Makeup and Beauty Blog: Makeup Reviews, Beauty Tips and Drugstore Beauty Finds

Bumble and Bumble enlisted the help of French hairdresser Laurent Philippon to test and fine tune the formula of their Spray de Mode hairspray over several seasons of professional use backstage at the Paris shows (aka in the trenches), and the hard work shows.

Let me just come out and say it: Spray de Mode is nothing like 1980’s hairsprays. I can’t even begin to estimate the obscene amount of stinky, flaky, crunchy aerosol hairspray I used when high hair was the fashion du jour.

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MAC’s Cream Color Base in Pearl ($16.50) makes colors really pop, taking eyeshadow to a brighter, bolder, and more diva-superstar level. With Cream Color Base, your eyeshadow is like an A-list celeb; without it, it’s like Jen Bunney from The Hills. It’s one of those products that every eyeshadow junkie needs to have in her makeup bag.

Pearl’s a soft, pale gold-colored product with just a touch of shimmer. Layered beneath powder eyeshadows, it intensifies color. To the touch, it feels like a cream blush. The picture below shows 1) MAC Parrot eyeshadow by itself and 2) applied on top of a layer of Pearl:

Pretty, yah? Pearl comes in a standard issue blush pan, so what I do is pick up the product from the pan with a synthetic flat brush like the MAC 239 and apply it directly onto the lid area (not the crease or the browbone), while trying to avoid applying too much. It’s easy to overdo it with Pearl. Too much can cause caking and lead to the product migrating around the eyelid.

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I’ve still got the fever!

Pink fever continues with Three Custom Color Specialists Dahlia Gloss. How do I love this blue based hot pink gloss?? Let me count the ways.

Color: Blue based tones work well with my coloring, and I love this pink’s vivid brightness. The glitter-free shade is highly pigmented and looks very, very, very pink on my lips… and I like it! It’s definitely not for the pink shy.

Product: Three Custom Color Specialists Dahlia Gloss
Price: $18.50
Use: As a lipgloss
Makeup and Beauty Blog Rating: A

Shine: Typically, lipgloss formulas radiate a high shine when applied. Unlike MAC Lipglass’ high shine formulas, Three Custom Color Specialists Gloss has a subdued shine that’s less reflective than usual for a lipgloss, resulting in a finish more like a lipstick than a gloss.

I like its subtle shine because of how suitable it is for day wear. And if I want a sassier look for evenings out, I’ll just add a layer of MAC Clear Lipglass and then bam! Ready for a night out at the club with the girls.

Texture: As much as I loves me some gloss, I can’t stand it when my hair sticks to my lips. That doesn’t happen with Dahlia. It’s nonstick, light and long-lasting.

I’m really impressed with this gloss and intend to snag a few more shades. The Three Custom Color Specialists Web site breaks down the gloss colors into three families — warm, cool and neutral — to help you find the right shade. You can purchase your gloss online or from a store near you .

Ya’ll gotta bear with me as I work through this pink lip phase… Maybe one of these days I’ll be healed!

Your friendly neighborhood beauty addict,

Karen

It was love at first sight yesterday when I laid eyes on Laura Mercier’s newest spring color collection, Dreamy. With six new sheer lipsticks, four delicious pastel shimmer cream eye shadow duos and a highlighting shimmer bloc, the collection is sexy and effortless — my makeup style to the Nth degree!

I wish I had better product pics, but here’s a stalkery phone picture of the display until I can get better ones:

Remember the bout of makeup indecision I suffered last week, trying to decide between the spring NARS Shanghi Lily and Laura Mercier Seduction collections? Well, I experienced absolutely none of that with Dreamy. My heart literally skipped a beat when I saw the eye duos and lipsticks, and I worked out the makeup math (aka, trying to justify buying it all!) in my head, LOL.

Although Dreamy is a spring collection, I get a laid-back, beachy, vacation vibe from it. These are colors I’d wear on a tropical getaway. To finish the look, I’d need a shade of cream eye shadow on my lids and a pink sheer lipstick on my pucker. And a surfboard. And a margarita. LE SIGH!

Here’s the lowdown on Dreamy…

Eyes

Creme Eye Duo ($28 each)

• Daydream - peach and bronze
• Enchantment - yellow and green
• Fairytale - pink and violet
• Mesmerize - sand and silver

Each Creme Eye Duo contains two contrasting cream shades which blend and work well either together or separately. The colors are shimmery but don’t have giant chunks of glitter in them. While the pastels are subtle and light, they aren’t so light as to look stark or unwearable. I’m excited about Daydream, Enchantment and Fairytale. The sand and silver colors in Mesmerize didn’t really move me, though, so I’m skipping that one for now.

I swatched the shades with my finger at the counter. Each of the colors appeared sheer on my skin. I think that’s by design because the product marketing is all about the suggestion of sheer — not in your face — color. I did notice I could apply multiple layers of any shade to increase the intensity of a shadow, so, on days in which I’d want bolder looks, I’d have that option, too.

The formula is long wearing, non-greasy and crease resistant — I swatched my arm and after three hours the colors had barely budged!

Lips

Lip Colour - Sheer ($20 each)

• Baby Lips - sheer warm pink
• Bare Lips - sheer rose beige
• Healthy Lips - sheer rose
• Nude Lips - sheer neutral beige
• Sexy Lips - sheer sangria rose
• Tender Lips - sheer brown rose

Each of the new lipsticks in Dreamy’s Lip Colour - Sheer collection, the newest additions to the Laura Mercier lipstick family, have a sheer wash of color and a semi-matte finish. Each little pretty is supposed to hydrate, plump and condition lips. Laura Mercier used a long-wearing formula infused with a special lipstick technology they call Laura Mercier Lip Complex, which “delivers a soft wash of color in just one swipe.” I’m psyched about all these colors, but the ones that move me most are Bare Lips, Tender Lips and, of course, Sexy Lips.

I couldn’t get decent swatches of the new Orchid Mosaic Shimmer Bloc ($38). Here’s a shot from the Laura Mercier Web site:

Truthfully, Orchid Mosaic didn’t move me as much as the other new products did. It’s a highlighting powder with a pearl finish and four separate colors you can either use alone or together on your eyes, cheeks or body. The pinks were a little too sheer on my skin, and I’m afraid the color wouldn’t display unless I really laid it on thick. Unless I can get a Laura Mercier makeup artist to show me a secret way to get the most out of Orchid Mosaic, I’ll probably skip this one.

Sadly, the forces of makeup nature were aligned against me, and I wasn’t able to buy anything from the collection yesterday, boo. When I arrived at the Nordstrom counter, the Laura Mercier makeup artist had just left for her afternoon break, and, because the collection was so new, none of the makeup artists from other lines could find where the collection items were stashed. I’ll return later today with a few gift cards that’ve been burning holes in my pocket, wheeee!

How’s your Saturday coming along? I hope you’ve got plans to do some relaxin’ this weekend.

Your friendly neighborhood beauty addict,

Karen