Review: The Body Shop Camomile Silky Cleansing Oil

I’m on the hunt for my Holy Grail of face cleansers, and am simultaneously on a buying ban.
No problem, when I cleaned Miss K’s and my communal bathroom, I hit the jackpot.
We belong on an episode of Hoarders, I swear that I uncovered almost 20 different face cleansers, some of which had not been opened, along with tons of masques, and enough shampoo and conditioner to last the next 6 months.
We have a tiny bathroom, so the fact that this was all stashed in there was impressive; most of it had been “put away” and forgotten about.

But enough about our terrible housekeeping, onto the review.

I am very lucky in that my days of pimples are 98% behind me; on the occasion I do get a pimple, it is just one, and its usually nothing too dramatic.  I’m putting this down to a combination of BC and an actual face care routine (Dear 16y.o me, moisturiser is your friend)
But I need something that is going to keep my face feeling and looking fresh, without upsetting it, or making it oily or dry. Working in food means that I often come home feeling a bit gross, and need something that will make me feel human again.

I tend to opt for gentler cleansers, and the popularity of the Oil Cleansing Method (OCM) has meant a large number of oil cleansers hitting the shelves, one of which is The Body Shop’s Camomile Silky Cleansing Oil.

This product retails for $26.95 for 200mls at The Body Shop; of course my purchasing it O.S on sale meant I only paid about $8 for it.
So would I purchase this at full price?

It smells very vaguely of camomile, as the name would suggest, but it’s not enough fragrance to bother the sensitive. It contains synthetic and natural emollients; whereas the oil cleansers I have used previously have been 100% natural oils, so the texture of this is slightly thinner than I would have expected from an “oil”

Ingredients:

Glycine Soja Oil/Glycine Soja (Soybean) Oil , Prunus Amygdalus Dulcis Oil/Prunus Amygdalus Dulcis (Sweet Almond) Oil , Helianthus Annuus Seed Oil/Helianthus Annuus (Sunflower) Seed Oil , C12-15 Alkyl Benzoate, Caprylic/Capric Triglyceride , Ethylhexyl Palmitate, Isohexadecane , Polysorbate 85 , Sorbitan Trioleate, Sesamum Indicum Seed Oil/Sesamum Indicum (Sesame) Seed Oil , Octyldodecanol , Parfum/Fragrance , Linalool , Tocopherol, Limonene, Anthemis Nobilis Flower Oil, Citric Acid .

It’s easy to use, simply apply to dry skin, and add water to emulsify and cleanse. (I personally prefer putting it on a warm wet facecloth and using that on my face) It’s claim is that it can even remove waterproof makeup, whilst providing a gentle cleanse. Unfortunately, this cleanser struggles to remove any eye makeup; but it is great at gently removing foundation.
As it claims, it provides a gentle clean, keeping the skin free of impurities. My skin has stayed looking clear, but I have felt on some nights that I needed that little bit extra, and used an additional product or a face scrub.
In all honesty, I think that this is a nice way to remove light makeup before a heavy duty cleanser, or as a cleanser for when your skin is very sensitive. If you’re into double cleansing, I think this would be an excellent first cleanser, again to gently remove makeup and residue from your day.
At $26.95 however, I can think of several other similar products that are cheaper, and possibly more effective cleansers. An upside to the price is that you need very little, one pump of this will do your whole face. I’ve been using it for over a month, and haven’t even used up a third of the bottle.
If you can get this at a good price, and you’re looking for a very gentle cleanse, go for it. But this certainly is not making it onto my holy grail product list.

Have you tried this or the OCM? Let me know your favourite oil cleansing products in the comments!

-Miss A

 

 

Is it a Dupe? Benefit High Beam vs Face of Australia Mineral Therapy Face and Body Illuminator in “Angel Mist”

Australia really gets the short end of the stick when it comes to cosmetic prices; New Zealand has it even worse. Typical “Drustore” products that retail for under $10 in the USA are ridiculously inflated by 2, 3 or 4+ times the cost. If most “Drugstore” products are easily hitting the $20 mark, it doesn’t leave much hope with the affordability of higher end products.

So when I come along a product that is a potential dupe for a higher end product, I jump on that shiz.

Miss K and I recently went to the USA and hauled back with us an incredible amount of cosmetics (I’m talking 200+ Nail polishes here people) and that included a number of products we just could not justify the cost of back here.

Imagine my surprise when I found a dupe for a product that was not only cheaper, but an Australian product.
As is evident by the title of this post, I’m talking about Benefit High Beam, and its striking resemblance to Face of Australia’s Face and Body Illuminator in the shade “Angel Mist”

I actually owned High Beam first, and picked up Angel Mist on a whim because it was hugely marked down. Here we have them side by side; the most evident difference is the size. Angel Mist is a whopping 50ml whereas High Beam comes in at a scanty 13mL

High Beam retails for $45AUD ($3.46 per mL), whereas Angel Mist is only $14.95 ( ~$0.30 per mL). I picked up my Angel Mist for $5 ($0.10 per mL). So Angel mist comes out miles ahead as far as affordability; you don’t really even need 50mL of the stuff, split the cost with up to 5 friends, and you all get roughly the equivalent amount of some High Beam for a teeny tiny $3 a piece.

I might be a tiny bit biased already on cost factor, so how do they shape up appearance wise? My apologies for the awful picture on the left, did not realise until I had packed everything up for the day!

 

If you look closer you can see that High Beam looks a wee bit pinker

The other big difference is the containers, Highbeam has a brush applicator, Angel Mist is in a tube. I don’t personally use the High Beam brush for application, but the Angel Mist tube has the tendency to expel way more product than I want, so no winner for packaging here.

Now on my skin! Illuminator is a tricky bugger to photograph!

On the right we have Angel Mist, on the left is High Beam firstly in sunlight, unblended, as you can see again, High Beam appears pinker

Texture wise, Angel Mist is slightly runnier

Here I have lightly blended, first in sunlight, then in artificial light

The variation here is due to the angle at which I am holding my arm, the intensity of both colour changes with the angle of the light (I have no idea how to photograph this accurately!!!),at first, I thought high beam was pinker, then I thought angel mist was pinker.

Long story short, on my skin I can’t tell the difference.

They both glow like anything under artificial light, look lovely in sunlight, and do what they are supposed to.

Here are the ingredients lists for your own comparison 🙂 and fyi, both products are cruelty free.

High Beam Ingredients:  Water (Aqua), Caprylic/Capric/Succinic Triglyceride, Mica, Pentylene Glycol, Polymethyl Methacrylate, Dimethicone, Limnanthes Alba (Meadowfoam) Seed Oil, Hydroxyethyl Acrylate/ Sodium Acryloyldimethyl Taurate Copolymer, Dimethicone Peg-7 Phosphate, Trimethylsiloxysilicate, Phenoxyethanol, Steareth-21, Squalane, Caprylyl Glycol, Steareth-2, Tocopheryl Acetate, Polysorbate 60, Sodium Stearoyl Glutamate, Butylene Glycol, Sodium Hydroxide.  [+/-:  Aluminum Hydroxide (Ci 77002), Bismuth Oxychloride (Ci 77163), Iron Oxides (Ci 77491, Ci 77492, Ci 77499), Titanium Dioxide (Ci 77891)].

Angel Mist Ingredients: Water (Aqua), Isopropyl Palmitate, Neopentyl Glycol Diheptanoate, Squalane Stearic Acid, Glyceryl Stearate, Triethanolamine, Lecithin, Propylene Glycol, Magnesium Aluminium Silicate, Simmondsia Chinensis (Jojoba) Seed Oil, Dimethicone, Polysorbate 60, Cellulose Gum, Tocopheryl Acetate, Sodium Ascorbyl Phosphate, Phenoxyethanol, Caprylyl Glycol. May Contain: Mica, Titanium Dioxide, Iron Oxides.

For my money, I know what I am buying. Face of Australia is regularly on sale, but with a full sized high beam and my tube of Angel Mist, I have enough Illuminator to impersonate a Twilight Vampire (bletch) on the reg, so I am set for now.

Have you you found any dupes recently? Let me know in the comments!

-Miss A

 

 

 

 

Rainy Day Swatches: Essence Metal Glam Trend Edition

Brisbane’s awful weather has really upset my plans for clear photos, so instead of my very exciting post about a high end dupe, we have some swatches of Essence’s latest trend edition, Metal Glam.

I was very excited to getting my paws on this collection as it features both a liquid blush and a highlighter!

Source: http://www.essence.eu/au/trend-editions/metal-glam/

As you can see, this trend edition also features nailpolishes $2.95 (including one glitter topper $3.50 ), lipgloss $3.50, some stick on beauty accessories and nail stickers/polishes $3.50 and new metal glam eyeshadows $4.25.

Miss K grabbed the nailpolishes, but I had eyes only for that blush ($4.95) and the highlighter ($5.35)

Our little haul!

Here we have the blush in shade Glam-me in artificial light, it comes off as a peachy/coral tone with quite a bit of shimmer. I think pairing this with a dewy look would be a bad idea, as i could give the appearance of oily skin. Its a gorgeous colour on my pale skin, and would give a nice flush of shimmer to darker skintones

The highlighter in Gold-Digger is just as gorgeous, the powder is finely milled and applies like a dream. Like any highlighter with heavy shimmer, you need to be careful with application, but for the price, I can definitely recommend this one.

Last but not least, the nailpolishes. These suprised me, as you can see in my swtches below, the glitter topper looks very green toned, but when applied over a base colour, it turns true gold. I am currently wearing the bronze colour:Steel-ing the Scene, and am happy to report that it is opaque in one coat. The brush size on these is excellent and I had no application issues.

L-R Steel-ing the Scene, Steel-ing the Scene (Yep, they have the same name) and Gold Digger

Add in one dodgy mani for effect

 

Overall, I am very happy with my purchases. Metal Glam is Priceline exclusive and limited edition, so get them while you can!
Let me know if you’ve purchased these and loved or hated them

-Miss A

 

 

Review: Garnier Micellar Cleansing Water

Hey!

Apologies for the lack of posts, our planned once a week posting schedule has been interrupted by our university commitments. We will get better!

So, onto today’s post. I want to talk about the latest addition to my skincare routine. Garnier Micellar Cleansing Water is Garnier’s take on the ever popular Bioderma Micellar Water.

This bad boy claims to 1)Remove Makeup 2) Cleanse and 3) Soothe. It also claims to have approximately 200 uses in one bottle. I bought it because I needed a lip friendly makeup remover that wasn’t going to murder my bank account.

First impression: I used this initially to just remove my makeup before cleansing my face at night, and holy heck is it effective. One cotton pad soaked in this stuff will take off my everyday makeup (Foundation, Setting Powder, Blush, Non-Waterproof Mascara)

One month down the track: I use this everyday, usually before I cleanse for the night, but sometimes additionally as a replacement for my toner on sensitive days. I use it to remove my makeup, it does take a little work to remove heavy/waterproof eye makeup, but is a gentle and effective remover.

My skin is reacting super well to the inclusion of this to my routine; it doesn’t mess with my oil production, and allows for a slightly gentler cleanse if I think toner is a bad idea. There is no fragrance, and no nasties that may aggravate sensitive skin.

At $11.99 for 400mls it is certainly friendlier on the wallet than many alternatives; and judging by my usage over the last month, this will get me very close to the advertised 200 uses.

I can highly recommend this if you’re in the market for a new toner, or a super face friendly makeup remover

Have you tried this, or any other cleansing waters? What was your experience?

Until next time

-Miss A

 

 

 

St Paddy’s Day Manicure

Hey Guys!

My St. Patrick’s Day manicure is of course green. But to make it just a little different I pulled on my extensive Harry Potter nerdiness to come up with this one. Introducing the winners of the 1994 Quidditch World Cup, the Irish National Quidditch Team. I used their team logo.

Irish Quidditch Team Logo

To create this look I applied Essie The More The Merrier followed by a coat of Sally Hansen Insta-Dri 01 Clearly Quick to speed up drying time. I then put down striping tape and painted with Zoya Hunter in between the lines before pulling of the tape. To create the shamrock I used the dotting tool to create 3 hearts with their points joined then added a stalk. Unfortunately it was originally too small so I had to increase the size of the hearts. This is meant it started to be off centre. Topped off with top coat.

Finished mani

Base Coat: Seche Clear Base Coat
Background colour: Essie The More The Merrier
Stripe: Zoya Hunter
Shamrock: NYC Long Wearing 134 French White Tip
Top Coats: Sally Hansen Insta-Dri 01 Clearly Quick
NYC Long Wearing 271 Extra Shiny Top Coat

Does anyone have crazy St. Paddy’s Day plans? because these nails are as crazy as my day is going to get 🙂 and I need to live vicariously.

Kiera xo

Credit: http://harrypotter.wikia.com/wiki/Irish_National_Quidditch_team

Spotted! New Essence Metal Glam Trend Edition and Essence Clearance Products

Hi,

Just a very quick post to alert people about my very exciting sighting today.
At the Queen Street Priceline (Brisbane) Not only did I find an almost pristine Essence “Metal Glam” trend edition display; I found that they were clearing out many of the essence products for 50% off.
Some of the clearance indicated the discontinuation of certain products, but I have no idea whats going on with the rest.

Here’s a quick snap of my haul, I will be reviewing the Metal Glam products later in the week! (Miss K picked up some nail polishes not pictured here) All of these bar the Metal Glam highlighter and blush were 50% off.
From memory, all of the older style lipsticks were on sale, 2 shades of lipliner, about half of the nail polishes, the translucent fixing powder (which was all gone. *sadface*) the concealer and quite a few of the lipglosses were all on clearance (but there were more, I’m sure of it)

Happy Hauling!
-Miss A

Maybelline NY FITme Shine Free Foundation Stick Review

I am the leader of the pale people.

Okay, so that may be an exaggeration. But I am pretty darn pale, it is almost guaranteed that if I go to buy a new foundation, I will be the second lightest shade in the range.

I also have oily skin; so you may feel my pain when it comes to finding a foundation in the finish you want (i.e does not melt off face/does not make you look like a human oil slick), in the shade you need, and within your budget constraints (I have only recently convinced myself that higher end foundations can most certainly be worth the price tag)

Maybelline NY has recently released a new addition to their FITme range; a foundation stick that is touted as “shine free”. Of course, the USA has had it for far longer than we have, and I actually grabbed one while I was over there because I liked the shade range of the FITme concept, but found that the liquid foundation just would not last on my skin. I wasn’t intending to review it, but lo and behold, IT CAME HERE (Now, can we have the baby skin too please?)

So, for my last few days out and about I have been rigorously testing this foundation (and risking melty/flaky/patchy/oily/orange disaster)

On each day, I followed the same routine, but changed up the primer each day. (See, rigorous!)

Primer, paint on foundation so I had whiskers/camo stripes, then used my Real Techniques expert face brush to blend my lovely stripes out onto my whole face (Note: The “official” Maybelline FITme page suggests blending in a circular motion with the fingers, but I am really starting to prefer my brushes over finger blending) blush and bronze, then set the whole shebang with Rimmel Stay Matte pressed powder.

The primers I used were: Benefit Porefessional, Napoleon Set calming pre-foundation primer (green tube), and Face of Australia’s Face Base primer.

So, how did it shape up?

I found that all my primers yielded similar results, the major difference being that porefessional reduced the appearance of my pores slightly more under this particular foundation. Staying power, and oil levels were both fairly similar.
Now here is the scary part, picture of my face. The horrifically funny bit of this is, that when I went to do facial photos, I realised my skin is horrifically dry today, so these are not the best shots I could give you (forgive me, I’m sick)

My naked skin 😦

One hasty coat of foundation, hence the streaks, but it has obviously evened out my skintone here.

Final finish, set with Stay Matte.
You can see on the dry patch near my eye how it can cling.
Of all the days I get dry skin, it’s the day I’m reviewing a product based on my oily skin

For comparisons sake, here is the MNY FITme swatched against several of my foundations (How some of these were “matched” to my skintone, I will never know)

From the top down; MNY Fitme (110 Porcelain), Mac Studio Fix Fluid (NC15), Rimmel Match Perfection (081 Fair Ivory),MUFE HD Foundation (N117), Face of Australia Lasting Looks Natural Foundation (Natural Ivory), Australis Fresh & Flawless (Nude)

Positives
For me, the FITme stick foundation provided medium coverage for my entire Uni day (About 8 hours) without the need to touch up, the “Shine free” claims certainly held up their end. I found that this foundation didn’t pool in my pores, and it didn’t flake off or change considerably during the day. The coverage was quite natural, and can be built up to a medium coverage level. . It didn’t feel heavy or greasy, and wasn’t sliding around on my face. The recommended RRP isn’t too steep for a foundation I like this much, so I will probably repurchase this.

Negatives
I did find that I was becoming a little oily in my T-zone towards the end of the day, however I have been wearing my glasses, which tends to stimulate oil production in this area. It was easily fixed though, I applied Australis Matte Me underneath my primer in my T-zone, and the oiliness was significantly reduced. On the opposite side of the scale, I found that this foundation did cling to the one dry spot on my face, so if you do have drier skin, this could be an issue.
Also, the amount of product in the tube is a little less than one would expect (its a big tube, and the product stick within is quite small), the stick is just over 1/3 of an Ounce, whereas a standard foundation bottle is 1 ounce so you may not get as many uses out of this as you would a traditional bottle.

Overall
I think that the shade range is great, that shade 110 is a good mach for my skin and that this is potentially a good day to day foundation for those looking for a medium coverage foundation that is going to last through your work/school/uni day. If you have dry skin, you may need to play around a little to get it to work for you, but it is definitely worth a shot.

Have you tried this as well? Let me know how you fared!

-Miss A

New Rimmel Apocalips shades! Swatches and info

Unless you have been living under a figurative rock in the beauty world, you would have at some point have come across Rimmel London’s Apocalips.

In Australia, we have 11 shades, the USA has 14 (and are named Show off Lip Lacquers) and the UK now has 13.

So, there are obviously some shade discrepancies between Australia and the rest of the world, but I thought I knew of all the available shades.

Obviously not.

Rimmel London released two new Apocalips shades in the UK sometime late last year, but I didn’t know this until last week when I was perusing Asos! I bought them immediately, and they arrived in under a week. Spoiler, they’re wonderful.

Which is why I am reviewing them despite them not technically being available in Australia; not only are they easily shipped internationally. But you NEEEEEED these shades.

Apologies for the crap pictures! Excuses: My lighting setup is not currently working for me, lips are drier than the Sahara. Also, my swatching does not do them justice.

“Across the Universe” (Left) and “Eclipse” (right) fill the dark shade void that I felt the original shade range originally lacked (and Australia still lacks! *sadface*)

First up, Across the Universe: A gorgeous classic red.

Here they are next to “Big Bang” (On the right) in case you’re wondering

and, my personal new favourite lip colour; Eclipse, which is an absolutely gorgeous purple toned red.

Just like the original, these bad boys are opaque, long wearing, and smooth to apply
No regrets with this purchase! If you “need” them too, they’re available online; I bought mine from Asos (Full price $12.85, but they’re currently discounted to $9.80!) because I had a discount code and they have free shipping, but you may find them elsewhere!

Love or Loathe? Let me know!

Miss A

Swatches from Essence “Tribal Summer” Trend Edition

Finally, after stalking two separate Targets for what feels like forever, I found an untouched display of the new Essence “Tribal Summer” trend edition. (In the Indooroopilly Target, I have also spotted it in the Brisbane CBD Target)

Essence has only really come on to my radar in the last year or so, and while I love their inexpensive products, the lack of attention that many stores put in their displays annoys me (though, unkempt makeup displays annoy me in general). Also, their lack of tamper proof packaging means that unlike a lot of the “drugstore” products you can get here, there is a serious risk of contamination of these products.

I grabbed the liquid blush, the two lipsticks, and one of the nail polishes (though I may go back for more, the $2.75 price point is irresistible)

First up the blush, in the shade Waka Waka ($4.25) is not exactly what I would call a “Liquid” as you can see in the photo below, it has more of a gel type consistency. Once blended, it gives a lovely pink flush to the skin- I’m looking forward to experimenting with this, as I usually shy away from non powder blushes.

I grabbed the polish in Inti Inka ($2.75) as Miss K has a mild *cough* serious *cough* infatuation with the colour yellow, so I was being a nice housemate and grabbed it to add to our polish stash. Its a lovely shade of yellow (The essence website describes it as gold..uh no), bright without being fluorescent and is mostly opaque in two coats.

 

The lipsticks in the shades 1 Na Rock and 2 Waka Waka ($4.10) were my main target for this hunt, after seeing them online, I just needed them. I wasn’t disappointed; the shades are gorgeous, and the pigmentation is great;it could be a little heavier, but with their glossy finish it looks fine. I haven’t done a proper wear time test of these yet, but I expect I will only get probably 4 or so hours before another application is needed. In my preliminary wear test of Waka Waka it held up quite well, and even after drinking out of a water-bottle, the colour was still good and the wear was minimal; after 2 hours I needed to touch up the inner areas of my mouth (caused by eating and drinking)

Na-rock
Natural light, light application (2 coats max)

Waka Waka
Natural light, light application (2 coats max)

The things available that I didn’t grab were; Feather hair extensions (not for me, $4.25), tip painters (at $5.35 for a pack of 3 in pretty average colours, I passed), bronzer (looked lovely, but I hardly use bronzer already, $5.35 ), the other nail polishes ($2.75), blotting papers ($3.50), and finally, the loose pigments ($4.25).

I thought about grabbing the pigments before walking away, but decided that I really needed to work on my brush technique before grabbing something like that. I imagine they are going to fly off the shelves along with the rest of the collection, so If you see something you were thinking about getting, don’t hesitate! (Another essence pet peeve, lack of trend edition stock. Me and My Icecream anyone? )

Good luck finding it if you’re after it (If you see Metal Glam, let me know!!)
-Miss A

Floral Stamped Mani

Hey guys, this second post of mine is a (relatively successful) stamping mani.
I’ve only recently mastered the stamping technique and can take a little bit of getting used to.

This was my finished product. I had hoped that the gold I had stamped with would stand out more but alas. I began with a quick coat of Sally Hansen Hard as Nails Hardener followed by 2 coats of Revlon Perfumerie Collection Bordeaux. I used Konad Stamping plate M71 (the floral design in the top right corner) with OPI Bling Dynasty. All of this topped of with 2 coats of Sally Hansen Triple Shine Top Coat.

Here are some close up pictures of the pattern. Instead of being a stark contrast with the gold against the pinkish red it kind of gave it a subtle shimmery effect.

All in all I quite like it, the pattern kind of reminds me of floral wallpaper which is pretty cool. The colours do work well together even if it isn’t quite like I imagined it being. Though, when is anything like we plan it?

Till next time,
Miss K x