Brand Review - Kat Von D Beauty (Part 1)

I've been writing this brand review for what seems like weeks now and it's getting a bit long winded so I've decided to split the review into 3 parts. I'm doing this because I have too many eyeshadow palettes to talk about, so I'll write a separate  blog post about those, and I have wanted to try the brushes forever, so I've just ordered a few and will do another post on my feelings when they arrive. This part will be a pretty long one, as there are quite a lot of products to cover, but I've tried to break it down and add as many pictures as I can so I don't bore you to death!

After being catapulted to stardom in the reality TV show Miami Ink, globally renowned tattoo artist Kat Von D launched her own makeup line for Sephora in 2008. Kat Von D Beauty was originally a Sephora exclusive and the initial launch included two eyeshadow palettes, eyeliners, brushes and four lipsticks - including the now iconic Lolita shade.

The brand has expanded over the years and now comprises of a full collection with everything from primer to setting spray. Kat Von D Beauty launched in the UK at Debenhams last year and counters are popping up in stores all over the country already. Super handy if you want to check out swatches or get shade matched to a foundation. All of the products are cruelty free and a good selection are vegan - the Kat Von D Beauty website will tell you which shades and products are vegan by the #VeganAlert hashtag on the product descriptions, which is pretty useful as so many consumers are switching towards veganism these days.

I've not got everything from the range but I have a decent selection so I'm going to give my thoughts on the products, and then the brand as a whole. In these reviews I'm going to try and stay away from the more problematic aspects of the brands and owners, as if I got into the whole drama aspect of the makeup industry I'd be here writing all day. It's all available on Google if you are a gossip lover though!

Let's start with the foundation;

The Lock-It foundation is SUPER full coverage. It's great for oily skin and it gives a matte finish. I initially didn't like this product as it is so thick it transfers really easily, even if I set it with powder. I've recently started to use it again though and I find that if I apply it with a damp beauty blender tather than a brush, it doesn't go on as thick and its much easier to set. Despite the heavy coverge and thicker formula, I don't find this foundation to be particularly cakey, it's a pretty nice foundation if you need full coverage - which I absolutely do! As you can see from the swatch image, it is not heavy enough to cover a tattoo, and it does enhance skin texture!

Might as well do this in the order I'd apply my makeup, so concealer is next up!

The Lock-It Concealer Creme was launched last year to replace the brand's original concealer (which I utterly hated). I do only have the shade White-Out which is pure white, so my review may not be totally accurate of the more pigmented shades.
I am very fair skinned, so when I read that Kat was coming out with a completely white concealer you can bet I was sat by my computer on launch day ready to buy this stuff! I do struggle to get a concealer that brightens my NW10 skin so this was ideal.Unfortunately, the coverage is absolutely diabolical! It's good to brighten the skin but it does not conceal at all unfortunately. I still use this concealer every day but I have to mix it with another one in order to conceal my dark circles.

Lock-It Setting Powder. I hate this stuff. I really cannot stand it. It cakes up around my oily patches and enhances my already gigantic pores something rotten. And baking with this is an absolute disaster. I'll stick to Laura Mercier.

Shade and Light Contour palettes;

The brand has two contour palettes, a cream and a powder. The shades are the same in each palette. I only have the cream contour palette though as I like to use one of the shades in the Shade and Light Eyeshadow palette for powder contouring! The cream formula is nice and soft, not super stiff and blends out really nicely with a brush or a sponge. There is a cream contour brush available from this brand, and although I've not tried any of the brushes I definitely plan to in the future.

Kat Von D Beauty currently only has one "blusher" in the range, and this is an "eyeshadow and blush" in the shade Lolita. It's the same size as the regular single eyeshadow pans and is EXTREMELY pigmented - I definitely had Aunt Sally cheeks the first time I tried this! Lolita is marketed as a universally flattering colour, and while this is certainly true as a blush, I would like to see more shades available for those of us who would generally sway towards a pink or orange blush, or even a more luminous blush.

Lolita: finger swatch, blush brush swatch and flat brush swatch

The brand currently has two highlighter palettes, Alchemist and Metal Crush.

The Alchemist palette is very much like Moonchild from Anastasia Beverly Hills - a palette of duochrome shades best suited to pale skin tones, which can be used as highlight, eyeshadow or eyeshadow/lip toppers. I am not in love with this palette for highlighting, I find it to be quite chunky and a little more chalky than Moonchild, and the pan size is very small. I do, however love to use this as a topper on a smokey eye to give a stunning pop of colour. Here is my client Emily wearing the shade Saphyre over a black smoked out look:

The Metal Crush Extreme highlighter palette contains 3 pans of the Metal Crush formula, although the pans are larger to accommodate a highlighter/fan brush.  A couple of years ago, the beauty community went crazy for the Metal Crush shade Thunderstruck as a hightlighter, and although I have never tried it personally, I was looking forward to the release of this palette. It contains a pink, white and peach shade and oh my goodness I absolutely HATE this palette!
I can't put into words how much I can't stand this bloody thing. It looks SO stunning, the packaging is beautiful, the shades are so pretty and when first applied to the skin it gives the most blinding, metallic shine. Give it two hours though and your face looks like you've just had a glitter bomb go off in front of you. There are so many glitter particles in these highlighters, they are so glitter heavy that it just ends up looking a mess if you wear it for anything other than taking a picture for Instagram. I'm super disappointed with this palette, it's definitely not what I had hoped for.

Brows:

The brand does have a brow product, Tattoo Brow, but it isn't available in the UK. I've not tried it so can't give my thoughts. I do, however, use the Shade and Light eye palette for brows a lot!

Eyeshadow:

Kat Von D Beauty sells individual metallic eyeshadows, the Metal Crush range. I don't own any of these individual pans, however I am fairly sure that the formula is the same as that of the metallic shades in the Metal Matte palette, and I absolutely adore those. They are super soft and full of pigment, and they are highly metallic. If I was going to pay £16 for an individual eyeshadow then this is exactly what I'd expect from it. Currently the only single matte eyeshadow available is Lolita, which I have discussed above. Here is a picture of me wearing Lolita on my eyes and cheeks and also the Lolita 2 liquid lipstick:

Eyeliner:

Ok, I know that everyone in the entire universe RAVES about the Tattoo Liner, but I have honestly never even wanted to try it because I am so emotionally attached to my NYX liquid liner (seriously, I have gone through 3 of these this year). However, I picked up one of the very cute mini kits from Debenhams (if you want to try this brand but don't want to spend a fortune, take a look at Debenhams, these little kits are excellent value for money) which included a deluxe mini Tattoo Liner, so I thought I'd give it a little review.
I don't hate it. I actually really, REALLY like it. I hate to say that I completely get why it's hyped up so much. It's super matte, super black, stays on all day and doesn't crack or flake...but neither does my NYX one, and that's £6 compared to £16 so I know which one I'll be repurchasing.

Top two swatches, Kat Von D. Bottom two swatches, Nyx.

The brand has recently released a limited edition eyeliner collab with Billie Joe Armstrong of Green Day

Marketed as an "anti-precision" liner, Basket Case is a smudgeable black pencil. It is  super soft and creamy to apply with the idea it can be smudged out to get a super black smokey eye, just like Billie Joe wears. I haven't had chance to play about with this yet so I'm hoping to do a separate review later.

Lips:

Kat Von D Beauty has an impressive selection of lip products. You can choose from the old school bullet lipstick or the current favourite, liquid to matte lipsticks. There are also lip liners in an array of colours, and the newly released Everlasting Glimmer Veil liquid lipsticks.
The Studded Kiss Lipsticks come in absolutely beautiful packaging. The casing is studded (obviously) and feels nice and sturdy. I have never been a fan of bullet lipsticks, but I have tried a couple of these and I quite enjoy them. They don't drag on the lips or cling to texture and imperfections like a lot of lipsticks can. The colours are nicely pigmented and opaque and they apply very smoothly.

Considering I really don't love the Everlasting Liquid Lipsticks, I own an awful lot of them!


I definitely don't hate this formula, but it is really not my favourite at all. It applies nicely, although I'd prefer a little more pigment in some of the nude shades and although they are comfortable to wear, I find that the wear time is not great. I also hate the giant applicators on the full size lipsticks, so I do prefer the minis. There's usually a box of mini liquid lipsticks out at Christmas, so if you are wanting to try these particular lipsticks then I definitely reccommend starting with one of those little sets.

The Lolita Vault which includes three lip liners, two liquid lipsticks, a studded kiss lipstick and the lolita blush.

I'm going to say pretty much the same thing about the Everlasting Lip Liners that I said about the Tattoo Liner. These lip liners are beautiful. They are soft, creamy and pigmented. They glide on beautifully. However, so do my NYX lip liners. I love the three Kat Von D lip liners that I own, but unless I need a specific colour in future, I think I will be sticking with NYX.

I find Kat Von D Beauty as a brand, pretty appealing. The packaging is always fantastic, but that is to be expected from a world renowned artist (Kat designs the lettering and packaging on all of her products). The brand has a great selection of products and colours, and are always coming out with new and innovative ideas - I am incredibly excited for the range of rainbow coloured eyebrow pomades coming this year, and I almost peed my pants with excitement when I found out they are bringing out a Divine palette in February! The brand does have some products which I personally think fall short of expectations, but I would say that this is true of most makeup/beauty brands. The fact that Kat is so passionate about animal rights and veganism makes this brand appealing to the many consumers who are moving towards cruelty free makeup these days, and it is great to see a brand of this size have so many vegan options. I know that, as a makeup artist, if I have a client who requests vegan products only, I would be able to get pretty much everything I need just from this brand. I definitely enjoy a lot of Kat Von D Beauty products, and I will continue to buy from them in the future as long as they keep up the same level of quality and innovation.

Review - Oh My Glitter by Robyn McCattrall Liquid Lipstick - Sakura

Oh My Glitter by Robyn McCattrall - Image from www.facebook.com/OhMyGlitterOMG

About a week or so ago, a Facebook page that I had been keeping my eye on, but never actually purchased from made a post that caught my eye.

I  have been following Oh My Glitter by Robyn McCattrall for a little while, I think I had seen her products mentioned in one of the many Facebook makeup groups I'm in, although after receiving my lipstick I reached out to Robyn for a little chat as I wanted to write this blog. 

Robyn Makes eyeshadows, highlighters, pressed glitters and lipsticks. Robyn started her business around 7 months ago, after her friends had mentioned that they struggled to find vegan and cruelty free makeup so she created some products to pass around friends and after the great response she got, she decided to look into making and selling her own makeup. 

You will probably recognise this very pretty packaging as being similar to a certain well known fashion designer's lip gloss component. Very expensive looking, with a mermaid scale design on the bottle, these lipsticks are a packaging lovers dream (and at a fraction of the price of the designer lip gloss)!

I ordered a mini liquid lipstick in the shade Sakura. This is a VERY pale pinky nude with a gold duochrome shift to it, and it is absolutely stunning. I'm very fair skinned so I do prefer to wear it on top of another lip colour, although I have worn it alone a couple of times. Here's a swatch of Sakura.

And a lip swatch.

And Sakura on top of a purple liquid lipstick.

I do really like this lipstick. I paid £8.99 for a mini, and the full size versions retail at £14.99. Postage (within the UK) took two days and I don't remember the cost but it was certainly reasonable.

I find that when applying this lipstick I do need to dip the applicator back into the tube a few times, but I wonder if that could be an issue with the actual doe foot applicator than the product itself. The product is not at all lumpy or patchy, just a nice smooth formula that dries down completely  matte and most importantly, is comfortable to wear.

I have to say, the last time I wore this lipstick out I ate like a pig (burger and ice cream) and it barely budged. A bit had come away from the inner bottom lip, but I had expected it to have completely vanished, especially with it being such a pale colour.

I am certainly more than impressed with the wear time and formula of this lipstick and I can't wait to try more colours and maybe even one of Robyn's subscription boxes!

Robyn's Facebook page: www.Facebook.com/OhMyGlitterOMG

Robyn's Website: www.ohmyglitteromg.com

Review - Charlotte Tilbury Bar of Gold

First released in 2013 as a limited edition, the Bar of Gold highlighter is now back in stock! This highlighter has become a cult favourite among collectors, mainly because of how stunning it looks! 
Charlotte Tilbury is well known for her high end products and beautiful packaging. The products look astounding and the items I have tried from her range have all performed really well. It's nice to find a brand that has eye catching packaging and that works like a dream too.

If you Google reviews on the Bar of Gold, probably the first thing you will notice is people saying that it is smaller than expected. It. Is. Tiny. Absolutely miniscule, especially for something that retails at £32. The packaging is also cardboard, which I have seen quite a few complaints about. Ideally I'd like to see this in a plastic or metal component, but it's not the end of the world for me that it's in cardboard. Here's a comparison with a Charlotte Tilbury Lipstick box:

See. Tiny. Good job it's highlighter and that you don't need to use much of it at a time!

On to the swatches! Here is a finger swatch (top) and a brush swatch using the Illamasqua highlighter brush (now discontinued, but I'd compare it to the Morphe M510 if you want an idea of the brush used). No primer, NW10 skin:

I was worried that this would be too dark for my skin, as I tend to find gold highlights too warm toned and dark for me. I was very pleasantly surprised, however, to find that this is very much a white toned gold shade on the skin and looks great on us ghost faced girls (and boys, of course)!

If you're expecting Instagram levels of glow, then this highlighter is definitely not for you. It gives a really pretty, subtle glow to the cheekbones. I'm sure it can be built up, but I really don't think it's necessary with a product like this. I don't have a picture of me wearing this highlighter so I threw some on this afternoon and took a quick picture - please excuse pretty much everything about this picture!!

That's a shadow, not muddy contour I promise!

I really do enjoy this highlighter for day to day use, and I will get a lot of use out of it. I can't see this working well on anything darker than a medium toned skin though (although I'd love you to prove me wrong, please tag me in your swatches on Instagram), and as I said before, if you like the whole "glowing to the gods" Tin Man look then this is definitely not for you. I think it's a great little item for a makeup collector as it's fast becoming an iconic piece of makeup and it's bound to sell out again this time around!

Review - Kat Von D Pastel Goth Palette

I don't think anyone will ever understand how happy my heart was when I first saw this palette! The promo pictures showed the eyeshadow pans as being really bright colours, and prompted one YouTuber to ask "honestly, where's the pastels?" In truth, although the colours do look fairly vibrant in the pans (although perhaps not as much as in the promo images), on the skin they absolutely do translate as pastel shades.

The palette is smaller than the palettes we are usually used to seeing from Kat. In comparison to the Shade and Light, Chrysalis and Innerstellar palettes, for example, this palette has 8 shades rather than the usual 12.

The Pastel Goth palette is currently a Sephora exclusive, retailing at $38. If you are in the UK, you can order from Sephora or wait until the spring, when Debenhams will be stocking it. I have no patience whatsoever so I went for the first option.

The 8 shades in this palette are Star (sunshine yellow), Clementine (peach), Meow (pinky lilac), Dope (cool toned purple), Doom (bright blue, probably the most vibrant in the palette), Gloom (cool toned green), Dagger (grey) and Skull (white).

I really love all of these colours, but Dagger is a bit out of place for me. Don't get me wrong, I enjoy a nice matte grey shadow as much as the next person, but I can't see me using it in conjunction with the rest of the shades in this palette.

Brush swatches over primer on NW10 skin

The palette comes in a matching box, complete with Kat's artwork on the front.  I know her packaging is a huge selling point for a lot of people. I'm not generally a fan, but I do like the colours on this one, it's very pretty and definitely screams Pastel Goth!

I think my favourite thing about the packaging is that the palette has the names underneath the shadows rather than just on the bottom, making them much easier to refer to by name!

I also like that this palette doesn't kick up anywhere near as much shadow as Kat's palettes usually do. Yes, they are still a little dusty but that is due to the amount of pigment, and although there is some kick up, I haven't experienced any fallout when applying to my eyes, which happens with every other palette of hers I have tried.

The colours blend easily and they last a really good amount of time on the eyes (I always use a primer, I haven't tested them without) without fading. I think this palette is a pretty versatile one, there are tons of different looks you can get from it and a great way to introduce yourself to colour if you are a bit scared of it and prefer your neutrals!

I've done a couple of looks with this palette so far and I think my favourite shade definitely has to be Clementine! It's so pretty and summery. Although at the rate I've been using it, I don't know if there will be any left by the summer.

I'm really enjoying this palette and I will definitely be picking up a backup when it comes to Debenhams in the Spring. I can't wait to play around more with it and see what other looks I can come up with!

Salon Update

So, we have had the salon for around two months now and this is how it originally looked! It still looks pretty much the same to be honest, as it was nicely decorated and kitted out with most of the things we needed, we just wanted to make it a bit more homely.

I have moved my makeup in, and that's pretty much all I need, I'm using these drawers which I got from Amazon at the moment, but I'll have to replace them as I thought I would be clever and take the entire thing with me on a mobile job but ended up breaking them - not so clever! Next time I'll be less lazy and pack up the Zuca bag instead! Julie also has a set of these drawers for her kit, but hers are white because she's much better at being a grown up than I am.

The acrylic stand on the top has lipsticks, lip and eye pencils, concealers and lip stains in. The drawers are full of everything else I need - palettes, foundations, single shadows, hair clips, cotton pads etc.. And of course, my Makeup Forever brush cleaner is on the top of the drawers, I love this for when I need to clean off my brushes very quickly in between colours.

You can just see our little fire in the corner of this picture, there's no heating in the room so we have this to keep us - and you - warm!

Our waiting chair - we get SO many comments about this, and it really is beautiful! I think we are going to get a little magazine rack to go next to it so people can have a read while they're waiting.

Julie's beauty bed and nail station - she offers brow and lash treatments, gel polish, pedicures, waxing and more! We've also brought a little mirror in, and the clutter on the back shelves has gone now.

Child labour is cheap but they don't get much done! This is my boys helping us to clean up. They weren't very helpful at all, surprisingly.

Here's Julie performing HD brows on a client, we are so excited to have people coming through our doors and can't wait to meet more of you! We will be expanding our services over the coming months too, so keep an eye on our Facebook and Instagram pages for updates!

If you want to be our friend, you can find us here:

Facebook: www.facebook.com/emmasparklesmakeup (me) www.facebook.com/thepaintedladybeautyparlour

Instagram: www.instagram,com/emma.sparkles (me) www.instagram.com/thepaintedladyparlour

Snapchat: emmasparkles67 (me)

Review - Sugarpill Pro Palette

FINALLY Sugarpill have released a pro palette that is available outside of trade shows! I had always wanted the original pro palette, but couldn't get hold of it. So the news that they were releasing a pro palette that was not only pink, but totally customisable made me feel all warm and happy inside!

Sugarpill's original pro palette was black, and contained the 3 Addicted to Pretty eyeshadow quads - Burning Heart, Heartbreaker and Sweetheart. 

The new palette is white in colour with the Sugarpill logo in huge pink and green lettering. It's incredibly girly and looks so pretty! The palette arrived in a matching sleeve and is HUGE!

Unlike a Zpalette, which I usually keep my single and depotted shadows in, this palette has 12 pans for you to fit your shadows in, rather than the usual magnetic open space on the Zpalette. I love the way both palettes look to be honest, and I don't have a preference when it comes to having pans in my magnetic palette or not.

The only drawback to this palette is the size. Personally, I love a large makeup item, I feel like I'm getting more for my money! But it could definitely be problematic for travelling. I keep my Kat Von D Metal Matte palette at home rather than in my kit due to it's size, and I'm unsure yet whether I will use this Sugarpill palette for work. I may swap it out for the Urban Decay Electric palette I keep at home, that way I have bright shadows in the salon and for my own use! 

Here's the Sugarpill palette compared to the Metal Matte, as you cans see it's slightly smaller in width but it's a little longer, so around the same size if you want a comparison for storage purposes! 

There are 12 magnetic pans to keep your shadows in, they are really easy to pop in and out, but very secure once they're in - I use a spatula to release the pans from the palette if I want to change the layout. 

My biggest problem was choosing which shadows to put in it! There are 12 spaces, but I have 14 Sugarpill pans. Obviously now I need to get another palette and 10 more pans to fit inside!

I depotted my Heartbreaker and Sparkle Baby palettes, as well as depotting some single pans to fit inside. I decided to leave out Frostine as there was way too much purple going on in here, and this is what I ended up with:

Isn't that just one of the most glorious things you've ever seen?!

The pro pans retail for $10 each on the Sugarpill website, or £7.95 on Love-Makeup in the UK. Sugarpill sell the palette for $20, but you get it for free if you buy 12 pans. I believe that Love-Makeup are offering the same deal at the moment, but if you just want the palette on it's own, it's £15.95, almost exactly the same price as a Zpalette.

The pan sizes of these shadows are crazy! They are absolutely gigantic, 3.5 grams, in comparison to Makeup Geek's 1.8 grams (£6 per pan) or Mac's 1.5 grams (£10 per pan) and the pigmentation of Sugarpill shadows is absolutely incomparable in my opinion. They're just not the brand to go to if you like to stick to neutrals!

Sugarpill Hotsy Totsy compared with Makeup Geek Brownie Points. You can see the size difference here, in my opinion if you love bright colours then there is no better brand for eyeshadow than Sugarpill. You do sometimes have to wait for certain products and colours to be in stock, but keep in mind that this is a small business and there will be wait times on occasion. I can never seem to catch their loose eyeshadow in Lumi in stock!

I definitely think that this palette is worth investing in, particularly if you buy the 12 pans and get the palette free. It's also great if you have some Sugarpill singles or palettes that you want to depot for storage space. It's definitely something I'll be looking at getting another of in the future!

ELF Cosmetics - Sale Haul and Review

I've heard a lot about e.l.f over the past year or so, mainly that they make great products at an affordable price (I mean, come on, Kathleen Lights uses their stuff, they must be OK right?) but the makeup snob in me never really wanted to try the brand. I'm all about packaging and e.l.f. don't cater to the packaging obsessed. Their packaging is very simple and quite sleek, usually plain black and white with the logo on, It's not terrible, by any means, but it's not covered in glitter, unicorns and drag queens so it doesn't cater to my taste.

Anyway, I had a quick look at their sale after Christmas and decided to give them a try. The sale at e.l.f. was INCREDIBLE, products from just 30p! I was sure they'd all be terrible but at that price I thought I'd give them a go.

I purchased the Day to Night Smoky Eye Set, Lash Love Set, Sparkling Eyes 5 Piece Eyeliner set, HD Blush in shade Superstar, Luscious Liquid Lipstick in Raspberry and the standard lipstick in Posh. All of these items, including postage came to £9.75. Shipping took around two weeks and there were no customs charges on delivery, which is always good! My order also came with a free sample of their Illuminating Eye Cream.

Lash Love Set