Our Moment - One Direction perfume.

A lot of you are probably, understandably, thinking that all Directioners were bound to buy Our Moment, regardless of whether they liked it or not. I can see where you’re coming from, however, this is not me. I am very particular about perfumes. A lot of them make me feel extremely nauseous and therefore if I don’t like it, or if I have any reservations at all, I just won’t wear it, let alone buy it. So when I heard about the impending release of Our Moment I thought oh god, this is potentially going to smell disgusting. If so, I certainly will not buy it. Perfumes in general are not cheap, and I wasn’t going to spend out on something and then not use it.

So last weekend when I was in Liverpool, I popped into the shops to investigate. The perfume had been released that week so naturally, there were cardboard cutouts and displays galore. I was impressed to hear that The Perfume Shop had completely sold out, and were waiting on a delivery of the fragrance. So I popped over the road into Superdrug to suss out the situation there. There was a large crowd gathered around the sample on display. Groups of teenage girls, mothers and daughters, even a man buying it for his girlfriend (how sweet, awh). I took a step back and watched the rabble for a few minutes. It became clear that Superdrug had sold out of the large and medium sized bottles, and only had the 30ml left. The sales assistant behind the counter was frantically phoning around other stores to try and find out who had what in stock. It was, crazy. When I could get close enough, I bought the 30ml bottle (£20).

I love this scent, it is exactly my taste. I do not love the packaging. When H Styles was asked, he said that they wanted to make the perfume as affordable as possible, in the best interest of all the fans. In my opinion, the box kind of does look like it’s a child’s perfume. The floating heads of the 1D boys is quite frankly weird, and there is a whole lot of pink. What I did like, upon opening the box, was the cute little booklet/note basically saying thanks for buying this, you are amazing, with all of the boys signatures. (Nice touch there, Modest). The bottle itself is…interesting. The pinkish tinge to the glass is fine. As is the Our Moment written across the front. The crazy lid certainly makes it stand out. It is kind of shaped like a crown (apparently, we’re all 1D’s princesses…) which is okay, but the big pink netted bit in the middle of the top not only makes it look cheap and tacky, but it’s quite impractical. This makes it difficult to carry it around in your bag because of how big it makes it, and it’s also so quite tricky to actually get in to.

Once you do manage to open the bottle, you discover that the perfume smells amazing. What I will say is that I can imagine this to be a total marmite product. You are either going to love this perfume, or you’re going to hate it. My first thought was, this is very sweet, it’s a little bit like Black XS. (I adore Black XS). My Mumma disagrees completely, and thinks that it smells like Red Door (I love that, too). She doesn’t like it, and described it as a very sickly smell. It has top notes of pink grapefruit, forest fruits and red currants, although to me I don’t think it smells overly fruity when you first spray it. The middle tones of freesia, jasmine and frangipani work to mute the fruit element, without actually taking any of it away. What really comes across as the day wears on, are the undertones of patchouli and musk. All of these different elements compliment each other beautifully to make admittedly, a particularly sweet, yet not overpowering fragrance. It sits on the skin beautiful and does last a long time with no need to reapplying. This product gets a huge thumbs up from me – I smell yummy.

B xxo

A Film, A Band, A Book.

As Autumn/Winter comes in, so does the time for a) going to lots more gigs (this always happens when the weather is rubbish),  b) snuggling up and watching a plethora of weird and wonderful films, and c) reading lots of lovely books. Mine and Sam’s tradition of snugging up to watch utterly crap films kind of prompted this last week. So I’m joining the trend of picking a film, a band, and a book that I think deserves mentioning, each month, and telling you lot about them.

A Dangerous Method

When I originally wrote the intro to the post, I wrote film/band/song that I’m loving. I had to change it, for this film. I can’t not mention this, but it certainly is not something that I am loving.

So as most of you probably know, Netflix recommends you films that it thinks you will like, depending on what you’ve watched/shown interest in before. For months now, Netflix has been recommending A Dangerous Method to me. I didn’t watch it. I didn’t even look to see what it was about – because the cover looked completely rubbish. Then last week when I was looking into Michael Fassbender’s filmography, I stumbled across the description of a film that sounded brilliant. To summarise, A Dangerous Method supposedly documents the relationship between Sigmund Freud and Carl Jung, along with the catalyst of their controversial patient Sabina Spielrien. Freud fascinates me, and through a very good friend I have heard a lot about Jung. Coupled with Michael Fassbender, who is clearly some kind of god, I thought hello, this film is going to be mind-blowingly amazing. So imagine my surprise when I went into Netflix and discovered it was the very film they had been telling me I should watch. Naturally I took this as a sign that I was going to love this film. Let me tell you know; I did not love this film. Everything about this film, dictated that it should be brilliant. It isn’t. It is utterly bizarre – the angle that it chooses to portray the story from is quite frankly crazy. Viggo Mortensen plays a very good Freud, however this was completely wasted on the audience as the whole film seems to work to undermine everything that Freud ever concluded. In fact, there is very little mention of his actual work – bar the odd few lines of Jung mocking his thoughts. Michael Fassbender is, as per usual, brilliant. The part that he plays seems to be a million miles away from the truth about Carl Jung – but as he did a lot of whipping and whatnot, I won’t complain about that. I have watched this film twice (hoping maybe I could teach myself to like it)  and both times I have reached the end of it thinking, what a wasted opportunity. It really could have been such a fantastic film – could have given a lot of people a better understanding of how two brilliant minds came together and shaped a science still applied today. But no, sadly not. Nice one, Cronenberg.

Sensorites. 

If you follow my personal twitter you will know that I’ve been loving this band for a while now. I am the first to admit that my music taste is…varied, to put it mildly. My spotify playlists jump from Death Metal to manufactured boybands, and any number of things in between. I like it that way. So anyway, Sensorites. Completely accidental discovery I won’t lie. I think it was around February of this year. In the midst of breaking up with my now ex boyfried, who I had spent a lot of time at heavy metal gigs with, I was very ready to go back to something sounded completely different. So I toddled off to a Parlour Flames gig (I’m the biggest Oasis fan ever, of course I was going to go) in Liverpool. I will admit, I was a bit sceptical about how this was going to go. The venue was an unusual choice for the kind of event and it wasn’t as busy as I would have liked. So we sat down, and on came the first support act. I can’t even remember who it was, I think I’ve blocked him from memory (if by some weird coincidence you get to read this, sorry honey, you just weren’t my style at all). So by that point I was feeling pretty, yk, what the hell have I walked into, when Sensorites started playing. If you’re into music, then you’ll know exactly how it is when you discover something new and amazing. When your ears prick and the hairs on the back of your neck stand up and the sound just seems to seduce your brain to a puddle on the floor. They have a sound that I won’t even try and describe because there’s no way that I’d do it justice, and it’s the kind of thing that you should discover for yourself. I’ve seen them twice since that night and both times, they have sounded brilliant. I’m just completely loving their sound – it is definitely my soundtrack for the moment. Go and check out their website!

I’m obsessed with reading, but I’ve been that busy this month or so that I haven’t had 5 minutes to pick up a new book, which is kind of soul destroying. Trying to find the time to sit down and read the highway code for my driving lessons is hard enough! Watch this space for a little review on the book I have sitting at home desperately waiting for me to pick up J

B xxo

Elemis Tri-Enzyme Resurfacing Gel Mask

After me sending them an email Elemis sent me some sample sachets through the post, including two sachets of their Tri-Enzyme Resurfacing Gel Mask. I tried it and absolutely loved it and was devastated when I used both sachets up. I always meant to get a bottle and completely forgot, but then in an odd turn of events when I was cleaning my wardrobe out this weekend I found a tube in the bottom I'd obviously acquired somewhere along the way and thrown at the bottom of a pile without trying. Yay for unexpected surprises!

Finding this has had me falling in love with it all over again. It comes out as a clear gel that smells sweet and almost citrus-ey. You need very little to cover your entire face (excluding mouth and eyes) then you leave it on for ten to fifteen minutes (consider this time an excuse to lie back in the bath and flick through our blog...). When on the skin this has a really weird feeling, it tingles as it dries and it feels for all the world like when you breathe in cold air after eating a mint, which isn't a bad thing given that it really reassure me that it's working. After this simply wash off (use a flannel, if you use your hands it seems to just re-moisten the mask), then do whatever you normally would do.

I'm usually pretty dubious about face masks, I've had ones that make me break out, ones that smell horrible and ones that literally just don't work, but this smells lovely and seems to leave me with clean, shiny, fresh skin. At £48 this isn't a cheap product, but given that it's a once a week ritual I'd say it's definitely worth the money, I'll be repurchasing when I've used up all the samples I can get my hands on!

Sammy xo

Purity Made Simple Cleanser

I'm not entirely sure how I came across this cleanser, I think perhaps it was in my British Beauty Blogger edit box, but I was aware of it as a product before hand. Philosophy Purity Made Simple is a cult cleanser which seems to have no limits, it's a cleanser that is - in my opinion - for beginners.

I'll be the first to admit that cleansers aren't really something that I'm well versed in, I use them (obviously) but I've always gone back to my very cheap, very basic Garnier. I really wanted this to change my mind, having heard a lot about philosophy as a brand, and actually it really has swayed me. It's a yellow lotion that borders on being a cream, which struck me as odd from the very beginning. I'm adverse to using cold creams to take my make up off and that's exactly what this felt like. It's a personal choice but for me, I always feel like I should have taken my make up off with something else prior to using anything that comes out with a texture like Purity does. It does smell amazing though, like an old fashioned lavender (actually, not unlike STEAMCREAM), and it's applied to damp skin so I hoped that the lotion-ey feel wouldn't last too long, so even though I was put off by the consistency I decided to give it a chance.

Applied onto a damp face you really don't need much at all, the website suggests "the size of a twenty pence piece" and that's probably more than enough. It needs to be massaged in for a while and then washed off with warm water and patted dry. I was impressed in its ability to remove my eye make-up, and although it didn't take all of my foundation off first time around, I'm yet to find a cleanser that does.

All the above sold me on the product but there was one thing that made sure it beat out any competitors ; the lazy girl factor. This is a 3-in-1 so not only is it cleansing, but toning and moisturising too, so in one easy step you're set for a full skincare regime. For 240ml this is around £17.50 which is about average for a higher end product and I'd say that it's definitely worth it, especially for beginners and lazy girls because this is a one stop product that gives you the benefits of a three step system.

Sammy xo

George Cheeky Tint! Lip and Cheek Tint

This is one of the summer products I've read a lot about and have been dying to get my hands on, cheeky tint! From George at Asda. Never have I heard such glowing reviews for such a budget make-up brand and, I'll admit, I was shocked. George make-up isn't a new discovery for me and it conjured up long forgotten memories of cheap gloopy nail varnish and eyeshadow clearly marketed at children. Having said that, when I stumbled across the tint (finally!) in store , I was pleasantly surprised, it seems George might just be becoming a company to be reckoned with.

The bottles aren't dissimilar to benefit's trademark posie tint and benetint, wide and short rather than tall and thin. In fact, at first glance they resemble nail polish bottles, which isn't displeasing to the eye, especially with George's new branding and the bottles being a nice mix of transparent, metallic and solid colour. Finding myself stuck between pink blossom (a much softer pink suited to my skin tone) and rose (a much deeper red that appealed to the daring side of me) I ended up buying both, but given that I only paid £3.50 for 8ml of each, it didn't exactly break the bank. However I probably could have bought just one as, although they look completely different when first put onto the skin, the blended results are pretty similar (the picture of my lips above has rose on the bottom lip and pink blossom on the top to demonstrate).

Although the results are pretty much the same, I can see how people could quickly develop a favourite between the two, the products are alike in colour alone. Rose goes on dark red and watery, with a distinct soapy smell and taste , whereas pink blossom is bright pink, much creamier and tastes almost like watermelon. It's mainly a preference choice, but I have to say I'm a bigger fan of rose. 

Both colours give a delicate flush if applied as just one layer, I would imagine you could build them up if you have the time and inclination , but I would expect it to take a fair few layers given that two looks essentially no different to just one. As expected from a stain , it does settle uncomfortably into lip lines but I've found a quick layer of Carmex or any similar lip balm levels it out nicely. I'd suggest applying a bit with the built in brushes and then use a blusher brush or a lipstick brush to blend it, otherwise you end up with stained fingers for the rest of the day.

Overall I have to say I'm really impressed , and in my eyes although the colours provided by benefit are stronger, cheeky tint ! Will definitely be replacing benetint in my make up bag for daily use, and at just £3.50 a pop, why not !

Sammy xo

Waitrose Baby Bottom Butter

For those of you that missed the craze a few years ago, Baby Bottom Butter is a cream formulated by and sold in Waitrose. Although as the name suggests, it was originally formulated as a sort of barrier cream for nappy rash (not unlike sudocrem), it quickly strayed into the realm of being a must have face product. Being swept up in the craze (which is so unlike me...) I bought a couple of pots when I took a trip to see my brother in Newcastle, and then promptly left them gathering dust in the back of my wardrobe for the next couple of months. 

  When I finally got around to trying the cream, it quickly escalated into being one of my favourite beauty essentials. The texture of the cream is really odd, but not necessarily in a bad way. It doesn't come out smooth but instead more like some primers that I've used in the past, slightly thicker than other creams that I've used, and not as glossy. This does mean that you barely need to use any each time though, making the £2.89 for 125ml price tag more than reasonable (read: bargain). One tub can literally last months, even if you're applying it twice a day like I sometimes do. Although I have used it for most parts of my body, I've found that even when my hands are completely chapped in the middle of winter the cream can take a while to absorb and it does leave greasy finger marks wherever I put my hands, having said that it does work perfectly for a sort of intense relief if you smother your hands in it and then wear cotton gloves to bed, and it does make the skin smooth as , well... a baby's bottom.   
Although I have used it on my legs and arms, I tend to stick to my face with this cream, and I stand by it being one of the only products in my make-up bag that I'm truly loyal to. I was worried about putting this on my face, I'll admit, being that I have fairly oily skin, but I found that it works perfectly as long as I use as little as possible whilst still covering my entire face. Even better, it makes the perfect primer! I've found the tiniest layer underneath my foundation can keep my make-up in place perfectly even when I'm at work for the day, plus I've also found you can use it in the place of cold cream (if you're that way inclined) to take off your make-up at the end of the day (although be careful not to get it in your eyes because it really stings.)
The packaging is very simple, as you would expect from a product intended for mothers, yet very elegantly designed, as you would expect from Waitrose. The clear plastic allows you to see what is left, and the screw on lid makes the packaging seems secure even when travelling with it. All in all, it's the perfect product, exactly the right balance of luxury and affordability.   
Plus, last but not least, the cream both smells and looks like vanilla ice cream, hugely addictive!   
Sammy xo

Rimmel Wake Me Up Foundation

So, in my constantly ongoing battle to find the perfect foundation, I recently purchased the Rimmel Wake Me Up Foundation. After reading and watching lots of people give it excellent reviews I thought it was worth trying it out myself. I have normal/combination skin with some dryness on my forehead and am very conscious of colour patches, meaning a good foundation is paramount to how I feel about myself. So I went out and bought the wake me up foundation from boots, for £8.99, in the lightest shade.
The packaging of this product is really nice. It comes in a glass bottle, making it feel much more expensive than it actually is. The bright orange lid is particularly eye catching, which I am also a fan of. However, the glass bottle does make it difficult to tell how much of the foundation you have left. Most days I don't use a lot of foundation, and this one hasn't lasted me as long as other high street brands. It has medium coverage but is definitely buildable. I often use a small amount on problem areas just to even out my skin tone, almost like a tinted moisturiser, and this works nicely. Alternatively when applying all over the face, I find that the foundation covers blemishes really well, and stays put all day. It has a natural looking, dewey finish and the tiny flecks of shimmer do give you a glowing look. I also really like that it has an SPF of 15, as we are going into the summer months this is important to me (look after your skin in the sun guys!)

The main problem I have with this foundation, is that the lightest shade is too orange toned for my skin, which is a real shame because I like everything else about. Yes, I am pale, but not really any more than the average non fake tanning English teenager. Therefore I think it's a bit rubbish that Rimmel don't cater for my skin tone. The range of colours to choose from was very limited. The pump allows you to dispense just the right amount out of the bottle, and it has a really lovely, fresh cucumber smell.
To sum up, I liked this foundation. The coverage is good, and can be build up depending on personal preference. It can be applied with fingers or a brush and is really easy to blend. The finish does have that "wake me up" effect that it claims, but I wouldn't recommend it for oily skin. Yes, it is suitable for sensitive skin, and it does smell lovely. For the price, I think it was a good buy. But due to the mismatch of colours I will not be repurchasing.
If you're reading this, thanks! And I hope it helps if you're thinking of buying this foundation.
B xxo

Barbara Daly Soufflé Foundation

I’ll be the first to admit, me and foundation have a long running love/hate relationship. As a girl very rarely seen in public without foundation, I consider it a necessity and yet I’m still struggling to find a foundation I’m willing to have a long term relationship with. Having said that, I’m currently using Barbara Daly Souffle Foundation in “Soft Linen” (£7.25 for 20ml) and I’m fairly pleased with the results.

The packaging is fairly basic, a clear plastic pot allowing you to see the colour and a black lid bearing the product name and the Barbara Daly symbol, but makes it look slightly more upmarket than other products of a similar price. For the amount you get, the foundation is pretty fairly priced, around the same price as similar soufflé foundations that I’ve tried (and abandoned) in the past. A 20ml pot can last me around 6 weeks, and given that I often get more than one pot in one go thanks to tempting Tesco 3-for-2 offers, for under £15 I can usually get around 4 months worth of foundation.

The coverage of the foundation is good, though can quickly look thick if I'm slightly too heavy handed . However, it looks soft and natural for the most part , with a light matte finish with the slightest of coverings, even for someone with oily skin like me, however, the make up does catch awkwardly on dry patches of skin . The make-up has a soft feel to it and has a flawless look without the need of concealer if applied with the fingers (in my experience, application with a brush leaves unsightly lines throughout) but as waitress , running up and down the stairs and… ahem… perspiration is part of my everyday job so one important factor for me is how well the make-up lasts. I know, I know, I could just use primer but, I’ll be honest, I always forget to buy it when I’m searching for make-up essentials, and so I like a foundation that lasts well without the need for it. This does, for the most part, although often even if I haven’t been in work I find it’s rubbed off my forehead and my nose by the end of the day if I don’t find the time to top it up. It’s not the end of the world, but it is a niggly problem I find I have with this foundation that I haven’t encountered with others.

One of my biggest issues with this foundation (and most other foundations) is skin match. As a girl who is horrendously pale but with pinkish undertones, I find it really difficult to find matches with my skin, which I still think is weird given that I assume it's fairly common. However, I do find that soft linen isn’t too bad, but is perhaps slightly more orangey than I might like, and I have to admit I find this with a fair few other Barbara Daly products.

Overall, I feel like I’m not appalled by this foundation, but it’s not a love affair of any kind. It’s a foundation of fair quality that lasts fairly well,  but no doubt it will be forgotten by the end of the year and replaced by something new (although admittedly that might just be down to a personality trait!)

Sammy xo