Clio Gelpresso Waterproof Pencil Gel Liner Swatch + review

I am in love with the Korean brand CLIO professional because they do the best makeup, of all that I have tried so far I love their eyeliners best. Today, I will be doing swatches of  CLIO Gelpresso Waterproof Pencil gel liner plus letting you guys know how they wear.

Etude House dual show volume mascara review + random life updates

Hi Guys,

So so so so sorry for being MIA life has been too hectic! I swear I will be updating quite a bit because I have lots and lots of things to share with you guys, so please don't leave and keep reading us at foreveerr29.blogspot.sg.

I came back from Korea a week and a half ago, just to give you guys an idea of what kind of beauty reviews to expect, this is how much stuff I purchased from Korea:

plus all the samples kindly given to me by the sales assistants, rest assure you will be getting Korean beauty products review galore. :)

The first beauty product I want to share with everyone today is a mascara from Etude house called the Dual Show Volume Mascara.

5 mins smoky bronzed look

I have been quite into bronze-y looks lately because in my mind eye, I feel like I am a bronzed goddess whenever I do a look like that. Yes yes... I am in denial....but anyway, bronzed look is great for summer (or Singapore where it's always summer) because you can showcase your sun-kissed skin, and look extra sultry and sexy like...

this model here.... or like...

J.Lo here... or like....

Kim K. here... or like....



Okay you get the idea.

Today, I want to share with you guys my own version of a toned down bronze look, which mainly consists of a slightly bronzey smokey eye, coral blush with a nude lipstick. A makeup look that can be thrown together in 5 minutes. Great for work, great for brunch, great for shopping with the girls.

Mamonde Total Solution Moisture bb cream: A Review

Yes, yet another product review, but I swear I did not spend another tens of dollars on this bb cream because I am still too in love with my Mizon snail bb cream. Story has it, a couple of weeks ago, my mother's flight to Hong Kong on Cathay Pacific was delayed and she barely made her connecting flight to Xiamen, China. Upon reaching Xiamen Gaoqi airport she realized that her luggage did not follow her home to Xiamen. After a lot of haggling and reasoning with the Cathay ground stuff in Xiamen, she managed to get them to give her RMB400 (around SGD 80 bucks) to buy some daily necessities to tie her over till her luggage arrives. The bb cream was one of the first things she bought. Now, with a mum like that, I am sure all of you guys can understand why I am such a vain pot. :P

I have never heard of Mamonde till my mum passed her bb cream to me. Apparently, it's a relatively high end brand from Amore Pacific (owns things like IOPE, Laniege etc) in Korea and is loved by mature women. The bb cream is a little pricey at around SGD40 for 40ml.  A quick search from around the net tells me that this bb cream claims to whiten the skin with the help of some "secret" flower complex, providing elasticity to the skin while preventing problems (I am assuming wrinkle problems).

I have been using this bb cream interchangeably with the Mizon snail bb cream for almost 3 weeks now, and I did not see a stark improvement on my skin condition, unlike when I first started using the mizon bb cream. So for this review, I will only be talking about the cosmetic properties of this bb cream  and not the skincare bit.

Clio art Blusher in #2 PINK: Review + Swatch

I have been eyeing Korean makeup brand CLIO for years. Over the past year,  I noticed their products popping up in Watson's Singapore, so obviously, when my sister was looking to buy a new blush and I edged her on to buy the CLIO art blusher. Let's just say she wasn't disappointed at all.

This blush is part of CLIO's art collection where they collaborate with artistes to come up these beautiful cover designs that awakens your sense before you even apply the makeup on your face. In this collection, they have baked eyeshadows, blushers and lipsticks, for swatches of these products, visit here.

Nyx Love in Paris- 06 C'EST LA VIE review

Hi everyone,

I took a week off blogging, no special reason, I was just kind of lazy. :P

Anyway, as some of you may know, I am getting married soon, so these days I have been more careful about spending money, and have been trying to cut down on my makeup spending habits. Besides buying less makeup (HA!), I am also exploring cheaper drugstore options. With age, I have come to realize that there are a lot of treasures in the drugstore, just because they are cheaper, doesn't mean they do not measure up to quality of branded cosmetics. For instance, I have come to love Revlon's lip products, in fact I feel that a lot of their formulas are every bit as good, if not better than MAC's lipsticks, and also Japanese liquid eyeliners are the best liners in my opinion.  However, drugstore eyeshadow is still lacking quality in my opinion, I am still searching for my holy grail eyeshadow brand.

Recently, my friend, Johnny, brought back Nyx Love in Paris Palette in 06 C'est La vie from the States for me. I wanted to try out this palette most because from the pictures online it has a very lovely olive green and a plummy brown, colors that I would love to incorporate into my everyday look.  Plus, I think the quality of Nyx's single shadows rival that of MAC's, I wanted to see if I can get the same quality from their palettes.

Offical professional shot from their website

Love in Paris is a 9 pan eyeshadow, retailing for USD 9 on Cherry Culture (they ship internationally). 06 C'est La Vie contains shimmery beiges, browns and deep greens. If the color turns out as gorgeous and as pigmented as they look in the pan, I think great everyday palette or for traveling.

First impressions, the packaging is the standard Nyx black plastic packaging which I am not a fan of because they break so easily,but  for USD 9, you really cannot ask for much. Plus, the bow closure on the compact is so cute, perfect for spring and perfect as a gift for a friend.

Moving on the the quality of the shadows, sadly, I have to say I am disappointed.

This is how the shadows look like in the pan. Still gorgeous. All shadows are shimmery, some of them has large chunky glitters.

However, the colors of the shadows did not transfer well to the skin. They are not pigmented, swatched chalky and gritty.

Below are the swatches I made. I had to swatch at least 3-4 times before I get the color to show up.

As you can see from the swatches, almost all of the shadows are very powdery, and there are a TON of fall out upon application. The glitters are also so chunky that they don't blend well with the shadows. Also, I don't know if it's just me, but I feel that all of the shadows look has a dirty greyish tinge to them. The olive green that I was so excited about swatched more like a dirty dark green on my skin, than the gorgeous olive green it looks like in the pain. 3-4 of the colors look about the same once I put them on my eyelids.

Just to show you guys how powdery the shadows are

All the fallout in the palette after I am done swatching.

All in all, I am just very disappointed in the quality of these shadows. The colors look flat and unimpressive on my eyelids. I have only used this palette once after receiving it. Even for the 9 bucks it's worth, I think it's a total waste of money.

If you are thinking of purchasing this palette, I suggest you pass on and save some money for my favorite urban decay shadows.

Friends, if you know of any drugstore shadows that can wow me, let me know!!!

Have a great weekend everyone, I am going for Avicii's beach party concert at Siloso beach later, be sure I am gonna blog about it!

Xoxo,

Lee Hyori Miss Korea inspired look

I am not a fan of Lee Hyori, but I have been pretty impressed by the hit song Miss Korea from her newest album Miss Korea. In the song, she sings about korea's obsession with plastic surgery and designer bags using her own self-penned lyrics, and a simple and yet catchy melody. What I love most is of course retro glam look she has adopted for the video.

Bored at home on a sat, I decided to  try the purple cat eye look she has in the video, and this is the result:

HER

ME:

 What I did:

Foundation

I wore a mixture of Paul and Joe Pearl Foundation Primer in 02 and Hera HD foundation in 23 for a high coverage but yet glowing look. 

Brows

I thought that Lee Hyori's straight brows in the video had a greyish tinge, so I recreated the brows first with a taupe brown color (Urban Decay Tease) as the base, and then gently mixed in grey to create a more 3D effect (Urban Decay Gunmetal, a matte grey color would be a better choice).

Base Shadow

I used a shimmery light purple (1) all over the eyelid except under the brows, and then used a silver grey color (2) as a highlight on the browbone. 

Next I moved on to the eyeliner first before adding more eyeshadow colors to my look. 

Eyeliner

I drew in the upper and lower wing liner with MAC's Fluidline in Blacktrack as shown in the picture. The liner was quite messy but I wasn't too worried about it because the edges will be smudged out with eyeshadow in the next step.

Smudging

For the top lid I smudged the eyeliner upwards using a first matt black shadow (Urban Decay Blackout) and then gradually changed to Nyx's Dark purple shadow in Morocco, making sure to keep blending the colors. The lower winged line is blended out with just the matt black shadow. This step ensure the the harsh lines of the eyeliner are removed, and it also adds drama to the look. 

Lashes:

 For lashes, I curled my lashes and applied a lengthening mascara (Maybelline's falsies) before applying false lashes. I cut my false lashes into half and layer them up onto the outer corner of my eyes to create a fuller, fluffy cat eye look.

Contouring

In the music video, lee hyori downplayed the color on her face, probably to complement her super dramatic eyes. So I did not add any blush on my cheeks, instead only contoured my face using Nars Bronzer in Laguna as shown in the first picture. I highlighted the top of my cheekbones as well as down the nose using Milani Illuminating face powder in 02 Hermosa rose. Finished look (last picture) shows sculpted cheekbones, higher nose bridge, an overall glowy look. 

Finally, for the lips, 

I believe Hyori was wearing a pinkish nude color for her lips, and because I don't have any colors like that in my makeup collection, I mixed a light pink lip color (MAC Sunny Seoul) with a beige nude color (Nyx orange soda) to create a similar color. 

And that finishes my look.

Disclaimer: I am not looking to look exactly like her, which is impossible considering we have different features and face shape, what I am doing is just to recreate a look with is similar to the retro look she wore in the MV. :)

Thanks for reading folks! I will leave you with one final picture, 

I think I did quite an ok job didn't I? Let me know what you guys think!

xoxo, 

Makeup and outfit to an Indian wedding (slightly AISHWARYA RAI inspired)

My fiance and I went for an Indian Muslim wedding last night and I was extremely excited about it. It was the first Indian wedding I have ever attended, and I wanted to do a makeup that was sort of Bollywood glam. The person I thought of was Aishwarya Rai.

Of course Aishwarya Rai and I have entirely different facial structure, hers being nicely chiseled and mine being extremely flat. There is no way I can recreate her entire look, so what I focused on instead was to creaste a sultry look thatmimic her very lovely almond shaped eyes and the high cheek bone. 

Then end result was this:

Before                                                                         After

(Please excuse the weird shadow on the after picture, somehow the sun started setting when I was half way through the makeup, and I didn't realize the window grills were casting a shadow on my face until this morning.)

What I used for this makeup:

What I did:

I filled my brows in with a mix of dark brown and black eyeshadow because Rai had dark brows, and I also created a slight arch with the brows instead of using doing my usual straight brows. 

For eyeshadow, I used a L'oreal color infallible shadow in 004 Forever pink as a base, and then set the cream shadow with a plummy pink shadow from YSL 4 ombres a Paupieres palette 6. To create a subtle crease shape (see from the pictures, all of Rai's crease colors are very subtle, but it could be because she already has very definite eye socket), I used a matt brown shadow Tease from Urban Decay. Finally, I highlighted my brow bone with a beige shimmer color, Bootycall from Urban Decay.  

Eyeliner wise, I did a cat eye because it will elongate my eyes and emphasize more on the almond shape of my eyes in order to create an illusion that they are as beautiful as Rai's eyes. I drew the upper line with Heroine make's smooth liquid eyeliner. For a more natural cat eye look, the flick should be in line with the upward turn of your lower eyelid (shown by the line in the picture). I then lined my water line with Makeup forever aqua eye waterproof eyeliner pencil in 0L. I only lined half of my waterline so that it will look a little more natural, but if you prefer a fiercer look, line your entire waterline. Finally I set my liner with a black eye shadow, Carbon from M.A.C. 

For the lashes, I only used Maybelline's falsies mascara, because I had unfortunate accident with a recent eyelash extension and did not want to traumatize my lashes further with eyelash glue. But for a better effect, please apply some false lashes. 

Cheeks wise, 

I chose to use a bronzer and a highlighter to sculpt out my cheekbones and did not use any blush. I applied  taupe brown Rock and Republic eyeshadow in SPY as a bronzer to the hollows of my cheeks (the line). And to highlight my cheekbones (triangle area), I used Dior's Shimmer powder in 002 Amber Diamond. All these created an illusion of higher cheekbones.

Finally, to finish off,

I used Relvon's lip butter in Sugar plum to add a subtle plum color  that matches my dress. And for something extra, I added a stick on nose stud from Chameleon.  

As for outfit, 

I wore a dark magenta dress with indian inspired silver and crystal beadings on the collar, paired with a pair of white strappy heels. I piled on a ton of silver tone jewellery for accessories, and carried my vintage Dior clutch. 

All in all, it was a fun time doing the makeup and putting the look together. It might not be the best imitation of Aishwarya Rai's look, but I think it was a decent effort. What do you guys think? 

Thanks for reading! 

xoxo, 

Nicole. 

Maybelline Colorsensational NEONUDE NEO1 Blush Beige

Hi guys,
Sorry I haven't been keeping to my one blog post a week schedule! Like Keira said, I had been down with a pretty bad bronchial infection which coincided with my cousin's visit to Singapore, so I have been sick and running around town (definitely not a great combo), it's hard to get down to blogging. I am still pretty tired so today's entry will be short (and hopefully sweet) to alert you to a great drugstore find in Singapore...

New lipsticks by Maybelline!!! Although I have been quite a fan of Maybelline products recently because of their fantastic mascaras, I still believe that Revlon is the winner when it comes to drugstore lip products (think Revlon Lip butters). However with the launch of Maybelline's 2 new color sensational lipsticks, I think Maybelline is now upping their game. Now available  is the BOLDMATT and NEONUDE lipsticks that promises color without drying your lips. I have yet to try the BOLDMATT lipsticks simply because I have too many bold colored lipsticks, but with how amazing the NEONUDEs are, you will be sure I am going in back to the drugstore next week to pick up some BOLDMATTs.

I only allowed myself to bring home one single NEONUDE lipstick in blush beige. The packaging is the same as their usual colorsensational line with a plastic cover which I am not a fan of because of how filmsy it is. However the product in it is pretty awesome, the lipstick is well pigmented, with a velvety finish. It wears for approximately 4 hours without eating which is pretty decent for a cream finish lipstick. The formula  glides on my lips smoothly and doesn't dry my lips (but not as moisturizing as Relvon's lip butters). I would call it a close dupe to Dior addict lipstick in 422 Tokyo which I love and am almost finishing.

Dior Addict Lipstick in 422 Tokyo

In fact, I think pigmentation wise, Maybelline's NEONUDE maybe even better than Dior Addict Tokyo.

After a single swatch

Multiple swatches of Dior Addict Tokyo and 2 swatches of NeoNude Blush Beige

Blush Beige swatches on the hand as a warm coral color, while 422 Tokyo is more pink. However on the lips, the 2 lipsticks are pretty similar, with 422 Tokyo swatching a little more beige than Blush Beige.

Blush beige is truly one great "my-lips-but-better" (MLBB) lipstick. Look at how it makes my lips look so soft and plump upon application.

Bare Lips and looking pale

With Blush Beige on

For the overlook, Blush Beige puts together my no-makeup-makeup-look, making me look less sickly, and more radiant. I love it!!

So if you are looking for a cheap MLBB lipstick, give Maybelline's NEONUDE line a try. They are retailing at Watsons, Guardian, SaSa, selected departmentail stores, major supermarkets and hypermarkets for SGD$17.90 (Watsons having a sale now for $14.90)

See how I used this lipstick in a bronzey make up look here: http://foreveerr29.blogspot.sg/2013/07/5-mins-smoky-bronzed-look.html

For more swatches from this line, go here.

Have a great rest of weekend!

xoxo,

Snail Essence Mask :Dr. Morita Repair Essence Ultra Slim Facial Mask

I had previously reviewed the Mizon Multi Function Formula Snail Repair Blemish Blam SPF 32/PA++ (Click to read the post if you haven't),  and have fallen so in love with the bb cream that I went to Watsons and picked up a snail essence mask too.

Just a short update on the bb cream, after using the Mizon snail bbcream for 2 months, my skin condition has improved a whole ton (Keira is a witness!). I used to be very very acne prone but after using the bb cream, I swear I rarely breakout anymore, and if I do, the pimple heals on its own within a day or two. Also, the old acne scars are starting to fade too! I used to think that the rave about snail essence is all but a hype, now I am not so sure. 

A quick search around the internet and pubmed tells me that the scientific name for snail essence is  “Helix Aspersa Müller Glycoconjugates”, it is actually a thick fluid collected by stimulating live snail (ok, I know gross, but hey, it works!). It is mainly made up of proteoglycans, glycosaminoglycans, glycoprotein enzymes, hyaluronic acid, copper peptides, antimicrobial peptides and trace elements including copper, zinc, and iron, which are all essential for keeping the snail free of bacterial or fungal infections as well as helping them heal when they get scratches from sliding around the hard pavement. I guess that's how the essence will be working on our skin as well by increasing topical wound healing properties. 

Does the snail essence really help in keeping us wrinkle free? I am not sure, because I do not have wrinkles yet. I am getting my mum to try out the mask though, will let everyone when I see results. Although, searching on pubmed, I do find some promising data, scientists have tested the snail fluid on a variety of cell cultures, where they see an increase in proliferation of fibroflast cells through the stimulation of new collagen, elastin fibers as well as fibronectin proteins. There was also a study that claims that snail extract improves skin condition by increasing the derma cells' ability to take up and hold water. Basically, I think there's enough legitimate evidence here to make the scientist in me believe that snail extract might really be a scientifically sound skincare product! 

It's up to you to believe, but let's move on to this new mask I have been trying. I have been using this mask for about a month, twice a week, and so far, I believe my skin has become fairer, and plumper, although I can't guarantee that the effects is from the mask and not the Mizon bb cream. 

Anyhow, 

Dr. Morita masks are supposed to be from Japan, but they are made in Taiwan, it made me a little disappointed. However, these masks are very well made, they are thick, and contains a whole lot of essence,  even more than those in the beauty diary masks.

The essence is also thick, slimy and sticky, it might be psychological but I like my essence thick because they feel like they contain more ingredients and are better absorbed.

This is how the mask look like on my face, I do have a pretty huge face, so there is enough material to go around. :P

I leave the mask on for 20-30 minutes, and this is a before and after shot of my pores.

Before

After

I think it's pretty obvious from the picture that my pores are a lot smaller after applying the mask.

TIP: After using the mask, DO NOT wash your face, just massage all the essence into your skin. The essence from this mask can be easily absorbed into the skin, and is not sticky after. Try it, it makes your skin smoother and softer the next day.

The mask is available only from Watson's, and cost SGD13.90 for 10 masks. Quite a good price for the quality. Are you willing to give it a try? Let me know!

xoxo,
Nicole