MizzWorthy let loose in London...AKA the Clarins Event.

Yesterday I was invited with Olivia and LipsAndLashes to an event in Selfridges in London by Clarins - ButtonSoph was also invited but her car broke down on the way! Lovely Olivia met me in the station and we navigated our way to Oxford Circus (all of two stops on the tube - we truly were explorers of the unknown lol!)...

When we arrived we were met by a couple of lovely PR peeps from Clarins, including Alexandrea who sent us the invites. We had a look at the new Autumn range called "Nude Inspirations", and a look around the new skin spa. At first I thought the idea of the skin spa in the middel of Selfridges seemed a little strange, but believe me, when the door is shut, that place is like a little have in the middle of London - blissful... I wanted every treatment in the book lol! They apparently have achair that scans your body and does a massage tailored to you while you have a facial - I want some of that!

We also each had a skin consultation and then went off for breakfast - We were told to expect a parcel by special delivery this morning, but I have to say I felt very sorry for the poor post lady who kindly lugged a huge pack of goodies up to the flat for me this morning;

I was totally bowled over when I opened it and saw all this!
So we recieved our skincare regimes (further posts and reviews to come about this as I am still testing another skincare regime at the moment!) - but yep, thats Beauty Flash Balm in there!
And on top of that we received absolutely loads of makeup!

I have to say, I wasn't expecting too much from these eye-shadow mono's as the last time I swatched them at a counter (a couple of years ago...), I thought they were poorly pigmented and the colour choices were a bit... safe? I have to say though, they have definately improved in terms of pigmentation and although the colours are still fairly safe, you could create a lot of different looks - nude, smoky and coloured. I'll be trying to create a few looks over the coming days and weeks to see how versatile these are! These retail at £12.73 each and also have a mirror in the lid which is always useful for us cosmopolitan girls on the go (well at least thats how I like to think of myself....)

They also sent this nude quad palette out - I can see this one being popular too! I'd personally use this with a fierce black winged liner and a bold red lip to get that classic pin up look, but I know a lot of people will be relieved to see such an easy to use combination of colours...This retails for £25.44.

We also recieved 6 shades of "Joli Rouge" Lipsticks. These are a lot better on than they look in the tubes - the one that looks brown (4th from the left) is actually a lovely sheer plummy pink. They have a lovely fruity scent (Blackcurrant with a touch of liquorice and vanilla apparently!) and are supposed to be extremely kind to the lips with skin loving goodies such as mango butter and vitamin e - stay tuned for a review!

We also recieved three tubes of their reformulated "Wonder Perfect" Mascara in three shades - Wonder Black, Wonder Brown and Wonder Blue - Coloured mascaras seem to be rocking right now! In fact though these are quite subtle - the blue is almost navy and not 80's at all - I tried it this morning in bed to see if it matched my PJs (as one does) and it makes the whites of the eyes look very clear... I still need to try the concealers too - they sent me three shades and I'm hoping one will be pale enough for me!

Finally we received a face an blush duo (retailing at £28) which is a lovely two tiered affair containing a face powder and illuminating powder on the top layer;

... and a peachy blush (this reminds me of NARS orgasm!) and a bronzer embellished with a golden powder section - very pretty! Can all obviously be used swished together or seperately...

The other great product in the collection they showed us was the eye brow pro palette - which I really liked the look of - it had three brow powders in good ashy colours (ie no red undertones - a giveaway in a bad brow powder!) - black, brown and blonde shades, a setting wax, highligher powder, mini tweezers, spoolie brush and sponge applicator - thats going to retail at £28, and I can see myself making a purchase...

My initial thoughts? I'm surprised by the improvements in quality in the Clarins makeup range, and I'm looking forward to the challenge of giving this neutral collection a MizzWorthy twist!

So, how did I spend the rest of the day? I met up for lunch with Alex from Illamasqua and had a good gossip about the next competition which we'll be launching soon! I was great to see her again for a catch up as I didn't get to speak to her at the Illamasqua masterclass - she was too busy being the model for Alex Box, so can't really blame her lol!

I also met a couple of lovely PR ladies - Jen from FuelPR and Lisa from Immediate PR, who have also furnished me with loads of other goodies to review including Sun Labs fake tan which smells of baby powder, (this is never a bad thing in my opinion), an anti acne range for Mr MizzWorthy to test, some new hair products and some BarryM - I am pleased to announce I finally have the lip paint in Peachy Pink - and I agree its a lovely colour - here is the obligatory lip close up!

I also made a trip to the Selfridges beauty hall (rude not to!) and picked up a couple of OPI shades - "I'm a Princess and You're Not" and "Done Out in Deco"... I also popped to MAC to get one of those Naked Honey Skin Salves and some clean up tips, and I was actually amazed by how bad the service was there - One girl behind the counter just ignored all the customers and the one who did eventually deign to serve me called me "babe" several times in a very patronising manner, and actually asked me "what colour" salve I wanted! Proof positive that they are bringing out too many collections - the poor dear clearly couldn't keep up. Poor service aside though, I am liking the salve...

I then had to hang about for my train so I painted my nails with OPI's "I'm a Princess and You're Not", which is a pretty colour but I fear it makes my hands look a bit dead... opinions please?

I have no idea what to play with first though, so please feel free to make requests etc!

MizzWorthy xxx

London Haulage!!! Shu Uemara, Mac Pro etc!

Hi everyone,

So its finally time to share the goods, and show you the things I got from lovely London - this lot of course doesn't include all the lovely goodies the Body Shop gave us! Obviously I don't often get the chance to go to London (this was only the second time I've ever managed to go!), so I was determined to take full advantage of the possibilities! I must say thanks too to the lovely Jasmine ( http://oxfordjasmine.blogspot.com/ ) for meeting up with me and showing me the shops etc!

First stop was Shu Uemura - I was absolutely thrilled to go, and to be honest I wish I'd bought a few more things now - I don't really have access to this brand where I live, so I should have taken more advantage of the opportunity - I'm really really pleased with what I did get though!

I bought a gorgeous blue eye shadow, which has a lovely metallic silver-aqua undertone. It called "me blue 600", I also got a lovely orange shimmery "glow on blush", in the shade "P Orange 53". This photo is for some reason making the blush look really dark, and it's homestly not!



I've also swatched the colours - I had to swatch the blusher fairly heavily by the way - it comes out very sheer on the cheek when applied with a brush by the way - I just wanted to show you the colour!



Next up I went to "B Never too Busy to B Beautiful", which is the cosmetics branch of the "Lush" company - as you would expect, the company prides itself on its anti-animal-cruelty stance, and all it's products are vegan - they also have an online shop too...

I only picked up a couple of things here as I didn't really have a lot of time to browse - I bought a lipstick and a cream eye colour...



The cream colour is a really unusual shade - green and orange mixed together if that makes any sense! I thought this might make a nice base for greens and oranges etc, and I also thought it would look good with "club" shadow from MAC which I already own...

Next up, we took a little trip to the MAC store in Covent garden, which is a non-pro store (Pro goodies coming up!), and I picked up a few bits from the sugarsweet and colour ready collections, as well as MACs clean up sticks which are really really hand little cotton buds all prepped with makeup remover and individually wrapped, perfect for sweeping away mistakes! I also picked up the new prep and prime powder, and Lipsticks in "lollipop lovin", "bubbles" and "show orchid". I've wanted show orchid for ages, but it was a pro product til this collection came out.



I'm not sure about the prep and prime powder yet - to be honest I find it a little bit gritty, and I haven't noticed any magical reduction in lines etc when I use it...

After the Body Shop event, we all tracked up the road to the MAC Pro store...

I only ended up picking up a couple of things at MAC pro - I'm really annoyed with myself though, cos I forgot to buy mixing medium, which I really want - I might make a phone order for them in the end, as I'm unlikely to be back in London anytime soon lol!

I picked up some invisible setting powder, which I really like - it keeps foundation put and doesn't dull it down. I'm so pleased with it, and the tub is really big too so should last me for ages! I also got a paintpot in "Delft", a blue colour I've liked for ages - that shu uemura shadow gave me the excuse to finally get it, as I thought this would make a perfect base for that shade, and I also picked up another lipstick in "Violetta" a pro shade I've been eyeing up for a while on the pro website...


The photo makes violetta look really really dark, but it actually isn't. It sounds just like it's name too - a true violet purple shade as you can see in the swatch below...


Final MAC purchase of the day was "Gorgeous Gold" in pan form for my quad palette - I'm not sure what colours I'll be teaming with this, but I fell in love with it as it it seems to have a lovely lime green tone to it...



I also wanted to show you a little something non London related but forgot to show you all - Bobbi Brown's Brights Palette..

This is a limited edition palette for spring/summer 2009. I have never bought anything from Bobbi Brown before, but I was impressed with the look of this - I love bright shade and this looked like it had a great range of colours in it. And that is true, but I have to say, the actual size of the shadows is very small - I'm talking smaller then a 5p coin here... The colours are amazing, with great range of shade, they are well pigmented and easy to blend. I do like the palette, but I suppose for a few pence short of £50 I'd hoped for larger sized shadows... It's perfect for travel though, and I'm glad I have the range of colours to play with... Does anyone else have this? What do you all think?

So there you go... London called and I hauled!

Hope you enjoyed

Love

MizzWorthy xxx

Body Shop Bloggers Event

Hi everyone!

Hope you are all well... so by now I'm sure you will have seen the pics of all the free booty we got from the Body Shop at the blogger event that they held for us yesterday, so I'm not going to rub salt into the wounds over that lol - suffice to say we were all overwhelmed by the amount of products we were given to try out...

One of the best things about the day, was getting the chance to meet up with some of the other bloggers in person (amongst others I met Oxford Jasmine, Becky/Sirvinya, Natalia of FilthyGorgeousMakeup, Becky from Panda Does Makeup, and Bubblegarm who are all as lovely in real life as you would expect!) - we all found it a bit strange at first... It was odd seeing each other in 3-D at first, but we all got over the wierdness quickly and ended up having a great time chatting and swapping stories about blogging and youtubing... Here we all are outside the MAC pro store (We couldn't resist a trip there - I'm kicking myself for forgetting to pick up mixing medium though!). The lovely oxford jasmine (http://www.oxfordjasmine.blogspot.com/) kindly sent me this photo and you can check out her page as well to see her thoughts on the day!

We all had a starstruck moment at MAC pro, as we saw Nicola from Pixiwoo of youtube in there, it was very funny! Thanks so much to all the other bloggers who attended - in particular oxfordjasmine who helped me find my way around the big smoke - I think without her I'd still be wondering around covent garden somewhere like a lost soul! All the girls were so lovely.

The people who organised the event were all really friendly and approachable, and mentioned it was possible that further events would be held in the future, so if you didn't get to go this time, there is still hope lol!

We all had the opportunity to have a makeover done by the makeup artist Chase Aston, who works closely with the body shop on the day. These were all filmed and we'll all be recieving our own copies of this, which I'm hoping I'll be able to upload for you to see.

Here is a couple of pics of me after Chase worked his magic!

I asked him to show me how to make blue eyeshadow wearable for me - as someone with blue eyes I never really knew how to wear the colour, and thoughts of Pat Butcher have always made me slightly afraid of the colour!

He also did a demonstration on a model before we all had our makeup done, and his tips for summer trends included making the smoky eye wearable for the summer by blending softly with fingers rather than doing a precise application with brushes. He also mentioned using a couple of drops of facial oil (he used the Body Shops vitamin E oil) underneath foundation to produce a dewy look for the summer, and keeping the lower lashline clear to keep the look modern. I'll be reviewing the facial oil amongst other things as soon as I have had a chance to have a play!

The organisers of the event gave us lots of information on the ethics behind the company and their Fair Trade and anti animal cruelty policies. They also introduced us to a new campaign that they are running in conjunction with MTV called "Yes Yes Yes", which is about promoting safe sex and awareness of HIV and AIDS in young people. This is such an important cause - most people in the 16-24 age group are more worried about the risk of pregnancy or chlamydia/gonorrhoea at the moment, but STI's like syphylis and HIV are on the increase in general and this age group is at risk. The body shop are now producing a limited edition lip butter which retails for £5 in the UK. All the profits from this lip butter go towards raising HIV and AIDS awareness in this age group, and in the UK that amounts to £3.98 from each lip balm. This is such an important cause! The lip butter is actually really nice too, and contains extracts of dragonfruit, which looks like this!

You can find out more information about this campaign and the scary statistics about the current levels of HIV/AIDS in the younger age group by clicking on www.yestosafesex.com

Stay tuned for reviews of some of the products we recieved... My reviews will be honest and unbiased as always! I would never recommend any product either on my blog or on you tube that I didn't feel was a decent one!

Love MizzWorthy

xxxx

PS - I'm away over the weekend so I'm unable to blog until Sunday, but please keep those contest entries coming in for the Illamasqua comp!