NOTD: Pink Friday

This was part of the Nicki Minaj Collection, I have 3 of the polishes from this collection but I think this one is by far my favourite. I think this is a great for summer and would look good with a tan. I really love pastel colours and think this would look great with a mint green colour or with some glitter over the top!

NOTD - Super Bass

Just a quick NOTD post today. I purchased this nail polish on buywapowa about 2 months ago from the Nicki Minaj collection. I'm not a huge fan of crackle varnish but I do like the black one every so often for a change. I wasn't planning on buying this polish but I wanted the Pink Friday polish and these two came as a gift set. I layered the Super Bass shatter over the Don't Touch My Tutu white shade from the OPI NYC Ballet collection and I like the effect it gives but I'm not in love with it. I feel like this type of purple would be hard to work with in a shatter polish. One thing I also find with OPI shatter polishes is that you can't layer them or else the shatter doesn't work. With my Barry M black shatter I can paint my nail several times and the polish always separates but with this I need to cover the nail in one or two swipes or else it doesn't work. If that makes sense lol Still, I liked experimenting with this shade and will no doubt try it out with some other colours in the future.

Hope you all had a good weekend!

MAC: Viva Glam Nicki

The first time I heard about Viva Glam and Aids fund was back in 2007 when I met Dita Von Teese at Selfridges when she was promoting the Viva Glam line. The MAC aids fund was set up to help people affected by HIV and AIDS. MAC donates 100% of the money through Viva Glam to it's organisation. On their website www.macaidsfund.org it shows you what buying one Viva Glam Lipstick can do for people affected By aids. So not only do we get to buy great products but we also get to support a great charity at the same time. MAC uses different celebrities to help promote the charity. The latest Celebrities being Nicki Minaj and Ricky Martin. A few days ago I was emailed a pre-sale code to purchase Viva Glam Nicki, and as I love Nicki Minaj I purchased it straight away. I've purchased previous Viva Glam products including Viva Glam Gaga.

I've never actually made an order from the MAC online store before, so this was my first time and I have to say I was really impressed with the service. Not only did I get free shipping but It also only took 2 days to arrive. 

  The lipstick itself is described as a "yellow pink" and is a satin finish. When swatched it is quite vibrant and pigmented. I really love the colour but when applied it washed me out, probably due to my pale complexion but I found that blotting my lips and sheering it out looked much better.

I think this would look great with a lip gloss applied over the top to tone down the vibrancy of it whilst still keeping the colour. It has quite a creamy texture but when blotted can dry out the lips I find that using a gloss helps keep my lips moisturised. As this is such a pigmented colour you may want to apply it with a lip brush to get a more accurate finish.

{swatched}

{Viva Glam Nicki}

{With lip gloss applied}

{sheered out}

The MAC Viva Glam Nicki lipstick will be available online 28th February and in stores March 1st. It retails for £13.50.

What do you think of Viva Glam Nicki? Will you be purchasing it? Have you purchased from the Viva Glam line before?

Glitter Nail Obsession

I was never into glitter nail polish until I tried O.P.I's polishes. Last year when I visited the states I visited a Nordstrom Rack and was instantly attracted to 2 nail polishes. I later realised that they were both from the muppets collection. These were Gone Gonzo and Gettin' Miss Piggy With It. The thing that attracted me to these were the colours, but also the actual glitter particles inside. Both are made up of fine coloured glitter pieces mixed with larger silver glitter. I'd never seen polish like this before so decided to buy them and after trying them I instantly fell in love. I found that layering these was fairly easy, with or without a base and you can achieve the same look that is shown in the bottle. When using the Gone Gonzo polish, I usually layer it with a base and find that blue moon by Barry M is a great base and you'll only need 1 layer or so.

{Gone Gonzo}

{Gettin' Miss Piggy With It}

On the same visit I tried another glitter polish by the Sephora by O.P.I brand however this one was slightly disappointing compared to the previous two, but still a gorgeous colour, which I blogged about here. My most recent O.P.I glitter polish was the Save Me polish which I purchased last week from the Nicki Minaj collection. This one looked a little different on the site but I still think it is a nice colour. The glitter in this is made up of fine silver parts and longer thing pieces which reflect several different colours. When using this, I like to use a top coat to even out the surface as it can feel quite scratchy at times. This is another polish that looks great either layered on or with a base. I'd really like to try this over the top of brighter colours like Pink Friday, which I have yet to purchase. 

{Save Me}

What do you think of glitter nail polishes? Do you have any favourites? 

Cats, Pixie's and... Nicki Minaj!

Is it just me or is anyone else a total sucker for gimmicky/novelty things? Last week I purchased a few items from asos based purely on the novelty factor. One of them being a cheek highlighter in the shape of a cat's head… wearing a cute hat! And the promo picture is just adorable! How was I supposed to say no to this?

I think I laughed for a good few minutes before adding it to my basket. As a cat lover I am a sucker for anything like this. It is just too cute. And all for the price of £21 and I'm afraid to actually use it because it is so beautiful. I'll just have to bite the bullet and do it. I've never tried anything from Paul and Joe before and asos is the only place I know you can buy it so I went ahead and purchased one of their cat eyeshadows too.

While browsing the site I also came across some pixi products and I've been wanting to try some of their products for the longest time but have never gotten round to it. Last week I visited their London store in Soho, it is the cutest shop ever! I reluctantly walked out with nothing. For their spring collection they have collaborated with disney to bring a pixie themed palette featuring Tinkerbell. (Refer back to the comment about novelty things) Being the disney lover I am and knowing I wanted to try their products I also added this to my basket. I thought it was a great idea to have one of the most famous pixie's featured on a pixi palette! The packaging is something that I absolutely love, it looks to me like they may have had a real model pose for this drawing of Tinkerbell as it is far from the traditional tinkerbell images we are used to. The design is much more fluid and sketch-like. The same design is mirrored on the front of the palette itself with the traditional pixi green. The palette itself comes with 5 eyeshadows, 5 lip creams and a 3 colour blush palette. Included is also a blush brush, duo eye applicator and a duo lip applicator. I have only swatched the colours in this palette so far so haven't had a chance to really make a decision of what I think of the products.

I also purchased the lump luxe radiance powder which is beautifully packaged. I am in love with the pixi logo.

And lastly I purchased the nicki minaj nail polish in "save me". I am going through a glitter nail polish phase right now and loved this when I saw it. It's just a shame that O.P.I nail polishes are £10.50. I was going to purchase a few other polishes from asos but at £10.50 each I couldn't justify it. (Yet I can justify £21 for a cat highlighter… !?) I have decided that when I go back to the states in 4 weeks I will try and buy more O.P.I there as I'm sure they are around $7 each?

I will be posting more on my thoughts of these products in individual posts soon. Hope you enjoyed!