Last minute beauty gifts!

With only three days to go until Christmas here is a very last-minute beauty gift guide. Everything is under £100 and available on Net-A-Porter. Best of all if you get your orders in by 3pm they will be delivered the next day!

Clockwise from top left:
• SMITH & CULT Nail polish in Lover's Creep, £19
• NAILS INC Nail polish in Belgrave Square, £14
• TOM FORD BEAUTY Lips & Boys lipstick in Tony 72, £27
• BURBERRY BEAUTY Warm Glow Bronzer, £31
• AERIN Large gold-toned hairbrush, £66
• BY TERRY Baume De Rose Nutri-Couleur in Cherry Bomb, £36
• DIPTYQUE Set of three 70g candles, £60
• HOURGLASS Ambient lighting Edit £65

www.net-a-porter.com/Giftshop

Kure Bazaar Nail Polish

Kure Bazaar calls themselves an eco-trendy company and considering the range of colours, the lack of chemicals and the detoxing properties within the polish, it seems fair enough.

The packaging is sturdy, sleek and classy. The range of colours is extensive but to get all wintery, I picked out the deep, shimmery purple called 'Catwalk'.

The varnish applied smoothly and although I did two coats, one would have been enough. The shimmer-ness made the nails look super duper glossy but it wasn't too much. 

Although I used O.P.I's Drip Dry drying drops, the product dried quickly. Despite wearing a base and top coat, several nails chipped after two days. I'm going to try the other shades to see if they do the same.

If you are someone who is conscious about the chemicals in products, changes their nail colour every few days or wants something that strengthens the nails, whilst wearing some colour, then this brand is definitely for you. I love that they use ingredients such as wheat, cotton and wood pulp to regenerate the nail. My only complaint is that for the price (£15 for 10ml), I would expect the colour to last for several days. 

I am going to try the rose gold colour and fingers crossed, it will last a little longer!

www.kurebazaar.com 

www.amazon.co.uk (Good bargains: £7/8 per 10ml bottle.)

www.naturisimo.com (Free glass nail file with any £30 purchase.)

Ciate Nail Varnish Advent Calendar

One of my closest friends gave me an early Christmas present and suggested that I open it before December 1st. Now, I know I sound like a big kid but Christmas presents really excite me, especially when you are allowed to open them before Christmas Day. Obviously, I opened it as soon as I got home – why wait?

It was the Ciaté advent calendar! Inside are 24 mini nail varnishes, one for each day of advent. The back of the box gives an idea of the colours that you will receive, including the mystery shades.... which makes me think that each box might be slightly different. Exciting stuff! 

With the boom of beauty advents left, right and centre, it is hardly surprising that they are becoming coveted gifts. The price range for each advent means that every budget can be satisfied (we went into Liberty's the other day and unsurprisingly, the luxury advent was over £100.) However, they are novel, beautifully packaged and allow for the Christmas gift giving to start early! Jen looked at some of the more popular ones (including Ciate and Liberty's) in a post earlier this month and if you want a unique gift and have decided upon a beauty advent, snap them up quickly. They are selling out fast! You can read that post here: Best Beauty Advent Calendars

www.ciatelondon.com

Christian Louboutin Rouge Nail Polish

Is this is weapon of some kind? Well, actually yes. It's a nail varnish weapon. The rouge colour is the most popular Louboutin nail polish and its classic red shade (which is deeper than the iconic red sole) makes it wearable and classy.

Yes it's expensive. It is £36.00 per bottle but it's Christian Louboutin and it's good. I am currently on day five of wearing it and it hasn't chipped. Admittedly, I am also wearing a base and top coat but even so, that is good. The only thing is the colour has faded from the top of the nail but only very slightly.

I have bought one for a friend's 30th birthday because, not only is the product amazing and long lasting but the bottle looks so impressive. It's a dressing table accessory as well as a nail varnish. I mean, who doesn't love painting their nails with a giant spike?!

You can find Christian Louboutin Beauty at www.selfridges.com

RGB Cosmetics - nail colour without harmful chemicals

As you know by now, we are always on the look out for brands that deliver great results whilst using the safest ingredients possible. For nails Kure Bazaar is a firm favourite, but I have recently stumbled across RGB Cosmetics on Net-A-Porter and am excited to give their products a try. They are new to (despite being around since 2009!) however the fact that they have been given the seal of approval by Net-A-Porter gives me high hopes.

What is so great about RGB? For starters they are free from Formaldehyde, Toluene, DBP, Camphor and Formaldehyde Resin. Yes, these are the ingredients that supposedly give you strong, shiny, chip-proof nails, but RGB claims to do all of this without the nasty chemicals.

Even better, their aim is to bridge the gap between conflict free beauty and luxury cosmetics. All of their products are vegan, cruelty-free, gluten-free and fair-trade. Sounds good to me! They have a fantastic range of neutrals and brights, as well as nail-care products, in fact I am struggling to choose what to try first. If anyone has any recommendations or can tell us whether RGB nail polishes are as good as they sound, we would love to hear from you! Review to follow so stay tuned....

www.rgbcosmetics.com
£15 each from www.net-a-porter.com/Shop/Designers/RGB_Cosmetics

Summer Nails!

From left to right: Essence, Essie's blanc, Sephora's Formula X in Hercules, Clinique's Hi Sweetie, OPI's Drip Dry drops and Sally Hansen's 220 Cafe A Lait

Off the back of Jen's Christian Louboutin nail varnish post, I have been busting out my summer shades. I'm not one for nail art, not because I don't like it but because I do not have the patience or co-ordination to be creative. However, I love colours and bright nails make me happy! 

1. White: Classic, somewhat classy, beautiful with a tan and seems to be ever so popular with brides this summer. Move over French Manicure. However, be careful with top coats. Some can turn the white a bit beige or even a light pink. Pretty but not the white that you started with.

Essie's 'blanc'

2. Hot Pink: This will always be my favourite. Any variation from a reddy pink to a true fuchsia.

3. Nude: This is a good one for travelling when you don't mind if your nails get a little chipped from lifting cases (and carrying duty free shopping bags) because it gives nails a bit of umph without being obvious and, therefore, the chips aren't obvious either.

4. Orange: There are two times of year that I wear orange colours: Summer and Halloween. If I can resemble a Caribbean island and a pumpkin, then I'm happy.

Christian Louboutin's Escatin

5. Gloss it: Can't be bothered with the upkeep on holiday? Use a nice top coat and gloss up your nails. Bourjois 1Seconde Top Coat is my favourite.  Long lasting and gives a gel look.

Christian Louboutin Scarabée nail polish

You might recall our excitement last summer when Christian Louboutin nail varnish turned up at Selfridges, accompanied by an exclusive David Lynch film. Well a new limited edition collection has now arrived! These beautiful nail polishes form part of the designer's Scarabée collection and the multifaceted jewel tones are inspired by the iconic Egyptian Scarab beetle.

There are three iridescent shades, which change colour depending on the light you are under. "They can look beautiful and reflective under the bright sun but also look like a precious jewel by night", says Louboutin.

The accompanying press images of the legendary designer exploring Egypt are nothing short of genius....

According to the Louboutin website these nail varnishes are so highly pigmented and glossy that in just two coats they achieve the effect of 20 layers of traditional lacquer! A bold claim... but then again, when has Louboutin ever let us down?

£36 each, www.christianlouboutin.com/uk

Olivia Palermo's first collection for Ciaté

Earlier this year, Olivia Palermo was named as guest creative director for nail brand Ciaté. She will create several collections throughout 2015, the first of which has just been unveiled on vogue.co.uk. It consists of three polishes in classic shades inspired by her own lifestyle; Hutch, Sundays and Nantucket.

Hutch is a classic red named after her mother, who wore a similar shade whilst Olivia was growing up. Sundays is a nude and the name pays tribute to her husband, whose weekly Instagram post of the pair are always entitled 'Sundays'. Finally Nantucket, my personal favourite, is a beautiful coral shade named after one of her favourite holiday destinations. All three are very classic wearable shades, an unsurprising first collection that is true to Palermo's own classic style. I look forward to seeing if she throws us a curve-ball with the next collection!

From left to right: Hutch, Nantucket and Sundays

Available from June 2015, www.ciatelondon.com/uk

Images via Vogue.co.uk

A YBBF catch up and some of my spring favourites....

Never too early for a cocktail....

Last week Kay and I got together for a catch up/blog meeting, but most importantly some food and a bit of shopping. We started out with lunch at The Big Easy, a BBQ place in Covent Garden that I knew Kay would love as it has a distinctly American vibe. Personally, I love anywhere that I can get a veggie burger, fries, cupcake and a margarita for £10....

The Big Easy, Covent Garden

We then moved on to a bit of shopping and a discussion about how much we love spring, warmer weather and the generally cheerier colours that start emerging in fashion and beauty this time of year. (Kay was on the hunt for a very specific pair of hot pink heels to wear for her birthday, which sadly we couldn't find… she assures me that she has since found a beautiful alternative!) So as spring has officially arrived in London, I thought I’d share a couple of things that I have been loving this month… 

Orange nails

I don’t wear a lot of orange clothing but I do love an orange accessory; a bright handbag, coral lipstick, and in this case…. tangerine orange nails! Oh yeah. As we have been focussing on healthier choices this year, here are a few of my favourites by OPI, a brand on the 'less-chemically' end of the nail polish spectrum. You might just be able to make out my orange nails in the picture at the top although it is slightly fuzzy! We'll blame that on the dim lighting and not Kay's photography skills.....

From left to right: Juice Bar Hopping, Toucan Do It If You Try, Where Did Suzi's Man-go?

Makeup collaborations

I do love a good makeup collaboration and this spring there are several exciting ones emerging. Charlotte Tilbury’s Norman Parkinson packaging is fantastic! I am a tad bias as he is one of my favourite fashion photographers, but if you are a sucker for great packaging then you might want to check this one out. Charlotte’s eponymous collection has received glowing reviews across the board so it is most definitely not a case of style over substance. The only downside,we’ll have to wait until July for this one. Below is the best selling Filmstar Bronze & Glow Palette featuring Parkinson's iconic shot of Jerry Hall.

Yesterday saw the release of the latest in a long line of exciting MAC collaborations, this time with none other than milliner-extraordinaire Philip Treacy. He has drawn inspiration from his own work to create a collection that ‘enhance the face’s most evocative features’ – sounds good to me!

Booja Booja ice cream

Last but not least I had to include my latest food discovery. I’ve been meaning to try Booja Booja ice cream for a while and it just sort of ended up in my basket on a recent trip to Holland & Barrett. My review? Amazing! I got the Hunky Punky Chocolate flavour and it is really rich and so delicious. Best of all it only contains four ingredients; water, agave syrup, cashew nuts and cocoa powder. It might be a little on the pricey side but it is so worth it for a product that tastes better than most dairy ice creams I’ve had in the past but that is infinitely better for your health.

I think that’s all for now. Hope you are having a wonderful month so far and the sun is shining where you are!

Kure Bazaar – nail polish without the chemical nasties

For the final post under this month's theme, Kay passed a nail polish my way to try by Kure Bazaar (a shade called September), that contains up to 85% natural ingredients. Having faced up to the fact that we absorb a lot of the product we apply to our skin directly into our blood stream (you can read all of our 'Healthy January' posts here), it has become important to me to find some good options for nails.

I'm a nail polish addict, I'll admit it. I've been wearing nail varnish of one shade or another almost every day for the last 20 odd years. I recently tried to give my nails a detox and went out with bare nails (oh how exposed I felt!) for a good couple of weeks. It was necessary, as years of slapping on one chemical-laden shade after another and removing them with equally chemical-laden products has left them weak. It definitely did my nails some good but as soon as Kay handed me this incredible shade of pink I had to slap it on my mitts immediately. It's beautiful....

I'd probably describe this colour as a raspberry pink; it's bright but not your typical hot pink. It's so pigmented that one coat is all you need, although a second coat and a top coat add extra shine and make your manicure last that much longer. The brush is a very nice size and shape and the polish glides on evenly. As an extra bonus it dries very quickly – a relief for every cab driver who has ever had to wait impatiently in my driveway when I inevitably decided to paint my nails at the eleventh hour!

So what makes Kure Bazaar so special and worthy of the £14.95 price tag? Well, it's the brainchild of Brazilian model Kartika Luyet, who aims to give us all better nail health by preserving our nails' natural vitality. These polishes are being billed as revolutionary due to the lack of 'toxic baddies' and inclusion of natural ingredients like cotton and wheat.

According to online natural beauty shop Love Lula: Kure Bazaar Nail Colours have NO Toluene, NO Formaldehyde, NO Dibutyl Phthalate, NO Synthetic Camphor. I'll admit I don't know exactly what all of these are but I sure as heck don't want them on my nails!

I feel the packaging is worthy of a mention here. I know that one concern Kay and I have had when looking for beauty products that contain fewer chemicals, is that the packaging should look high end – especially if the price tag is. You often have to pay a little more for natural products but if the product is great and the packaging looks sleek then it tends to be worth it. And this scores very highly.

In conclusion, due to the fact that I get through a horrendous amount of nail polish, I don't normally spend this much on it. However I do believe in almost every case you get what you pay for. Nothing about your typical nail polish is natural – the smell, the colour, the list of unpronounceable ingredients – but this nail polish is different. I'll hold my hand up and say I think it is well worth the price.

Sadly we often associate natural products with a poor performance, leaving a frustrating conflict – do we want fantastic, effective products or ones that are kind to our bodies? Thankfully companies like this are raising the bar and giving us both. This product is vibrant, lasted the best part of a week without chipping, and who knows, in the long term it might even help a nail polish addict like me to improve the condition of my nails.

Kure Bazaar Nail Colours, RRP £14.95. Check out the other fantastic shades on offer at www.lovelula.com

Christian Louboutin nail colour now at Selfridges!

It's an exciting day in the beauty world as the Christian Louboutin nail colour range finally arrives at Selfridges. The signature 'Rouge Louboutin' takes its colour inspiration from the iconic soles of Louboutin's stillettos – very apt considering the red soles were originally created using his assistant's nail polish!

The full collection consists of 30 shades grouped into three families: Pops, Noirs and Nudes. At £36 they aren't cheap, but the packaging is suitably glamorous, with a lid inspired by the spiked Ballerina Ultima heel, the highest Louboutin heel ever made at 20.5cm. The Ballerina Ultima was created for a 2007 photography exhibition in collaboration with David Lynch, and Lynch has also created a film to celebrate Rouge Louboutin (see below).

If the reviews I've read so far are accurate, the finish is exquisite and the colour long-lasting.There might be 30 shades but let's be honest, it's the Rouge Louboutin we all want to get our hands on first. A classic red nail polish is a fashion staple and it doesn't get more iconic than one that was three years in the making and is the epitome of luxury. Sign me up!

www.selfridges.com
www.christianlouboutin.com

Nail Varnish and Top/Base Coats

I look for two things when it comes to nail varnish – a colour that stays put for the working week and a fun colour. To define 'fun', anything from a pearlescent pink to a vibrant aqua. It all depends on my mood. 

CIATE IN JELLY BEAN:

THOUGHTS

Jelly Bean is a bright fuchsia pink is a summer staple and I like the depth of the colour. That's probably a weird thing to say but if you use it, you'll know what I mean, especially with two coats. With a good top coat, it lasts five days. Without a top coat, chipping happened after a day. 

APPLICATION 

A good size brush, distributing the product evenly. One coat will create an opaque finish. The easiest nail colour to apply.

COST

£9.00 for 13.5ml

REPURCHASE?

I might try other colours but will buy from Ciate again. Most definitely.

www.ciate.co.uk

MAVALA IN RIGA

 

 

THOUGHTS

This was a gift and I had not heard of this Swiss brand before. You can buy it at John Lewis, Boots, Feel Unique and Beauty Bay. The consistency provides opaque cover with two coats and is the most beautiful candy pink. It lasts five days with a top coat and tends to fade at the top of the nail, rather than chip. This is brilliant for a muted nail look but has more umph than a nude or for work, where bright nails might not always be the most appropriate. 

APPLICATION

The product applies evenly and dries quickly.

COST 

The product may only be small (5ml), but for £4.75, it is worth it. I have painted my nails four times (two/three coats per time) and I have only used a quarter of the bottle.

REPURCHASE? Yes, plus other colours.

www.johnlewis.com

www.boots.com

www.feelunique.com

www.beautybay.com 

NAILS INC FLORAL IN QUEENSGATE GARDENS

One coat:

Two coats:

THOUGHTS 

This had so much potential. The advertising images showed floral designed nails. Unlike other nail fads, where any texture or pattern is applied though various intricate methods, this looked easy. All in the same bottle... time saver or what?

My boyfriend looked at my nails and said 'That's a mess'. Why thank you, sweetheart. However, I couldn't have agreed more. The glitter was overwhelming for the flowers and the flowers were either non existent or piled onto the nail in twos or threes. I don't know if the more you use this, the easier it will be become. Mainly because the flowers have sunk to the bottom half of the bottle (despite energetic shaking) and so, the more that you use, the quicker you get to the glitter and flowers in a more equal distribution.

APPLICATION 

All glitter or flower central. Glitter over flowers. Lumps and bumps. Really not good.

 

COST

£12.00 for 10ml 

REPURCHASE?

Nope. I had such high hopes. 

www.nailsinc.com 

TOP COATS

Nicole by OPI Quick Drying Top Coat

THOUGHTS 

Really speedy drying time. Two minutes for touch dry, three to five for completely dry. Very useful for painting nails in a rush but doesn't preserve the colour too well and does not prevent chipping. Every time I use it, the nail colour has chipped the next day, even when wearing long lasting nail colours. However, this is perfect if you are rushing to get ready and only want your nail colour to last for a day/evening out. 

APPLICATION

Even and smooth, no bubbling. Quite 'liquidy' in consistency. 

COST

£7.99 for 15ml 

REPURCHASE? 

No, I would rather try the Orly Flash Dry Drops. 

www.superdrug.com 

Sally Hansen Double Duty Base and Top Coat

THOUGHTS

Protects the nail from being stained by nail colour and dries fairly quickly over nail varnish (five minutes touch dry). It is moisturising and seriously good at preventing chipping when wearing the Ciate, Mavala, Tanya Burr and Essie. Doesn't prevent Barry M Jelly Nail Paint from chipping after a day. Such a shame because the Barry M colours are so vibrant and eye catching. I also found that it didn't prevent the Maybelline Super Stay 7 Day Gel Nail Colour from chipping. However, I have only tried this once and I was in a mega rush, so it's not really the best test. 

Barry M 

Maybelline 

APPLICATION

For me, this product does not cause bubbling and smooths the varnish to create a glossy finish. 

 

COST

£4.95 for 13.3ml
 

REPURCHASE? 

Yes. 

www.superdrug.com

www.boots.com