Oracles of beauty - the little pink powder

Well done if you've already guessed what I'm about to discuss, those little tubes and pots of brightly coloured pink, ripe with the promise of revealing hidden secrets. Like the real oracles of ancient greece however I'm inclined to think of their predictions as deliberatley vague to provide the illusion of mystery.

All right all right I'll get to the point. This outbreak of colour change "shifts to the most perfect pink for YOU" products that simply refuses to go back to the mists of the 80's from which it crawled. I hate the way they use science, not complex science mind you, science we've all done in our fabulous free education, to attempt to baffle us into believing many ridiculous things, as I shall demonstrate below...

The products all claim to use "the pH in your skin" to adjust their colour. We will start by dissecting just this one claim. Let's assume that this is correct and the products do react to pH, by no means an impressive feat, red cabbage and Phenolphthalein can perform this circus trick and with their clear to pink spectrum it wouldn't surprise me if the chemical in these products was of similar origin or makeup.

Let's have a closer look then, pH is a measure of acid/alkaline. 7 in the middle is neutral. Stomach acid being the strongest acid at 1 and bleach the strongest alkali at 13. The general idea - that we got from school anyway - was that alkalis (at the levels most people would come into contact with) were far more dangerous than acids. Our skin is slightly acidic at pH 5.5. Looking at the way Phenolphthalein works i'd wager whatever chemical they use is very sensitive to slight variations around pH 5-6 with the pink darkening towards the more alkali end.

Indicators are a fairly basic, but visually impressive science and i'm not averse to their use as an exciting and entertaining product, I love science, I love pink, these are normally something i'd be all over. But no, what I don't like about these products is the way they heavily imply that whatever pink it turns is your OMGSUPERSECRETMOSTPERFECTESTJUSTFORYOUSPECIALSNOWFLAKE.

The product changes colour, it reacts to the pH in your skin, pH has nothing to do with tone or what suits you, the lipstick/gloss/blush CHANGES COLOUR - that is awesome in and of itself, I don't need to be told that it knows what suits me better than my own eyes do, I'm not going to buy it for fashion advice, If I buy it at all it's because it uses science and changes colour.

Mac Craving Review

After falling in love with the delightful scent of mac lipsticks I couldn't resist using a bit of Christmas money to order another. The swatches on the mac website aren't too bad, but the colour descriptions I find to be twaddle. I always look for real life swatches if I can, but even then skin tone differences can cause the colour to pull another way.

After a long time choosing and many google searches for colour swatches (the swatches on Karla Sugar are AMAZING) http://karlasugar.net/2009/09/mac-amplified-creme-lipsticks/ I decided on "craving".

The amplified creme finish is an odd one. It actually reminds me more of Ellis Faas creamy lipcolour than a usual stick lipstick, it's almost a thick ink. The lipstick doesn't feel like much is on your lips and has a slight sheen to it, though not at all as much as something with creme in the name normally has. Craving is VERY pigmented and yet doesn't bleed. You should be careful with application though as it stains! The colour melts into your lips (exfoliate first for optimum results!) though I find it works better without a balm under as the extra moisture just makes it slide off.

This photo was taken with my laptop through facebook to show off my new favourite lipstick colour. I haven't altered the colour in any way, nor did I use flash. The odd white cast to my face is caused by the illumination of the screen, normal skin tone can be seen on my arm at the bottom left of the photo in case you were wondering. Not that much difference, but that's what a healthy dislike of the sun does to you. (Speaking of which, can you please make shades lighter than NC-15 mac?)

Craving as I would describe it, is a plum tinged pink that looks deceptivley warm in the stick. On me it seems a cool toned pink, which is exactly what I wanted, I can't pull off warm toned colours near my face.

I found the way to get what I consider the best result from this lipstick is to just rub my lips with a toothbrush (first thing in the morning when I brush my teeth - lazy) apply a good slathering of lanolips 101 straight after and then get dressed, do the rest of my makeup and lipstick last when the ointment has sunk in properly. For a faster way i'd exfoliate, moisturise, let it sink in a moment then wipe off the balm to leave a dry canvas for this ink stick to adhere to.


Transfer is surprisingly little, I adore this lipstick!

Mac Sweetie

My first MAC lipstick arrived yesterday. I chose "sweetie" after much deliberation and it arrived not much more than 24 hours after I ordered it. Excellent service indeed!

With a sweet vanilla scent that is found in all mac lipsticks this is a beautiful pinky shade that is from the "lustre" finish range. The colour is sheer, almost too sheer in fact, but lovely never-the-less. :)

Disappointingly it seems to fade within as little as an hour and considering the short amount of time it lasts I'd have thought it would be much more moisturising and glossy. I do like sweetie, but I wanted so badly to adore it. I would purchase again from mac, their service was incredible and the quality of the packaging, including the scent is well worth the reasonable cost. On my next lipstick purchase I think i'll stay away from the lustre finish and give satin or matte a try. If you have any colour recommendations let me know!

Oh Origins, how I miss you

I remember when Origins use to sell their full makeup range in this country (UK) and I LOVED it. Three of my favourite make up products ever are from Origins.

Unfortunately only one is available in this country now. The FANTASTIC "Pinch your cheeks" is a beautiful sheer buildable blush stain. Just beautiful. Please. Please don't discontinue this one Origins!!!

Another favourite was their powder foundation. Best part for me was that they actually stocked shades that those of us with milky skin could actually wear without looking like we'd been tangoed.

The third, and now sadly, discontinued product. Was "Bite your lips" a sheer flush stain in a sleek metal tube. My favourite shade was "raspberry". Clinique "Black Honey" almost lipstick is the closest I've found to it, but nothing can replace this for me. Please bring it back!