I picked up the March issue of More (S$19.30) yesterday evening at Kinokuniya. The magazine comes with a lovely set of three Banner Barrett zip pouches. Banner Barrett is a Japanese fashion line, which I'm not familiar with. I only wanted the pretty flower-print pouches which are bound to come in handy, such as for storing a small selection of makeup products for touching up on the go. The pouches are made of polyester with a PVC coating. The largest pouch is 12x21x2cm. The pen case is 7x21 cm and the card case is 8x11.5cm. The fact that the three pouches sport zips of different colours is a nice touch. As is common with magazine pouches, the inside seams are exposed along the sides of the pouches. The material feels a tad thin as there is no separate lining or padding but nevertheless, the pouches retain their shapes well. Ideas for how to use the pouches. Banner Barrett fashion feature in the styles of Diane Keaton, Jane Birkin and Brigitte Bardot. The dress in the pic below features the same floral print as the pouches.
The Samantha Thavasa store at Ion has been fully restocked after many designs sold out very quickly in the first couple of weeks after its opening. Aside from the popular Mouton Aimi in a wide variety of colours, there are also many Hello Kitty and Liberty print bags, wallets and card/key cases. Love these nautical stripe bags with the Liberty print teddies! By the way, the Liberty mooks in Tatum and Poppy & Daisy will be arriving today at Kinokuniya stores in Singapore in the late afternoon. You can see many more pics on Samantha Thavasa's Facebook page!
Urban Decay is celebrating its 15th anniversary at Sephora Ion! From now until 16 February, you can get a UD custom makeover at the store. The limited edition 24/7 Glide-On Eye Pencils 15th Anniversary Collection is also available now at Sephora Ion. Retailing at S$160, the set includes 15 full size eye pencils (of which there are 6 new shades) and a pencil sharpener. Given that the Eye Pencils usually retail for S$30 each at Sephora Singapore, the set works out to be a pretty good deal at about S$10 per pencil! The normal retail price of the sharpener is S$15. The retail price of the set in the US is US$92 (about S$118). After factoring in US sales tax and shipping costs to Singapore, the total cost difference is not substantial enough for me to go through the hassle of getting it from the US. Furthermore, Sephora Singapore is giving away a S$40 voucher with every S$240 spent between January to June 2011. With purchase of the Eye Pencils 15th Anniversary Collection and another Urban Decay product, you can receive the travel pack gift worth S$47. The mini Glide-On Eye Pencil is Stash.
This week, I've been using primarily the Sleek i-Divine Jewels palette that I purchased on Ebay recently. Compared to the other i-Divine palettes, I would say that it is most similar to Curious, which is also an interesting mix of predominantly greens, blues and browns. There are no identical shades between Jewels and Curious except possibly the smoky olive shade (extreme left in the top row of the pic below). The textures are typical of Sleek, but I did encounter problems with a couple of the brown shades which applied patchily and needed quite a lot of layering and blending. For the first look, I applied the light green shade on the inner half of the upper lid, the deep green shade at the outer half, the smoky olive shade in the crease and the silvery grey shade along the lower lashline. I used a pinkish white shade from the Good Girl palette as a wash over the browbone. Next, I used MAC Superslick Liquid Eyeliner in Signature Blue to line the upper lashline. The second look is similar except that I applied the deep green shade along the upper lashline, the light green shade at the inner half of the crease and the smoky olive shade in the outer half. I also lined the upper lashline with Shiseido Automatic Fine Eyeliner BK901 Black Noir topped with L'Oreal HIP Intense Eyeliner #320 Dark Sky. I am wearing Elisha Coy Diamond Shiny Pearl BB Cream and RMK Ingenious Lips B 328 Rose. And for the final look, I used the light peach shade at the inner half of the upper lid, the reddish brown shade at the outer half, the dark chocolate above the outer half of the crease, the light metallic beige over the browbone area and the silvery grey shade along the lower lashline. I also used Hourglass Calligraphy Liquid Eye Liner in Cognac to line the upper lashline. In this look, I am wearing Elisha Coy Always Nuddy BB 24 Anti-Irritating Blemish Balm and Topshop Gloom Lip Gloss. I'll be reviewing the Elisha Coy BB Creams separately after I've tested them out a few more times. Thanks for reading!
SKII introduced its newest Brand Ambassador Japanese actress Haruka Ayase to the local and regional media earlier today. At just 25 years of age, Ayase is the youngest SKII Brand Ambassador and the first Japanese Brand Ambassador to visit Southeast Asia. In Japan, Ayase is known for her roles in hit television dramas such as Crying Out Love, In the Center of the World ("世界の中心で、愛をさけぶ") and Hotaru no Hikari ("ホタルノヒカリ"), for which she was crowned Best Actress at the Nikkan Sports Drama Awards. Looking incredibly fresh faced and poised, Ayase recounted how she first started using SKII skincare when a makeup artist recommended SKII's sheet mask to perk up her tired skin after an outdoor shoot. Initially, she shared the common impression of many Japanese people that SKII was more suited to mature skintypes, and that over-usage of efficacious skincare could cause skin to become overly reliant on skincare products and lose its natural beauty. Hence, she started using SKII's Facial Treatment Essence, which consists of 90% pitera, only sparingly when she had skin troubles. Ayase started using the Facial Treatment Essence daily when she felt that her skin had reached a "tipping point" with the emergence of fine lines around the eyes and dark circles. With regular use of the Essence, she saw her skin being transformed with improved clarity and translucency. Her skin felt very supple, like the bouncy surface of a hardboiled egg, or "mochi mochi tamago" as she describes in the ad. ("Tamago" means "egg" in Japanese.) When asked for her beauty advice, Ayase replied that it was important to follow a regular skincare regime and enjoy those small acts of taking care of one's skin. Like most Japanese, she also believes that a hot soak in the bath tub does wonders for the skin. Together with SKII General Manager Joanna Crewes, Ayase unveiled her new ad visual before autographing it. Here's the TV commercial featuring Ayase.
For non-Japanese speakers, here's my own rough (and uncompletely unofficial) translation of the ad script: "I didn't know...such clear skin! Surprise...SKII. Eh... what? Super hydrated! Wow, "mochi mochi tamago" Be surprised at your own skin in 14 days Someone said that I became pretty Taxi! Experience SKII's Pitera with the 14-day kit Because it's now. SKII."
Here are pics of the Liberty Print 2011 Spring & Summer Style mooks in Poppy & Daisy and Tatum that will be released in Japan on 27 January. The two prints were chosen from Liberty's most popular and bestselling prints. The mooks will feature the new prints for spring/summer, interviews with the designers and sewing guides. The zip tote bags are coated to make them more durable. I haven't purchased any mooks (Japanese publishing lingo for "magazine book") in months but I'm definitely picking up at least one of these. The contents of the mooks are identical with only the tote bag print differing. You can find the mooks on Amazon Japan here and here. Amazon Japan ships internationally but their postage rates are expensive. If you are in the US or Canada, you can also try www.yesasia.com which sells Japanese magazines and mooks at more affordable shipping rates.
Mandom recently sent me a clutch of the new Dolly Wink nail polishes. The collection comprises 10 Nail Colors, 4 Lamé Nail Colors, a Smooth Cover Base Coat and a Gloss Stay Top Coat. You can see pics of the store display in this earlier post. Dolly Wink is the beauty brand designed by 25-year old Japanese "charisma model" Tsubasa Masuwaka. Thanks to her hugely influential gyaru style, she has the "Tsubasa effect" of increasing the sales of products that she uses. The nail polishes, which are made in Japan, are retailing at Watsons stores in Singapore for S$12.90. In Japan, these are 546yen each. The volume is not stated but given how tiny the bottles are, my guess is that it is less than 10ml. The short handle makes the brush a bit tricky to wield. The brush can cover my nail in two smooth strokes. After applying the base coat, I applied 2 coats of Nail Color #1 Red and finished with the top coat. The shades are truly vivid and bright, from the very first coat. Two coats give a nice opacity with no visible nail line. The drying speed was also impressive. After just ten minutes, they were budgeproof and did not smudge or lose their reflective finish when pressed. The official Dolly Wink website can be viewed here.
The All Doll'd Up Palette from the Barbie Loves Stila collection was released in the fall of 2009. The first shipment at the Escentials boutique at Tangs Orchard sold out very quickly but I was fortunately able to snag one from the second shipment sometime in early 2010. This week, I finally broke it out and have been using it for the past three days. I always meant to review it but other new stuff kept getting in the way. Plus by the time that I purchased it, it was already quite hard to find. I paid S$70 for the palette at Tangs, quite a big mark up from the US$28 retail price in the US. Nevertheless, the palette was still well worth the price given the number of shades and the top-notch, buttery smooth quality of the eyeshadows. The palette is made in the USA. Stila now sells similar eyeshadows trios in a black pot packaging for US$20 each on Sephora.com. Of the shades in the All Doll'd Up palette, it looks like only the violet/gunmetal grey/teal trio ("Afterhours") made it to the permanent line. For the first look, using Too Faced Shadow Insurance as the base, I applied the gunmetal grey along the upper lashline, the bright violet shade at the inner half of the lid, the teal at the outer half, the pale beige over the browbone area and the pink shade at the inner corners and along the lower lashline. For the second look, I applied the gunmetal grey along the upper lashline, the pink shade at the inner corners and along the lower lashline, the silver shade in the crease with a touch of the light blue blended at the outer corners, and the light beige shade over the browbone area. For the final look, I used the gunmetal grey along the upper lashline, the pink shade in the crease and along the lower lashine, the bright violet in the outer half of the crease ad the light beige shade over the browbone area. The rest of the makeup was kept the same: Guerlain Prarure Pearly White Fluid Foundation 01 topped with Jill Stuart Loose Powder, MAC Wicked Ways Lipglass (from the Venomous Villains collection), Esprique Precious Gradation Cheeks #2 Pink Rose and Tarte EmphasEYES for brows. This will be excellent for travel as one can create a good number of different looks with it. I also like the simple metal case (with the Barbie winking!), which is much sturdier and more compact that the colour wheel palettes that Stila released in the recent holiday collection, which just looked very unwieldy to me.
