I had some Sephora Collection eyeshadows to play around with (there’s a video at the end of this post!), and I wanted to swatch them out and let you see how pretty they are! I find I often ignore Sephora’s house brand and I have REALLY got to stop doing that. They make wonderful products at a typically cheaper price point than some of the more common brand names that we’re familiar with.
Swatches
Sephora Collection – My Boyfriend’s Jeans
My Boyfriend’s Jeans: Shimmery royal blue.
Sephora Collection – Girl Talk
Girl Talk: Peach with a lotttt of sparkle.
Sephora Collection – Friend’s Selfie
Friend’s Selfie: Shimmery pale lavender.
Sephora Collection – French Riviera
French Riviera: Pale yellow-gold.
Sephora Collection – Sweet Dreams
Sweet Dreams: Shimmery baby blue.
Sephora Collection – Purple Stilettos
Purple Stilettos: Mid-tone matte purple.
Sephora Collection – Picnic in the Park
Picnic in the Park: Shimmery shamrock green.
Makeup Look
And here’s the look I came up with using several of those shades:
Sephora Collection makeup lookSephora Collection makeup lookEye close upEye close up
Makeup Tutorial
If you’re looking for a full tutorial, look no further than my most recently posted YouTube video. This is a talk-through tutorial as I play around with the colours.
Sometimes you try a new lip product and you wonder how the heck you were missing out on something so amazing all along. This is one of those times.
Smashbox Be Legendary Lipsticks in Infrared Matte and Famous
Smashbox recently added new shades to their Be Legendary lipstick line. They come in two types of formula:
CREAM: Get show-stopping colour with a lustrous finish from this rich cream formula. Enriched with shea butter, the vibrant lipstick hydrates deep into lips for lasting moisture throughout the day, while added Vitamins C and E add a boost of antioxidants to protect and perfect.
MATTE: Master the matte lip trend with this silky hybrid formula. The vivid colour glides on smooth, with added adherence power to help the lipstick stay in place all day. Plus, each sultray shade added Vitamins C and E for saturated colour that never dries out your lips.
Smashbox Be Legendary Lipsticks
Since this is my first time experiencing SmashboxBe Legendary lipsticks, I was pleased to see how solid the packaging and bullet felt. The sleek rectangular case for the lipstick is hefty and expensive looking. The bullet of the lipstick itself is wonderfully firm – this is something I always look for since I have a nasty habit of snapping lipsticks in half.
Smashbox Be Legendary Lipsticks in Infrared Matte and Famous
But don’t let a firm bullet mistake you… these lipsticks are easy to apply and they really do glide on smoothly.
Smashbox Be Legendary Lipsticks in Infrared Matte and Famous – swatches
Matte shades are generally my preference for lipsticks, and Infrared Matte did not disappoint. It glides on seamlessly and is excessively comfortable to wear, especially since it’s a matte. I wore it for about five hours and noticed no difference between when I applied it and when I took it off five hours later. That’s impressive!
Although I love my mattes, the Famous (cream) shade equally impressed me. It’s a soft, creamy lipstick with a sheen. What impressed me the most about this lipstick is that there’s a bit of tacky-ness to the formula that actually helped the lipstick adhere to my lips. I know that sounds… not pleasant, but work with me on this one. Usually when I wear a nude cream lipstick, it disappears in about two hours. This one did not! Famous stayed on my lips for over four hours (I took it off at that point cuz I was removing my makeup) and still looked just as good as ever. I really, really appreciated the consistency of the lipstick because it worked for me.
Smashbox Be Legendary Lipstick in Infrared Matte
Infrared Matte has quickly become one of my favourite reds… and it may actually bump MAC’s Russian Red out of first place. /gasp
Smashbox Be Legendary Lipstick in Famous
Famous is a nude-pink cream that looks a bit more peach in the tube. Super impressive formula on this one.
Final Thoughts
Well Smashbox, you’ve done it again. First you impressed me with your Insta-Matte a few weeks ago, now you’ve taken my breath away with your lipsticks. Pigmentation is incredible, wear time is excellent and they feel fantastic on the lips. I wish I’d paid more attention to Smashbox lip products before because the Be Legendary lipsticks have blown me out of the water. If you’re looking for a comfortable lipstick to wear on the daily, I’d put this near the top of my recommended formulas.
I’ve waited a loooong time to pick up The Body Shop‘s Honey Bronze Bronzing Powder (eesh what a redundant name). It’s been in more blogs and vlogs than I can even recall and it’s been haunting me for not owning it. But really, when you already own 15+ bronzers, why do you need another one??? So I held off buying it for months, maybe even years, until just this past holiday season when The Body Shop was having an unbelievable sale and I caved. (I was also shopping with some beauty blogger friends, and we’d had some wine… so you know how THAT goes!)
The Body Shop Honey Bronze Bronzing Powder in 01 Light Matte
I picked up the lightest shade in 01 Light Matte. Notice it says matte right in the name of the product? Love that aspect, and that’s one of the reasons I wanted this so badly. Although I love shimmery bronzers for certain occasions, I had found I was a bit overrun with them and needed ones that were actually matte. (On me, shimmery bronzers look a bit odd during the winter months – I far prefer them for the summer.)
The Body Shop Honey Bronze Bronzing Powder in 01 Light Matte
The Honey Bronzer Bronzing Powder has a honeycomb pattern on the powder (and we all know how much we love our embossed products, don’t we?), the case is sleek, compact and even has a honeycomb pattern embedded on the lid. The whole compact just feels really well put together which is something I can really appreciate. One thing to note though: while this product is enriched with Community Trade Honey from Ethiopia, it does not actually smell like honey. (Boo!)
The Body Shop Honey Bronze Bronzing Powder in 01 Light Matte – swatch
So while this may be their lightest shade, if you look on their web site, their range of colours is actually pretty impressive and there are intensely dark shades that look like they’ll be really fantastic for darker skin. 01 Light Matte is slightly warm, but I never feel like it looks too warm on my skin. It’s easy to blend and can be built up for extra intensity if desired.
Wearing 01 Light Matte
If you’d like to see the bronzer in action (applied on top of foundation), you can see that in one of my tutorials from last week – the Too Faced Chocolate Bon Bons/Valentine’s Day look over on YouTube (scroll to the 1:33 mark if you’re only interested in the bronzer).
Final Thoughts
Although I’m currently trying to finish up another one of my bronzers (I’m soooo close), this will absolutely become my go-to winter bronzer. The Body Shop‘s Honey Bronze Bronzing Powder feels dummy-proof to me, and I *need* that on winter days when I can barely see my face in the mirror because the sun hasn’t risen yet. I’ve yet to actually go truly overboard with this powder (unlike blush… holy smokes sometimes I show up at work, take a look in the mirror and I’m like “Hey there clown cheeks, how come I didn’t notice this at home???”) and I think that’s partially a factor on how well this blends out and how pale the colour is. For the snow queens out there who are scared of bronzer, you may want to check this one out – it might just be pale enough for you!
The Body Shop‘s Honey Bronze Bronzing Powder can be purchased on thebodyshop.ca for $20 CAD (or for wait for a sale and grab it at a cheaper price!).
If there’s something you know I like, it’s a good Too Faced collection!
Too Faced Spring 2016 La Creme Lipsticks: Topless, Double Bubble, Mean Girls, WHAM!, Berry Naughty, Ursula and Unicorn Tears
I’ve got seven out of the 10 new shades in the La Creme lipstick range and wanted to try them all on. Let’s go!
Too Faced Spring 2016 La Creme Lip Swatches
Too Faced La Creme in Topless
Topless is a beautiful peachy nude – this is a nude that I love seeing on myself.
Too Faced La Creme in Double Bubble
Double Bubble is the Barbie pink of the collection.
Too Faced La Creme in Mean Girls
Mean Girls is a slightly deeper pink chockful with glitter.
Too Faced La Creme in WHAM!
WHAM! surprised the hell out of me. The tube looks like a total glitter bomb, but I LOVE how this looks on me. The glitter doesn’t really transfer as much as I expected – instead I’m left with a gorgeous glossy berry shade.
Too Faced La Creme in Berry Naughty
Another stunner! Berry Naughty is quite plum/purple and unlike anything I own. I tend to steer towards the red-berry shades, but this is sooo nice.
Too Faced La Creme in Ursula
Another killer one. Ursula is a deep plum with a lot of glitter in it but it doesn’t look like a glitter bomb on the lips which I highly appreciate.
EDIT: I wore Ursula to work the next day and encountered problems with the glitter in the product moving around on my lips. The colour is still gorgeous, but I’d recommend wearing a similar coloured lip liner all over your lips and then applying this shade on top.
Too Faced La Creme in Unicorn Tears
Unicorn Tears is the most unique shade out of the whole launch. It’s blue in the tube but turns silvery purple on my lips. It definitely has a lot of duochrome in the shade, which can make it look a bit chunky on the lips. This would be best for layering on top of other lipsticks to give them more dimension. (Although I kind of want to wear it to work as is and see who comments on it!)
Too Faced La Creme Spring 2016 Additions – Swatches
If you want to see me apply them and talk a little bit more about the shades, I’ve also done a lip swatch video as well:
Final Thoughts
I was a little apprehensive about some of the shades because I had seen that Too Faced was starting to add glitter into the some of their La Cremes which kiiind of didn’t make any sense to me (I mean… La Creme does not mean “with glitter”!). I’m so happy to be proven totally wrong. The only shade that had noticeable glitter was Mean Girls, the other two (Ursula and WHAM!) are beautiful with the addition of the glitter particles (and they also don’t feel super chunky which I appreciate).
These new shades are just as amazing as the original shades I have from the line and it was really nice to see Unicorn Tears being added into the mix. It’s a “strange” colour, sure, but part of what makes Too Faced such a fun brand is that they add whimsical touches onto their products. It may not always be conventional, but it definitely keeps it intriguing!
Out of this launch, WHAM!, Berry Naughty, Topless, and Ursula are my favourites. And I’m currently eyeballing 9021Oh (not pictured above) which I may “need”. Let me know what shades were your favourite!
