The Beauty Wolf

Category: Makeup (Page 7 of 10)

3 CONCEPT EYES HIGHLIGHTER REVIEW

February 19, 2014 /

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I am an addict. There I said it. I am an addict and my drug of choice is highlighters.  Really any glow products. I cannot pass up a highlighter, it is a serious problem. I remember about three years ago waiting backstage to meet Nicki Minaj and just furiously brushing Mac’s Mineralized Skinfinish in Shimpagne all over my cheeks to help compose myself (it worked and she ended up heavily complimenting my makeup to boot!). So the moral of the story is, highlighters are magical and everyone needs at least one good one.

3 Concept Eyes is a brand I’ve had my eye (my concept eye?) on for awhile now. Their minimalistic black and white packaging is so exactly my aesthetic that it just screams for me to buy it. I think the rest of North America might be catching on because I noticed they’re selling 3 Concept Eyes online at Urban Outfitters now.

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This highlighter comes in a slim mirrored compact. It includes a small flat brush hidden away in a bottom compartment. It’s pretty great packaging design! I am kind of enamored with it. The product itself is a powder with small shimmery particles. I chose the shade Beige but it’s also available in Gold Pink.

Going back to my glow addiction, I have really high expectations when it comes to my highlighter products. I like to, in the words of Rihanna, shine bright like a diamond. What I don’t like though, is glitter. I hate glitter. I like a very specific shimmery sheen.This product does manage to avoid the glittery texture that I hate, and does provide the sheen that I like. However, I find that this is not near strong enough. It makes an extremely, extremely faint highlight. So much so that I had to struggle to get a swatch. I ended up having to show this on top of another product (a blush) to really have it capture on my camera.
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The colour is perfect, the sheen is great, it’s just not nearly powerful enough for my liking. That being said, it does impart and extremely natural looking highlight for cheeks and the T-zone. If you’re going for subtle then this is the product for you. It’s just not the product for me 🙁 I can’t say this is a bad or poor quality product, it’s just not what I was looking for personally. 3 Concept Eyes Highlighter gets a middle of the road 2.5 out of 5 turtles.

If you’d like to give it a try yourself it’s available on ebay here
http://www.ebay.com/itm/3CE-3-Concept-Eyes-Highlighter-Pink-or-Beige-/181747999406?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&var=&hash=item2a510662ae

and Amazon here:
http://www.amazon.com/Concept-Eyes-Highlighter-GOLD-PINK/dp/B00AF55XP2/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1433884041&sr=8-1&keywords=3+CONCEPT+EYES+HIGHLIGHTER

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ETUDE HOUSE SOFT TOUCH AUTO LIP LINER REVIEW

February 18, 2014 /

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I’ve been really into lip heavy looks lately. It’s a big change from the super neutral mouth I’ve been sporting since, well, forever. After years of just tracing my lips with a nude coloured pencil to stop feathering, it dawned on me that I needed a lipliner to compliment these new bolder lipsticks I’ve been favouring. So, I went out in search of the best ones to bring back to you guys.

Etude House Soft Touch Auto Lip Liner is exactly what it says it is, an automatic lip liner. I love these so much more than pencil liners. It seems so archaic to drag out a sharpener and crank a pencil through it. What really sold me on the Soft Touch Auto Liners is that they are fully retractable! No more swiveling up a liner too high only to have it break off because you can’t retract it back to a more manageable size. The mechanism is extremely smooth and has never given me a problem.

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Soft Rose and Milky Brown are the two shades I picked up to try. Both are great colours that could be used with a lot of different lipstick and glosses I have. The formulation is extremely nice. These are neither chalky nor dry. Unlike some dry pencil liners, these glide on and never drag. You could pretty much wear them alone on top of a lip balm if you wanted to. They apply easily, smoothly, and wonderfully. The wear time is the same as any other lipliner, it lasts as long as you want it to as long as you’re not eating or kissing someone. My only complaint with these are the limited shade selections available. There are only five shades and they are mostly earthy neutral sort of tones. Other than that though these are great! I’m very impressed, especially considering how ridiculously cheap they are. They can be had for under five dollars on ebay here
http://www.ebay.com/itm/ETUDE-HOUSE-Soft-Touch-Auto-Lipliner-sing-sing-girl-/141521245989?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&var=&hash=item20f352d725
and the various online Korean cosmetic stores. I think these great little liners deserve 4.5 out of 5 turtles.
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IOPE AIR CUSHION XP REVIEW

February 10, 2014 /

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Hello gorgeous Beauty Pups! I’m back with a look at another BB cushion. Today’s review is Iope’s newest offering, the Iope Air Cushion XP SPF 50+/PA+++. Apparently this is a revamp of their prior air cushion with an improved formulation. I have shade C21, Natural Vanilla (that sounds like the world’s worst R&B group). The C in C21 stands for Cover, as this has more coverage than the other options, which are N for natural and S for Shimmer. As with the majority of Korean bb creams this comes with extremely limited colour options, 21 being the lightest and 23 being the darkest.

Iope was one of the first companies to release a BB cushion onto the market and helped the trend catch fire in Korea. It’s been established that I’m a huge fan of BB cushions, the one I reviewed from Holika Holika sealed the deal for me. However, the Iope cushion is a higher end brand. If Holika Holika is Covergirl then Iope is Lancome. I’m not always a proponent of “expensive is better” but I came across this cushion on sale and knew I had to give it a try. It’s your typical cushion in that it’s a compact that comes with a silicone sponge and has a divider protecting the stamp pad like cushion underneath. What I did notice right away upon opening it was the weight, it’s so much more sturdily constructed than the Holika Holika compact, which is the be expected I guess. Another thing that was a really pleasant surprise is that it comes with a refill and additional sponge! Since this is roughly double the price of the cheaper brands, it almost ends up balancing out in the end once you factor in that you get two products with this for slightly more than the cost of two cheaper ones.
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I must say, this formulation lives up to the hype. It imparts that dewy glow that I’m addicted to yet it has none of the stickiness that can sometimes come along with it. Once it’s on your face is almost feels like a matte formula but it still looks like a glowing one. I’ve really never encountered anything like it and I’m in love.
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 Despite being billed as a higher coverage product, I’d say the actual coverage on this is just about medium. It didn’t do a lot to hide an angry red mark I had from a run in with a prescription retinoid (don’t ask) but it did cover my faint hyper-pigmentation spots. What it did do was give me a beautiful ,soft, even skin tone. You would still have to break out the concealer for serious blemishes, but for mostly even skin this is a stand alone product. I’m also in love with the fact that this comes with the super high SPF of 50, always a plus for me. I should also mention the scent, it has that pleasant floral smell that is typical of high end brands but it fades away upon application.
The wear time on this for me was the entire day long. Although, as I’ve mentioned before, I have a dry to normal skin type. I don’t really have problems with oil making my makeup disappear so YMMV. Although with the light airy almost matte feel I do think oily skins will appreciate this product. Even though I can’t speak to it’s sebum control properties, it does seems like it will be a good fit for everyone! The literature on this product claims that it is sweatproof. I plan on wearing this to the Kanye concert I’m going to next week so that should tell you I’m comfortable enough with it’s performance for harsh (glorious) conditions. I have no idea what outfit I’m wearing yet, but I know for sure what my face will be wearing.The Iope Air Cushion XP SPF 50+/PA+++ certainly deserves the full 5 out of 5 turtles.
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MEMEBOX REVIEW

February 6, 2014 /

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There seems to be a new subscription box company every time you turn around these days. I’d look over the reviews and just “meh” every one of them. I knew that it would be a waste of money to subscribe because 90% of the things they sent would just collect dust and take up valuable real estate in my makeup drawer. None of them ever appealed to my tastes. That is until now.

I have never gotten so worked up over a beauty box until I caught wind of the Memebox. Memebox is the #1 beauty box in Asia. For those of us with a serious addiction to Korean skincare and makeup, this is the box we’ve been waiting for. It’s also a great way for those of you who are just now discovering Korean beauty to get in on the ground floor with a wide variety of products to try each month for a nominal fee. What I really love about Memebox is it’s full of both high end favourites and little known hidden gems. There is something for the newbs as well as the old pros. And no matter how well versed you are in the Korean beauty scene, you almost always without fail discover something new through Memebox. They’ve done a wonderful job selecting products for each box and I’m always so excited to tear into these gorgeous beauties when they arrive. It’s way better than Christmas, because you never have to worry about this box ever containing socks from your Great Aunt Mildred. You’re pretty much guaranteed to find something you fall in love with each month. Memebox also has an online store, they carry products that are up to 80% off regular retail prices. I’ve also found that they carry things that a lot of other online stores don’t stock.Another plus to this is, it’s not a subscription box. You pay for the individual box you want. So say you want to skip a month, you simply just don’t put in an order for it. The only downside to that is, these boxes are immensely popular and they sell out super fast. So far a total of four boxes have been released and shipped. An additional three boxes were then announced and up for pre-sale. Every single one of the boxes are now sold out and they haven’t even begun shipping yet. So, editions #1-#7 are already gone! They regularly sell out a within a week of being announced! I waited a day too long and I’ve already lost out on box #7. I’m so irrationally upset about it lol. These boxes are highly coveted and people are desperate to get their hands on them. If that doesn’t speak to the quality of the products inside I don’t know what does.Today I’m going to show you a little peek inside the latest release, the 4th edition box.memeboxopen
As you can see upon opening the box there is a little card provided with English descriptions, instructions, and regular retail pricing for each item. Brilliant! Underneath that we get to the goodies, all gorgeously packed up and just waiting to be ripped into. Inside they have deluxe sample sizes along with full sized products.
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Left to right:
Laneige Snow Crystal Pure Lip Gloss, Lanoa Natural Soap Sulfur, LJH Dr’s Care Vita Propolis Ampoule, T.E.N Cremorlab Mineral Treatment Essence, Goodal Repair Plus Essential Oil, Clio VF 21 Water BB SPF 35 PA++, Peripera Peri’s Tint Mini Mandarin Juice, The Shampoo Plus Natural Waterless Shampoo, Iope Bio Essence Intensive Conditioning (comes with cotton pads), Danahan Bon Yeon Jin Essence.
I honestly love every single thing in here so far. There are some serious winners that I’m loving experimenting with. I was especially happy to see the inclusion of the Iope essence, the oils, and the Clio bb cream. Those are all things I had wanted to get my hands on at some point.
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The Memebox retails for $23.99, and unfortunately, like I mentioned before, this particular edition is already sold out completely. (However my dear Beauty Pups, stay tuned because I’m announcing a giveaway for a 4th edition box just for you!)
Right now Memebox is taking preorders for editions #8-#10, so hurry and jump on it before they’re all gone at http://us.memebox.com/!

SKIN FOOD VITA WATER DROP CC CREAM REVIEW

February 5, 2014 /

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Skin Food Vita Water Drop CC Cream is an odd little duck in the CC cream world. Despite coming in two differently decorated tubes, this CC creams it comes in only one colour. Unlike most other CC creams, this one is not self adjusting. The single shade is a neutral apricot colour, so if that doesn’t work for you, you’re pretty much out of luck on this one 🙁

The coverage is sheerer than the Tony Moly Pure Luminous Aura CC and the formula is water based so it’s less emollient. This would definitely be appreciated by oily skinned folks, but it’s not drying so drier skinned people would still like it as well. When I first received this product I was kind of put off by it. It smelled a little funky (I still can’t place the smell, its like vaguely grassy chemicals) and I was so used to my other CC cream that this different formula was just strange to me. But I have to be honest I do find myself reaching for this a lot more often then I thought I would. I could see myself really appreciating this formula in Summer.
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Like I said above, the cover on this is extremely sheer. It does almost nothing to cover any redness or hyper-pigmentation you might have. It does however create a smooth surface for BB cream or foundation. As always with CC creams, if you have smooth blemish free skin you could definitely wear this alone. It also contains SPF 35 PA+++ so that’s a plus. I don’t quite know how to rate this cream! I keep changing my mind about it. I’m going to go with 3.5 out of 5 turtles, but somedays it’s a 4. This retails for under $15 in most online stores so it’s not that big of risk to give it a try!
Available on Ebay
http://www.ebay.com/itm/SKINFOOD-Vita-Water-Drop-CC-Cream-30g-NEW-Korea-Cosmetics-/121416024021?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item1c44f57fd5
And Amazon here
http://www.amazon.com/Water-Cream-SPF35-Korean-original/dp/B00KR37X8M/ref=sr_1_3?ie=UTF8&qid=1433882930&sr=8-3&keywords=SKIN+FOOD+VITA+WATER+DROP+CC+CREAM

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