I mentioned this already briefly in my last monthly favourites, though I still haven't come round to making a proper review about it, but these things take time. I don't necessarily think it's the most versatile palette as far as combinations go and Nude'Tude is better in that respect, but you can create a nice warm coppery smoky eye, a light warm brown look or a purple combination - basically it's an expansion of the Nude'Tude with all the shades you might have missed in that one. I think that TheBalm has some of the best eyeshadows out there. They are very smooth, pigmented and wear best out of all I own. My favourite combination in this palette is surprisingly Flirty with Friendly, a pink-purple combination that looks a lot more neutral taupe-ish on my lids. You can see it in my Wet n Wild Megalast lipsticks and Milani Amore in Gorgeous posts.
I already wrote a lot about this powder in my latest New in, when I just started using it and after a few more weeks of testing it in combination with my foundations, I think I can say this one of the best finishing powders I've tried if you want to set the makeup and avoid the powdery finish or you, like me, experience that almost every powder completely ruins your makeup as its wearing off by basically clumping the foundation bits together and emphasizing pores. This one doesn't do that. It's a radiance boosting powder, so should work similarly as Hourglass Ambient powders and Bourjois' Java powder, but it's multi-coloured, so it promises to also enhance the natural skin tone, but I notice nothing like that and it's just a transparent powder. It looks very light on the skin, like there is nothing on, but it takes away the shine and doesn't look powdery matte. I'm not confident it'll hold back at lot of oil, but my skin isn't oily, so I can't say that for sure. Another star of this product is the packaging which is so adorable and handy because of the big mirror in the back.
I raved extensively about this concealer and even crowned it as my co-all-time favourite concealer along with Maybelline's The Eraser. Initially I was turned off by the unfortunate shade range that excludes Snow White complexions like mine, but the scarily orange-looking lightest shade somehow manages to blend in well and not look so out of place. The reason I love this concealer is because it looks so natural. I'm prepared to sacrifice full coverage for a product that doesn't look heavy and cakey on my skin, a problem that tends to happen to me a lot for some reason, and this one delivers. It has such a spectacular natural "of course I'm not wearing any makeup" finish, has about a medium coverage and a nice light formula. I even wear it sometimes as a foundation and I think it looks better than all the proper foundations I currently own.
Maybe I'm being boring by dragging this lip colour in my favourites again, but it's become my staple looks-good-with-anything shade a.k.a. my second Nude-ist colour. It's about the same in tone as the latter, so a muted rose shade that looks so polished and modern, but it's about a shade or two darker. My lips tend to disappear if I don't wear a non-nude lipstick since they are pale and this is the shade that defines them, but isn't too bright. The formula of it is a lovely matte one and it's affordable. Truly a great everyday shade for my skintone.
Ok, the termo a.k.a colour changing effect is a just not working on me, which is fine, not a big deal at all because the reason why I love this nail polish, is the shade. It's a medium, slightly taupe grey that just works so well with my skin tone. I call it a pretty, "weird neutral", not a classic nail polish colour, but one that somehow just works and looks great on the nails.
From an unusual neutral to a classic red. I've been in a retro mood in the last part of the month and I started wearing my hair in retro curls again, so what else would I wear on my nails other than a red nail polish. This one is my only blue-toned one, which I prefer to my orange reds and it's the kind of shade that makes you appear like you give a damn in looking professional and classy.
I like this purely for the scent. While it's quite a classic Dove scent, it does have a tinge of a strawberry scent mixed in it and not in that obnoxious fake way that I hate, which is in every strawberry scented product. I use it to refresh my hair and not to absorb oil, since I don't have any, but it does make my hair lighter and more voluminous like any dry shampoo I've tried so far. How well it would perform on oily hair, I can't say, but it leaves less residue than Batiste, so it might not absorb as much oil.
This and Bourjois' concealer are the uncontested winners of these favourites. I've been a fan of Paco Rabanne fragrance for many years, but this one is such an untypical scent for this brand. You won't find their almost signature notes of patchouli and pepper in this, instead it's a more mellow floral vanilla mix. On my skin the first burst is pure gourmand heaven that reminds me of Monte dessert (on the paper I smell predominantly jasmine) and it then develops into a jasmine-vanilla-woodsy mix. The lasting power is excellent, which is not that surprising given the notes and the fact it's an eau de parfum. I can smell it faintly at the end of the day and it lasts so well on clothes. The bottle is outstandingly gorgeous to me, though I wish I had the 50 or 80 ml, which has a rose gold laurel leaf design instead of just glass. I just loved making a review for this fragrance, it's one of my favourite posts I did, since I love the ancient Greco-roman world.
Notes
Top: green mandarin, water jasmine, ginger flower
Heart: vanilla, salt
Base: sandalwood, cashmere and ambergris.
