Day 59. February empties

So, this month I finished a lot of products. Mainly skincare products but also a couple of make up items!

Read more if you want to know which products I finished and if I'd repurchase them!

Day 58. All matte look

Today I did a all-matte look using the Sleek Ultra Mattes (brights) palette. I didn't use the bright-brights, but two muted colors: pink and grey.

Products:
- Sleek MakeUp iDivine Ultra Mattes (brights) in pink and grey
- Urban Decay 24/7 glide-on eye pencil in Zero
- Maybelline feather look Volum' Express Mascara

Day 57. Day look in bright nude colors

Today a warm and bright day look in neutral/nudes tones!

Products:
- Sleek MakeUp iDivine Storm palette
- Urban Decay 24/7 Glide-On eye pencil in Whiskey (review and swatches here)
- Kiko Super Color Mascara in 04

Day 56. Mac Plumful lipstick [review & swatches]

Today I'm reviewing the Mac lipstick I just got: Plumful, from the Year of the Snake collection.

Day 55. Quick & Easy Dramatic Eye Look

Today a quick post for a quick & easy dramatic look for going out, using just 3 eye products and a pair of false lashes!
Except for the falsies, the eye look is pretty easy: just an eyeshadow and liners.

Products_
- Urban Decay Virgin eyeshadow from the Naked palette
- Make Up For Ever Aqua Black gel liner
- Urban Decay 24/7 Glide-On eye pencil in Zero
- Primark Beauty Sultry Lashes

Day 54. N°7 Stay Perfect Foundation [Review & Swatches]

During my stay in London I had the chance to head to a N°7 counter in a Oxford Street Boots and try out the "N°7 Foundation Match Made Service". After that, I purchased the N°7 Stay Perfect Foundation the N°7 advisor suggested. I have been testing it for a few days now and I think it's time for a review. I'll also briefly talk about the Foundation Service.

Day 53. London Haul

Quick post today with the stuff I got during my London trip.
I'll be reviewing the products below or using them in my look posts in the following months.

- Maybelline Eye Studio Color Tattoo Cream Gel Shadows in Pink Gold and Light in Purple
- Eylure Individual Lashes: Semi permanent lashes for a longer, full look
- Eylure Naturalities fake eyelashes (070)
- Maybelline Master Shape brow pencil in soft brown
- Suqqu Eyebrow Liquid Pen in 02 (brown)
- N°7 Stay Perfect Foundation (in deeply ivory)
- Claire's Glam lashes
- Primark Beauty Natural Look lashes
- Primark Beauty Sultry lashes

- Rapidlash Eyelash Enhancing Serum
- Rapidbrow Eyebrow Enhancing Serum

- Dermalogica Daily Microfoliant
. Dermalogica Oil Free Matte spf 30 cream
- Dermalogica Moist Active moisturizer
- Dermalogica Overnight Clearing Gel

Day 52. Kiko 'Colours of the World' LE Long Lasting Stick Eyeshadows [swatches]

Quick post today with a few swatches I took in-store of the new Kiko Long Lasting Stick Eyeshadows from the Colours of the World collection.

Day 51. Urban Decay Fun Palette [Review & swatches]

For today I am going to review the Urban Decay Fun palette.
A word of warning: I do not own the new edition of the palette. The new version has a soft-plastic case with a zipper and some of the eyeshadows may have new formulas. The Fun palette I own is the old version, that came with a carton box. The color are the same though.

Keep reading for review and swatches!

Day 50. Double wing eyeliner

This double wing eyeliner look was born out of a mistake I made while applying my eyeliner in a rush!
I am glad I managed to salvage the whole look and made it somewhat presentable!

Products:
- Mac Paint Pot in Bare Study
- Make Up For Ever Aqua Black gel liner
- Maybelline Feather-look Volum'Express Mascara
- ArtDeco Blusher

See more after the jump!

Day to Night look: Night

Follow-up post from yesterday!
I transformed a typical neutral day look in a night look just by adding an eyeshadow and making the lips bold!

Product:
- Urban Decay Naked 2 palette: Bootycall, Tease and Pistol
- Urban Decay 24/7 Glide-On Eye Pencil in Underground
- Kiko Super Color Mascara in 04
- Inglot lipstick in 408

Day 48. Day to Night look: Day

I found myself having to go to work and then directly out for the night. So I did an easy day look that I could transform into a night look with a few gestures and product!
This is the day look!

Products:
- Urban Decay Naked 2 Palette: Bootycall and Tease
- Urban Decay 24/7 Glide-On Eye pencil in Underground
- Kiko Super Color Masca in 04
- Kiko Sun Bronzing Trio in 01 (Sculpting Beige)

Day 47. Where to shop for make up and skin care products in Italy [3]

If you are in a big city in Italy, such as Rome, Turin or Milan, one place you are going to find everything for your cosmetics-related need is department stores.

From wikipedia.it

Day 46. Eye primer/base comparison

Today's post is a battle between different eye primers/bases. I compared the following products:

- Mac Paint Pot in Painterly
- Mac Paint Pot in Soft Ochre
- Urban Decay Primer Potion (classic).

More information, swatches and review after the jump!

Day 45. Travel makeup bag

Quick post today to show you what I bring with me in my travel make up bag when I go away for the weekend.
Since I usually have to get on a plane everything must be hand-baggage approved!
So I travel light and with a lot of mini-sizes and sample bags that I collect during the year.

The only full size products I have in my travel makeup bag are:
- Mac Prep+Prime Transparent Finishing Powder (and a Essence blush brush to apply it)
- Clinique Airbrush Concealer in 02 Medium
- Erborian BB Crème Au Ginseng in Dorè
- Essence Stay All Day long lasting eyeshadow in 03 (Steel the show)
- Carmex Lipbalm stick
- Kiko  Urban Look eyeliner and kohl in 04
- Elf Mineral Primer
- Sephora Express Cleansing Wipes

Then I have a series of mini and travel sizes of skin care products
- Dior Iconic Overcurl Mascara (mini-size)
- Dr. Hauschka Mint Toothpaste (mini-size)
- Dr. Hauschka Cleansing Cream (travel-size)
- Dr. Hauschka Day Cream (travel-size)
- Weleda Skin food cream (mini-size)
- Shu Uemura Depsea Hydrability moisturizing emulsion (mini-size)
- Weleda Wildrose Day Cream (sample)
- Dr. Hauschka Rose Body Moisturizer (sample)

I won't bring any other make up with me because I always end up buying something but sometimes I bring with me a Sleek MakeUp palette, since they are small and compact.

Day 44. YSL Vernis à Lèvres #25 [review & swatches]

Second post dedicated to one of my favorite lip product, YSL Vernis à Lèvres, this time in shade #25 (also named Fuchsia Neo-Classic).

Click here for swatches and more information!

Day 43. MakeUp inspired bijou/jewelry/charms

A break from our normally scheduled makeup talk to show you something that intrigued me.
A few days ago I went out with my friends, and the always trendy and fashionable G. had these splendid earrings.

They are lipstick shaped earrings! So nice! This intrigued me a lot and spurred me to find other jewelry shaped like makeup items!
Click below to see what I found!

Day 42. YSL Vernis à Lèvres #8 [review & swatches]

This is the first post (out of two) dedicated to the fantastic YSL Vernis à Lèvres, a fantastic lip product that is not a lipstick, nor a gloss. I already took pictures of the two YSL Vernis à Lèvres I own but these are going to be full reviews of the two shades. This post is all for #8.

Day 41. Sleek Make Up Sunset palette [review & swatches]

Quick review and swatches of one of my favorite palettes from Sleek MakeUp, the iDivine Sunset palette.

More swatches after the jump!

Day 40. Inglot Teal trio eye look

Today I did a eye-focused look using a trio of eyeshadow I did with the Inglot freedom system. The main color is a green-based teal.

Products:
- Inglot eye shadow in matte #372, matte #338 and ACM Shine #24
- Mac Rich Ground Gel liner
- Avon Cosmetics powder blush in Rosa Rocio
- Maybelline Colorsensational lipstain in 640 (In the Buff)

Day 39. Quick Day look with two eyeshadows

The look for today is a vert simple day appropriate look using two eyeshadows, one eyeliner pencil and Mascara.

Products:
- Urban Decay Naked 2 palette: Half Baked and Tease
- Urban Decay 24/7 Glide-On eye liner pencil in Bourbon
- Kiko Super Color Mascara in 04

Day 38. Mac Party Parrot lipstick [review & swatches]

I recently got my coveted my Mac Party Parrot lipstick, which is my new love. I love bold color on the lips and Party Parrot is exactly that: bold.

Keep reading for my review!

Day 37. Where to shop for make up and skin care products in Italy [2]

Welcome to the second post dedicated to cosmetics shopping in Italy.

In my first post, I mentioned supermarkets as sure places where to find skin care and make up products wherever you are in Italy.
The second place you may find cosmetics is a "profumeria", that is, a perfume shop.

Most town will have an independent profumeria where you will find an idiosyncratic mix of brands and products. Most of these shops will have two section: a section dedicated to perfumes and one dedicated to make up. Brand and product selection will vary from almost knock off brand to luxury brand, with almost no in between. Skin care products are usually pretty rare, in these places.

If you are in a bigger town, you may find a franchised profumeria, which will have a good selection of drugstore (i.e. Maybelline) and luxury (i.e. Dior) brands both in the perfume and make up sections of the store.

Two of the most widespread chain/franchised profumeria stores are Limoni and La Gardenia. In particular, La Gardenia is the only distributor in Italy for SmashBox and theBalm products.

Profumeria shops are a sure bet if you need something specific from an international luxury brand.

Prices may also vary from indie profumeria stores (high) to franchised stores (high/middle range).

Day 36. 5 minutes look: Rubenesque + Cork

Easy and quick day look featuring Mac Rubenesque Paint Pot and Mac Cork Eye Shadow!

Products:
- Mac Paint Pot in Rubenesque
- Mac Eye Shadow in Cork
- Urban Decay 24/7 Glide-On Eye Pencil in Underground
- Kiko Super Color Mascara in 04

Day 35. Sleek MakeUp iDivine Original palette [review & swatches]

Today I want to show you one of my favorite high street/drugstore palettes. I adore all the Sleek MakeUp palettes (I actually own quite a few that I want to swatch and post here on the blog), but the Original has a special place in my heart as it was one of the first eyeshadow palettes I purchased.

 To read my review and see the swatches, please keep on reading!

Day 34. Gold-olive look

A look in golds and greens, using a banana technique.

Products:
- Sleek MakeUp PPQ Palette in Barry White, Supernova, Primal Green, Golden Silvers
- Urban Decay 24/7 Glide-On eye pencils in Stash and Mildew
- Maybelline Feather Look Volum'Express Mascara

Day 33. Simple grey smokey

For today, a very simple and quick look: a soft grey smokey eye look!

Products:

- Dr. Hauschka Natural Glamour Palette (Lava Grey, Ice Blue and Lily White)

- Make Up For Ever Aqua Black

- Urban Decay 24/7 Glide-On Eye Pencil in Zero

Day 32. Neve Cosmetics Fenicottero natural lip pencil

Today I am going to do a short review of one of the new natural lip pencil from Neve. It'a pencil named Fenicottero (flamingo) and it's a bright pink/ fuchsia color.

These new lip pencils are completely natural, and can be used alone or as a base under a lipstick.
Fenicottero, as I was saying, is a bright pink-fuchsia color.

I tested it for a couple of days before writing this review. I tested it alone.
Fenicottero is not that bad, the color payoff is very good and it has a decent enough lasting power.

I applied it around 9.30am and it looked like this:

I took a picture with my mirror light set on "natural", because natural light was sort of scarce today. The color are a bit warmer in this picture than in reality. Anyway, it applied smoothly, without tugging on my lips, and it was not drying at first.
After about 30/45 minutes I started feeling my lips drying without reaching an uncomfortable level. I almost reached for a lip balm, gloss or moisturizing lipstick a couple of time during the morning.
At lunchtime the color was still there, with only minor fading, probably from my sipping coffee all morning.

After lunch (soup), my lips looked like this:

(changed location, new light!)

My lips look kind of chapped, and the lip color is only present on the very edges of the lips. I think it's a good result for a lip pencil! So overall it lasted about 4 hours or so, fading only after eating, with only a drying sensation on my lips.

This last step was a huge mistake. As I wrote before, my lips felt like they were drying and chapping. I reapplied the lip pencil after lunch but the lips drying is definitely evident in the picture below!

The color is ok but my dry-as-the-desert lips are definitely evident!
I suggest not reapplying the product without a balm, a gloss, or something hydrating on top. The pencil tugged on my dry lips, but still applied smoothly.

Next time I'll have to try to wear Fenicottero with a lipstick and see if it still dries my lips and if it last longer! I'll keep you updated!