Base routine/ favourite base products

Oh hi! Welcome to my morning face, and my amazing mug which I got literally ten years ago. Welcome.

It's been a while, sorry about that, life got in the way.

Anyway, hopefully as  you can see from the title, this post is all about base (buttery biscuit base)..if you don't know what that means I don't think we can be friends. Look it up.

So for this, I used all (very almost) highstreet, or drugstore products to achieve a natural looking base which just needed topping up with whatever eye and lip look I fancied.
I won't say this is an everyday look - I tend not to have time to do a few of these steps- but this probably only took 15-20 minutes tops.

For foundation, my favourite at the moment is Rimmel Match Perfection in a mix of Porcelain and Ivory to get my colour. I love this stuff, even though I have pretty oily skin, and I think it might be better suited to normal to dry skin as it has a really natural/dewy finish. I do get oily on my T Zone during the day, but I prefer that to the foundation breaking down into patches which looks awful with foundations like the L'Oreal True Match. Anyway, I digress.

For concealer, a mix of my Bobbi Brown Corrector, Collection Lasting Perfection Concealer and the L'Oreal True Match clicky highlight pen thing. Love all these, great cocktail of concealers. Speaking of the Collection concealer, I used a little of Shade 4 to warm up my face just around the edges and on my cheeks. This isn't a cream contour, it's a pretty warm shade, but it works really nicely as a cream bronzer.

For powder (which isn't in the photo, sorry, it was 7am) I use my Hourglass Ambient Lighting Powder in Difused Light, as well as my Fit Me Powder to set oilier areas.

I like to cancel out discolouration on my eyelids every day, it just makes your eyes look so much more awake. I was using the Maybelline Colour Tattoo in Creme de Rose, but I have this sample of Benefit's Stay Don't Stray so I've been using that for a while now - it's lasting forever!

For my brows, I am looving my Anastasia Dip Brow in Soft Brown at the moment, I think it's dried out a little and I'm finding it a lot easier to not over- load. I top this off with the L'Oreal Brow Plumper. 

Somehow, for the rest of my face, I accidentally used three Revolution Products. Firstly, this huge Bronze/Shimmer/Highlight pan and then the blush in Love. Really like both of these, especially the bronzer which I always go back to. For highlight, which I basically put all over my face, I used the Revolution Radiant Lights palette which is amazing if you're looking for a budget highlight, really long lasting, and a great selection of three shades for all skin tones. Ah-maze.

So yeah! Think that's it. As I said, not something I have time for every morning, but definitely nice when I have a little more time in the mornings and I want a little extra bronze 'n' glow.

Thanks for reading!

Side note, I have child hair. Yep. 

Make Up Revolution Ultra Sculpt and Contour Kit

I've been on the look out for a budget Bronze/Blush//Highlight kit for a while now, mainly for the convenience. So- I was really excited to see this offering from Make Up Revolution for around £3.50. I got mine in the shade Ultra Fair, and I've worn it a couple of times to check the wear time, which is surprisingly good.

(I did film a little video of my applying it but it was too large to upload to my blog, so I'll make a YouTube video and upload it soon)

 I would say the best of the threesome is the bronzer/contour. It's very pigmented but blends out like an absolute dream. The blusher is my least favourite because, when teamed with the highlight, the two together is a lot of shimmer. But hey, its summer so who cares? The highlight is beautiful; not chunky or glittery like a lot of cheaper highlights, but really shimmery and pretty, lav it.
I think this is a really good mini- palette, and definitely one to pick up if you're heading away on holiday and you want a quick fix.

Thanks for reading!
Lou x

Top 5 Undiscovered Beauty Gems

There are a lot of things in the beauty internet world which get a lot of mentions, and most of them deserve it.

However, there are at least a few things in my collection which I absolutely love and I've never heard anyone speak about.

Here's a lovely swatch of the lipstick (MAC's Captive), liner (Collection 24hr Liquid Liner) and Cream eyeshadow (Bourjois 24h cream to powder in a mysterious colour)

Check out my YouTube video to find out more :)

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCECys22qgk3G01ozysH6rcA

thanks so much for reading/watching, please subscribe and follow my blog to keep up to date :)

Lou x

Revolution Ultra Blush Palette Sugar And Spice ~ Mini Review and Swatches

This is the Make Up Revolution Blush Palette in Sugar and Spice which is a set of 8 'blushes'.

It is a strange set of powders to be honest, with two intensely glittery, unwearable highlighters at the far end, and then 6 completely matte, insanely pigmented powders in the rest of the palette.

1. Is a colour I stayed completely clear of until very recently. It's like a deep browny peach which I thought would be horrible on pale skin, but actually looks really natural, and can be used as a contour/bronze/blush hybrid because its matte

2. Is a really dark bright pink, I will never ever use this colour to be honest. It's so pigmented and dark that it just won't look right on my skin, so I don't think I'll ever use this colour, but  I think would look really nice on darker skin.

3. is a lighter, less brown version of 1, as you can see, so it's a really good all-in-one shade.

4 & 5 are ridiculously similar, I tend to use 5 rather than 4, I just think it's a shade lighter, but is still quite a full-on darkish pink

6 is my favourite shade out of this whole palette. It's a proper bright coral with a huge pigment punch, love it

7 & 8 are highlighters. Now...I don't understand how you would use these, except maybe as eyeshadow. 8 especially is just...unwearable. It's incredibly, incredibly glittery, and a super bright pink. Totally unwearable and basically a little bit crazy. 7 is like the same thing but a silvery lilac, so could work as a really super intense highlight, but I still think is not very wearable.

All in all, I don't think this palette is really worth getting, unless you love a range of super matte, SUPER pigmented blushes and crazy highlights. They are so pigmented that they are quite hard to blend, so you have to apply with a really light hand. However, I love having a range of blushes in a palette, and I'm eyeing up the All-About-Cream blush palette from Revolution which I think would be more usable. 

Thanks for reading :)

Lou x

Black Swan Make -up Look ~ All Budget Beauty Products

This is the look I created for Halloween last year, and I think its such a fun easy look which looks really effective if you have any fancy dress events to go to. :)

What do you need? -

A pale foundation or white face paint (I used Miss Sporty Stay Matte in Ivory)

A Black liquid liner (I used collection 2000 Black liquid liner)

A white and a black pencil eyeliner (I picked up both from MUA for a pound each)

A grey toned contour colour (I used a grey eyeshadow)

A white highligher (I used 'Golden Lights' from Make Up Revolution which was a little too golden but it worked)

Mascara (Any will do)

Fake Lashes (f you want)

Dark red lipstick (I used 17's Stay Pout in 'Rule Breaker' which is amazing)

A small eyeshadow brush. (I used one from W7 which you can see in my 'Budget Brushes' post)

This look is really easy. I wish I had taken photos throughout but honestly, it's meant to look feathery and messy, so a little smudgi-ness just adds to the whole look.

Here goes- I promise you it doesn't use any complicated techniques, just a bit of blending and concentration. :)

1. Apply foundation/ white face paint allover the skin. I used my fingers and applied two coats to make sure it was super opaque and pale. Don't do concealer as the eye look is definitely going to produce a lot of fall out.

 2. 

Do you love this sketch. I do.

So take your black pencil eyeliner and roughly sketch out this shape around your eye. The top line should run along the top of your eyebrow, and the bottom should be just slightly under your eyelid.

3.Continuning with your black pencil eyeliner, go ahead and fill in bits which are going to stay black. Fill in from your bottom line right up to your bottom eyelid. Also fill in the whole of your top eyelid and your eyebrows.  Thicken up the edge of the shape all the way around, but leave the outer edge of the shape thin and rough for the minute.

Still with the same eyeliner (maybe sharpen it at this point), create a design within your outer edges. I created points outwards from my eyelid, all heading towards my hairline. Fill them in with black pencil eyeliner. Your eyes should look something like this:

4. Take your white pencil eyeliner and fill in all of the gaps between the black lines with white. Because they are both pencil this might start looking slightly smudgey, but that's ok.

5. When everything is covered in black and white pencil eyeliner, have a look at the whole design and make sure you are happy with it before you go in with a more intense black eyeliner. When you are happy, take your black liquid liner and just intensify the black areas. Also use this to bring all the lines to a point on the outer edges, so it looks like feathers. Use the same technique around the inner corner and down the nose to create really pointed edges.

Your eyes should be looking a little something like this. If you have an intense white eyeshadow, go in to the white areas and intensify them

6. Line your waterline and tightline with black eyeliner, and apply mascara. Lashes are optional, but I think they really add to the intensity of the look.

7. Tidy up any fall out with some concealer or white face paint.

8.  To finish the face, take an ashy contour shade and hollow out the cheekbones, creating a harsh angle. Add highlight to the tops of the cheekbones.

9. For the lips, line with the black pencil eyeliner ( I know, stick with me), and then use a brush or the lipstick straight from the bullet to apply to the rest of the lip. Smudge the eyeliner into the lipstick to create a really intense outer edge and a dark red inner colour.

There you have it! A simple way to do the make up from Black Swan, you could even switch it up with a dark base and a white feathered eye which would look amazing.

Hope this was useful, thanks for reading,

 Lou x

Budget Bronzers

Even ghost white girls like me want to bronze up a bit, and I've found its quite hard to find bronzers in general,  let alone cheap ones.

These four are my four favourites, all really affordable and really really good.

Firstly, here's the Body Shop Matte Bronzer in 01 light matte, and if you are pale and you need a bronzer or a contour powder, go and buy this right now. I think it's £12 but the Body Shop often do 40% off so its easy to pick it up for seven or eight pounds. To me, this is fairly expensive, but I can assure you, its worth the money. So silky, such a nice colour, pigmented but not too harsh so you can built it for a more cheek-bone-y (?) look. The packaging is also really nice, sturdy with a nice mirror which makes it really good for travel

This is a slightly darker matte bronzer, its from MUA and its Bronzer Shade 3. I think it's fairly universal as a bronzer shade, but I can get away with this even with my pale skin, so good for all skin tones. Really pigmented, and I'd use this for contour in the summer when I'm hopefully slightly more tanned. The picture above shows the body shop bronzer on the right and the MUA version on the left. It is slightly darker but if you're looking for a more budget option than the Body Shop bronzer, this MUA one is really good, and i think it's one or two pounds- amazing.

 Onto Shimmery Bronzers, and this is slightly different because its bronzing pearls, which I feel like aren't really a thing these days. The swatch makes it look quite orange,and I suppose it is, I'd use it if I wanted a shimmery golden bronze look. Really easy to build or use lightly, definitely good on all skin tones because of the buildability. This pot is from Avon and it was around £4- really affordable, and this has lasted me for YEARS.

If you're looking for a shimmery budget bronzer, this three tone 'Bronze, Shimmer, Highlight' from Revolution is definitely one to look at. I love this product so much. It's not glittery, it's a really nice shimmer. On a normal day, I'll sweep the middle tone over my cheeks or under my cheekbones, depending on the look I'm going for. If you had darker skin, the darker bronze colour is amazing too, I can only get away with this shade mixed with the middle shade but it's so lovely. The highlight is amazing, basically a light skin- coloured powder which is really nice mixed with the bronzers just to add glow, or on top of the cheekbones by itself for a really subtle sheen. Lovely. This was £4 and I think this is such a good product. It  feels very similar to the Body Shop bronzer in it's silkiness, and it is beautiful and buildable.

I hope this helped if you're looking for a bronzer to help you into Spring/ Summer!

Thanks for reading :)

Lou x

Revolution | Radiance Palette

If I had to recommend one item from Make Up Revolution, it would be this palette. I would pay premium prices for these powders, which are amazing! It's eight pounds for the whole palette, and even though the outside looks a bit cheap, the inside is lovely, huge mirror and a nice matte...package. All three are really blendable, and very light but buildable if you want a more striking highlight. 

These powders are so natural and nice that they're really hard to photograph, I had to build them up a lot on my arm to swatch them. All three are quite different, and I think they would suit all skin tones. The far right shade is the most natural, and my favourite, it looks almost golden in the picture but its pretty much a natural...beige ish, skin colour with a fresh sheen which is wearable for every day, and so lovely. The middle shade is more of a classic champagne/ white/ gold highlighter, and a bit more ..obvious than the first one. Still lovely, and really nice for the brow bone. The last one I haven't actually used yet, but I know I will love in the Summer. It's pretty much a golden brown iridescent colour, and would look great on a darker skin tone, or on top of bronzer when I'm tanned in the summer.

I think this is a really good palette, only £8, and really worth it if you want a nice selection of highlighter shades. All three are very sheeny, not too glittery so no nasty chunks of glitter, but obviously some sparkly as its a highlighter.

Thanks for reading!

Lou x

Budget Brushes

Normally, when someone talks about Budget make- up brushes, they mean Real Techniques or Eco Tools. Not me, I mean straight -up under five pounds budget. I do own Real Techniques brushes, but they are  some of my most precious beauty items, and I love them so much- most of them were actually presents for Christmas/ birthday. So, I know the struggle of trying to find good make up brushes for a couple of quid when you can only dream of MAC or Zoeva brushes. 

(I apologise for the photographs- it was dark so I used my desk light. Everything is awful.)

So here's the collection. I'll talk you through bit by bit, and as far as I'm aware, all of these brands still excist and are easily available. All of these brushes cost me under £3, most of them under £2, and I'll let you know which ones are worth picking up.

We'll start with the two odd ones out. These two are both powder brushes, and I have had them both for about two years, having washed them at least once every two weeks. Neither shred, and they are both as soft as when I bought them. The black one is from Primark and it is so soft and lovely, perfect for powdering or for bronzer. The only bad thing about it is the size. You've probably noticed, it's a tiny brush. You don't understand how angry this makes me, and how irritating it is sitting in my brush pot. But, it was one or two pounds, and has lasted so well, I would definitely recommend it. The pink one is from H&M and was £1.99. I haven't tried anything else from their beauty range, but this brush is the perfect blush brush. The right size, nice and soft, and blends everything like a dream. Also it's pink and a heart shape- what is not to love here.

These two are from the Wilkinson's brush range, and they are both good. The stippling brush is really nice, cost about £3, and does blend your foundation in nicely. However, because I have the RT Buffing brush, I don't normally stray from it, so this brush doesn't get much use. The small brush is one of my favourites, and perfect for travelling. It's a double sided brush called the 'smokey eye duo' brush. I don't use this for smokey eyes, but I use the angled brush for eyebrows and it is PER.FECT. I even prefer it to my RT eyebrow brush because it is smaller and even softer. The other end is a nice fluffy blending brush which is good for the crease, or for blending in foundation- whatever you want. This can be annoying to store, but I kept the little plastic wrap it came with, for the eyebrow end, so I pop that on and store it that way up and nothing gets squished! Perfect. The Wilko brush collection is definitely worth a look, I have my eye on their large powder brush which is so soft.

These two slick looking black brushes are actually part of the new brush collection from Revolution. These were both under £2 and I'm seriously impressed with them both. They are the E103 and E104. I've been looking for a cheap brush like the thin slanted brush for AGES, perfect for applying dark eyeshadow along the lashline. Amazing. The other is a really good blending brush, not the fluffiest, but pretty darn good.

These two are my oldest make up brushes. Bless them, theyve had a lot of wear. They are both from the brand W7 which I have never seen a store, but I bought them both from Amazon. The bigger one is a really really good staple eyeshadow brush, not too big, not too small. Amazing. I would recommend picking it up. The other one I use as a lipbrush, but I suppose it could be used for eyes too.

These last two are ELF brushes. When I did this order from ELF, I ordered three, I also got the powder brush from the main collection- the white packing. It was AWFUL. Scratchy and gross. Anyway. These two are good, so ignore that. The white one is a 'defining eye brush' which is quite thin and quite... not packed with hair?  It's very fluffy, so I wouldn't use it to apply along the lashline, but I would absolutely use it to smudge it out. The black brush is from the studio line, which is a slightly more expensive but still really cheap, and its the Blush brush. Now, this does work for blush, yes. BUT its the perfect size for highlighter. Amazing. Really soft and great. I would definitely recommend the ELF studio brush line.

I hope that's helped you know where to look for really good value brushes, it's definitely taken me years to find some good ones!
Thanks for reading
Lou x

Revolution 'I Heart my Lips' Collection/ Review

I love Make Up Revolution. Normally.

Unfortunately, this collection of I Love my Lips lipsticks which came as free gift ( so I can't really complain) with my order, are quite disappointing. 

I haven't actually tried anything else lips-wise from Revolution, and so I was pretty excited to get a whole free set of these. 

On arrival, I actually got five out of six, and a two of 'Irregular Heartbeat' which is a shame, so I don't have the red shade which is called Heart Attack.

The packaging is obviously a copy of MAC's bullet shaped lipsticks, but it has a shiny, rather than matte finish, and feels a lot lighter and, well, pretty cheap. The purple shade, Racing Heart, was actually broken when it arrived, and is really hard to twist up. 

This is 'Heart is Pumping' and it is probably my favourite one of the bunch. It's very sheer (as they all all are) and is basically a very subtle pink. Very little to complain about here, but nothing to get excited about. You can't build up this colour as it is so sheer, but it's a very quick easy option if you want something balmy and tinted. This lipstick actually broke when I did the arm swatch which is SO annoying.

This is 'Beating Heart' and actually this one is not so bad. It is a nice medium pink which applies pretty evenly, and actually stayed in place quite well which is good. You can build this one up to a certain extent but the finish gets a little patchy after a while.

This is a coral shade, which is Irregular Heartbeat. It looks nice when just patted onto the lips, for a really subtle corally- lip. HOWEVER, you can build it up, but please don't. It sinks into all the lines on my lips, goes patchy, and suddenly becomes quite neon- and not in a nice way. Again, as a subtle shade applied carefully, this one is okay, but nothing amazing.

This is the nude shade, which is Rising Pulse, and is actually really pretty. Sheer, like the rest of them, but a nice medium- nude with peachy brown undertones. Very nice, I like this one.

Lastly, this is Racing Heart, and I don't think it gives credit to how awfully  it applied. On the website it looks like a rich purple, but it's more like a berry-red which is pretty patchy, and just generally quite horrible. Sorry make up Revolution!

Out of the collection I would recommend Rising Pulse as a really nice nude sheer lipstick. The two pinks are alright, but nothing special, but I would say steer clear of the coral and purple- not good. 

I'm a bit disappointed because Revolution haven't let me down before, but I will definitely be thinking twice before purchasing any other lip products from them.

HOWEVER, the rest of my order was absolutely amazing, and I will include a few top items in a full review or a collective review.

Hope this was helpful, thank you for reading!

Lou x