Blush overload

 Hullo. Yesterday my friends took me out for some belated Birthday drinks. I decided to do a sort of monochrome coral look based off a picture in the Nars Makeup Your Mind book. This consisted of a lot of blush heading up to my temples and the same colour on my eyes.

The photos aren't great because my camera is broken and so I used my phone. It takes great photos in natural light but at night they look a bit weird. Still you get the basic idea of the makeup.

  Wearing:

Face: Illamasqua Skin Base in 02, some Avon powder, Hi Fi Cosmetics Raid the Kind Eyeshadow as blush

Eyes:  Hi Fi Cosmetics Raid the Kind Eyeshadow, black mascara

Lips: Sleek Papaya Punch lipstick, clear lipgloss (blotted down)

Topshop makeup - my haul and thoughts

Topshop's makeup brand launched just over a month ago to much fanfare from the press and bloggers alike. Personally i had some high hopes from the brand as Topshop always seems to aspire to high fashion with a (slightly higher than usual) high street price tag so i thought maybe they would take some risks with their makeup line. I was a little disappointed when i first saw pictures from the launch because there were no real bright, exciting colours or innovative seeming products, but i did see some nice looking things so i  headed off to Oxford Street to see for myself.

I must say that my first impressions of the brand have been very favourable! I think the prices are fair (highest being £10 and the lowest £4 meaning they're slightly over drugstore prices but not as pricey as mid-end brands like Mac) and they have a nice selection of products. I like the fact that there will be a limited edition collection 4 times a year, it means that there will be exciting new products to see, but you'll have a whole 3 months to make up your mind and purchase. Everything I tried seemed to be of very high quality and, while the colour range might not be as exciting as, for instance, Illamasqua, but they're not dull either. There's lots of bright, fun eye colours and lots of highly pigmented red, pink and coral lip colours, not just lots of nudes and neutrals.

Personally i love the packaging. I think it's fun but classy, love the stripes and spots and like the fact it's made of metal, it's unusual. I also love that some products come in black boxes with illustrations of the product inside. 

Anyway here are my thoughts on the range.

The main range, so far, has nail varnishes, eye shadows, crayons, liners and mascaras, sheer foundations, highlighters and a concealer, cream blushes, lipsticks, crayons, 3 different kinds of glosses and balms.

The SS10 Range consists of false eyelashes, glitters, a lip and cheek stain, a big, golden pressed powder (possibly baked?) highlighter (seems to be sold out on the website), 3 trios of baked eyeshadows, 4 shimmery nail polishes, 2 pencil eyeliners and 2 soft metallic crayons for all over the face.

The packaging is similar to the main range but with gold and silver added to the otherwise monochrome packaging. Some have golden stars on the boxes and the crayons come in very luxe golden tube-things.

I tried the lightest foundation (Skin Tint in Fair) and it was too dark and too yellow for me but seemed to be a lovely consistency, feeling more like a moisturiser on my hand (where i swatched it) than a foundation. The colour range of the foundations isn't great with only 4 colours, however it does at least go up to a dark colour which looks like it would be suitable for lighter black skintones as does the highlighting liquid. I tried the eye crayon in Black Jack, which is a black with silver glitter, the pigmentation was great but I found the formula a little odd, to me it felt like i was rubbing charcoal on my skin, it certainly wasn't creamy like eyeshadow pencils often are. There are 3 different types of lip gloss, Glosses, Glazes and Polishes. The Glosses come in a squeezy tube similar to a Lancome juicy tube and are the most highly pigmented (apart from the clear one obviously), coming up quite similar to Illamasqua Intense Lip Glosses (which, in my opinion is wonderful!), they are very shiny. The Glazes come in a stiff plastic tube with a wand and are sheerer and slightly pearlised and the polishes come in a small pot (the lip balms also come in this packaging) and are quite pigmented, 'stiffer' not runny like the other 2 types of gloss and shimmery. 

From the SS10 range i only swatched the eyeliners and crayons. I didn't buy anything but having thought about it for a while i am definately going to get all of them (and possibly some of the nail varnishes). The eyeliner pencils were just beautiful, coming in stunning metallic pink and blue colours with hints of silver, the applied smoothly to my skin. And the crayons, well when i first applied them i thought i didn't need them because i have the Illamasqua liquid metals. The colours and consistency when first applied are very similar, but the crayons were slightly thicker. However after i got home from my day of shopping i realised that while all of my hand swatches had either disappeared entirely or faded into one big stain on my hand, the gold and silver crayons had stayed absolutely perfect. Even when i watched my hand they stayed strong. And so i need them, particularly for my eyes as i imagine they wouldn't crease as much as their Illamasqua counterparts.

And now onto what i actually bought!

 

Neon Rose - a vey bright but light orangey coral and Crushed Berry - a true berry colour

I LOVE these. They are a cream-to-powder formula and are beautifully pigmented and... just lovely! I like to apply them with my fingers, but they do dry quite quickly so sometimes they can be a little hard to blend.

 

 

Rio Rio - an orange toned red and Brighton Rock - a slightly corally pink

These are beautifully pigmented and have a great matte finish. They are slightly drying but nothing terrible.

  

Rosa - a bright fuschia pink and Pulp - a shimmery true purple gloss

I haven't worn the Rosa Lip Stick pencil yet but it applied wonderfully to my hand and felt soft and was slightly glossy and really brightly pigmented. The Pulp lip gloss is nicely pigmented, but not quite the colour it looks in the tube. Also it's a tiny bit shimmery with a slight blue sheen.

 

Gypsey Night - a stunning black with holographic glitter and coppery flakies.

I also got the Matte topcoat, but forgot to photo it.

The formulas of both seem fine, nothing amazing but certainly not bad at all. They dry quite quickly and were nice and not at all thick or gloopy to apply.

Swatches:

 

From left to right:

Neon rose applied sheerly, Neon rose applied thickly, Crushed Berry applied thickly, Crushed Berry applied sheerly, Rosa, Brighton Rock, Rio Rio

 

Pulp

 

Gypsey Night (craply applied and with a top coat that caused shrinkage, the polish itself applied very well)

There will be proper reviews of everything when i've used it properly. But so far i really like everything i bought. 

Hope you found this interesting! You can buy Topshop makeup from the website (available to the US too and possibly elsewhere, not sure) and selected topshop stores across the UK.

BFTE Cosmetics

I was contacted by the lovely Crystal from Beauty From the Earth cosmetics to see if i wanted to try any of their products. Did i Ever! 

Again please believe that any reviews of these products will be entirely truthful and not sugarcoated in any way because i recieved the items for free. 

I have had a soft spot for BFTE since I first heard about them which was when the scandal about Lime Crime's repackaging was found out. It turned out that BFTE had been repackaging but didn't realise how it would upset people. When they found out they instantly apologised for any upset they caused anybody, reduced the amount of plain micas they sold and relabeled them all as 'primary pigments' so people would be aware of the fact. This seemed such a good, sensible way to deal with the problem, admit it and apologise and learn from your mistake. It made them seem quite trustworthy.

BFTE sells hundreds of multi use minerals (mainly used as loose eyeshadows) the vast majority of which are unique, original blends, as well as foundations, veils and blushes, lip glosses, primers and some false eyelashes and brushes and other supplies. Their website is really professional looking iwith tutorials, before and after looks and more. Their prices are competitive for an indie, mineral makeup company (for instance $6.50 for a full jar of shadow, $2 for a sample jar, £9.99 for a lipgloss etc). 

Anyway Crystal asked me to send her a long list of products i'd like to try and she would choose some to send to me. So, assuming i would be sent just a few samples, i went to town creating a long list of choices. Really long! My parcel arrived a week or so after i sent my email and was shocked to see that they had sent me basically everything i had said i was interested in! Of my ludicrously long list only a few items were missing. I couldn't, and still can't, believe the genorosity!

Here is what i was sent:

 

See, so generous!

I was sent 3 full multi-use minerals, 13 samples of multi-use minerals (12 pictured here and also a small baggie which i have forgotten to swatch), 4 blush samples, 3 foundation samples and 1 veil sample.

:O

Please see below the cut for swatches.

2True Cheek n Lip Tint in Blush Pink

I've had the photos for this review on my computer but managed to misplace them in a folder where they shouldn't have been, but i've finally found them! Hooray.

I bought this a long time ago but i still love it. Like all 2True products it costs just £1.95 or you can get 3 for a fiver. There are 2 shades of this product, this one i'm reviewing 'Blush Pink' and another which i don't know the name of (i do have it somewhere but i have put it somewhere) but is basically a very cheap Benetint dupe.
I picked up this colour as, having a few cheap dupes of Benetint already, i wanted to try a cheap dupe of Posietint. I was going to pick up the 'Me Me Me' version (I cant find it online so i can't tell you what it's called but i think it was around £5 ) but then spotted this. Now what i realised when i got home is that this actually isn't a particularly good dupe of Posie tint, but i actually like this so much better!
Posie tint is (I believe, i've never tried it just seen photos) a light, slightly iridescent pink liquid, 'Blush pink' from 2True is a bright, bright, basically neon pink.

 

(it's actually brighter and more neon in real life)

It's thicker than other lip and cheek tints and stains i've tried, seeming more like a runny cream, but it works in much the same way. While the colour might look a bit scary in the swatch if you only use a tiny dot it applies as a sheer, clean wash of pink but it's buildable so if you're like me and want fluorescent cheeks you can achieve it on your skin.

Here's my naked cheek:

And here it is using Blush Pink (i applied 3 dots in a triangle shape on the apple of my cheek and then blended)

 

As you can see it just gives a lovely bright pink 'rosiness' to my cheek. You could always make it more sheer by using a smaller amount, or more vibrant by using more :)

However there was a problem when it came to applying it to my lips. At first i wanted to get the stain to apply the same colour as it is in the swatch, a bright, bright neon pink. However to get it to that colour i had to use lots of layers to get it to that colour and i really don't recommend that.

 

Naked lips

 

Applied very thickly.

As you can see adding lots of layers made it look odd and sort of clumpy, patchy and thick. It also didn't feel nice, it was too thick and quite drying. However when i applied just one or two sheer layers it looked really lovely:

  

A more natural flush of neon pink :P This time it felt fine, i could forget i was wearing it and looked a lot less messy.

I've found that on my cheeks this will last all day with no problems and basically no fading at all. But on my lips it will probably last for an hour or 2 before it starts to fade. But i bite and lick my lips a lot.

However i had one problem with this stuff, i do not like the taste or smell. You only notice it when the product is wet, when it has dried i can't tell it at all. I can't really descrive why i don't like it, it seems to be entirely unflavoured and unscented, but tastes and smells chemical-ish and just nasty to me. Also if you are looking for a posietint dupe this really doesn't work, i'd try the Me Me Me version or just shell out the big bucks on Benefit.

However if, like me, you really like this bright candy pink i would absolutely encourage you to try this. It works well, it's under £2 and the only downside i an see is that before it sets it tastes and smells a little funky :P

Illamasqua Week - Powder Blush Review

Illamasqua has both cream and powder blushers that come in a gorgeous myriad of colours from contouring shades to pinks, reds, oranges and purples. I only have one colour, Nymph which is a pale, soft candy pink colour and has fast become my go-to blush.

I adore this blush. It is so, so pigmented (WAY better than the mac colours i own) which could be too much for some people (particularly if they chose a more in-your-face colour like a red or purple) but i find it's actually quite easy to just leave a sheer burst of colour when using a large powder blush. Or it also makes for wonderful dollycheeks when applied less sparingly. It's such a beautiful colour - truely the colour of candyfloss and really makes my face look healthy and youthful. Personally i like to use this mainly on the apples of my cheeks for a proper porcelaine doll look,  but it also works if you use it from cheekbone to temple for a soft contour. It is a really soft, fine, matte powder, very easy to blend and build as you wish. Once applied i find this lasts all day without fading.

 

Ok i don't know why but i could not get a good swatch of this! I wear it in a lot of FOTDs though so that will probably give you a better idea of how it looks in use anyway.

The packaging it comes in is Illamasqua's signature design for all pressed or cream products, a square with concave sides making it very unique. The sides and back are made of a shiny black plastic and there is a frosted Illamasqua logo on the clear top window which allows you to see the colour of the blush. It then comes in another black cardboard box with cream writing. I really love the look of the packaging but there is one problem with it, the shiny, shiny black plastic collects fingerprints and so can look less than pristine in a very short while.

I really don't have any cons to speak of with this blusher's quality but i know the price (£16 for 4.5g) will be very off putting to some people. Personally i think it's sort of worth it, it performs better than my Barry M blushers (although they are still really lovely) which is the cheapest brand of rouge i have at the moment and is far, far superior to the Mac blushes i own which are only slightly cheaper (£16.50 for 6g). There are many colours that are very unusual for blushes and look really stunning, however as i've only tried Nymph i can't be certain the other colours are the same high quality.

So i would recommend this blush definately, i think it's wonderful. It's not really any more expensive than other high-end brand cosmetics (a lot cheaper than some) but i know a lot of people will still think it's overpriced, and if you think of it that way you won't get the same enjoyment out of it.

A week of Indie Makeup Day 4 - Hi Fi Cosmetics.

http://www.etsy.com/shop/hificosmetics

Hi Fi Cosmetics is run by Veronica, a certified makeup artist who states about her company: 'I specialize in unique, handmade, and highly pigmented mineral cosmetics with lots of sparkle and huge color payoff. I blend all of the colors myself, taking special care to only offer a product that I would use myself. I use these products on my clients, as well as on my own face!!'.

Hi Fi make an incredible amount of products,including powder eyeshadows, powder and gel blushers and bronzers, fine handblended glitters, shimmer gels, glitter gels and, a product that wasn't around when i ordered, lip glazes. Her prices are excellent at $4.99 for a 5 gram jar (filled to the brim with sifters) of eye shadow, paparazzi flash powder (and Veronica states clearly in these product listings that the amount is 3/4 of a teaspoon) and glam rock eye glitzes, $3.99 for a full 10 gram jar of Star glimmer gel, $6.99 for a 10 gram jar of gel blush or bronzer, $6.99 for a 5.9ml tube of lip glaze and $5.99 for a ten gram jar (with sifter) of shimmer dust or blush. She also sells little 3 piece sets for £9.99, including 3 eyeshadows and a 'look card' to help you recreate a look, so that's amazing value.
She also often has other sales, when i ordered she was offering BOGOF on all eyeshadows, paparazzi flash powders and glam rock eye glitzes.

Hi Fi currently sells on Etsy which makes ordering nice and easy. They don't list their ingredients on the website, but they are listed on the actual products and Veronica says you can contact her anytime before purchase for a full ingredient list. I couldn't find anywhere on the site that states whether or not the products are vegan or tested on animals (i must start asking this before i buy, i'm an awful vegetarian!) but have contacted Veronica to ask.

I picked up 4 eye shadows, 1 paparazzi flash powder, 3 glam rock eye glitzes and 1 gel blush. As i said at the time Hi Fi were having an amazing BOGOF sale so i only paid for the 4 shadows and gel blush. My total came to $29.70 including shipping to the UK and took about 3 weeks to arrive.



My order came really well wrapped with all the products bundled tightly together in catergories in zip lock baggies that were then sellotaped shut and then popped in a bubble mailer. Included with my order was my invoice with a short 'thank you' written, 2 business cards and a magnet, 4 eyeshadow samples and a code worth 25% off my next order over $20! :O So incredibly generous! (and no you cannot share my code :P)



So firstly the eyeshadows. The colours i bought are Grinch, (a beautiful glittering green the exact colour of the grinch in the cartoon), Raid the King (a practically neon red coral), Live Large (a bright violet purple with blue shimmers) and In Bloom (a hot pink). The samples i recieved were Champagne toast (a very shimmery gold-champagne colour), Brandy (a shimmery light pink), Chicago (a shimmery bright denimy blue) and Crash around me (a slightly dulled greenish teal).


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flash

Grinch, Raid the King, Live Large, In Bloom, Brandy, Crash Around me, Chicago, Champagne Toast

I think you can probably see for yourself, but these colours are all amazingly bright and vibrant and incredibly true to their colour descriptions. I have not yet tried a look with them so i cannot comment on their blendability or longevity yet, but will tell you soon :) I really like all the colours i recieved free!

The Grinch shadow was from their holiday collection and look how cute the label is! It's really kitsch and reminds me of a cheesey old christmas card, love it!



Next i got a Paparazzi Flash powder, which is basically a beautiful fine glittle dust. I chose the colour was Conspiracy which is a yellowy/greeny chartreuse colour with different coloured shimmers.

I got a gel blush in Amore, which is a beautiful shimmering orangey coral with golden sparks. This stuff is amazing! You only need a tiny bit to get a lovely sheer flush of colour or if you want it more pigmented you can just layer it. It was really flattering on my skin tone and amazingly this stuff acts as a sort of 'stain'. When i washed my hand to get the swatches off the coral flush stayed on but without the gold and a bit less vibrant. The pot came absolutely full to the brim. If anything i'd say it was a bit too full as when i closed the lid a tiny bit of the gel would squidge out from under the rim, but hey i'm not about to complain about getting too much product for my money!

And finally i picked up 3 Glam Rock Eye Glitzes, with are amazing glitter gels. The gel is absolutely saturated with glitter A thin layer gives you a lovely sparkle, or you can put it on thickly for a real jewel encrusted eyelid, though if you do put it on thick it takes a good while to dry so might smudge above your eyes. I picked the colours Pyrotechnic (a holographic orangey bronzey colour), New Age (bluey/greeney glitter) and Elecric (fuschia pink with green and blue glitter)


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New Age, Pyrotechnic, Electric Glam Rock Eye Glitzes, Amore Blush, Conspiracy flash powder.

So would i buy again? Ohhooo yes. I absolutely loved all the products i bought. Honestly i cannot think of a single fault with them! I want to try the new Lip glazes, at least one other gel brush, all of the remaining eye glitzes, a shimmer gel or two and more paparazzi flash powders and eyeshadows. I think these products are amazing and even better considering how inexpensive they were. Veronica was incredibly generous and besides i've got a 25% off coupon :P

A week of Indie makeup Day 2 - Fyrinnae

http://www.fyrinnae.com/
Fyrinnae is an amazing indie makeup company run by two incredibly lovely boys. They specify that they are not a 'mineral' makeup company (though their products do contain
some mineral ingredients) and all of their products are entirely cruelty free and vegan :)

The website is really easy to navigate and as well as clearly stating the ingredients Fyrinnae have special catergories of dye-free colours and recommedations for eye colours, as well as noting if any products are not safe for use on lips, eyes etc.

As well as the products i tried they also make finishing powders, primers, glitter, bronzer, highlighter, and various other products as well as many other varieties of eyeshadow. They used to make a sort of liquid eyeliner but it appears to have been discontinued, i'll find out if i can.

My order consister of 6 lip lustres, 2 blush samples, one full sized bottle of pixie epoxy and 6 eye shadow samples. I also recieved a free sample of their 'Jaguar' endangered collection eyeshadow. In total my order came to $36 and shipping to anywhere in the world is free if you spend over $20! A full size shadow's price depends on what collection you buy from but is always under $6, a full size lip lustre is $4.50, full blush is $6.50 and
I think these prices are really very fair and 100% worth it :)



My order came amazingly well wrapped. Firstly all the products in tubes were wrapped securely in bubblewrap, then tiffue paper, then bound in a sheet of corrugated card, then a small plastic bag and finally another layer of tissue paper, amazing! I can't imagine anything ever breaking with this treatment! An invoice with a thank you note was included too.

So first of all i shall discuss the Pixie Epoxy. I have heard this stuff is the thing of miracles and well... it sort of is! I'm not even sure if i'm using it correctly (i just pop some on and 'pat' my eyeshadows on top of it, is that it?) and yet the results i've got are amazing. Basically this makes any shadow look more vibrant and almost foiled when you apply it over the epoxy. Heres an example of the Jaguar sample i recieved free with and without pixie epoxy:





the swatch on the left has been applied dry over epoxy, the one on the right is just a regular dry swatch.
Is that an amazing difference or what?
Also i absolutely LOVE Jaguar. When i ordered i couldn't afford much so i picked only Arcane Magic shadows to sample, believing that as there colour shifted they would be the most beautiful and complex. Well they are amazing but i now see that if the other 'regular' colours are anything like Jaguar i was wrong to assume they weren't just as amazing!

The sample size of shadows is a generous 1/8th of a teaspoon for the more expensive shadows or 1/4 teaspoon of the regular shadows for £1.75 The blush and other face make-up samples are $1.50 and appear to be about the same amount as the shadows i got (the website does not specify how much). All of these samples come in 5 gram jars which makes me want to do a little happy dance, i LOVE getting samples in jars.
The blush samples are quite hard to apply as obviously a blush brush won't fit into the small jar, but then that's not Fyrinnaes fault as to combat that they'd have to send blush samples in bigger jars and that would just be silly :P And I still prefer it to samples in baggies.

Here are the two blushes i got samples of:



seduce, an amazing darkish lilac and charm a pretty pink with a tiny hint of lavender.
These are beautifully pigmented but it's easy to get a sheer sweep of colour. They blend really easily, i'd like to try a lot of the other colours and as i really like the colours i got, especially Seduce which is such an unusual colour, i'll probably get some full sizes.

Like i said before, all the eyeshadows i got are from the Arcane Magic collection, which are amazing colour-shifting colours. Not just duochromatic but they actually change colours depending on what how close they are to the light and what the source of light is. These are amazing. Of course i couldn't capture this at all in my photos, but here it goes:







Colours from left to right are: Farseer, Mystic, Dark Fabtasy, Warrior-Mage, love potion and evocation. (i just swatched them again as i had forgotten which shade was which in the photo and in this low light they look completely different! So cool)

These colours are just amazing. Not only do they have the colour changing effect but they are amazingly pigmented, blend incredibly easily and have several layers of colour and shimmer. Some new colours are coming soon (photos can be seen here at Anastasias blog: http://www.lipsticksandlightsabers.com/2010/02/happiness-comes-wrapped-in-corrugated.html ) and of course i want, ney, NEED them all.

And finally the product i was most excited about, the lip lustres!



Fanservice, diabolique masquerade, Shangri-La, Bounce, Ryunome, Type A.

These are a bit similar to the OCC lip tars i love so much, in that they are a liquid lip product but not a gloss. These are thick and opaque (though you can get some semi-sheer shades) and have a shine but are not glossy. Some of these have an amazing multi-layered effect, a bit similar to the Barry M lip crayons i posted about before. These are really moisturising and feel really silky on my lips. A problem i had with all of them was feathering, but then any liquid colour (or some solid ones) feather on me, so i guess it's a personal thing depending on how feather prone your mouth it :) The colour range is just briliant, check out that blue, so gorgeous! And there are so many more i want to try (here are more swatches from anastasia http://www.lipsticksandlightsabers.com/2010/02/1337-sexiness.html) I just bought mini tubes to try which are $2.50 for 3.5ml or a full tube (5.8ml) is just $4.50 and they come with little doe foot applicators which makes them easy peasy to apply.

Lip swatches:

Type A:


Shangri-La:


Ryumone:


Fanservice:


Diabolic Masquerade:


Bounce:


So would i purchase again? Oh god yes, a million times yes! But there's just so much! Hundreds of eyecolours and dozens of lip lustres, not to mention the primers and face products i want to try! Where do i start?? Pricing is great, the products are amazing quality and depth and again you can just tell that these boys are just dedicated to their brand and are pumping out the most amazing, exciting products.
I would suggest everyone try out some pixie epoxy because it's just a miracle liquid! Anastasia is actually doing a little giveaway of some trial sizes of it for anyone who's never tried before, use the first link with the new arcane magic swatches. I can't wait to see what these boys come out with next :)

And here's my Face from today, using all Fyrinnae :) Seduce blush, Type A lip lustre and Evocation and Love Potion arcane magic eyeshadows:

It must have been love, but it's over now.

A few days ago i bought the Joie-De-Vivre Cremeblend blush. While i am really happy with the actual product, a lovely coral coloured cream, i'm becoming more and more disenamoured with the company.

My intense love for Mac started years ago, i got my first Mac lipstick (Ruby Woo) when I was about 14 and they soon became been my go-to company. While I always used drugstore brands as well, if i could afford it i've always plumped for Mac, believing them to be special, a brand i was proud to support.
Well not anymore. Recently Mac have done some things which i really take issue with. Firstly i've always been really unhappy about how in the UK we have to pay so much more for Mac than in America, for instance over here a lipstick costs £12.50 whereas if we were paying the US price it would be about £9. I'm not sure why this is, do Mac really have to import everything from the US? I can't imagine so seeing as there are so many Mac counters and stores over here, as well as the UK website, i would imagine they have their own stocks, maybe i'm wrong. Anyway if they aren't importing the products there's no proper reason for it to be so much more expensive.

Then i was really annoyed when i bought the blush recently, which is from the Mac in Lillyland collection. Over here the collection is online only, meaning there's no way to test the colours before buying (to me as well as being annoying this just seems stupid. For instance i really liked all the cremelend blushes, but decided to only get the one because i think i might have dupes for the others. Had i been able to swatch the other 3 i might have found they were different and bought more!) and i had to pay for delivery. I don't know about you, but to me £4 seems really overpriced to deliver one small blush, it meant i paid amost £20 for one blush. It arrived in a box big enough to fit 10 of them in, which is just stupid overpackaging too. I really shouldn't have got it, it was stupid of me.

But what has really left a bad taste in my mouth is there recent downsizing of products. You probably all know this but at the beginning of the year Mac changed it's pigment jars, making thm smaller, from 7.5g to 4.5g . I've also heard that Studio sculpt (and i dont know what else) has gone from being 40ml to 30ml. And you're still paying exactly the same price as you used to. Now this to me is just extremely unfair. Even if i never finished an old pot of pigment it now means i never could even if i wanted to. And while of course the size has only gone down a tiny it i'm still paying the same as i used to so i should get the same amount! It just seems really disrespectful to your customers to lower the amount of products they get but keep them paying the same price. While we may only be losing a few pennies worth of pigment, by putting less in every pot Mac will be upping it's profit margins hugely.
I understand the reasons ehind changing the jar were both aesthetic and as it uses less plastic it's better for the environment, but why not reduce the price to reflect the new size? Having less packaging means they're paying less for packaging and product, so there's no excuse not to reduce the price except profit. If they'd reduced it by as little as 50p at least it would have been a show of good faith.

Anyway, those are just my thoughts on the matter. Here are the swatches of my Joie-de-vivre blush:





it is very beautiful and i'm really looking forward to using it ut it was really overpriced and in retrospect i shouldn't have bought it all. I will of course continue to use the Mac products i have, and i do really like them and think they're great quality and i probably will buy from them in the future, but i'm going to be a lot more reticent to do so, and really check i can't get something similar elsewhere. I've never been able to wear their foundations, know to stay well clear of their nail polishes and can find dupes for a lot (if not all) of their eyeshadows and pigments, but i do really love their lipstick formula.
And sadly for the company i know a lot people are feeling the same.

(also really not part of my argument but i actually really prefer the way the old jar looks, anyone with me?)