural flush on the cheeks you only need the tiniest bit. In fact, it is very easy to go overboard with this blush, especially because it is quite a bright color as well. Nonetheless, after it is nicely blended into the skin (my favorite brush to use for blending bronzers and blushes is the Kiko 103 face brush) it looks really beautiful and I think it is a great summer blush.

When you first look at it you might think that it is so glittery it will make your face look like a disco ball (at least that is what I thought at first) but once blended into the skin it transforms into a beautiful glow and is not at all shimmery. It is also one of the most long lasting blushes I have tried yet, which is amazing for the fact that it is not expensive at all.


As for the packaging, it does look a bit cheap in my opinion (and yet another one of those small brushes that no one seems to actually use), but considering the price range I do not really mind it. Especially because the blush is such good quality. And after all that is what it’s all about.

The Beauty UK blush in 4 Rustic Peach retails for £2.99.