It’s nice to see that not all makeup companies have lost their sense of humour! Honestly, I think one of the main problems with those promo images may have been simply that companies have been taking themselves too seriously — when what they should have been taking was a lesson from NARS! It’s okay to laugh at yourself sometimes :P In fact, it’s healthy!
The product: Vincent Longo‘s Water Canvas Primer.
The ingredients:
Water Dimethicone Dipropylene Glycol Peg-8 Dimethicone Copolyol Crosspolymer SD Alchohol 39-C Dimethicone/Vinyl Dimethicone Crosspolymer Phenyl Trimethicone Sodium PCA Dipotassium Glycyrrhizate Pyridoxine HCI Polygonum Bistorta Root Extract Butylene Glycol Sodium Citrate Methyl Paraben Methylcellulose Tocopherol
The basics: I like how this dries to a smooth, scent-free finish, though it smells a little chemicaly when you first apply it. The consistency is thinner than many other primers (for instance, Tarte Clean Slate) and its finish mirrors that — with a thick, jello-like (mmm, jello!) primer you often get more of a slippery finish, but with something that’s more of a liquid-gel the final result feels quite different. Your skin soaks it right up, and it’s as if you can feel your pores tighten. Not in a bad way, though — it definitely doesn’t seep moisture from your skin, and though it feels more taught it by no means feels dry.
The wear: Once this dries, the finish is smooth and (fine) lines are blurred. No, it’s not the holy grail of anti-ageing, but any good primer helps blur fine lines. I find that my skin stays oil-free for longer when I wear this, and my colour stays on longer as well. I can’t pick it out from the ingredients, but the product description mentions silica — and the silica’s very prevelant in this! You can feel it in the finish, and I’m willing to bet my favourite eyshadow that it’s the silica that keeps the oilies away.
Random photo of my hand.
Just kidding. Primed skin.
The difference: Like any good primer, this makes colour “stick” to your skin and enhances wear. In the photo below, the blush above the line is on bare skin and below the line, it’s on primed skin.
(Lancome Aplum, if I’m not mistaken.)
The verdict? If you like a slippery, silicone-y finish, this is not for you. However, if you have oilier skin, you like a weightless finish, and you can afford it (this one’s not cheap at $44 a pop) it’s definitely worth checking out. I really like this, especially in my t-zone, but primers are a very personal choice!
Here are three Spring 2010 collections with god-awful promo images. I mean, they all had very good (and very visible) intentions, but they were just… very poorly executed, if you ask me.
Dior, Clarins, and YSL respectively. Opinions?
And, finally, Shu Uemura’s Egerie collection. I can’t decide if I totally love or totally hate this — for now, it just confuses me. Are you fierce (the shadow, hair, shirt, nails,) whimsical (the colours, glistening bits,) or girly (pastel shadows, light colours)?
I mean, I definitely liked that they’re being risky and mixing all of the above. I just can’t decide if they suceeded, or if they mixed and failed miserably!
5. You’re all going to hate me for the amount of Guerlain on this list, but I personally think their Orchidée Impériale treatment set is quite pretty.
4. Givenchy and Cle de Peau have to share this spot for their brilliant logo-in-packaging design, in their Gloss Poetique and Intensifying Cream Eyeliner (mentioned here) respecitvely. 
3. I’m in love with this Narciso Rodriguez Musc for Her bottle, mentioned earlier here.
2. After reading this, you all probably knew that Guerlain‘s Holiday Sublime Radiant Powder had to be at least in the top three of this list. And it’s not something you can argue — this is some nice packaging.
1. Three words that no one can dispute: Alice. In. Wonderland. Perhaps not the prettiest, and perhaps not technically packing from 2009, but it is the most awesome packaging that we’ve seen photos of all year! Mentioned earlier here.
Do any of you have anything to add to this list? I’ve only just grazed the tip of the iceberg, mentioning only items that we’ve discussed previously or items that we *will* discuss once the posts work their way up and out of the backlogs, so give me the heads-up on your favourite packaging of the year in the comments! Be it something you found this year, something that was released this year, or even something that you heard rumors about this year that hasn’t been released yet — I’d love to know!
So I showed you the outfit about a week ago — here’s the eye look! I needed something really simple; something that I could do in under ten minutes and something that wouldn’t need to be touched up during the day.
As usual, sorry for the quality! It was so dark by the time I got home :( I brightened them to the best of my ability, but the colours just weren’t retained by the camera!
Happy boxing day, folks! I get all jazzed up each year around the holidays, as you know, and go crazy with gold eyes and red lips — I can’t stop myself! So, here’s the last bronze-gold eye/red lip combination of the year. I’ll be reviewing these false lashes soon (hint: I really like them!) so keep your eyes peeled for that. Enjoy!!
A confession before you see these photos — if I’m doing a FOTD just for theNotice, I don’t blend my lashes into the false ones. I hate having to remove mascara from falsies!
How-to
This one’s actually super-easy: just create a neutral smoky eye, to whatever intensity you desire, then pat gold shadow in the middle of your lid and blend outwards to cover your entire lid. With a small brush, intensify this gold on your inner V (around your tear duct.) Hilight the brow bone and ta-da! You’re done the shadows.
Using a creamy black liner, line both upper and lower waterlines. Take an angled liner brush to “pull” this off your waterlines at the corners, creating a small wing. Crimp lashes and finish with lots of mascara — or falsies, as I’ve used!
Finish with whatever lips and cheeks you want, but I picked a light pink cheek (contoured, obvi. You know me!) and a stained red lip.
Aaand, because it’s been pointed out recently that I basically never smile, here are three smile-shots for you! Consider it your day-late Christmas gift :P Man, do I ever feel like a camera-whore today! But it’s all good, because this lighting is definitely working in our favour.
Plus I have Photoshop to hide my third eye.
Used:
Lancome Crème Lustré shadow
Urban Decay 24/7 liner in Zero
Fyrinnae Polar Bear loose pigment
Annabelle Creme Caramel shadow trio
Marcelle Minerals Graphite shadow
Revlon Intensifying false lashes
Lancome Aplum
Smashbox Smoke
Paula Dorf Tapestry lip liner
Sephora Bronzed Beauty lip gloss
*dances wildly*
Just finished ordering it off the Future Shop website and I could not be more excited!! It should be getting here on the 31st — can’t wait!!
And let this stand as a heads-up, Canucks: for Boxing Day, Future Shop has them on special at $599.99, which includes a (kinda unfortunate) bag, the camera body and IS kit lens, and a 58mm UV lens filter. Basically, everything in the image below.
Merry Christmas! xoxo
I want to gooooo. But for the first time in years, this year was going to be the year that we DIDN’T do boxing day shopping! Boo :(
Here are some face charts I sent to a friend as part of her Christmas gift. And, because it’s finally Christmas day, I can finally post them for you ladies! (She sometimes checks in on theNotice and I didn’t want her to see them early.) If you have a last-minute party that you don’t have a look for, or even if you’re not sure what to wear (on your face, obvi) for your holiday photos, perhaps these can help.
The colours weren’t retained all that well when they went from paper to digital, but you get the gist. Feel free to enlarge by clicking on them! I remember most of the products that I used, so let me know if there’s a specific colour that intrigues you.
Tess, if you’re reading this, I miss you! Happy Christmas hon <3
The setup: you have approximately twenty four hours before Christmas, and your perfect red lipstick is a) missing in action, b) not so perfect, or c) totally nonexistant. So, clearly, you need something you can pick up at the drugstore on your way to the annual family get-together.
The solution: Annabelle‘s Rouge Velours Crème in 210 Adrenaline, mentioned earlier here.
The smell: There might be sugarplums on the dining room table and gingerbread cookies in the living room, but there’s no strong scent here! Yes, it smells a bit like lipstick as you put it on, but let’s be honest — I can’t be the only one who secretly loves that smell! It would annoy me (and make me nauseous) if it hung around, but it doesn’t.
The colour and texture: It’s creamy, but not as creamy as a Revlon Super Lustrous. This means that it’ll be a bit less moisturising, but also that it’s easier to layer, it’ll wear a little longer, and it’ll be easier to put on without colouring outside of the lines. And on the topic of colour… holy man! I was expecting it to be stunning, and it is just that — stunning! I have six spots for lipstick in my everyday stash, and this one’s totally bumping out MAC Dubonnet for the “red lipstick slot”. It’s everything that I hoped the MAC would be!
Caution: those who you thought were your friends may try to steal this from you.
The only person you know it was NOT is me, because I already have one. But man, if I didn’t…
The only person you know it was NOT is me, because I already have one. But man, if I didn’t…
The ingredients: (that’s right… it’s paraben-free!!)
Aloe barbadensis leaf extract, Ascorbyl palmitate, Butyl stearate, Candelilla cera/euphorbia cerifera (candelilla) wax/cire de candelilla, Cera alba/beeswax/cire d’abeille, Cera carnauba/copernicia cerifera (carnauba) wax/cire de carnauba, Diisostearyl dimer dilinoleate, Isodecyl neopentanoate, Lanolin, Methyl glucose sesquistearate, Oleyl alcohol, Oleyl oleate, Ozokerite, Persea gratissima (avocado) oil, Ricinus communis (castor) seed oil, Silica, Simmondsia chinensis (jojoba) seed oil, Tocopherol. May contain: Blue 1 lake, Carmine, Iron oxides, Mica, Orange 5, Red 27 lake, Red 6 lake, Red 7 lake, Titanium dioxide, Yellow 5 lake, Yellow 6 lake.
Tip: us timid gals can wear our holiday reds all year ’round by using them as stains!
The verdict? It’s a Christmas miracle! Well, okayyy, not quite. I just really wanted to use that line. However, this is a gorgeous red, and it’s so stunningly blue-based that it almost makes me want to cry. At under $8 a pop (though they’re usually on sale for about $5) this is a total steal!