Makeup

Get Free Shipping on Cargo: The Cargo Cosmetics Collection for Spring 2011

January 21st, 2011 by Karen 74 Comments

Cargo Safari Collection

All aboard! The cosmetics captains at Cargo aimed to take us on a trip with their new spring 2011 collection, and I like the destination.

I took a long, leisurely look at the six piece collection today (aren’t the pouches cute?) and absolutely love the travel theme. Most of the color products lean warm, and I think they work well with my yellow undertones. If you like the way you look in warmer shades, you might like them too.

For what it’s worth, don’t miss the Voyages Safari collection/kit. I was surprised by how great the products looked on both darker and lighter skin tones.

Now I just need someplace to go! 🙂

The entire collection includes

Four cute kits with special Voyages packaging…

Voyages Gloss Collection ($32 for five mini glosses with a sheer finish and a non-sticky texture)
Voyages Bronzing Collection ($25 for a bronzer in Medium and a kabuki brush; exclusive to Sephora counters inside JCPenney stores)
Voyages Water Resistant Collection ($25 for a full-size Water Resistant Bronzer and a mini Better-than-Waterproof Mascara; exclusive to Ulta stores)
Voyages Safari Collection ($34; contains one full-size eyeshadow duo, blush in Coral Beach and eye pencil in Khaki, and mini versions of CARGO’s lip gloss in Serengeti and Triple Action Mascara)

Other travel necessities…

JetLag Concealer ($32; available in two shades)
Mascara-Mascara! ($20; comes with travel-size versions of four bestselling CARGO mascaras)

CARGO Voyages Spring Collection

cargo spring 2011 all

cargo spring in boxes

Voyages Safari Collection

Cargo Safari Collection in hand

Cargo Safari Collection back

Cargo Safari Collection products
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Seeing the World Through Sephora Lash Plumper Mascara

January 21st, 2011 by Karen 14 Comments

Written by Kris

When you smile with your eyes, try it while wearing the subject of today’s guest post from Kris.

Sephora Lash Plumper Mascara

When it came to my attention that Sephora Beauty Insiders got a free gift on their birthday, the first thing I did was shout “FREE GIFT!” The second thing I did was get myself down to my local Sephora on my bday to collect.

I received a nice little set with a mini-eyeliner, mascara and eyeshadow. The mascara looked promising, but I wasn’t holding out the highest hopes because I have high standards when it comes to mascaras, and I want the ones I use to lengthen and create volume at the same time (the spider-leg-look doesn’t appeal to me). I don’t like flaking, smudging, or wet/runny formulas at all, and I don’t want them to be so hard to remove that I have to wash my eyes three times in a row. I can’t stand that.

It had seemed to me that I would never find my mascara mate. That was, until my birthday date with Sephora Lash Plumper mascara.

The first things I noticed were the wand and brush head. I’d been using Covergirl Lashblast Fusion and hated the bulky head. Sephora’s has your normally slender wand style with a typical volumizing head — and not with the gel-like bristles that most mascaras have nowadays. This brush tapers off at the tip, which makes it ideal for getting into corners. As for the packaging, it’s no-nonsense, no frills or flash, but that doesn’t bother me in the least.

Sephora Lash Plumper Mascara

After examining the wand and brush, I checked the formula. It’s absolutely perfect! It’s never dripping wet (like Lancome Hypnose Drama) nor bone dry (like Covergirl Lashblast Volume), and it doesn’t fall off in gobs at the tip.
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Estee Lauder Is Wild About Violets: The Wild Violet Makeup Collection for Spring 2011

January 21st, 2011 by Karen 25 Comments

estee lauder untamed violet eyeshadow swatches

I swung by the mall yesterday on my way to get my bangs trimmed and snuck in some swatches of these beautiful Wild Violets (Estee Lauder’s limited edition collection for spring). 🙂

Available now on counters and online, the collection features coppery neutrals, trendy grays and purples for eyes and nails; and adventurous corals, reds, pinks and violets for lips.

estee lauder wild violet swatches display

estee lauder wild violet swatches lipsticks and glosses

For reference, I’m an NC35 (have you tried the MAC Foundation Finder?).

estee lauder wild violet swatches quad
Eyeshadow Palette in Wild Violet Pure Color ($42)
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The NYX 10 Color Palette in Bohemian Rhapsody Is Fit for a Queen

January 20th, 2011 by Karen 60 Comments

nyx bohemian rhapsody

Any way the wind blows, doesn’t really matter to me…because the NYX 10 Color Palette in Bohemian Rhapsody makes everything better. It comes with 10 of the line’s most wearable neutrals in shades of silver, taupe, brown, beige, gray, peach and black, all for an easily digestible $11 (and they even included a case!).

NYX tends to get a little repetitive with their 10-Color Palettes. I say, NYX tends to get a little repetitive with their 10-Color Palettes, but a variety of matte and shimmery finishes keeps this Bohemian Rhapsody from singing the same song twice.

What’s my favorite way to wear it? I like to add one of the lighter mattes to my brow bone, sweep a slightly darker matte in the crease, pat one of the shimmers on the lid, and then define both my lash and water lines with the matte in black.

Each and every time I open this thing I want to break into song! — like I’m a long lost Von Trapp child (who happens to be brown). 🙂

nyx bohemian rhapsody

nyx bohemian rhapsody swatches with flash
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Just How Smooth Is the New Dolce & Gabbana Smooth Eye Colour Quad in Eden?

January 19th, 2011 by Karen 42 Comments

Amid the deluge of gray falling on eye palettes this spring, Dolce & Gabbana stands out. In the pan, their Smooth Eye Colour Quad in Eden ($59) looks like a garden with pretty pastels in mint green and pink.

Dolce & Gabbana usually scores with their quads — hitting them out of the park with rich pigmentation, a buttery, easy-to-blend texture, and shadows that exhibit very little fallout, but I think this new one falls a little short.

As the one and only quad in the new Secret Garden Collection, Eden’s shadows are uncharacteristically uneven when applied.

I wore the colors in the palette today and kinda struggled to blend them together. They weren’t as smooth as I’m used to from the brand and looked patchier then I would’ve liked.

Dolce Gabbana Secret Garden Eden Smooth Eye Colour Quad
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I Feel Good About the New NARS Multi-Protect Pro Primer

January 19th, 2011 by Karen 50 Comments

Look out! It’s a primer triple threat! From the fertile mind of Francois Nars, the new NARS Pro-Prime Multi-Protect Primer SPF 30 ($32) creates a smooth canvas for your makeup while it supposedly nourishes skin with a bevy of plant-based ingredients.

This newest member of the permanent NARS Pro Prime line has a colorless, lotion-like texture that feels light and fluffy to the touch. Oil-free, it totally reminds of Urban Decay’s Complexion Primers, absorbing quickly without leaving a greasy residue or white cast on my skin.

I like the texture, and I do notice smoother makeup with it on (especially in pictures).

NARS bills this as a “treatment face primer.” Sounds good, right? 🙂 And they identify two plants as key to the product’s many benefits: Gentiana Urnula, a Himalayan flower used in Tibetan medicine for its anti-oxidative properties; and Indian Frankincese, used in Aruveydic medicine as an anti-inflammatory.

I dug around and found a handful of studies involving Indian Frankincense to treat asthma, cancer and arthritis, as well as one directly related to skin care, but I didn’t find any studies pertaining to Gentiana Urnula.

I think it’s cool that NARS is looking to ancient medicine for ingredients (if people have been using the stuff for centuries, it should be good for something, right?), but some data to back up the product’s claims would help, as would clearer language. Which compounds provide which benefits? Inquiring minds want to know.
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The Lancome Ultra Lavande Collection for Spring 2011: Now THAT’s a Lot of Purple

January 19th, 2011 by Karen 47 Comments

lancome ultra lavande

It’s time to bust out your lighter and sway back and forth, because Lancome’s new spring makeup collection is a regular Prince!

As in Purple Rain. 🙂

Just how much purple are we talking about here? Well, if you crammed a thousand Prince impersonators, all of them wearing sparkling purple suits with matching ruffled shirts, into one HUGE room, that would be less purple than Ultra Lavande, Lancome’s spring release of new and repromoted items for eyes, lips and cheeks.

Lancome invoked the ’70s for the product names, and some of them are great (Disco Silver and Le 54?). I don’t know though… Doesn’t the promo pic remind you more of the ’80s than the decade before? Check out the model’s Brook Shields brows and the blocks of color on her eyes. I mean, she could pass for one of those jungle girls from Hungry Like the Wolf (or an extra on Dynasty).

When I saw these pics, my first thought was, “This is a purple version of LM’s Silk Road.” Heck, there’s even a dash of gold on the eyes.

Butterflies Fever Ultra Lavande Blush, $40

Color Design Eyeshadow Quad in Ultra Lavande, $42
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The Clarins Neo Pastels Collection Turns Down the Lights

January 18th, 2011 by Karen 19 Comments

clarins neo pastels

I wonder what would Neo from The Matrix would think about the new Clarins Neo Pastels Collection. Would he consider ditching his black cloak and brooding persona for its uplifting makeup in pink, purple and peach?

I highly doubt it, but ya never know. 🙂

SCI-FI SIDE NOTE: Now, my girl Trinity would probably dig that pop of black liner the Neo Pastels model is wearing on her lower lash line, but I digress…

Back to makeup in three, two, one…

Available now on counters and online at clarinsusa.com, the new Neo Pastels Collection features 21 new and repromoted items consisting of an eye palette, six blushes, 12 lipsticks, one mascara and a wrinkle-smoothing primer in a palette of primarily soft pinks, purples, peaches, with a sprinkling of neutral brown, beige and black thrown in for safe measure. To me the colors seem like typical (in a good way) spring/Easter shades.

clarins neo pastel display

With the collection, Clarins says they wanted to celebrate the annual spring renewal by interpreting pastels in a new way. Like Chanel did with pearly finishes in Les Perles de Chanel, Clarins tried to play with varying degrees of sheen, shade and shine to give faces, eyes and cheeks a subtle radiance — almost like a halo of color.

At least that was the idea. Looking at the swatches now, the concept might have been lost on me, but I wouldn’t say that’s a bad thing. I do like many of these colors, but they’re darker than typical pastels — a good thing, perhaps, if darker also makes them wearable on a wider range of skin tones.

Take the Eye Colour & Liner Palette ($40), for instance, and I’m hoping its brown, pink and violet shades will be wearable by pale princesses and tan temptresses alike.

Still, gals who had their hearts set on pure pastels might want to look elsewhere, like to Dolce & Gabbana’s Secret Garden, with its more traditional pastel greens, violets and pinks.

Grays have been showing up in several of this spring’s collections from lines like Chanel, Dior, Dolce & Gabbana and Laura Mercier, but I was quite surprised not to find any in Neo Pastels. Nada. Zilch. Zero. You won’t find any gray here, folks!

But while you won’t find any gray, you will probably spot some fingerprints. I can already tell that trying to keep this packaging pristine will be a useless endeavor because prints are easy to notice sitting on the surface of these shiny gold compacts. Not a big deal, but it might be something for the super spies with secret identities to consider. 🙂

The first time I saw the model in the promo pic at the top of this post, I fell in love with her eyes. The ethereal purples and pinks suck you in and then POW! — there’s that black liner along the waterline. She’s like a biker angel. All she needs now is a leather jacket to ride her winged hog into the sky…
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