PRODUCT ROUND UP: Here's what I'm loving

I had a bit of a manic month where I was testing like a million products. I’ve calmed down now, and here’s what I’m using this month and how I rate it:

MORNING
HAIR: Bumble and Bumble Mending Shampoo (£21), Bumble and Bumble Conditioner (£23) and Bumble and Bumble Complex (£23). Best hair products I've ever used...can't rate them highly enough. They’ve actually changed my life and make a good blow dry a total breeze.
BODY: Dr Bronners Peppermint Castile Liquid Soap (£9.65). Wakes me right up in the morning, works well as a shaving oil too and is gentle and moisturising for eczema prone skin.
FACE: I was using Rodial A-list cleanser (£48) but it’s headed to the ‘urgh’ pile along with Organic Pharmacy Carrot Butter Cleanser (£31.95) and Liz Earle Cleanse and Polish Cleanser (£5.00). I’ve tried most of the cleansing balms around and really only rate the Eve Lom Cleanser (£28) and Bobbi Brown Extra Balm Rinse (£38). I’m now using Shu Uemera cleansing beauty oil premium (£55), which is a little too rich for me, but still a lovely product.
Then on to Chanel Beaute Initiale spray serum (£56). Absolute genius! Seriously, if your skin is quite oily and you’re a bit on the lazy side, this is a fab way to moisturise. One light spray in the morning and you’re good to go. At the moment a light day cream and a rich night cream is totally working for me.

DAY
MAKE UP: My usual kit, with Lancôme Hypnose precious cells mascara (£22), ByTerry Baume de Rose SPF 15 (£32), Chanel Le Crayon Kohl (£16) , MAC Studio Finish Concealer SPF 35 (£12.50) and Shu Uemera Glow-on Blush (£19).
HANDS: Guerlain Super Aqua Hands hand-cream (£34). I don’t know why but I just love this cream and it smells like roses!

NIGHT
HAIR: Bumble and Bumble Mending Masque (£27)- Used overnight every few days, beautifully soft hair in a tube!
FACE:Lancôme Absolue Precious Cells (£83) and Lancôme Absolue Yeux Precious Cells (£73.)I want to say they’re not worth the cash, but they are. My skin is really soft and plum, it feels just like cashmere. My forehead gets a little dehydrated and it’s so smooth now I look like I’ve had botox. Really lovely products. Sorry, I want to say there is a cheap version, but I just don’t think there is.
BODY: I have really dry skin so use almond oil (£3.00), from Indian food stores. I tried using extra virgin olive oil once, but ended up smelling like an Insalata caprese. GROSS. Almond oil doesn’t have a smell, it’s packed with Vitamin E and if you like add a few drops of essential oil to it like rose otto or lavender. It’s cheap too and clearly I’m bankrupt from night cream, so have to save a few pennies here and there. Such is the price of beauty!

TALKY: product saturation

I love MAC, with a passion. The bright colours, the amazing base products and everything in-between. I used to covet the Christmas sets and new lipstick launches and save them all up like precious jewels. They were distinctive and really beautiful products synonymous with that particular season. But over the last year or so, they just seem to keep churning stuff out constantly. Its new collection after new collection, inspired by really random (not edgy or that chic) collaborations. Just loads of weirdy random crap. This Digi-Pops-wank is the newest offering, I just don’t get it. Masses and masses of nothingness. Its a shame the Rodarte collection is a dogs dinner of a situation, because that would have been the only half decent collaboration they'd done in a fair old while.

I think Chanel did the same for a while with Allure Sensualle, Mademoiselle Coco and Chance, Chance Eau Fraiche and Chance Tendre. TOO MUCH. No build up, no covetability or aspiration value. Who wants that many half-arsed Chanel products? Coco would be turning in her grave! One iconic perfume launch every 18 months - 2 years is fine thanks. It's Chanel, I want to pine, weep, bleed and work for it.

We need to go back to quality not quantity, that’s all I’m sayin’.

TUTORIAL: Green with ENVY

Quickety quick eyeshadow tutorial.

I went to a green themed house party (pure carnage), rocking the following slightly crazy look to make up for my lack of outfit:


What I used:


-Base: Mac paint in untitled. Go for one that is a shade lighter than your eyeshadow. If you have trouble with oily eyelids, dust some translucent/blotting powder over the eyelid and then use the paint as a base.
-Colours L-R: Mac Sunny Spot (matte lime green) blended into Mac Humid (emerald green, blended into Mac Nehru (navy blue) which is used on the outer corners and crease. Take some Mac Mineralize Duo in Sea and Sky underneath the eye in the centre to open them up (very reflective pigment.) I also used some Make Up Forever liquidy green stuff, but it didn't blend very well so ignore that *ahem.* To finish, go around the whole eye with the Sunny Spot (matte lime green) to make it really bright.
- Highlights: Illamasqua liquid metal in Solstice (bright gold) to highlight inner eye and Rouge Bunny Rouge highlighting liquid in Sea of Showers to highlight cheekbones. Always take the hioghlight in a "C" shape along upper part of cheekbones and up to the brow bone. Never under the eyes, or it looks a bit weird! (words are my tool, clearly!)
- Lips: Mac Lipliner in Magenta and Mac Girl About Town lipstick which is a bright barbie pink. I apply the liner underneath to give the lippie a stronger colour and a more matte finish.
-Others: Diorshow black mascara, applied from the roots and flicked out to avoid clumping. Chanel black Kohl on waterlineand Illamasqua Tweak blusher in a teardrop shape near cheekbones. If you've got full cheeks like mine, blusher in a big circle on the apples just accentuates this! Go a bit higher up the cheek and always sweep upwards.

Voila!

Perfume Love: Chanel Coromandel

So, perfume. What makes us favour a certain scent over another? Top notes, base notes, and all the bits in between? Screw that, I’m bucking the tedious trend for analysing smells until they bleed and self indulgent descriptions that mean nothing to anyone reading them. For me, a fragrance has to mean something, or be tied to a certain feeling or memory; otherwise it’s just expensive body spray.

I’m madly, irretrievably, in love with Coromandel, one of Chanel's Les Exclusifs range created by master perfumer, Jacques Polge. The name comes from the lacquered screens in Gabrielle’s apartment and when she first saw them she said she could “faint of happiness.” Bit extreme, although I do like a nice screen myself.

Coromandel is dark, alluring, rich and mystical, like the count that comes to dinner and never leaves. It’s eerily reminiscent of the rain-covered jungle, surrounded with lush forests ripe and fecund with mangoes, woody spices and Peruvian flowers dispersed with delicate little nuggets of honeyed tree sap. Ok, so here’s why I really like it.

Coromandel smells overwhelmingly of camphor, which I’m really drawn to in any product as it bring back memories of Indian summer holidays when I was younger. My grandfather was a lovely, authoritative man, who was devoutly religious and prayed every morning. He used to teach me what to do (very long Hindu ceremonies!) and we’d start by picking blooms of pink hibiscus in the garden, washing them and placing them in the prayer (pooja) room around the pictures of Hindu Gods and ancestors. We’d light oil lamps, make a sandalwood paste and then set a piece of camphor alight as we prayed. Camphor burns with a bright light and thick black smoke, the aroma is said to ward off the evil spirits and negativity. Probably small animals and insects, too, as it’s pretty strong.

I was very close to my grandfather and we were very alike (stubborn, unforgiving but loyal), and unfortunately he died a few years later, when I was about 7. So now almost twenty years later, those memories and almost enough to make me buy anything with camphor in. It could be total coincidence, but Coromandel is also a coastal area in South India where we used to visit for day trips by fishing boat.

I hate disposable culture with a passion (so does Joe Corre, so I’m in good company,) but that doesn’t mean you have to spend hundreds on perfume, but isn’t it nice when anything in this world really means something to you? Course, you may just like the smell which is cool too. ;)

Product Lust: Les Impressions de Chanel

Let it be declared – and publicly so – that I adore Chanel. I love King Karl and his bizarre ways (check out the dvd!), the clothes, shoes, bags, jewellery… everything is TO DIE FOR. The skincare is incredible, too, but – with a few notable exceptions – the make up doesn't always cut it for me.

Before Christmas, I had a Chanel make up session in the US with one of their professional team. These are the products she used, and they're totally different to what I'd normally wear.

How hot is this? Works brilliantly as a highlighter, but could also work as an eyeshadow with a bit of mascara for a beach look.



This has a real 50s vibe to it colour-wise. It's all cadillacs, Smeg fridges, bakelite jewellery, vintage milk jugs, stand-up hair dryers… *ahem* you get the drift, right? To apply: Be warned you need to use a base and to layer the shadow by patting it on for impact, especially with darker skin tones. Mental note: Do not break/lose this before summer, will look hot with vintage dresses!




How I wear it:

Abort Mission: THE PERFECT RED

I read somewhere that Dita Von Teese uses Ruby Woo red lippie by MAC. It’s a retro matte shade, the most perfect red ever in fact. It's ideal for that 40s look, but I just didn’t think it would work with darker skins (too blue-toned, blah blah.) So off I went on a year-long quest to find THE PERFECT RED. It deserves caps as it's a big mission and of grave importance!

So, after a whole year of searching for THE PERFECT RED, I managed to amass 27 of them. Many seemed perfect at the time, less so, though, when they were smeared all over my face after a night on the town. I thought I’d found THE PERFECT RED in a Kyrolan one, which was the most beautiful blood-red colour but the wrong texture. I went into MAC and was told that a warm-toned Russian Red would suit me the best, I disagreed, but bought it anyway out of sheer hope and desperation (I was right). Next on my list was the sublime Besame lippie, complete with its 40s-style bullet packaging to die for, but alas, the shade was too orange, although the pigment was gorgeous. SO then finally, on a lark, I popped back into MAC and actually tried Ruby Woo and behold – THE PERFECT RED.

Why didn’t I just buy it in the first place? Maybe I wanted to put myself through disappointment (and all those terrible tagged Facebook pictures with red tragedy strewn throughout for all to see). Maybe I like causing myself hassle, resulting in a year of torment and wasted funds. Maybe I just like to be difficult and make life harder than it ever needs to be. That's it, clearly.

The moral of the story is:

A- Darker skins aren’t ‘all the same’ as we're constantly told ('dark skins must wear dark plums and purples…’ Pah! Trust your own judgement and if it looks hot, then rock it!

B- Some things are known as the best products because they actually are!

So, in conclusion, I present my red lipstick the finalists and one winner, in the middle. The quest is over. Time for a rest now.



L-R: MAC Lipmix Lip Pigment in Fuschia; Kryolan LC00A; NARS Red Lizard; MAC Lipstick Russian Red; MAC Lipstick Ruby Woo; Lancome L'absolue Rouge 173; Besame 204 Carmine; Chanel Rouge Allure 09; Autograph Plumping Lip Gloss Scarlet; MAC Longwear Lasting Lust; Maybelline Superstay Red Passion

So you can see the insane the colour is



With chum and stylist Sammie N