Hair & Beauty

The formula is very watery, which I found quite strange as it loses its proper colour once I applied just one drop onto my face.I had to go in 2-3times of droplets until I actually got some colour out of it.The smell isn't really that pleasant either, which I was quite shocked about as normally L'Oréal produce some lovely scented products.This one smells a little bit chemically, and although it doesn't linger after applying, you can always smell it when you take the top off.

Not much information was provided when it came to blending it out, so for the first time I used my finger and the second I used a beauty blender.This was actually really hard to blend with both and actually dragged my foundation with it, leaving it streaky.To me its just too watery and its more of a shimmer, than an actual highlighter in my opinion.Its not that pigmented at all, which again I'm shocked about as L'Oréal usually deliver.It didn't set as a powder after leaving it on my face for 30minutes and even with applying a setting powder on top didn't really do anything.I didn't want to give up on this product just yet, so I decided to mix it in with a foundation to see how that works.It did work a little better at first, only slightly making it luminous, but it then began to break down my foundation,

I decided to do a swatch comparison to another highlighter that I own by L'Oréal, so you can see the different formulas.Both were applied with my finger with one swipe and without a base.Both were left on my arm for 45minutes, with the top formula starting to break down and the other completely set after a few minutes.The formula of the glow drops was still wet after an hour and in no way set as a "powder" as advertised.Out of the two, I would pick the Liquid Illuminator by far, purely because its:

Every time I'm low on money, L'Oréal end up coming out with new products which I obviously NEED to buy.L'Oréal have been on there makeup game recently and I nearly had everything to complete a whole makeup look, but two important products were missing for me.I'm so excited to talk about these, but the real question is, are these products "worth it?"

I've always struggled to find a concealer for me by L'Oréal that isn't too light, too dark or that hasn't got a pink undertone.I was doing pretty well with just using there True Match Foundation for this, as it pretty much covered most of my dark circles, but its nice to have that brightening look under the eyes sometimes if you get what I mean?There are 14shades available to choose from and because they haven't rolled out at my local drugstores yet, I just had to completely guess my shade.At the time of purchase, there were no guidelines to show which shades suited what skin tones, so it was really hard to work out what the shades looked like.I assumed that you go for the corresponding shade to either your True Match or Mineral Foundation, but nothing was explained at the time, however L'Oréal have now provided images for this to help you.

I decided to take advantage of the 3 for 2 offer at Boots, picking the shades Beige (4.N) and Golden Beige (3.D/W).The beige shade has more of a pink undertone to it, whereas the golden beige has more of a yellow and golden undertones.These concealers are designed to:

The applicator reminds me a lot of the Urban Decay Naked Skin Concealer, being extremely soft and flexible.The scent also reminds me of that concealer as well, with the beige shade being slightly more scented, but the smell fades after blending it out.The formulas have a little bit of difference, with the beige shade being more watery, but since this concealer is lightweight and buildable, it doesn't leave it looking cakey.Below is three images showing it just being applied, the second it being dry on the skin and the last one is a comparison with my other products I use as concealers:

Its extremely lightweight and I was fairly lucky to guess the correct shade.I personally prefer to blend it in with a Beauty Blender, as I found the coverage is a lot better.I tend to rub my eyes quite a lot because of my anxiety, and although it didn't budge for a while, it did begin to fade because of this.I did go in with a setting powder which made it stay in place, despite me rubbing my eyes a few times.

The concealer lasted approximately 7hours with no setting powder and 11hours with setting powder.You can apply another layer if you want to, because it doesn't leave it cakey at all.For me it works the best for brightening the eye area, as I sometimes only get 4-6hours sleep, so I end up waking up with panda eyes.I prefer this more to my expensive concealer, as it lasts longer, its lightweight, extremely easy to blend and its only £7.99.I recommend going to your local Boots or Superdrug to find out your shade, as you have 14 to choose from.

I've introduced setting powders to my makeup routine a lot recently so when I saw that L'Oréal have FINALLY made there own, I just had to put it to the test.I don't have many pictures to show of the actual product itself as its pretty much a powder, but I can still show you how it left my makeup looking.This translucent setting powder is designed to:

Apart from the highlighter that I have on my nose and my ringlight blaring into my face, it actually left my makeup completely matte with no shine to it.I also used it alongside the golden beige concealer mentioned in this blog post for the under eye area and just look at how smooth it is!My makeup did not budge for the whole day and it didn't leave my makeup looking ashy either.

The only two negatives I can say about this powder is 1. Its a pain to get the powder out without it getting extremely messy and 2. I'm not too keen on the £12.99 price tag.You only get a small amount of product in the pot and £12.99 just seems a little bit too much for me.Don't get me wrong, it works great and we all know how much I love L'Oréal products, but I feel this is a little bit pricey and I'm not sure if I'll repurchase once I've ran out.

I hope this review has helped and if you have any questions, please let me know in the comment section :)

I decided to pick up the Normal To Combination Skin bottle, mainly because my skin tends to get oily sometimes during the summer time.I also like to have that extra moisture in a bottle as well, especially since I wear a matte finish foundation quite a lot.The other two bottles in this range for other skin types are: 

I've been meaning to be purchasing a new mascara for ages, after my L'Oréal False Lash Superstar ran out.Although I was really happy with the Superstar, I was seeing a lot of hype about this one and I waited a few weeks until some reviews came out about it.Boots are currently doing an offer (at the time of this post), that you get a free eye mask with any of the Miss Baby Roll Mascara's, so that sold me for my pamper days.

The packaging of this mascara is pretty cute and vibrant.Depending on the colour of the mascara you choose, the bottom half of the tube will reflect that colour, so in my case, the bottom half of the tube is black.The formula is very different from all of the previous mascara's that I've used by L'Oréal, for example the the False Lash Superstar and Volume Million Lashes.Its very very thick, and upon taking it out of the tube, a lot of the product was left on the brush.I had to put the excess amount back in the tube, because there was nooooo way that I was going to be left with spider eyes.Using the amount that was left over on the brush, I applied the "roller brush" as described by L'Oréal to my eyelashes, moving back and forth from root to tip as recommended.

I'm in love with the design of this brush and it kind of reminds me of the twister ice cream as it twirls all the way to the tip.Its a very easy applicator to put on, however you only need a very small amount to achieve voluminous eyelashes.After applying it just the once, my lashes were left with a beautiful natural looking curl, but after brushing it root to tip as recommended, it started to leave them looking a bit clumpy.This isn't really a fault with the mascara in my opinion, I probably still used a little too much and you only need the smallest amount to achieve full looking lashes.

It dries very quickly, so this might of been why it left them looking a bit clumpy as I went to re-apply another layer after about a minute.It hasn't transferred or left any dark circles under my eyes, despite touching my eyes a lot during the day.To remove this mascara, I highly recommend using the Nivea Essentials Eye Makeup Remover, which is my personal favourite to remove any strong staying powered products.For the price of £7.99, I think its very reasonably priced and I would of thought it would be around the £10-£12 mark.You can pick this mascara up from many beauty retailers, but if you want to get your hands on the beautiful, satin soft eye mask, its only available at Boots

I want to apologise firstly on how awful those bags under my eyes look.I got zero sleep because of my anxiety and I was generally just feeling "blargh".The toner does feel lovely and gentle on the skin, despite the really strong perfumed smell.When I first used it, I decided to try it with some makeup that I had on to see how it removed it, but the results weren't that impressive.The second time round, I used it on clean skin and I was really surprised on how much dirt that it removed.My nose area tends to be quite sensitive, and it did feel like it was a little bit irritated, but this is normal for me, so just carried on with my morning routine.To moisturise my skin, I used my L'Oréal Skin Perfection cream, which I 100% swear by as one of the best face creams and finished off with a light foundation.My skin started to feel quite irritated around the nose again later on in the day, but I just decided to ignore it because it wasn't bothering me that much.

The next morning, I touched my face and felt a really horrible pain around my nose area.I looked in the mirror to find a massive boil like spot, and the image above of it was the day after, because it was too ugly to show the full on spot.Although spots are horrible to pop up on the face, I felt this was good because this toner had done its job by removing the "impurities".I'm not joking, the first day that spot popped up, it was extremely painful, like it really did feel like a boil that was ready to explode.I've somehow resisted popping it, because I wanted to see how it went down by itself, and if the toner would aggravate it in any way.I used it again this morning and the although the spot is still sore, its gone down quite a lot.L'Oréal recommend to not use this around the eyes, but of course I didn't see this as I was in a hurry to use it, and surprisingly, it didn't irritate my eye area.I think this is mainly due to how perfumed this is and it wouldn't be a good idea as it could easily irritate the eye area, but in my experience I didn't get any irritation at all.

I removed my makeup last night with the Nivea Double Effect Eye Makeup Remover and removed any dirt with the L'Oréal Micellar Water.My skin was clean and clear, so I was shocked to find this on the cotton pad this morning when I used the fine flowers toner.My skin felt so clean after using it and it was kinda disgusting seeing that dirt on the cotton pad, despite cleaning my face the night before.I know its possible to pick up dirt on your skin while you sleep and it can't be avoided, but I was still surprised on how much dirt was on that cotton pad.

To finish off, I went in with my Skin Perfection cream to add that extra moisture and protection to the skin.I've also decided to not wear any makeup today, just so I can give that spot some breathing space, but I did apply some on the day it was a "raging spot" and makeup didn't seem to aggravate it.I'm actually really impressed with this toner, because it really does remove the impurities of the skin and any dirt that you may of thought that you removed.This toner only made me break out with one spot, but I'm ok with that because I'm prone to getting dirt buildup in the pores around my nose area, that anywhere else.Its currently on sale at Superdrug and Boots for £3.99, but I'm still very happy with the £5.99 that I paid for it.If I see any change in my skin, good or bad, I'll make sure to update this blog post to let you know :)

L'Oréal has been stepping up there game recently, by not only adding more foundation shades to cater for us medium and darker skin toned folks, but now a range our curly, afro, kinky hair too.This range has been out for a little while, but its either selling out completely or the store don't stock it.I couldn't find it at my local Boots and Superdrug, so when I saw it available at Amazon, I picked it up so fast.I decided to just pick up the cleansing conditioner, along with the hair masque, because I'm perfectly happy with the current shampoo that I've got and the shampoo has been getting quite a lot of negative reviews.I owned the original Extraordinary Oil range and although my hair loved it at the beginning, it got to the point where my hair was feeling extremely yucky from the buildup after longterm use.My curls are a mixture of 3a/3b/3c

The packaging is always on point when it comes to L'Oréal, and I'm really glad that they decided to shape the bottle like the Kérestase Curl Ideal Cleansing Conditioner, that are also owned by L'Oréal.I've found with this new design that its so much easier to pump the product out, instead of shaking the bottle to get the product out like the old packaging.It was also a nuisance to stand the product on the cap, and the product had hardened, making it a mess and wasting the product (shown below).You don't have this issue with this new designed bottle, however L'Oréal have kept the same styled bottle for the other conditioner in this range, so thats something to keep in mind.The masque is the exact same design like the others which I'm glad that they've kept, because its easy to just scoop the amount of product that you want out of the pot, and screw the lid back on with zero mess.The original conditioner bottle is shown below and its grim:

I've been through a lot of conditioners, even the expensive Kérastase products as mentioned in this post, but this cleansing conditioner does such a good job for the price.Before using this product, I want to point out that I had not washed my hair properly for 2weeks, because I had the flu.I had to constantly just apply product after product to keep it moisturised and you can imagine the amount of build up that was sitting on my scalp and hair.The cleansing conditioner doesn't foam like it says on the bottle, but you can seriously feel it working its magic on the hair.In the photo above, that is just one pump, but for me, I need at least two pumps to work for the whole of my hair.Its recommended to massage onto the scalp, whilst combing or finger detangling to separate the curls.I always use my trusty Denman or Lily England paddle brush for this, as they don't tug on the hair at all.After doing that for about a minute, I washed my hair with luke warm water, which was super easy to wash out and my scalp was left feeling very clean.My hair wasn't left feeling dry or stripped and smelt so delicious.If you're not a fan of the scent from the original extraordinary oil range, you might like this one because they smell completely different and has more of a floral scent to it.I feel this cleansing conditioner can just work well on its own like a co-wash, but if you're wanting that extra hair treatment or nourishment, I would follow up with the hair masque from this range.I will be switching to this cleansing conditioner once my Kérastase runs out, because I prefer this L'Oréal one more and I'll be saving pennies.

I admit, I did try applying just a walnut sized amount on my hair, because its not gonna hurt right?but like I predicted, I needed at least another 2-3scoops for my thick curls.It recommends to then leave it on for 2-3minutes which sounded good to me, so I went to go cuddle my cats until it was time to rinse it out.This masque was incredibly easy to wash out, like it was melting away from my hair strands.My hair was not only left extremely soft with a lot of moisture and no frizz, but I had some definition going on too!I wanted to make sure that this definition was going to stay though, beause you can't have too much definition, so I applied my favourite curl product which is the Camille Rose Naturals Curl Maker.

I had such a good hair day on that day, that I was comfortable with just having my hair down and being able to take pictures for my other blog posts.My hair only got a little bit of frizz on top which is mainly my fault, because I couldn't stop touching my hair.I'm so shocked at how well these two products worked on my hair and how they left me with such great results.The prices vary between each retailer, but sell from just £1.98-£5.99 each, which is a fantastic price, especially since I've spent so much more on other brands that don't leave my hair feeling and looking this good.Although I'm intrigued to try the shampoo and conditioner from this range, I'm currently very happy with just the two of these.I think it would be interesting to see L'Oréal releasing a curl cream, oil or spray for this range like the others.

The top shade by L'Oréal is called Icy Glow and the Cover FX is Celestial.There wasn't much of a description about the shade of icy glow, however celestials shade is described as glistening pearl.Both of them have a little hint of pink in them, but the silver shine that it gives off mostly counters it out.Icy glow has a little bit of a scent thats nice but doesn't last too long, whereas celestial doesn't have a scent at all.Even though there is quite a price difference between the two, with L'Oréal ranging between £4.99-£6.99 and Cover FX between £28.99-£34.99, there are a lot of pro's and cons, depending on what you're looking for.

The packaging of them both are completely different and with Icy Glow you get 30ml worth of product.It can be used as a primer and can be mixed in with your foundation to give your skin a radiant complexion.I've trialled it with three different foundations: NARS Luminious Weightless Foundation, Kat Von D Lock-It Foundation and L'Oréal True Match foundation.Using it as a primer or to mix it in with your foundation didn't have much of an effect with the NARS and Kat foundation, but it worked great with True Match which was expected.It could be down to the formula for it to be working with the True Match as they're part of the same range.

The application is pretty easy, as the small pierced hole on the end makes it really easy to get the product out and to not waste any product either.You have to squeeze the bottle with only a little bit of pressure to get it out and you can either apply it directly to the face or put it on the back of your hand and apply with your fingers.I prefer to use the finger method as I don't want the highlight to be too intense for my skin tone and it can be easily blended out using my fingers without it leaving them sticky.The texture comes out like a cream but as soon as you start blending it into the skin it turns into a liquid.It gives off more of a matte finish and lasts approximately 5-6hours, which isn't bad for a £6.99 highlighter.

The packaging of this highlighter is still very pretty, however you get 15ml worth of product, compared to the 30ml by L'Oréal above.This can also be added to your primer or foundation, but also states it can be used along with a serum and moisturiser.I've only tried this as a highlighter on top of my foundation, because this highlight is SUPER intense and I think it would of left my face (or head) like below if I mixed it with my foundation or formula.

The application is surprisingly easy and I honestly thought that I would have a struggle with the applicator in general.I practiced before hand with it above the bottle, to stop myself from wasting any product, but it doesn't seem to drip at all.Where the lid goes, it can get a little bit messy, especially when you take the applicator out every time and its all left on the outside of the bottle, but it can easily be put back in or can be used to apply on the face.I like using both methods of putting it on the back of my hand (habit) or applying 3 small dots to the face to then blend out using my fingers.You literally only need a small drop for this highlighter to go a long way, because it is one of the most intense highlighters I have ever used and the pigmentation is amazing.I like to use it mainly on my collarbone if I'm going for an intense look and also my cupids bow or brow bone to highlight them features.The texture is more thick but is really easy to blend like I said with my fingers and it gives off more of a dewy finish.It lasted approximately 7-8hours for being INTENSE, but around 11-12hours it started to completely fade.

Out of the two, I personally favour the Cover FX one, because of how intense it is.I also love that its Paraben, Mineral Oil, Gluten free too.I also forgot to mention that icy glow tends to get patchy after the 6+ hours (depending on how much you apply) compared to celestial that just gradually begins to fade.Although its quite pricy, I would highly recommend the enhancer drops out of the two and think its 100% worth the price.By trying to get icy glow as intense as celestial, I would have to use a lot of product  and saying that I have about 60%-70% remaining of it, where as I have about 97-98% remaining of celestial.I've provided links to where you can get them from, with the sites that regularly have deals on them

L'Oréal True Match Highlight: 

£6.99 or 3 for 2 at Superdrug

£6.99 & free gift if you spend £12.99 or more on selected L'Oréal products at Boots

£6.99 at Feelunique

Cover FX Custom Enhancer Drops Illuminator:

£28.90 (15% off) at House Of Fraser 

£34 at BeautyBay