Makeup Haul | Mac, Benefit & Too Faced

Hello Lovely People,

As you can see, I went makeup shopping and kind of went a little mad, so I thought I'd share some of the amazing products I bought with you, first with an overview of everything and then in the upcoming days I'll review them individually. The Products I purchased are from Mac, Benefit, and Too Faced, all from Debenhams in Cabot Circus in Bristol. Mac is my typical goto Makeup store, Benefit next and then Too Faced is a product i have never tried before, although, I have heard great things and had heart palpitations when I saw the little Too Faced Stool, as I thought you could only get them online in the UK.

There were 3 items I knew I wanted to purchase from Too Faced that I had wanted for ages, The Sweetheart Perfect Flush Blush, The Brow Envy Kit and The Powder Pouf Brush (Which unfortunately I was unable to stretch my pay packet to :( ) The Blush, In colour "Something about Berry"just has the perfect blush colour pallet inside, with three really beautiful pink shades within. As for the Brow Envy Kit, I am a complete sucker for Brow Kits, I have so many it's shameful, and unneeded, However, this was an exception... another exception! ;) The kit is packed with everything you need, wax, powder, highlighter, 2 different brushes, tweezers, stencils and brow directions! Just amazing. 

As for Benefit, I use this brand a fair amount, I mean, what is there not to love, Flawless makeup, their funky retro design, colourful girly brand, and the cute slogans they put on their products that just make you smile! The first item I rushed to was the Gimme Brow - brow-volumizing Powder Gel. my eyebrows are almost non-existent when I apply my foundation, the colour seems to camouflage in with my makeup look, even though I'm a naturally dark haired brunette! So I usually apply a lot of eye brow makeup, and end up getting annoyed when it messes up when I'm in a rush! So this product, sticking my brow hairs in the perfect direction, giving them lift and a little colour is perfect for when I'm in a rush and want to wear minimal makeup. The Hoola Bronzer is just another product I have seen people going on about, so I thought I'd give it a try, a long with the They're real mascara. As for the Boi-ing Concealer, apparently, this is the Benefit Equivalent to the Mac Studio Finish Concealer, which is what I use, however, I felt it was time for a change to see if the Boi-ing could step up to the challenge of covering my freckles that come out in the sun, of which, actually, my Studio Finish hasn't been!

Then onto Mac, I got my usual, Mac Studio Fix Fluid, which I swear by like the rest of world :P I decided on purchasing another Mac 187 brush, which I use with my Studio Fix Fluid Foundation, as my other two have seen better days! And then I went a little Lipstick Crazy! I bought, the Retro Matte Relentlessly Red, The Matte Candy Yum-Yum and Amplified Creme Morange, They are all very loud and bright colours, of which, I love the names, The names describe and compliment the colour perfectly.

Hopefully in the next couple of days I will be reviewing some of the products and hope to love the ones I haven't tried as much as I think I will love them!

Have a great evening, Nighty night 

xox

Smashbox Photo Finish Foundation Primer

Hello Everyone! 

This, I am happy to say, is my first product review on my blog, and the product I am going to be reviewing is this Smashbox Photo Finish Foundation Primer. I have had this product for a while now, probably about 4 Months and it is the primer that I use every. single. day. And by this you can probably tell that this is a good review! I bought this product in Boots at The Mall in Cribbs Causeway in Bristol. I had known about this product for quite a long time, as I had seen quite a few Beauty Gurus talk about it, however, I was under the impression that Smashbox was only online and only in America, however, a new stool had just opened in Boots in Bristol and I was so happy I couldn't wait to get my hands on it! So this is why I am super excited to tell you about this Primer sent from heaven.

Price

Firstly, I might as well get out the way the only thing that might be seen as a negative with this primer... the Price! I purchased this primer for £25. The second most expensive primer I have ever purchased; second to the Mac Prep & Prime Brightening Serum for £30. £25 However is still a fairly expensive product for 30ml/1fl. oz. of product. Needless to say - although this is quite a big price tag for an average amount of product, it really becomes irrelevant, and that brings me onto the second thing to talk about...

Coverage

The price of this product for the amount is definitely worth it when you use this product and see how a little amount goes a long way. I'm not sure if this may be different if you apply your primer with your hands, However, I apply my primer with the same brush I apply my foundation with, the 187 Duo Fibre brush from Mac and this primer goes a really long way when I apply it with this brush; I literally have to use an amount smaller than a pea spread evenly over my brush hairs and this covers my entire face and little bit of my neck if i need it: Meaning that although there is a small amount in there, you will be using a lot less and it will last a very long time!

As well as this, I found that when applying this makeup this primer then improved the coverage of my concealer and foundation. I would let the primer dry for a very short amount of time, maybe just less than a minute, and then apply my concealer, and it allows the concealer on my brush to spread a lot more around where i am applying before having to put more concealer on my brush; I have to put my concealer in my brush a lot less! The primer makes the face very smooth and bases the face with the perfect amount of softness for the concealer to glide nicely over the face. I use the Studio finish SPF 35 concealer by Mac on a normal day and when it is quite cold, the concealer tends to go very hard, even though it is already a compacts concealer rather than a liquid concealer, when this happens it doesn't apply evenly onto my concealer brush and I am using a lot more product and constantly going back to my concealer to apply more, However, the Smashbox primer, reduces this by a huge amount and almost restores the concealer back to being a lot softer and spreading more over the face. This also applies to my foundation, it really helped the brush glide over my face.

Feel

My ultimate favourite thing about this product is how unbelievably soft it is - When I first applied this product with my brush, I truly thought that it wasn't being applied to my face and I was left confused thinking... Why does this keep disappearing!?? However, then I looked and applied a small amount with my hands, and realised it was going on, but the product was so smooth and feathery that I could feel it! It literally felt like applying feathery air to my face! It was very light and weightless on the face and felt just perfect. I then felt my face with my hand and my face felt softer than a babies bum, I have never felt my skin so smooth before.

Look

When i first applied the primer, I looked at my face before even applying foundation, and even though the Primer is a clear product, my skin actually looked slightly airbrushed in my opinion, the red areas on my skin and any variation in colour of the skin on my famous almost looked as if it had blended in and evened out slightly on my face. The product also really worked for me with shine control, I have a very shiny nose, chin and T-zone and the product seemed to give a mattified effect to my skin, where the shine was very much reduced - which is a big bonus for my because I am always whining about my shine nose!

Then I applied my foundation and was I amazed! The primer allowed my foundation on my brush to just glide over my face, and the foundation was completely consistent over my face... no gaps on bits I may have only brushed over slightly or gaps on particularly dry areas, and no inconsistency of the coverage of my foundation: And because of this, my skin looked airbrushed, the foundation was even all over the face, even when I looked closely through my magnified mirror, almost as if my foundation was my actual natural skin! Usually I would have applied two layers of my foundation, However, in this case, I only needed to apply one. I did definitely feel photo ready and felt like my underlying not perfect skin was flawless.

You

I do really recommend that you try this product, However, as mentioned above it is quite pricey, in Boots i know that they do have a travel sized one available for £12.50, which has 12ml / 0.4fl. oz.

which is a lot more affordable and great if you just want to give it try. As well as this, there is a box available by Smashbox, called the Try It Kit which is tester sizes of all of there top selling products, I purchased this when I bought this primer, also from Boots, for £19. It comes with 7.1ml / 0.25fl. oz. of the Smashbox Primer, and it also comes with a tester sized Photo Finish Lid Primer, Full Exposure Mascara, Limitless Eye Liner in Onyx, Lip Enhancing Gloss in Illume. (Amounts below)

• Photo Finish Foundation Primer - 0.25 fl. oz. / 7.1ml
• Photo Finish Lid Primer - 0.02 fl. oz. / 0.5ml
• Full Exposure Mascara - 0.13 fl. oz. / 4.0ml
• Limitless Eyeliner in Onyx - 0.03 oz. / 0.8g
• Lip Enhancing Gloss in Illume - 0.14 fl. oz. / 4.2ml

This is a really great kit if you're interested in just trying out Smashbox as a band, and want to explore there various products and see how you are with them, without having to spend lots of money on all of the full sized versions of their products!

I hope you enjoyed this review, if there's anything I missed out that you want to know about the primer, just ask. Have a lovely Tuesday! xo