Top 5 Nude Lip Products

Nude hues are slowly taking over my lip product collection. A few years back you'd be lucky to find anything even slightly neutral in my stash but now nude lip products are all I seem to buy. I still absolutely adore wearing a classic red lip now and again but nothing seems to effortlessly pull a look together like the perfect nude lip. Somehow I've managed what I thought would be impossible and I've whittled down my collection and selected my Top 5 Nude Lip Products to share with you. From barely there washes of colour to bolder, more solid mattes I think I've managed to cover every base. I suppose my Top 5 products are almost like a capsule wardrobe for the lips!

November Favourites 2015

Originally, this post started out as a rather belated birthday beauty haul but as time went on and my love for each gift grew stronger it seemed a little more appropriate to turn this post into my November Favourites instead. So, what was once a very late birthday post has now turned into a perfectly timed monthly favourites. How convenient! My makeup dreams basically came true on my 22nd birthday and it's safe to say that all of my friends and family seem to know that I'm a complete beauty addict now. I'm still overwhelmed by the generosity and kindness of my nearest and dearest and I'm not ashamed to admit that I actually still squeal every time I reach for my Chanel (yes - Chanel!) Lipstick and Hourglass Blush.  To be honest, throughout November I really do feel like I've been living in a Beauty Blogger's heaven. 

March Favourites

March has absolutely flown by and I'm thankful that winter is officially over! I've only just started to get into the spring mood as England begins to heat up over the Easter weekend and I'm currently itching to dig out all of my pastel nail polishes and bright blushes and change up my makeup routine! Throughout March, however, I haven't really been reaching for anything too different but there are one or two things I've fallen in love with or rediscovered and I can't wait to share them with you!

January Favourites

Surprisingly, after an unpleasant start to the month - consisting of essay deadlines and exams *shudder* - January actually turned out to be much more enjoyable than I could have ever expected it to be! Along with eating out more times than I care to admit (and completely taking advantage of Yo! Sushi's January Blues offer), I finally bought my first ever iPhone and it hasn't left my side all month - who knew how easy communication could be when you have a functional, working phone?! On the blogging front, I was possibly the luckiest girl ever and I had the opportunity to work with my all-time favourite make-up brand bareMinerals. After spending a few hysterical days in utter disbelief  I actually managed to produce some content that is (hopefully) worth reading and you can check out my posts here and here (one more post is on the way!).

As far as beauty is concerned, I've spent the majority of January hardly straying from my everyday make-up look. I have, however, had a little bit of time to play with some beauty products I received for /picked up over Christmas and I've discovered a couple of things that have found a permanent place in my make-up bag this month!

Beauty Favourites
Jo Malone Wood Sage & Sea Salt Cologne 30ml - £40: I can't help but feel glamorous when I wear my Jo Malone perfume. I was kindly given this for my birthday in October but I've been wearing it so sparingly as I never want it to run out. The Wood Sage & Sea Salt Cologne has accompanied me on every dinner date or night out in January. I can't quite put my finger on what I love so much about this scent but I've had to restrain myself from using up the entire bottle this month.

MAC Ruby Woo - £15.50: As a lover of red lipstick how have I only just tried the famous Ruby Woo? My boyfriend actually bought me this for Christmas (a complete surprise - somebody must have really been listening when I natter on about makeup!) and it was my lip colour of choice for New Year's Eve. I love the matte finish and it's the perfect, classic red shade! It is a little bit drying but applying lip balm beforehand easily fixes the problem!

Stila In the Light Palette - £25: Oh my... I don't think I can explain how much I love this. I love it so much I've had dedicate an entire post to it which should be up sometime next week. Everything about this palette is perfect - the formulation, the mixture of shimmer and matte shades and the shade selection (especially Kitten and Night's Sky) couldn't be better. If you don't have this eyeshadow palette then you need to buy it no matter how many neutral palettes you own!

Soap & Glory Supercat - £6: I honestly just can't find a fault in this eyeliner. It doesn't budge all day, the felt tip applicator makes it so easy to achieve a thin or a thick line and the liner is super pigmented and it hasn't lost any colour/dried out at all and I've had this for just over two months now! I love the Stila Stay All Day Liquid Liner but for less than half the price I don't think anything can beat Supercat (it also has a really cute name and makes me think of cats in cute superhero costumes aww!)

Revlon ColourStay Concealer - £6.99: After picking this up on New Year's Eve in a frantic dash around Boots I can't believe how impressive this concealer is. I've written a post on this which is going up on Tuesday but this concealer matches my skin perfectly and covers so well whilst blending seamlessly into the skin!

Non-Beauty Favourites
Fashion: In January it's simply too cold for tights yet revision in the library calls for comfort that denim simply cannot offer. My solution? Meet Topshop's Leigh Jeans, which in all honestly don't feel like jeans at all! I have them in Black and a light Blue colour but I'm itching to get my hands on a Dark Vintage Blue pair.

Music: ♫ Ben Howard - I Forget Where We Were  and all of Taylor Swift's 1989!

Random: My iPhone 5s and my cute Cath Kidston case!

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Review | MAC Mineralize Skinfinish in Soft and Gentle

MAC Mineralize Skinfinish in 'Soft and Gentle', £23,  available from MAC and House of Fraser

This ever so famous highlighter has been on my make-up wishlist for (literally) years now. I remember lusting over it whilst watching endless amounts of YouTube videos in 2009 - back when Mac was the brand everyone was obsessed with - so I'm not exactly sure why it has taken me so long to get my hands on it. Thanks to my wonderful best friend, who kindly bought me this for Christmas, I now have it in my collection and, after reaching for it on a daily basis for the past couple of weeks, I think I might have to promote it above The Balm's Mary Lou-Manizer as my go-to highlighter! 

MAC's Mineralize Skinfinish in Soft and Gentle is a beautiful frosty highlighting powder which adds a natural glow to the skin. At first glance I was a little bit worried about this product being too glittery for everyday use but after applying this to my cheekbones, down the bridge of my nose and even as an eye-shadow (which is one of my favourite uses for this - it's absolutely gorgeous as a inner corner highlight or lid colour) I have to say that the 'glitter' really isn't a problem. In fact, due to the finely milled texture of the powder, this highlighter has much more of a metallic, rather than a glittery, finish which is gorgeous and so luminous. To apply, I swirl a fan brush around the product and lightly tap off any excess. I use a light hand and sweep this across my cheeks and the fan brush helps me to control the amount of product I apply to my face by not depositing it all in one place! The highlighter glides on the skin easily without rubbing away foundation and can be built up to work for both day and night-time looks. There's honestly nothing about the formulation or texture of this product that I can complain about, it looks amazing and it's so easy to apply. 

Soft and Gentle is described by MAC as a 'gilded peach bronze' colour which I certainly agree with but I definitely see a tint of champagne in here as well! I think this colour would suit all skin tones really well, especially fair to medium shades. It's definitely the champagne, peachy element to Soft and Gentle that allows it to take the crown from my Mary Lou-Manizer which is a much lighter, more golden highlighter. I also love Soft and Gentle's multitasking qualities as I absolutely love to use it as an all over the lid eyeshadow colour on days where I'm in a rush and want to add a little bit of colour and light to my eyes. For £23 you get 10g of product, (Mary Lou-Manizer contains 8.5g and costs £16) so it is quite pricey but for the size of product you receive and the small amount that you need I think it's definitely worth it!

Have you tried Soft and Gentle? Let me know what your favourite highlighter is in the comments below!

The Classic Red Lip

(Left to Right: Rimmel Apocalips in Big Bang, Mac On Hold, Bobbi Brown Hollywood Red)

Lip products are my weakness, especially red ones. I've loved the classic red lip look for as long as I can remember, I think one of the first lip products I ever bought was a sparkly red lipgloss from Rimmel and whenever I put it on I truly felt like a grown up. There's something so chic, so feminine and so elegant about red lipstick and I thought it was about time I dedicated a blog post to my favourite lip colour!

Shamefully, I have yet to try Mac's Ruby Woo (America's best selling lipstick of 2013 apparently!) which is terrible considering I'm a self-confessed red lipstick addict. My favourite everyday red lipstick, however, is also by Mac. On Hold, a Cremesheen, is not as classic as Ruby Woo but it's a beautiful alternative for a more subtle, casual look. It has a slightly pinker, raspberry tone which tends to make it more wearable if you're not feeling that bold and it has amazing staying power! However, if I do feel like making a statement one day I always reach for Big Bang, a super vibrant red shade from Rimmel's Apocalips line. I've mentioned the Apocalips line before here and here and I really can not praise Rimmel enough for how pigmented and long lasting this line is. Big Bang is the ultimate classic red shade and I like to use a lip brush to apply this for accurate results. My final favourite is a product I tend to gravitate towards when I'm going somewhere fancy, such as dinner or an important event. Bobbi Brown's Hollywood Red lipgloss is, out of all my red lip products, probably my favourite. It really does remind me of old Hollywood stars like Marylin and Audrey and it leaves a lovely shine on the lips. It's such an opaque gloss and it's actually quite difficult to get off so you certainly don't need to worry about it fading throughout the night.

What are your favourite red lip products? I'd love to know in the comments below!

Current Favourite Lipsticks

(Left to Right: Rimmel Apocalips in Apocalyptic, Mac Up the Amp, Calvin Klein Delicious Luxury Creme Lipstick in Henna)

I have a confession to make... I'm a little bit obsessed with buying lipstick. I can't help myself, whenever I'm near a make-up counter I always gravitate towards the lipstick section. So, the other month I sat down with my collection of lipsticks and I had a huge sort out. It was painful but definitely worth it, you wouldn't believe how many rose coloured lipsticks I had! Anyway, during this process I discovered some hidden gems that had found their way to the back of my collection and now I can't stop reaching for them!

My favourite alternative to a statement red lip is currently Rimmel Apocalips in the hot pink shade Apocalyptic. I've mentioned the Apocalips before in my Festival Beauty Essentials post and I have 4 in total. I remember my excitement back in 2012 before they were released and they're still a favourite of mine today, especially the bold, brighter colours. Apocalypic is a beautiful hot pink with blue undertones and it's insanely pigmented, creamy and opaque. Like the rest of the line, it has a satiny finish which dries matte after a few hours and the staying power is fantastic! I prefer to apply Apocalyptic with a lip brush for a more accurate application!

Probably one of the most daring shades in my collection is Mac's Up the Amp and as Autumn slowly approaches I find myself reaching for this more and more when I want to spice up a simple outfit. It's an Amplified Creme (my favourite finish) and Mac describes the shade as a lavender violet, a purple shade that's not too bold and not too dark. The lipstick applies smoothly, has a creamy texture and a shiny finish and it looks beautiful on bronzed skin.

My final favourite is from Calvin Klein, a brand I didn't even realise made make-up until I stumbled across this lipstick on the Fragrance Direct website for only £1.99! They retail at £13.50 so this was an absolute bargain and I'm definitely going to buy some more! (I also have Rose Rush which is gorgeous!) I have the shade Henna, a pretty nude pink shade and it reminds me a lot of Cream Cup from Mac, although Cream Cup is a bit lighter and has deeper, blue undertones to it. It's quite pigmented and has a matte finish. My only issue with this lipstick is that it's a little bit drying but this isn't anything a lip balm can't fix! The packaging isn't that glamorous either but for the Fragrance Direct price of £1.99 it's easy to overlook.

What lipsticks are you loving right now?

Wishlist | Beauty # 1

At the end of every month, as well as gathering up my favourites, I love to make wishlists for the months ahead.  Somehow August is nearly over, summer is slowly coming to an end and, even though I'm not saying goodbye to my bright summer lipsticks just yet, I've found myself lusting over make-up with autumnal hues and products with more subtle, natural scents. Although I probably won't be able to buy every item on my wishlist in September I hope I can at least purchase one or two! (Sumptuous Olive is definitely getting picked up in the airport on my way to Prague in September!)