Rimmel Lasting Finish 25 hr Foundation

FOUNDATION ON HALF THE FACE

FOUNDATION ALL OVER

FINISHED MAKEUP

In my first £15 high street challenge, I picked up the Rimmel Lasting Finish 25 hr foundation after some reader recommendations.  Being a fan of Rimmel foundations, I thought I'd give it a go!

This is quite different from the usual foundations I wear, it's a bit heavier.  I think at the time of photographing this, I was having a good skin day, because in the half and half picture, it's not really showing much of a difference on the foundation covered half!

Without a doubt you can see it's evened out my skin, hidden blemishes and redness, creating a lovely blank canvas ready for the rest of my makeup.  I've not tested the 25-hr claim as quite frankly, to do that I'd have to wear it overnight, and that's not something I'm prepared to do :P  It does last well during the day, but I do need to smooth it over around the chin and mouth area as it tends to crack a little - this is something most foundations are doing on me at the moment, so not a flaw of this one.

It's not as heavy as Estee Lauder Double Wear, but I would class it as heavy - personally, I think it's much nicer than double wear - that stuff can be a nightmare to try and remove, whereas this comes off pretty easily with cleanser.  I set it with a powder, it seems to work well with the three I tried (L'Oreal illuminating powder, Japonesque powder and Glo & Ray powder cake) - my favourite was probably the L'Oreal powder as it just helped to give my skin a little je ne sais quoi.

Overall I liked this - it's not my absolute favourite, those spots are reserved for Chanel velvet foundation and Bourjois radiance reveal, however, it is good and certainly great for those days when you have a breakout or general redness.  I did actually have a pretty large spot on my chin when I took this picture and it's covered it really well, I bet you can't even see where it is!? :)

- Please note, I have combination skin - VERY oily t-zone, and dry cheeks.

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Top 3 foundations for Summer

Welcome back to the next instalment of my favourites for Summer series!  Today it's all about foundation, and whilst I haven't shown these products in place on my skin, I have done in previous reviews, and besides, this isn't a big review, it's more of a favourites :)

Makeup Forever HD foundation

This I picked up in Sephora when I was in France in Jan.  It hasn't suited my skin that well until now, I can thank pregnancy for that (and Origins skincare!).  My skin the last few months has been rough like sandpaper, dry and covered in spots.  I've been foundation free for most of that time, and actually got myself out of the habit of wearing it every day (which is very empowering!).  This lasts really well, it's medium-buildable coverage but looks really natural on the skin.

What surprises me about this, every time I'm wearing it and I feel like maybe I'm looking oily and patching, when I look in the mirror, it looks pretty much perfect!  It's long wearing and deals with little dry patches really well (better than my Chanel velvet foundation).  If you can get to a Sephora or get your hands on this, I highly recommend it - mine doesn't have a shade on it, but it was the lightest shade they sold :)

Chanel perfection lumiere velvet

I reviewed this recently, it's pretty much my favourite foundation at the moment, despite it not being perfect.

It's not heavy and I'd describe it as light-medium coverage.  It evens out your skin tones great, and sets to a really matte finish (it's basically made for oily skin!).  It lasts a long time on the skin, the only drawback is that if you have any dry patches, it will highlight them and not look great.  So take my advice, exfoliate first to get rid of as much of that dryness as possible, then moisturise and prime. That'll set you in good stead :)  If you're lucky and have oily skin with no dryness (huzzah!), then you needn't worry about that :)

** TIP **

It's not going to be for everyone, so I'd recommend popping to your local Chanel counter if you're thinking about getting it, and ask if you can apply it yourself to try it on.  I always recommend this as often the ladies (or gents) at the counters will apply it too heavily or different from how you would, meaning you might get different results from it.

Rimmel Match Perfection

Last but certainly not least, the wondrous Rimmel match perfection foundation (my shade is 010 Light Porcelain).  I've been recommending this to people for a while, after seeing Tanya Burr rave about it, and on the back of that getting it myself and loving it.  (thanks Tanya!)

This is one of those foundations that sets really well (matte), you'll need to apply a setting powder on top of it, and you won't be shine-free for the day if you have oily skin like me.  However, in spite of that it's a really great foundation.  It gets rid of all the redness on your skin and sets you back to neutral so you can add in the colour and definition where you want it :)  It's a purse-friendly option great for everyday use (review here) :)

So there's my top 3 foundations for the Summer, what 3 would you recommend for being good in the heat?

 

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Rimmel match perfection foundation in shade 010

After seeing the likes of Tanya Burr rave about this foundation among others, I decided to give it a go. As you can see on the right (pic above), there's quite a lot of redness and blotchiness on my skin at the moment, and with the pregnancy it's beginning to break me out a bit too, boo!

The Rimmel Match perfect foundation does a great job of evening out my skin tone, and covering any little blemishes I have.  Once set with my Japonesque setting powder, it stays matte for a good few hours, which is remarkable for me, since I have a really oily t-zone, and at the moment, dry skin on my cheeks, which this foundation doesn't emphasise.

The shade I bought is the lightest one they do - my hubby thinks it's a bit pale for me, but it matches my neck and chest perfectly - he's just got used to seeing me without foundation recently i.e. seeing my face nice and red all the time.  I love that this has a pump on it too, something a lot of high street foundations seem to miss having. 

It kinda reminds me of the Revlon Colourstay foundation, but with better and more even coverage, and better staying power.  I've found myself reaching for this almost every time I've worn foundation recently, so I wanted to share my thoughts with you on it (I love it!).  What's more, it's only £6.99 in Boots at the moment, what a bargain!!

This months Biggest-Pixi3 advertiser is the lovely Casey from A Topsy Turvy blog

 

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Rimmel Scandaleyes Retro Glam Mascara

A bit like yesterday's post, I also picked this up in my 'I want to try lots of new stuff' haul.  I hadn't heard anything about it, just saw it and that it was new (about a month ago) and decided to try it, I think it was only about £4.99 or thereabouts so there wouldn't be much love lost if I didn't like it.

The packaging is nice, black and white and feels very solid.  The wand really reminds me of the Max Factor wild mega volume mascara...

The MaxFactor one is slightly shorter and straight at the end, but that's the only difference as far as the wand goes.  For the formula, I prefer the MaxFactor one, I will be reviewing it soon.  The Rimmel one is currently £6.99 in Superdrug, and the MaxFactor one should be the same price, but currently has £2 off at Superdrug (that's where I bought both of them).

The biggest thing I didn't like about the Rimmel retro glam mascara was how spidery it made my lashes look.  One coat was just about ok, but it didn't make my lashes look amazing, but two coats and my lashes were all caked together (not a good look).

What it did well is curling my lashes, you can really see that in the difference between two coats and one coat in the pictures.  There was a bit of fallout from it during the day too, but not too bad, certainly nothing most mascara's don't do to me (other than Maybelline Rocket Volum (review here) - that stuff is awesome).

All in all this isn't a bad mascara, but if you're spending £6.99 on a mascara, I'd put an extra £1 towards it and pick up the Rocket instead - it stays put, doesn't clump and works very much like a waterproof mascara.  If you're a big fan of Rimmel, then you might well really like this :)  But personally, I'm a big fan of Maybelline for mascara and in my opinion, the Rimmel Scandaleyes Retro Glam mascara doesn't hold a torch to it.

This months Bigest-Pixi3 advertiser is the lovely Karen from Liverpool Lashes

 

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Rimmel ScandalEyes eyeshadow paint

A few weeks ago I was perusing the shelves of Superdrug when I was steered in the direction of the new Rimmel ScandalEyes eyeshadow paints by their friendly staff.  Much like the Maybelline colour tattoos, these are a liquid/creme eye shadow that you can either wear alone, or as a base for eyeshadow. Personally, it has to be as a base, my lids are far too oily to deal with anything that comes in a liquid form without primer and shadow.

**** WARNING PHOTO HEAVY ****

Ladies and gents, I give you, the swatches.

** Don't mind my arms looking patchy, for some reason when I take photo's in HD mode it makes my skin look mottled... very odd! **

I wanted to do some different swatches with these, since I use them as a base, I thought it would be good to show what they're like with different colour eyeshadows over them next to swatches of them by themselves.  I used Urban Decay for all the swatches to keep things consistent.  It's also worth noting that for every swatch of the shadow by itself, I am using a primer.

On to the products!  I started off with just the brown shade (Rich Russet).  It's a beautiful shimmery brown much like On and on bronze (or Bad to the bronze if you're in the states) by Maybelline.  The main differences are, this one dries faster and isn't as thick.  Be careful though, it sets really fast on your lids, so either be ready to blend with your finger, or if you're like me and use a brush, have that on stand by and just to one lid at a time.  On the strength of this one, I went back and picked up Slate Gray for the days that I want something a bit deeper and more smokey.

They really help the intensity of my shadow, and more to the point, they really don't crease quickly, it's only after a good 9-12 hours that they start creasing which really isn't too bad.

You can pick these up for about £4.99 each depending on where you get them from and if there are any offers on.  I know at the time of writing this, Superdrug are doing a 'buy one get second half price' offer.

This months Bigest-Pixi3 advertiser is the lovely Karen from Liverpool Lashes

 

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My lip product collection

Hey guys!  Ok a couple of things about this post, it's my lip product collection (excluding lip balms), now, I haven't listed every item because there's too many too list.  Similarly I haven't swatched them all either :p  What I will be doing over the coming weeks is lots of posts on Top 5 (lipsticks, glosses, glitter glosses, reds, pinks etc etc) but I just wanted to start that series off by showing you the collection I'll be making my picks from :)  So without further ado here's the collection :)

There were a few I missed out which I found afterwards, but not many :) So over the coming weeks, be prepared to see lots of posts featuring these items :)  I'm also making a pledge to myself, a pledge to wear a lip product from this collection every day :)  Clearly judging by the size of the collection, I love lip products and need to make better use of them :)

You'll notice I've got quite a mix of products, from MUA to Chanel - when it comes to lip products, I'm not loyal anywhere, if it's good and I like it that's all that matters.  When it comes to skincare it's a little different, things need to be a little better, the ingredients need to be right etc - that doesn't necessarily mean it needs to be expensive, just good quality :)

I might do a Project Lip Pan - so using 5 lip products lots and not allowing myself to buy any more until they're gone :)  Food for thought :)

Pixi3 out

xXx

Top 5 Glitter Topcoats

Hey guys!  So I've been thinking about doing this post for a while and today I thought, now is the time!  So I grabbed all my glitter top coats and played around with them a bit, and decided on my top 5, it's pretty much the 5 I was going to pick before playing around with them :)  So, without further ado, here they are :)

From left to right Beauty UK Comet's Tail, Maybelline Flash Cosmic, Beauty UK Twinkle Twinkle, Rimmel Disco Ball, Rimmel Disco gold.

I put each of these colours, on to my fingers too :)  Again, the same order as above (left being my little finger, and the Rimmel one on the right being my thumb)

Obviously they all work differently with different varnishes - i.e. the Rimmel Disco Gold works really well with Purple, and the Maybelline Flash Cosmic works great with turquoise :)  But all of these I really like, and you can build them up too for greater effect :)  

Have you ever used any of these?  What's your favourite glitter top coat?

Pixi3 out

xXx

Maybelline Express Finish Nail Varnish

Yep, you read it right, 2 Maybelline posts in a row :)

The same time I bought the Tattoo's the other day I also purchased a new nail varnish, and I've totally fallen in love with the colour.  It's this beautiful teal colour called Turquoise Lagoon (number 862).  One thing I love about the Maybelline Express Finish varnishes is how well they last, how quickly they dry, and their longevity.  I've used a couple of them before and find that they easily compete with the likes of OPI etc.  On to the pics!

I included this Rimmel varnish as well as it went so well as an accent nail - just 2 coats on top of the Turquoise Lagoon was perfect.

I have to say, I'm loving Teal right now - I've changed my blog to it, bought Teal jewellery and wearing more of it on the eyes too.  Such a nice colour for spring :)

Pixi3 out

xXx