Beauty : my all time favourites

Hello people !

Today I'm going to share my beauty favourites. As I don't try enough products every months to make monthly favourites, I decided that it would be good to share the products that I particularly love and that I still will be using for a while.

The first product is skincare : it's the Crème Prodigieuse by Nuxe for normal to combination skin.

I got this cream in a Christmas box and at first I was afraid to use it as I have oily skin, but I decided to give it a go anyway. And I'm glad I did !

First of all, the cream smells delicious. The texture is not too watery nor too thick. It moisturises the skin, but without leaving an oily feeling when you've applied it. I use it as my daily moisturiser since maybe January and I still have a lot in it. I really recommend it, Nuxe are said to make really good skincare products and that one proves it to be true !

Another Nuxe product that I cannot live without is the Rêve de Miel lipbalm.

I made a review about it a few months ago, saying how good this balm was. I repurchased it last month and I'll probably be using it non stop from now on.

It is very moisturising and recommended if your lips are really chapped. The texture is thick and smells of honey. The best lipbalm I've ever tried !

Next is a Lush product ! I've tried a few of their face cleansers, but I always go back to this one (and I'm definitely purchasing it again soon) : the Aqua Marina.

 (I'm not putting a picture of mine, because it's empty haha, I've filled the box with bubble bath things !)

This cleanser is amazing. It smells reaaally good (it may not be to everybody's taste but I love it !), very fresh and "natural" etc. The texture is a bit unusual, a pinky cream with seaweed on it. The seaweed can be difficult to handle in the beginning but you get used to it. It works like most of the other Lush face cleansers : you take a little amount of product in your hand, pour some water on it to make it melt a little and then wash your face with it. When you're done, you face looks so clean and pretty. The only thing is that it leaves some areas of your skin quite dry (if you naturally have dry patches sometimes), but that's the only thing I noticed.  Anyways, this product is perfect for daily use, to clean your face in the morning and then in the evening after you've taken off your makeup.

The next product is a statement one. It is so famous that I won't talk about it much, everybody knows (and probably has) it. It is the Naked Palette, by Urban Decay. Here it is, without the brush because I've stored it elsewhere :

Do I really need to explain why this palette is fantastic ? The colours are perfect, either for everyday wear or for a going out/party makeup, the eyeshadows are very pigmented, they last very long (I don't even use a primer anymore and they still stay all day on my eyes)... And 12 eyeshadows for about 45€ (even though I paid a little less when I bought it, which was two years ago) is quite a good deal !
This palette will last me a very long time, this is the only real palette I own and it is definitely enough for now ! I love using it, the colours suit my skintone perfectly and I like them better than the ones of the Naked 2 Palette. Love that !


Another eye product in my favourites, a mascara this time. I've had the chance to try this as a sample, which was sent to me after I asked for it online (thanks to a website offer). And now I use it all the time and I'm really considering buying it when I run out of it because it's so good ! It's the Le Volume mascara by Chanel. It looks like this :

 

I'm really happy that I got to try it because it's amazing. I love the brush, it curls your lashes very well and makes the mascara easy to use. Your eyelashes look longer, more voluminous, but not dramatic either. I've had it for about two months and I've been using it non stop ! I just fell in love with it. 

The last face product of my favourites is a lipstick I've already talked about, but I love it so much that I have to add it to my list. It is the l'Oréal Caresse lipstick in "dating coral".

As I've already swatched it and talked about it in a previous article, I'll just add that it's one of my favourite lipsticks, the colour is wonderful and goes with every makeup. When I don't want to put a lot of colour on my lips, I go for it because even though it's a coral, it has a nice glossy finish that makes it look fresh and simple. Maybe I'll try other colours of this range, because this one is so good !

My last all time favourites product is a nail polish. Even though I love nail polishes to death, I don't tend to have one or several favourites in terms of colour, because it changes all the time depending on my mood. But there is one nail polish that I love all the time, that I could wear any day, and which is maybe my favourite colour ; it is the 529 Graphite by Chanel. 

You can see how much I love it by the so little amount of product that is left here ! I've never finished a bottle of nail polish before, I will be so sad when I finish this one... And I'm not sure about buying it again because of the price and because even though the colour is wonderful, it doesn't stay really long on the nails.

In spite of the negative "technical" aspects of it, it will stay on my favourites forever just because of its colour. It looks beautiful and shiny in the bottle, and it's even greater on the nails. Have you ever seen real graphite ? well that's what inspired the nail polish, and I think they did a good job.

Aren't they the same ?

 

 

So this colour looks great on the nails and I love wearing it. Favourite colour ever. Thanks Chanel, you're way too expensive but you did right with this one !

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So I'm done with my all time favourites. I would recommend those products to everybody, they worked out great on me so I hope it does the same for everyone else !

Julia xx

What I'm loving right now : Lily Elsie

I love these posts where I just speak about my random interests, and it's been a while since I've done one of them. And today I've got the perfect subject to talk about ; a lovely lady I discovered a some time ago.

Her name is Lily Elsie.

She was an English actress and singer, very famous in the Edwardian times.

She became famous in 1907 when she acted in the operetta Merry Widow, in London. She quickly became a very popular figure and was pictured in a lot of magazines and advertisements at the time.

She took part in a lot of shows and even performed in two movies : "The Great Love" in 1918 and "Comradeship", in 1919. I would love to see those films !

Her pictures were used on hundreds of postcards. These are the most vivid memories we have of her, and a lot of vintage and Edwardian times lovers are here to remind us all of this fascinating lady.

I love her pictures. She has a perfect face, and amazing melancholic eyes. I'm also fascinated by her style, the way her hair is styled, with a hat or not. And her clothes and dresses are wonderful, the one on the first picture up here must have been stunning ! No wonder she was one of the most photographed women of her time.

Here are a few pictures of her I fell in love with :

This hairstyle and hat are amazing !

 

And a last one ! This one is quite different because Lily Elsie is wearing a suit. I find it funny that she is wearing what at the time was still considered a man's outfit. She still looks beautiful in it !

 

I took some extra info about Elsie in this very complete website : www.lily-elsie.com.


Julia xx

Spring selection : my top 3 lipsticks

To complete my spring selection (I made an article about my spring nail polishes a few weeks ago), I'm going to speak about my favourite lipsticks for spring.

I've chosen only three lipsticks, because I thought it wouldn't make sense if I gave ten of them (or it would make sense if it was an all time favourite lipsticks article !). Here are the three colours that I love to wear when the weather is nice (i.e. not very often at the moment in France, unfortunately) :

Even though it's my top 3, I'm not going to present them in a special order. I love them all the same !

The first one is a Rouge Caresse lipstick by L'Oréal. These lipsticks are a mix between a balm and a lipstick. The colour is quite sheer on your lips, but you can control it and add as many coats as you want to make it more opaque. I have the colour 301 "dating coral", which is as its name says a pretty coral colour, a rosy coral I'd say. There are tiny shimmer in it, you can barely see it. 

I think it is the most beautiful colour when you want a nude makeup, with almost nothing on the eyes, but with a pop of colour on the lips, without it being too bright.

The second lipstick is from Kiko. They have many ranges of lipsticks and some of them are really good. This one is from the Ultra Glossy Stylo collection. It has a SPF 15, which is always good !

It is a lipstick with a glossy finish. Mine is the 804 "pearly watermelon". It is a quite vibrant pink with gold shimmer in it (but again you cannot see it when you wear it on your lips).

It can go with any makeup, because it is so simple and wearable everyday.

Finally, my third lipstick is a chubby stick by Clinique. It is a very popular product and considered to be very good quality. It is a moisturising lip colour balm. I have it in the colour 15 "pudgy peony", a bright fushia pink. I love this lipstick, it stays on for a very long time and does moisturise a little bit your lips (even though I'd recommend putting a lipbalm first, but just to be sure your lips are moisturised all day long).

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So that's it for my favourite spring lipsticks ! They are all quite similar, simple pinks, but they are very good for the season and go with a lot of different makeups.

Julia xx

Collective haul #2 : beauty

This is the second part of my haul, all the beauty bits that I got.
Here is an overview of it :

The first thing (and the biggest) is the Kenzo bag. It came with the "Flower" perfume in it (50ml), and a bottle of body milk of the perfume (50ml too).

I love the smell of this perfume, it is my "spring" scent and I was almost running out of it so I'm glad I got this. Plus the bag is really pretty and I'll use it to store makeup.

The set was 73.00 € (I'm still shocked by the prices of perfumes sometimes !), but there was a discount on it (all the sets were reduced at the time I think).

Then I got the Nuxe "Rêve de Miel" lipbalm again, I missed it too much ! I took the jar version, because the texture is thicker and protects the lips better. As I've got dry lips all the time, I want the best moisturiser possible and this is the best I've tried.

It was 6.95, much cheaper than it normally is (the pharmacy were I bought it made cheaper prices for almost everything I think).

In the Glamour magazine (June edition), I got a sample of the Clarins body crub (30ml). It smells very good and I can't wait to use it !

Then my mother ordered a few things from the brand Agnes B. It's a French brand of cometics (although it is also a clothes brand), so I don't know if you can have it in other countries. 

The best thing about this brand is that they often make very good deals and reduce their prices. This time, we got three products for 20.00 € only. 

The first one I got is a blush/bronzer (kind of). I wanted it for so long, it's so beautiful ! It looks like this :

I'll wear this when the sun is around more. The blush was 27.90€ without any discount, so even more expensive that what my mother actually paid... 'Tis cool.

Along with that I got a lip product called "Cinémat". It is a sort of lip lacquer, with a mat finish once you've applied it. I chose the colour "Fushia Audrey" (Audrey for Audrey Hepburn I guess). It was 18.90€ without discount.

And I got an orange lipgloss... for free ! It is a present they give you when you buy from them. And I'm glad they gave me that because I've been thinking about trying orange on my lips lately, to see if it suits me. Now I'll be able to try without buying anything new haha !
So here are the two products :

And here are the swatches :

The last thing that was for me in the order was a sample of mascara (along with the little pocket of foundation/lipstick/eyeshadow samples), again a present from the brand... It looks like this :

I tried it on once to see what it looked like and... it's not overwhelming, it does the job but the eyelashes don't look long enough for me, it's a very natural and discrete effect. So I'm not gonna use it regularly for now, I'll keep it for when I don't have any other mascara left !

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This is the end of my haul ! I'm really excited about everything that I got, and can't wait to try all these products. Yay !

Julia xx