Sleek | Lipglossiping

Category: Sleek

Friday, May 7th, 2010

Sleek MakeUP i-Divine Circus Palette

Truly excited by this…

It’s gorgeous no? I dug it out of my goody bag that I was given at the Sleek MakeUP blogger event this week.

I’m loving the new Sleek i-Divine cardboard sleeves… not so much the coloured cases, but the sleeves are a total win for me!

Visible from outer space.

It’s a bright palette… I personally wouldn’t wear these as eyeshadows… but I’d buy it anyway, ‘cos these are gonna make some cracking Summer eyeliners. I’ve already worn both blues blended tightly along the lashline… fabulous!

Like the Bohemian palette before it, the Sleek Circus palette contains a mixture of shimmer and matte shades. Mostly heavily pigmented (with 2 exceptions) this is an exciting selection. It’s exciting because it’s pushing the boundaries of my comfort zone… without going too far. It’s not the acid palette… I couldn’t wear that one. This, I can work with… it’ll spice things up nicely!

Here’s a quick colour description of the shades…

1. Guava Pink (Matte)
2. Purple (Shimmer)
3. True ‘shrimpy’ Pink (Matte)
4. White (Matte)
5. Bright Yellow (Matte)
6. Fuschia (Slight Shimmer)
7. Black (Matte)
8. Greyed Lilac (Matte)
9. Chartreuse (Shimmer)
10. Azure Blue (Matte)
11. Midnight Blue (Shimmer)
12. Orange (Matte)

They will be getting named in due course by one of the lucky bloggers who won the opportunity at the event!

4 & 8 are crapola. Heavily swatched, I’m just not getting any colour payoff from them dry or wet. They’re write-offs unless you have incredible patience. I’m not bothered about the white, but it’s a shame that the lilac is so disappointing… it’s an interesting shade.

Stand out shades for me are: 1, 2, 5, 9, 10 and 11.

Infact, I’d buy the palette for 11 alone. It’s perfection.

The Sleek Circus Palette will be released in June, what do you guys think? Impatient or Indifferent?

Posted in Bargains, Eye Shadow, High Street Brands, Palettes, Reviews, Sleek | 43 Comments »

Sunday, April 18th, 2010

Sleek MakeUP Kajal Eyeliner

Ringing up the till at £3.99, one of Sleek MakeUP‘s latest product releases is the Kajal. A deeply pigmented eyeliner made with smudgy smoky looks in mind.

Based on the traditional Southern Asian kohl… Sleek MakeUP’s kajal is a much waxier, crayony affair. It’s an eyeliner that never needs sharpening and is ready to go with a quick twist of the tube. Compared to PURE’s now discontinued version, I find Sleek MakeUP’s version a little waxier… not quite so soft to apply but perhaps a touch more waterproof as a result.

I was sent the version in matte Black (Nocturnal). The Kajal is also available in purple (Odyssey).

As already mentioned, the eyeliner twists up to reveal it’s full length. It tapers to a smooth point, which is great for applying along the waterline and depending on how you angle the eyeliner during application… you can achieve different effects and amounts of ‘smokiness’.

The swatch on the left shows the Kajal applied directly from the tube, whilst on the right… I’ve smudged the line. It smudges readily and thus I would only recommend this eyeliner for when precision is not important. I don’t have particularly watery eyes and found that the Kajal remained happily on my waterline for many hours.

If you’re wanting something soft, easy to apply and richly pigmented for a ‘rock chick’ look (I hate that expression)… then beat your way down to your local Superdrug and pick one of these babies up!

Posted in Bargains, Eye Liner, High Street Brands, Reviews, Sleek | 23 Comments »

Tuesday, March 30th, 2010

Some VERY exciting news!

I’ll just come out with it shall I?

Sleek MakeUP got in touch, they liked my idea of naming the individual shades in their i-Divine palettes (admittedly probably not original) SO much, that they’re going to name ALL past, present and future i-Divine shadows!! How cool is that?

Oh, but that’s not the only thing…

They wondered if I’d mind terribly if they used the names I’d already invented for the Bohemian Palette?! Hmmmm…. do I mind? Um… NO!

So… kinda officially…

I’m not sure how it’s gonna work for future palettes, if the names will be printed on the back or if they’ll just be referenced on the website…. whatever, not really bothered – LOOK! I named 12 eyeshadows!

I would call this my proudest moment yet, but it might cost me a marriage and motherhood… so I won’t, but well… *squee*

I also have SOME EVEN MORE exciting news to break a little later in the week, so stay tuned!

Posted in Bargains, Eye Shadow, Great Reads, High Street Brands, Palettes, Sleek | 51 Comments »

Wednesday, March 17th, 2010

Sleek MakeUP Bohemian Palette Matte FOTD

A quick (quick? who am I kidding, took me ages!) FOTD showing off a couple of the matte shades from the new Sleek MakeUP Bohemian Palette:

Marron on the lid and lower lashline
Wafer in the crease
Moto-X on the upper lashline and outer V

gah… hooded lids…

oh well, you can at least see Marron UNDER my eyes right?

Dude, I honestly CAN blend! The camera has totally washed out wafer which I blended into the socket line to ease the transition between browbone and lid.

I was surprised by how much I’m enjoying playing with some mattes, they’re looking more sophisticated and I feel like they’re blending less ‘muddily’ than shimmer shades. Am I imagining things oh matte addicts? I’ve really not worn mattes much before, but I just seem to be creating more polished looks with these than normal (not that you could tell from my photos).

And here’s a brighter EOTD with the Bohemian Palette:

Emperor on the lid
Sanguine in the crease
Moto-X into the socket to darken

Ok, that’s enough badly executed FOTDs from me for at least a year, apologies for any nightmares you may suffer as a result of viewing this post. Hopefully though, it will help you decide whether or not you’ll be spending your lunchbreak today in Superdrug or Boots

Posted in Bargains, Eye Shadow, FOTDs, High Street Brands, Palettes, Sleek | 21 Comments »

Tuesday, March 16th, 2010

Sleek MakeUP i-Divine Bohemian Palette…

…Or just ‘divine’ according to the packaging. And yano what? I think they might be right…

Sleek MakeUP have truly outdone themselves on the design front. Reminiscent of MAC’s soon to be released (in the UK) Give me Liberty of London collection with it’s whimsical scrolls and monochromatic base design. Someone in the Sleek MakeUP Art dept. has their fingers very much on the pulse.

When the palette arrived unnanounced from Sleek HQ, I was momentarily thrown by all this new styling! Ordinarily enclosed in a clear plastic carton, the Sleek MakeUP Bohemian palette finds itself housed in cardboard. I don’t know if this is a permanent shift in packaging, but it’s one I prefer. It’s easier to open at the counter to make sure you haven’t managed to pick up the one palette that’s been smashed to smithereens by an over-zealous 9 year old.

The actual palette itself has undergone a bit of a transformation too, no longer a sleek black box I’m undecided on the new look. It looks a bit cheap, the stark white seems to emphasise it’s overall plastic-ness. I think if Sleek MakeUP had continued the graphics (or even just the black swirls) from the outer sleeve onto the palette itself, it would have been a knockout.

In fairness though, do we care? Probably not…

With 12 generously sized eye shadows contained under the lid, the Sleek MakeUP palettes retain their excellent value for money credentials. Let’s take a closer look at those eye shadows.

Sleek MakeUP Bohemian Palette is billed as being inspired by “antique trinkets, vintage finds” and um… “Sienna Miller”. Despite this obvious drawback *removes tongue from cheek*, they’ve managed to pull off a fabulous array of strong shades that are sure to pack a punch. Will I use all of them? Probably not… but I don’t think I’ve ever used every shade in a Sleek MakeUP i-Divine palette and that hasn’t stopped me buying them thus far.

The Bohemian palette is comprised of 3 shimmers and 9 mattes. Woah there! As a shimmer girl, I have to admit to being a little disappointed to see so many mattes…. I mean, go buy the Chaos palette if you want mattes! Still, I’m nothing if not adventurous (honest!) and do realise that I’m not the only makeup-loving chick in the world… let’s have a closer look…

Oh, but before we do… For the love of God, will someone at Sleek MakeUP please consider naming the i-Divine shadows? No? Fine… I hereby christen these shades with some twatty names on your behalf…

Top Row from Left to Right… (S) = Shimmer, (M) = Matte

1. Gilt – Golden Olive (S)
2. Russet – Rust (S)
3. Marron – Maroony Chestnut (M)
4. Calendula (shutup, they’re MY names) – Banana Custard (M)
5. Anaemia (come on MAC, employ me already) – Off-White (M)
6. Neutron – Black (M)

7. Wafer (It SO is, right?) – Pale Tan (M)
8. Sanguine – Raspberry meets Cranberry (S)
9. Clover – Bright Grassy Green (M)
10. Overdyed – Indigo Denim (M)
11. Emperor – Purple (M)
12. Moto-X (yeah, I’m bored of shade naming now) – Dirt Brown (M)

And the swatches…

Bar Clover and Calendula… I think I’m happy to wear the rest of the shades, which is more than I thought when I first looked at the palette. My only other ‘not sure’ was Wafer which actually works fabulously in the crease to blend out a more vibrant shade.

The pigmentation of the mattes is (as expected) not as strong as the shimmers, but they’re easily buildable without looking chalky and the above swatches show no more than 3 swipes (2 in most cases).

I’ve given Sleek a hard time recently on Lipglossiping.com…. from Eye Dusts that spill to liquid liners that flake, I’ve been disappointed with the quality of some of the brand’s recent offerings. So it’s just as well they’ve come along and hit this one out of the ballpark.

Sleek MakeUP i-Divine Bohemian Palette is Limited Edition and will be available from Wednesday 17th March at some Superdrug stores (not my local – boo!) and online at Sleek MakeUP priced at £4.99.

International ladies, please note that Sleek MakeUP now accept online orders and offer international postage.

Posted in Bargains, Eye Shadow, High Street Brands, Palettes, Reviews, Sleek | 46 Comments »

Friday, February 19th, 2010

Not so Sleek

I was recently sent two products from Sleek Makeup‘s range, focusing on a couple of shades that are suited to this year’s Spring trend.

On the left we have the Dip It in Pastel Green and on the right, an Eye Dust in Livid Lilac.

I’m a beauty addict with eclectic tastes and try not to discriminate based on price or accessibility of products. So, I approach this review with a fully open mind. Even when I held the Dip It pot in my fingers, twirling it…. marvelling at how incredibly cheap Sleek had managed to make it look.

The eye dust packaging doesn’t fare much better. I mean, they’re both obviously plastic, but they’re SO lightweight I’m surprised that they’re not defying the rules of gravity.

Having said that, I ultimately only really care about how it looks if I’m gonna be seen in public with it (shallow soul that I am), how about the actual contents?

How ABOUT those contents…

Well, there they are. In all their ‘spilled across my new desk cos the sifter fell out when I tapped the bottom of the pot’ glory. You can only imagine how much I was loving that purple Eye Dust at this point.

When I grumbled about my little dust-spilling incident on Twitter, it turned out that I wasn’t the only one who had nearly ended up with a lapful of Livid Lilac. Something for Sleek Makeup to investigate perhaps?

Anyway, the colour is pretty… it’s more vivid in the pot than it is swatched, a good thing seeing as it’s called ‘Livid Lilac’ afterall and looks thoroughly ‘Royal Purple’ in the container.

The top swatch shows the Dip It liner in Pastel Green. It’s an opaque mint, and really does look like a fabulous shade for Spring. Livid Lilac is far softer once swatched (dry) and slightly metallic. I was really impressed with the choices for this season’s shades.

Application of the Dip It was a bit tricky. The wand and narrow tip allowed for a precise sweep across the eye lid, but as I was drawing the line, I found that the applicator dragged at the pigmentation leaving the line of colour less pigmented in the centre than at the edges. To be fair, nothing that a second coat didn’t remedy. The liner dried almost instantly without transferring to the hooded part of my eyelids.

I had no issues applying the Eye Dust, it blended smoothly and the colour depth was nicely buildable.

Here’s a FOTD, don’t laugh… the shades are a bit bright for me, but I enjoyed playing!

Unfortunately, that’s where the fun ended, 20 minutes later, I looked in the mirror and saw that the eyeliner had begun to flake…

Bits of Dip It kept getting caught in my eyelashes, so I ended up using an eyeshadow brush to work back and forward until I’d dislodged all the flakes. I wasn’t left with much.

Fast forward to bed-time and my cleansing routine. I cleansed with my ever faithful cleansing oil and a blob of Cetaphil to finish, towelled my face dry and then shrieked at the mirror when I saw a matching pair of pink-dyed eyelids looking back at me. I would have photographed them for the comedy value, but it was kinda late and I’m kinda lazy so you’ll just have to use your imagination instead.

On the plus side, it showed that my sense of symmetry has improved. Those dyed patches were perfect.

Overall, I was disappointed at the quality of the 2 products I was sent by Sleek Makeup which is a shame, because in the past I’ve been mostly impressed (how ’bout them 12 pan palettes eh?).

Sleek Makeup products are available from selected Superdrug stores, the Eye Dusts and Dip Its both retail for £2.99 each.

Posted in Bargains, Eye Liner, Eye Shadow, FOTDs, High Street Brands, Reviews, Sleek | 20 Comments »