A Makeup & Beauty Blog – Lipglossiping

Well, sort of.  No, I am!  Kind of.  I’ve been included in a special supplement for the April issue of ELLE UK in association with LG who are promoting their new Prada phone.  I’ve been featured alongside some brilliant bloggers which is very lovely indeed!

You can click the image to view a larger version.  That’s an instruction, not a suggestion by the way 😉

So what did I do next?  I weighed up my options… I thought about buying up all the copies in my local newsagents, approaching the till with it open on the right page before lying my face on the counter, parallel with my photo.  That would have been fun.

Or, I could have taken a few copies with me to Leila’s dance class and walked down the row, accidentally ‘dropping’ one directly infront of each parent.

No, I’ll tell you what I did.  I showed my Mum.  She was cooking dinner and didn’t have her glasses on – so I read it out to her.

“…Once the preserve of geeks and tech nerds, these days the best blogs showcase talent that sees their creators feted (I had to ask her what that meant) both online and off.  Further proof, if it were needed, that cream always rises to the top.”  I look up, with a happy tear in my eye…

“So does scum.” says the woman who gave birth to me.

Some savings are worth taking a closer look at and this one from Stylist.co.uk definitely had me going in for a more detailed inspection!

Stylist have teamed up with cult British brand Illamasqua to offer a 25% discount online at Illamasqua.com – the discount code remains valid for use until 5pm on the 6th April, so you still have some time to get your shopping lists in order!

To get your hands on the code and to read the terms and conditions, click through to Stylist.co.uk and take a look.

Happy bargain hunting!

Last month, Simple asked me if I fancied penning October’s guest blog for them and I jumped at the chance to feature on the site of a brand that to all intents and purposes, I grew up with!

They were curious about what life was like for a beauty blogger who doesn’t really have enough hours in the day to get away with such frivolity and I was more than happy to tell them.  After all, once I start… you’ll struggle to shut me up!

I recently sat on their judging panel to help decide who would become their new online brand ambassador, or “Simple Star” as she will be known.  It was both incredibly interesting and a real privilege to watch the impact that social media is having on a big beauty brand first hand.

I’ll be doing a little write up of the day shortly (I’m waiting on photos), but until then… you can read my guest blog by clicking here.

I received this email in my inbox yesterday and thought it may be of interest to some of my UK ladies.

The blurb:

We’ve got just the thing to lift you out of the January blues and make you feel fabulous – a free Barry M make-up kit! The five-piece set includes an eye pencil, eyeshadow, nail varnish and lipgloss, which all come in a gorgeous pink cosmetics bag, worth £20*!

To get yours, simply collect four of the tokens that will be appearing in Fabulous magazine every week for five weeks from this Sunday (17th January). Then redeem in any of our Superdrug stores between 7-14th February to collect your goodies.

On a mildly related and not very PR friendly note… does anyone else get the urge to kick Ms. Holden up her smug, bony arse?  Just me then…

Did you grab June’s InStyle magazine yet?  I did and I’m currently sporting my new nails.

The magazine shelf at Asda had been ransacked and I could only find Coral and Bare (typically I wanted Berry), but no matter, I grabbed Bare as I totally wouldn’t be able to carry off the super bright Coral colour.

Here it is!

It’s a really, really lovely soft colour – milky beige with a hint of pink.  And that’s where the compliments end.

Applying it reminded me of when I used to paint my nails with Tippex in school science classes.  It was a chalky, draggy nightmare!

I have no other experience with Nails Inc. as a brand, and wonder whether the quality was lowered for this huge InStyle promotion.  I don’t know if that’s usual practice – but if it is, how stoopid?  It’s left me pretty uninterested in ever picking up another Nails Inc. product.

As I’ve said before, my application skills suck (I’m slowly getting better though!) – and this looks like the worst I’ve ever done.  Up close, you can really see the drag marks at the base of the nail and the cleaning up I had to do after drying took me longer than painting did (2 coats btw).

It doesn’t look so bad here, but trust me it is.  I don’t know if paler colours are less forgiving – so that may make a difference.

The quality of the brush also left a lot to be desired, I had to snip the end a little to make the bristles align.  Surely, this must just because it’s a free promotional item – you wouldn’t pay £10.50 RRP for polish like that or are Nails Inc. incredibly over-rated?  I dunno, but thanks to the shoddy 1st impression I’m curious but not inclined to spend money on their products to find out.

Any reader opinions on Nails Inc. would be appreciated – tell me I’ve got it all wrong, or save me from my curiosity and let me know that YES, Nails Inc. are indeed overrated.

Shame, cos I really do love that colour.

[starreview tpl=23]

The cover of June’s InStyle magazine will feature a free full size bottle of Nails Inc. polish worth £10.50.

3 colours to choose from: Berry, Bare and Coral.

Magazine is priced at £3.50.

On sale from the 30th April.