The Laura Mercier Limited Edition Travel Brush Set ($85), available now at Laura Mercier counters and also online.
Laura Mercier Limited Edition Travel Brush Set
The Daphne Guinness for MAC Blush Ombres: Just as Sweet the Second Time Around
Wearing MAC Blush Ombre in Azalea Blossom on my cheeks
Dang, you have a great memory for MAC makeup! I should call you “Total Recall.” 🙂 Forget Sudoku and crossword puzzles; trying to recollect the first time MAC colors launched is a great brain exercise for beauty buffs.
And yes, you’re right! Two of the new Daphne Guinness for MAC Blush Ombres ($26 each) appeared last year in the Spring Colour Forecast collection. Azalea Blossom (a light cool pink) and Vintage Grape (a mid-tone violet pink) are staging a comeback, except now they cost $1 more than they did in 2010 (a sign of the times, yo).
If you missed ’em the first time around, you get a second chance. They offer the same moderate, buildable coverage they did back then, in a finish about halfway between shimmer and matte.
Each one combines two colors in the same pan, and as far as I can tell, the gradients aren’t an overspray. Swirl the two colors together to create a single shade, or keep them apart and use separately. I’m partial to wearing the lighter halves as blushes and highlighters and the darker halves for contouring.
I just love how these look on the skin. The grains are so fine that they’re almost undetectable!
Blush Ombre in Azalea Blossom
Blush Ombre in Vintage Grape
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Laura Mercier Limited Edition Baked Eye Colour Palette
The Laura Mercier Limited Edition Baked Eye Colour Palette for holiday 2011 ($48). Available now at Laura Mercier counters and also online.
What do you think of these shades? I love ’em and think they could easily transition into spring.
Prepare for Warp Speed, Red Dwarf, Because There’s an Approaching Storm of Daphne Guinness for MAC Pro Longwear Lipcremes
I just can’t say no to MAC’s Pro Longwear Lipcremes! — not even when they’re in colors I don’t normally wear, like the cool-toned shades in the new Daphne Guinness for MAC collection. I feel like this batch caters to cooler skin tones, but that doesn’t mean warmer ones can’t try to make ’em work. 🙂
When MAC introduced these long-wearing lipsticks last fall with the Styledriven collection, I fell in lurve! They were everything I wanted, everything and more. Smooth, with a slightly shiny finish and plentiful pigment, they quickly became a favorite of mine.
The Daphne Guinness collection brings four more shades to the Lipcreme line, three of them I’m wearing here — Warp Speed (a light silver), Red Dwarf (a blueish pink) and Approaching Storm (a deep rose). MAC describes the fourth shade, Seasoned Plum, as a mid-tone lavender.
MAC Pro Longwear Lipcremes from the left: Approaching Storm, Red Dwarf and Warp Speed
Red Dwarf
Warp Speed
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With the MAC Daphne Guinness Interior Life Quad, There’s a Storm Brewing, But It’s Cool
I love it when life imitates art, or seems to, like it did yesterday when a storm passed overhead while I was contemplating the Eyeshadow X4 quad in Interior Life ($38).
The gray clouds came out of nowhere — clear skies one minute, a downpour the next — and when a blast of thunder roared, I was clutching the quad and its four cool-toned shades.
Remember this scene from the end of the first Terminator movie?
Looking up at the sky and then down at the quad, I realized that both of them were cut from the same cloth, a shawl of moody grays, purples, blues and pinks…
Now, I like these colors. I do. They’re just not the easiest shades for me to wear, and if you’re a damsel with a darker skin tone like mine, you might find that these shadows appear quite sheer when applied.
Who is Daphne Guinness?
The Honorable Daphne Suzanne Diana Joan Guinness, the Irish heiress to the Guinness brewery fortune, is a style icon and world-renowned fashion journalist. Tom Ford once called her “one of — if not the — most stylish women living.” She was also the inspiration behind last year’s holiday collection from NARS.
This year, MAC joined forces with Daphne to develop a 21-piece collection for eyes, lips, cheeks and nails in a mostly cool-toned palette of gray, pink, brown, taupe, charcoal, blue, green and lavender.
I’ve played with nine of the pieces so far, and from what I’ve seen, this release looks stunning for lighter lasses who wear cool-toned grays, pinks and purples well.
With Interior Life, MAC continues to play with sheer pigments. In comparison to Miss Piggy Pink, I think these shades offer a touch more coverage, and while I can appreciate MAC wanting a change of pace, I can see why it might ruffle the feathers of MAC fans addicted to pigment.
Tocca Beauty Graciella Eau de Parfum
Any Tocca Beauty fans out there? Right now I’m taking their newest scent, a lush floral inspired by Grace Kelly named Graciella ($68), on a test run.
Official fragrance notes: Bitter Orange, Asian Pear, Watery Apricot, Casablanca Lily, Ylang Ylang from Comoros Islands, Karma Fleur, Rose de Mai, Creamy Iris, Cashmere Musk, Benzoin and Laos.
Review to come, but in the meantime, let me know what’s your fave Tocca scent. 🙂
Mixed Metal Mani: A Nail Tutorial Starring Two-Tone Silver and Gold
Earlier this year when I met with Rob, a personal stylist at Nordstrom, one of the things we chatted about was metal — that is, mixing metal accessories.
I was drooling over a pair of shoes with silver accents at the time and wondered about incorporating gold and silver jewelry into the outfit. Rob said, “Sure!” He thought that mixing silver and gold was a cool and modern way to update a look.
I remembered Rob’s metallic moxie this week while trying to figure out something fun to do with my nails. I wanted something festive that wasn’t red and green, so I figured, how about silver and gold? 🙂
It’s a little quirky, but that’s one of the things I like about it, and I can see myself wearing this with various shiny baubles all year round.
Are you ready?
First, I painted my nails with a clear base coat to create a nice, smooth surface for the following steps. Next, I applied two layers of the color I chose for the silver background, Icicle by China Glaze.
Once Icicle dried, I reached for my stickers — punch-hole reinforcement stickers, the office supply kind (I got these at Target) — and applied them about halfway down each nail.
Here, “careful” and “gentle” are the operative words. I was careful to gently position and press the stickers into place, making sure they were firmly in position. I learned the hard way (screwed something like this up once before) that it’s also a good idea to wait a few extra minutes before applying the stickers to make sure that the background color is completely dry; if it’s wet at all, the stickers might peel part of the background color when they’re removed.
With the stickers stuck, I painted the portion of each nail above them with two coats of my golden shade, Champagne Bubbles by China Glaze.
Prep, Cover and Finish: 3-Step Flawless Skin with the New Make Up For Ever Professional HD Complexion Starter Kit
Over the course of many merry Christmases and happy New Years, I’ve been guilty of myriad makeup faux pas, a few of which were regrettably caught on film (the horror!). And never mind the oversized twinkling reindeer horn hats or Bedazzled sweaters I was probably wearing at the time. In some of those pics I’m sure I was showcasing blotchy red patches and an oily forehead.
Eek!
In an effort to keep history from repeating itself, this year I’m enlisting the help of Make Up For Ever’s new Professional HD Complexion Starter Kit ($79).
It’s either that, or run the risk of being caught in another holiday pic looking like I’ve had too many cups of eggnog…
Yeah, no thanks! 🙂
The new four-piece set is designed to deliver flawless skin in three simple steps — 1. Prep, 2. Cover and 3. Finish. Available now at Sephora stores and also online, it comes with one full-size HD High Definition Foundation, travel sizes of Make Up For Ever’s HD High Definition Primer in #0 and HD High Definition Powder, and an HD Microfinish Kabuki Brush.
