Holiday 2014 – Bubbly Michelle

NARS Laced with Edge Holiday colour collection : Photos, Swatches & a suggested look

If glitzy, glamourous makeup isn’t your preferred holiday look, here’s a post for you! My take on NARS Holiday 2014.

starting with todays menu,

Opal Coast Eyeshadow single

Ukraine Blush

Corsica Lip Gloss

Femme Fleur Lipstick

Algonquin Nail Polish

First up, Opal Coast. A beautiful, frosty white which swatches smooth and evenly.

Ukraine is a reddned, cranberry brown in a satin finish.

Femme Fleur is a warm medium, shimmery brown with a copper tone.

Corsica is a rose brown gloss with a satin finish.

Now onto a look created with this collection, something I believe would look beautiful paired with a white or ivory dress.

For the eyes I started off with a neutral shimmery nude base and then added Opal coast on top as a shimmer coat. As you can see I concentrated the colour towards the center of the lid. I then added the same shimmery nude to the tear duct for an intense inner eye highlight to make the eyes pop.

For lips I used Corsica by itself. No lip liner or lipstick beneath. Following with the blusher and some Kevyn Aucoin highlighter on the high points of my face to catch the light and add some dimension.

Overall thoughts

I believe the lipsticks and glosses from this collection were particularly good. Specially the red one Deadly Catch which I swatched in store and of course Corsica which is now permanently in my makeup bag.

I also loved the quality of the blush. Well pigmented, soft & blendable which was very much worth the price. Overall the collection is rather nice to own, specially with it’s limited edition packaging which is always something special.

Other info

The NARS Holiday collection is already available at Tangs beauty department as well as Robinsons.

MAC Holiday 2014, Heirloom Mix lipsticks: Review, Photos & Swatches

Hello there! Firstly, it’s been a loooong absence! Sorry bout that. Blogging had to take a back seat since i’ve been on vacation. Rested and rejuvenated, here I am with another post. Hope it’ll be worth your while. So if you remember, quite some time ago I did a preview and swatch post on the MAC Holiday collections that were set to come out this year.

Since then I did try out a few of their seasonal goodies and also purchased a few more to add to my testing bag. The favourites of course being the lipsticks. So today i’m here to share my thoughts on these as well as some lip swatches of how they look on. As always let’s start with some eye candy.

All three lipsticks released were in the regular MAC matte formula. The only exception being Sparks of Romance that was matte but with multi coloured glitter (which is not too visible in face to face contact)

No Faux Pas – A neutral leaning slightly warm, bright medium pink. This applied evenly and smooth with pretty much full coverage in a single stroke. This was my favourite from the bunch as far as colour was concerned. And if you know me by now, I find it hard to resist a good bright lipstick! Salon Rouge – A neutral deep rich burgundy red. This applied with ease achieving semi opaque coverage in a single stroke and was easily buildable to richer opacity in 2-3 passes. Sparks of Romance – A warm, medium, brightened red. Application was slightly draggy and felt gritty due to the glitter particles. The coverage was good and wore well without much transferring.

Overall these wore well into 6-7 hours and looked fresh throughout with minimal fading. I managed to eat meals and drink coffee without the worry of having to reapply. The MAC matte lipsticks are some of my favourite mattes and they are awesome quality for the price. From the three, Sparks of Romance was the most noticeably drying with Salon Rouge being the least.

Now onto some swatches starting with No Faux Pas which I love pairing with ‘nude eyes’ dressed with just mascara and a skin toned eyeshadow.

Salon Rouge

Sparks of Romance

Final thoughts

If you are into reds and on the look out for a more winter appropriate option, Salon Rouge would make an excellent addition. I really love that it’s a nice transition shade for those of you who have mixed feelings about sporting vampy lips. For a fresh take on holiday lipstick picks, No Faux Pas would be my recommendation. This looks stunning paired with a LBD and a fresher and less boring take on the classic (yawn) black dress and red lip holiday look. As much as I like the brighter and complexion enhancing tone of Sparks of Romance, I didn’t quite enjoy applying this as it can get a bit draggy and gritty due to the glitter content.

Other info This collection is currently available at all MAC counters each retailing at SGD32 Part of my trio was sent by MAC for review and some I purchased myself.

Lastly thank you for stopping by and wishing you a lovely weekend!

Michelle.