NEW Illamasqua products and Crown Brushes

Sorry I haven't posted in a few days, main reason being lack of internet signal on my laptop. Pretty annoying but it's back now. 

So, today I wanted to review some products I received in the post over the past few days. These will include Illamasqua products including Gleam, Eyebrow Cake, Lipstick, and Sheer Lip Gloss. I will also be reviewing some new brushes I used from Crown Brushes. Both companies are unbelievably good when it comes to delivery, my Crown Brushes parcel came within two days. I actually wasn't expecting them so soon that I questioned what they were before I opened them! Illamasqua was free delivery (always a bonus!) and I ordered with them over the weekend to find it arrived this morning, another quick delivery especially as the postage cost me nothing!

My favourite make-up brand for a while has always been MAC but I can honestly say given the choice between MAC and Illamasqua now I'd find it hard to choose as Illamasqua has fast become my favourite too, possibly even more than MAC (I never thought I'd utter those words!). The quality of Illamasqua products is unbelievable and I don't think they are too expensive either. I literally have a list of things written down that I still want including their Cream Pigment in Hollow, Pure Pigment in Furore, all of their Powder Blusher Duos (especially Lover and Hussy), the Blush Up brush and finally Pink Raindrops nail varnish which should be coming out soon (I hope!). Obviously as soon as I get any other products I will blog about them too and I still have a few things from my parcel to try out. Another thing I love about Illamasqua is that when you're ordering online, from your third order onwards you get a 10% loyalty discount, so they really do reward their customers. Amazing.

Crown Brushes are a new discovery for me but I can honestly say I'm a fan. Their prices are so reasonable that I will be able to afford almost every brush I ever wanted! I ordered a few brushes last week which I will continue to blog about as I use them. The quality of the brushes I've bought so far is excellent and taking the price in to account I will be recommending them to anyone who questions me about make-up brushes in future.

So, on with the post...

The main things I wanted to showcase in this post are from Illamasqua and Crown Brushes but I had to put some basic make up on too in order to take photos so I will list what other products I used on my face as well. Warning: there are many selfies (self portraits) in this post which I kind of had to do to fully show the effect. Sorry in advance!

Firstly I prepped my face with Comfort Cream by MAC. I don't always use this as a base but I wanted a dewy finish as this look is very neutral and fresh. 

I haven't done any swatches for this because it's basically a moisturiser so sinks in to your skin leaving no colour. I do like to use this for a base a lot, particularly as I have dry skin but another product I like to use is Skin Base Visage, also from MAC.

Next I used my regular foundation Studio Sculpt from MAC:

 

 

I like this foundation as it stays put all day and is definitely long wear without being too heavy on my face. It is best applied with a foundation brush for a perfect application rather than your fingers. Crown brushes do have reasonably priced foundation brushes too however I already own one so haven't tried theirs yet but when I do need a new one I'll definitely be buying from them. My shade is NW15 and if you are unsure of what shade you need then it's best to drop in to your nearest MAC counter and have a member of staff colour match your foundation.

After applying my foundation I used my bronzer which is also from MAC (no surprise there as they were my favourite brand until I discovered Illamasqua):

I chose the shade Golden as it just gives me a hint of colour when I apply it under my cheekbones to contour. The reason I want the Cream Pigment in Hollow from Illamasqua is to try contouring using that as an alternative. I applied this using a contour brush to give myself some better cheek bones as unfortunately I wasn't blessed with amazing ones!

Now for one of the products I really wanted to review, Eyebrow Cake from Illamasqua:

Totally unflattering picture of my eyebrows above, but for blog purposes I've uploaded it. I chose the shade Thunder for my eyebrows which is a dark brown powder, rather like an eyeshadow. I prefer this Eyebrow Cake as opposed to my MAC eyebrow pencil as it gives much softer definition than a pencil can. I found it very easy to apply with by brush (which I will review in a minute) but I did it before I did anything else around my eye in case there was fallout. I'm pleased to say there was no fallout and it made for a very easy application so can be used if you're in a hurry. It can also be mixed with Sealing Gel (also from Illamasqua) to give it durability to last the whole day/night. It is available from Illamasqua stores/counters and from their website for £14.50.

I used two brushes to apply this, not because it was necessary but because I bought two different types to see which I preferred. The first brush I used was a Stiff Brow Angle Brush (number S218) from Crown Brushes. This cost me £1 (absolute bargain) and I preferred this slightly to my other brush as it created cleaner lines due to it being stiff.

The other brush I tried was an Angle Brow brush (number BK35) which cost me £2.89. This was also pleasant to use and did the job well, I just preferred the stiff brush. 

The  Stiff brush has the silver handle and the softer brush has the black handle:

Now that my eyebrows were finished I deciding to apply my eyeliner before my highlighter. I didn't use any shadow as I'm not really reviewing any in this post, it was more about my new products. The eyeliner used was the Bobbi Brown gel liner I mentioned in an earlier post and I applied it with my new Sable Angle Liner brush (number C207) which cost £3.69 again from crown brushes. I really like this brush as it made applying my eyeliner completely effortless and created a perfect line for me. 

The black on the tips of the brush is from my gel eyeliner and the brush fibres are all the brown shade. The quality of this brush is excellent even after being cleaned so I would really recommend it.

I applied my new highlighter from Illamasqua called Gleam in the shade Aurora after this:

This is a pearl, iridescent highlighter that i applied to my cheek bones and I also patted a little under my eyebrows. I did this using my fingers as Gleam has a creamy texture and I found it easier to manoeuvre with my fingers. I included the last picture of myself to just to show how it highlights when under the light. I really don't think I'll ever be without this again as I love the effect it has and I also love that it is a cream and not a powder. A definite beauty staple, this can be bought again from Illamasqua for £18.

I applied a little of my MAC Mineralize Blusher next to the apples of my cheeks:

The shade I use is Warm Soul and as you can see it is a beige shade with a slight shimmer to it described as 'gold pearl'. It can be built up when worn but I like it quite subtle. This is available from MAC for £19.

Finally I moved my attention to my lips, starting with Illamasqua lipstick and then finishing with Illamasqua Sheer Gloss.

The lipstick shade I used is called Sonnet and is from the Broken Heart collection. I lined my lips with my lip liner from KIKO as mentioned in an earlier post and then I took my new Lip/Liner Brush from Crown Brushes (£2.19, number C323) to apply the lipstick more precisely to my lips. 

 

 

  

 

Sonnet is described as a cool, peachy nude with a matt finish and it lives up to this. Behind MAC's Creme Cup this is definitely my new favourite lipstick shade. I found that despite it being matte it still has a creamy texture to it and doesn't make my lips feel dry. I am really impressed with Illamasqua lipsticks and I have a few more to review. This is available from their stores/counters and their website for £14.

This is the lip brush I used from Crown Brushes:

As with the other brushes I bought I find this is of great quality and I'm really pleased I bought it. It allowed me to apply my lipstick with great precision and coverage.

I applied my new Illamasqua Sheer Gloss after the lipstick to add another dimension to my lips:

 

 

The lip gloss shade I used was Artifice which is a similar colour to the lipstick. It smells delicious and has really good staying power, even when your drink and eat. I'm not usually a fan of lip gloss but I now own three Illamasqua glosses as they are just that good!! This cost me £14 and is also available from Illamasqua stores/counters or their website.

Finally, I though I'd show you two picture of my full face just so you can see everything together. Please ignore the dark circles under my eyes as no amount of concealer seems to cover them lately due to a lack of sleep! 

The left picture is with gloss and the right is without the gloss. I hope this helped anyone wanting to buy any of the products or interested in the products. I'll blog again tomorrow :)

Amanda

MUA Lipsticks

Today I'm going to be discussing the MUA lipsticks I own. MUA is a reasonably priced brand with all the lipsticks only costing me £1 each. You can find them available in Superdrug stores or the MUA website itself. One of the pros to these lipsticks is that the bottom of the container comes off to reveal a hidden lip gloss which is cute. 

I'm not entirely sure how I feel about these lipsticks as although they are very pigmented, there's a lot of colour choice and they are only £1 each they do have their pros but I just don't like the texture when they are on my lips. That could be personal opinion but I find they are somehow too creamy and slide around my lips too much. Also, when I'm applying them they don't feel very secure, like they are about to snap any moment. All this being said, for £1 they are worth a try and they're not the worst quality I've ever tried so if you're unsure if a shade would suit you and would like to try it out you could buy one of these to test for a few days and see how you feel without it damaging your wallet too much. I actually wish the shades were a little more matte or that a variety of finishes were available as I don't always like my colours to have a sheen to them, so this is a downside for me.

I own 10 of these lipsticks so I'll be discussing them in chronological order as most of the shades are only known as numbers. I can't really compare quality and texture between them as it is literally the same for most of them, but I will give you a review on the colours. I will post a swatch at the end of the post showing them all next to each other so as you can see the difference in the shades easier.

First I'll talk about Shade 1:

This shade is kind of in between a red and a fuchsia colour. As you can see it does have a lot of pigment in it so creates a bold lip but it probably would need re-applying an awful lot.

Shade 2:

This shade is kind of a deep raspberry pink with a blue tint to it. As I said with shade number one it is very pigmented and you don't need to apply a lot to get a strong colour from it, however it would need reapplying.

Shade 7 is the next colour I own and looks like this:

Okay so this shade has a pink coral tone to it and looks lovely when worn. It actually looks more peach than pink in the picture and when swatched in person but it really is more of a pink colour on your lips, like a paler version of shade 2.

Shade 8:

This one is definitely more of a red, if not the perfect red itself. It has a kind of gold sheen running through it that can't be seen on the picture and it looks almost glittery. It really is a lovely colour but as it is such a bold colour this one needed re-applying an awful lot I found because these lipsticks do come off very easily.

Shade 9:

This shade come out almost a bronze/brown colour however there is pink in there so when worn on the lips it doesn't look as brown as it seems. It is quite a nice neutral colour that could be worn with most things.

Shade 10:

I do hate to give anything a bad review as I'd love every product to be amazing but shade number 10 is a total disaster for me. As you can see from the very messy swatch, it is not like the others for some reason. I may have received a faulty one but I felt like I had no control of the lipstick as it is too slippery and it literally went everywhere. So colour and finish aside, purely based on quality I do not rate this shade. That being said maybe if you see one in Superdrug or order it yourself it may be different and I may have just been unlucky in receiving a faulty one.

Shade 11:

Again a neutral shade with an orange/coral kind of appearance to it. It may look like a strong colour but when applied to my lips it actually wasn't too dissimilar from their natural colour so just gave a tiny hint of colour which I liked very much.

Shade 12:

 

 

This colour looks very bright against my hand but when worn it is actually just a sheer pink stain effect. There is definitely silver glitter in this lipstick but it provides a lovely effect when worn. Definitely one of my favourites out of the MUA lipsticks as the texture is not too bad either.

Shade 14 (this one has a name which is Bare):

Although this shade is called Bare, I actually found it to be quite a bright pink coral colour when worn. Because it is quite bright it may not be to the taste of everyone but it is actually a very pretty colour so for £1 I would buy it and try it.

Finally, shade 16 which is called Nectar:

This colour looks lovely when swatched on my hand but I found it way too bright for my liking. It's kind of a bright, sickly sweet Barbie pink colour. It doesn't suit my complexion at all and showed every imperfection on my lips so they would need heavily priming before I considering wearing it out. Even after that I think the upkeep through the day/night would be difficult as I mentioned these lipsticks do come off very easily. So out of personal preference it's not for me, but it could be perfect for someone else.

To conclude this post I've taken swatches of them all next to each other in chronological order to make it easy to distinguish which is which:

I hope this helped if anyone is considering buying any MUA products or is wondering what they are like. I think they are perfect to experiment with colours as they are so cheap so you don't feel like you've wasted too much of your money.

I'll be reviewing a similar brand of lipsticks called NYC tomorrow and they are in the same price range as these so be sure to check that out. I also have a large order of Illamasqua coming in the next week so I'll blog about that as soon as it arrives :).

Amanda.