Hourglass Mineral Veil SPF15 Primer!!!

Hourglass is a luxury beauty brand that's been gaining a massive following in the UK in recent months, I absolutely love the ambient lighting powder in dim light, review here. I'm eager to try more from the brand, but there products aren't the cheapest and my closest spacenk store that stocks there products recently closed down, meaning colour matching and swatching in person is difficult. However for my next dip into the hourglass pool I ordered the travel size mineral veil primer from the spacenk website, at 10ml this will set you back £20, a full size 30ml bottle costs £52. It's probably one of the most expensive primers I've used, but with the warmer months unusually warm for the UK and my combination oily skin setting in, I thought it was worth seeing what all the hype was about.

What Hourglass say about the product;
A mineral-based, water-resistant primer with SPF 15 that creates an impossibly smooth canvas and seamless look. Veil eliminates redness, minimizes pore size, softens fine lines and creates a uniform canvas for a flawless makeup application and minimises shine. This clean, satin-finish formula helps keep makeup looking fresh and prevents fading, while SPF 15 shields the skin from the sun.

 As you can see, it's a white, thinkish liquid, that looks like it would give my darker skintone a white cast, but doesn't. This definitely prolongs make-up wear and helps towards mattifying the skin, it got daily use during the heatwave, but now I try to reserve it for long make-up wearing days or events. The SPF is a nice bonus, although a little low for me during summer, so I still use sunscreen prior to this. The product keeps going, everytime I use it I think this is going to be the last pump, so this small size will still last a decent amount of time.

So far Hourglass is a brand I'm becoming increasingly impressed/obssessed with, I will definitely be trying a few more of there products, currently on the list is the No28 primer serum, for the colder months and the immaculate liquid powder foundation. I'm also toying with the idea of getting one of the new nude lip stylo's and possible the No28 lip treatment oil, among a myriad of other things, the list just keeps growing!!! 

Have you tried any hourglass products? What were your thoughts? Recommendations welcome.  Let me know what you would like to see on the blog.

Thanks for visiting today

Alex.

 

Chanel Les Beiges Healthy Glow Sheer Powder - No50!!!

I'm sure most of you have heard about the latest release from Chanel, the healthy glow sheer powder from the Les Beiges collection, inspired by freedom and light as air make-up. I had a £10 Debenhams voucher and decided to put it towards the purchase of this £38 powder, I'm getting a litle bored of my MAC mineralise skinfinish and with these new powders on the market claiming to prevent cakey over powdered application, while mattifying and giving the skin a glow all at the same time I had to see what it was all about. I have the hourglass ambient lighting powder (review here) and absolutely love it, but due to the universal shades it offers no extra coverage when setting make-up. My skin is a little crazy at the moment, I have some horrible blemishes on my cheeks that refuse to fade, so I need something that will work towards disguising them without having to wear a full coverage foundation. Saying that the powder is incredibly sheer, so coverage is minimal, which is great if your wear little make-up and/or have great skin. I use this powder to set my foundation and concealer, it also has SPF 15, which is personally a bit low for me in the summer months, but can help to top up your SPF throughout the day (better than nothing).

The packaging is gorgeous and chic, the powder feels soft and buttery to the the touch and it comes with a large mirror and brush for touch up's on the go. I have used the elf powder brush and real techniques buffing brush to apply this, but my favourite at the moment is the elf mineral powder brush. I love the feeling and finish of this powder, it never leaves me looking over powdered or cakey, it does have a strong scent, but I don't notice this once it's been applied to my skin. I got the shade No50, but think in the winter I would need No40, however the powders are incredibly sheer so I could probably get away with either shade. The powders can also be used as a bronzer if you purchase a shade or two darker than your skintone. The shade range goes upto No70, but I'm not sure how many of these shades are available in the UK, the darkest shade the counter I purchased mine from seemed to be the No60.

Heavily swatchedSlightly blended out

It looks light initially, but blends out beautifully to give a demi-matte, sort of satin smooth finish to the skin. I believe these powders will be realeased in the USA in August, I can't wait for the cream blushes that are already avalable as part of the fall collection in America to launch here in August.

The powder with Laura Mercier's secret camouflage concealer

Do you have any chanel make-up, have you tried this new powder? Share your thoughts and any questions below.

Thanks for visiting the blog today.

Alex

Benefits fake up!!!

Hello everyone,

By now most of you would have heard of Benefits latest release, the hydrating crease-control concealer, Fake-up. I was in need (want) of a new day-to-day use concealer and decided to try this one, especially as asos had 30% off all beauty on there website, which meant this £18.50 concealer was even cheaper. This concealer is different in that it is surrounded by a hydrating ring, which contains vitamin E and apple seed extract, benefit claims it hydrates, conceals, is long lasting and won't crease among other things. The shade range is limited, light, medium and deep, I knew I would be using this as an under eye concealer so opted for the shade medium to brighten and highlight my under eye area.














I love Benefits quirky packaging, which makes this concealer easy to use and travel/handbag friendly, great for touch ups throughout the day. I dab it straight from the tube under my eyes and blend it out with my finger, I then set it with either my MAC mineralise skinfinish powder, my hourglass ambient ligthing powder in Dim or both.

With FlashWithout Flash

Initially when I applied the concealer, it creased a very tiny bit, but I blended it out further with my finger and it's not been a problem since. I really like this concealer, once blended it doesn't crease and is long lasting, I was worried it would make my combination skin look greasy and oily, but it gives a gorgeous, luminous glow to the skin. I can't comment on whether it conceals dark circles, as I am using it as a highlighting concealer and my dark circles are only bad when I've had periods of poor sleep.

Set with ambient powder in Dim.

 

 

Have you tried this concealer yet, what did you think? Any further questions please feel free to post a comment below.

 

Thanks for visiting the blog today.

 

Alex