Bobbi Brown Myer Melbourne Counter Opening and Palette Reviews

Until MBBE I was a Bobbi Brown virgin… is that embarrassing? According to my friends it is XD BB is a luxury brand here and it’s always been out of my price range so you can imagine how excited I was to have the opportunity to try the products out!

Celeste and I were invited to take a tour of the new Bobbi Brown counter opening in Myer and it was very eye opening!

Bobbi Brown Counter Opening/Review

So many pretties and shiny things to eat up my bank account!

Bobbi Brown Counter Opening/Review

They had framed photos of her first notebook where she swatched the lipsticks that lead Bobbi to start her very first collection…

Bobbi Brown Counter Opening/Review

I was very pleased to see lots and lots of their skin care line. I’ve been using the eye cream recently and I really like it!

Bobbi Brown Counter Opening/Review

Holiday palettes=very pretty!

Bobbi Brown Counter Opening/Review

Our lovely hostess Alexis who was absolutely packed full of great information about the products, the brand and also Bobbi herself. It was very interesting to learn about the philosophy and woman behind the brand. It’s all about natural beauty and while that may not be my personal style I have total respect for women that can pull it off!

Bobbi Brown Counter Opening/Review

We were lucky enough to receive awesome gift bags too which I was super excited about!

Bobbi Brown Counter Opening/Review

Now what everyone’s waiting for… palette review!

Bobbi Brown Counter Opening/Review

Bobbi’s Holiday Glamour Set

Bobbi Brown Counter Opening/Review

This set is basically an all in one travel kit. It comes in a seriously cute little zip up bag which is really good quality. I know that the bag will still be with me even after the make up is used up so very happy with that. If you can find one in store, touch the insides because it feels awesomely silky  😀

Bobbi Brown Counter Opening/Review

On the left side it’s filled with 3 brushes (blush, lip and shadow) and a mascara. The mascara is quite lovely, the formula is nice and smooth and it’s dark. It doesn’t give an insane amount of volume or length so I think it would be best used when adding false lashes or going for a pretty natural look. Unfortunately it brought up one of my allergies so no natural look for me >_<

Bobbi Brown Counter Opening/Review

The brushes were really lovely, nice and very soft. Sturdy and no bristle loss at all while I used them.

The palette has 4 shadows, 2 lip glosses, 2 lip colour and 1 blush.

Bobbi Brown Counter Opening/Review

Names of the colours:

Bobbi Brown Counter Opening/Review

The eye colours are definitely for a more natural look than I’m used but the shimmery one on the top right really gives them a boost.

Bobbi Brown Counter Opening/Review

The quality of the shadows were really nice, which is really what you would expect considering the set costs AU$240. I think the shades really don’t suit my skin which is unfortunate 🙁

Bobbi Brown Counter Opening/Review

The colours were very long wearing and lasted from morning until night with no touch ups.

Bobbi Brown Counter Opening/Review

I enjoyed the lip colours a lot, especially “pink bouquet” and “ruby”. They both went on like a dream 😀

VERDICT: Lovely bag, lovely brushes, while the colours of the palette didn’t suit me I think on the right skin tones they would be quite lovely too. The price is the big falling point for me as I would personally never be able to afford $240 on a Christmas gift, it’s not far off being  a week’s rent! That said, you are really paying for quality and there is a huge amount in the pack when you think about the value of the brushes, bag and mascara too…. so if I had the kind of budget that would allow it, I probably would splurge on this if the colours suited me.

Day to Night Cool Eye Palette

Bobbie Brown Reviews

According to the marketing material, this one is aimed at “the busiest woman on your list”… that sure sounds like me!!

This palette was much more my colours than the previous one, pinks sparkly greys and white. Looks really nice on and the brush was lovely. The one thing that I noticed with most of the shadows that I’ve played with from BB was that they are very light and fluffy. You don’t have to dig to get colour at all which is awesome but you do tend to end up with a bit of a mess at the end XD

VERDICT: Really loved this one. Priced at AU$99, again it’s most definitely a luxury brand but should someone slip this into my Christmas stocking this year I certainly wouldn’t complain ahahaha!

Bobbie Brown Reviews

Bobbi’s Beauty Rules

Bobbie Brown Reviews

This palette is an accompaniment for the book of the same name. The book is aimed at teenagers using make up for the first time and basically about finding yourself and your style.

The shape and construction of the palette is very clever, it opens like a book, has a magnent closure and an eyeliner which slots into the spine. That said it doesn’t come with a brush or an applicator which I think is an oversight as most teenagers just starting out with make up probably wouldn’t have their own or maybe wouldn’t have the skills to apply with fingers etc.

The lip colours at the top are all very squishy glosses which are quite pretty colours even if they don’t suit me personally. I really liked the blushes and the formula was very easy to use, very difficult to use too much so probably good for teens too XD

Again the shadows were very nice and fluffy. I *loved* the light purple here too, very shimmery and pretty.

Bobbie Brown Reviews

VERDICT: At AU$115 I would have needed to save a a long time when I was a kid to afford one of these (I only earned $40 per week at my job during highschool) but I imagine if you had really awesome parents this would have made a good starter kit as a birthday or Christmas present!

So far of all of the Bobbi Brown products my favorites are still the gel eyeliner and eye cream but I’m going to save those reviews for another day! Overall I’m very pleased with quality of products and while I can’t afford them personally I would have no hesitation on recommending them to someone with a higher budget ^_^

This afternoon I’m going to get the 10 Step make up consultation so I’ll let you all know how it goes!

Amaranth Opulent Lolita Jewellery Review

Running this blog has given me the opportunity to meet some really fantastic people from all over the world, one of them that I’ve been chatting with over the last couple of months is Miss Lumpy who runs Her Lumpiness. I’ve watched her blog grow to be one of my favorites over the last year and saw her launch her store Amaranth Opulent recently. I was so excited for her and couldn’t wait to get my hands on some of her pieces. When she offered to send me a couple of custom pieces to review I was over the moon 😀

Amaranth Opulent makes Lolita/Mori (though really they could be used with almost any style) eco friendly jewelery, most of which features beautiful wild flowers in hand cast resin.

Welcome to Amaranth Opulent, a line of eco-friendly, one-of-a-kind jewelry designed for the lolita or mori-girl in all of us. Named after the Grecian flower of immortality and mixing hand-picked, hand-pressed local wildflowers with findings bought from small businesses that reflect a vintage, old-world style, Amaranth Opulent is devoted to creating a mix of the natural and the luxurious.

All organic materials are hand-picked from local plants in a sustainable manner, meaning the entire plant is not harvested and therefore can continue to be an important part of its local ecosystem. All jewelry findings are purchased from other Etsy sellers or local stores because it is important to us that we support other small businesses. By purchasing from us, you are helping us continue to help other entrepreneurs and artists. Thank you!This is what arrived in my letterbox the other day:

P1020855 copy

Shipping:From the US it took about a week for it to reach Australia which is about average for an airmail parcel here. I was surprised it was so fast actually because our postal system is in a bit of a shambles at the moment because so many people are ordering from overseas while our dollar is strong >_<Anyway everything was very well wrapped in a little box with padding and a little paper bag to keep the other piece separate. Also included was a business card and 3 little candies which I just love! I’m all about the details so things like this make my very happy:

DSC_0258_Edited

Another detail which I loved was the fact that she even used adorable packing tape on the envelope!

P1020854 copy

Inside everything, these were the pieces that she custom made for me:

Amaranth Opulent Review

Firstly a little hand bag chain. This is a very delicate looking flower on a thin chain with pearls and a little key. I especially like the key because it reminds me of one I had for a jewelery box when I was a child. The pearls match the flower perfectly and the whole thing just looks lovely.

The fastenings seem fairly sturdy to me and the pearls aren’t too heavy so I think it could easily be attached to a cell phone without weighing it down. When I get my new phone I think that’s going to be the first thing on it ^_^

My favorite part is that inside the resin is set with glitter so it really sparkles in the sun 😀

Amaranth Opulent Review

The second piece I received was a brooch with a violet set in it. Super extra points for custom making a violet for me!!

The base of this one is a deep copperish colour which is balanced by cream pearls, white backing and the glitter in the resin. Again it’s all very light which I think makes it more versatile as I’ve already worn it as a brooch, on a necklace and even in my hair without it weighing down anything or being annoying.

The only real thing I could say if I was being picky is that the flower isn’t perfectly centered but that’s just the perfectionist part of my brain talking XD Handmade jewelery in my experience always comes with little fun quirks like this and it certainly doesn’t detract from the item as a whole!

Amaranth Opulent Review

The back of the brooch is fastened with a pin which has been glued into place. So far it’s been very sturdy so no complaints there.

Communication on Amaranth Opulent’s part was great too, she’s always very quick to respond to my emails and really knowledgeable on the eco aspects of the products too.

Amaranth Opulent Review

Price-wise I think they are a bit of a steal. The items in the store range from about US$10-21 and considering that everything is eco-friendly, extremely pretty and well made those kinds of prices are a bargain. Compared to prices of similar things in local stores here everything is at least $10 cheaper on average and especially with the strong Aus $ at the moment it’s perfect timing hahaha!

I’ve already added one of the dual pearl brooches and another bag charm to my Christmas list XD

Amaranth Opulent Review

VERDICT: Eco friendly, good quality, good price, beautiful designs, couldn’t really ask for more! 😀 DO WANT

News and Updates

Lots of things to talk about today so I’ll jump right into it…

Firstly!

On Friday my Gmail account was hacked. The person that did it sent out a spam email to everyone on my lists pretending to be me and trying to get people to sign up to some site and buy a cheap Mac Book Pro. THAT WAS NOT ME. The hacker deleted my last 2 month’s worth of emails and then deleted my entire contacts list so I couldn’t warn anyone that it wasn’t me 🙁

If you received that email please don’t click the link in it. From what I can tell it’s just a phishing scam trying to get you to enter your details into it. However if you did get that email it would probably be a very good idea to run a virus scanning program just in case.

So in light of that and in light of Gmail being completely useless in helping sort it out I am switching to my self hosted account. From now on if you need to contact me please use:

Violet AT violetlebeaux DOT com

I will be disabling the contact form for a couple of days until I can get everything under control again. Thanks for your patience!

Secondly!

It’s been a while since I’ve done a poll to get your ideas and opinions on how the site is progressing so if you would like to give your opinion about what you love/hate I would be really happy if you could fill in the survey here:

What do you want more of?

Outfits!

Craft tutorials!

Any kind of tutorial!

All of them!

Other (please comment)

pollcode.com free polls
What do you think of the layout?

I love it!

It’s ok but it takes too long to load!

It’s kind of dated, time for something new…

I hate it!

Don’t care either way as long as the content is good!

pollcode.com free polls

Thirdly!

I am thinking it would be really cool to put together some kind a gigantic list ordered by genre of Australian blogs. I know there are lots of lists out there already but most of the ones I’ve seen either aren’t maintained or are not divided into categories/genres. If you have an Australian blog that you would like me to include on my list I would love to hear from you! Just pop your details in this form here:

 

Fourthly… these are no longer real words but I’m going to keep going with the theme 😉

I want to say thank you so much for everyone that has voted for my car design in the Barina Spark competition!! I couldn’t believe it when I woke up today, my design is currently placed #229th!!! That’s down from being #2500 when I submitted it! Thank you and massive hugs if you voted!

Fifthly…

This one isn’t such a nice one. Over the next week I’m going to be implementing a little reminder for first time visitors to the site but I want to make it perfectly clear that it is NOT ok to steal my images and claim them as your own. It is NOT ok to repost my blog posts without my written permission. It is NOT ok to submit my posts or photos to certain sites that promise things like iPads and LV bags if you post on them often (I want an ipad too ok and seeing as I did the hard work writing the post it’s a pretty crappy thing to do!). It is NOT ok to take a tutorial I’ve made here and use it for your commercial gain. I write these tutorials to encourage people to be more creative, using my hard work for your own financial gain and not even offering me a cut is really sucky! Everything on this website is for NON-COMMERCIAL use only! I swear this is all just basic courtesy but that seems to be in short supply lately >_<

Sixthly…

I don’t normally do this but as a small thank you for being so wonderful to me I thought you might be interested in some of the upcoming posts I’ve been planning ^_^

  • Photos from the Nuffnang Christmas Party
  • Photos from the Bobbi Brown counter opening and review of the products
  • Tutorial- DIY easy cute Christmas cards
  • Tutorial- DIY shoe clips
  • Tutorial- 3 things I did with the pink extensions I bought from Bodyline
  • Tutorial- Prettying up a folding fan for Summer
  • Photos of all the embroidery I’ve been doing
  • More Nuffnang competitions
  • Tutorial- the hair style from the Nuffnang Xmas Party
  • Review- Amarath Opulent jewellery
  • Review- Various BB creams
  • Tutorial- Making sweater clippies
  • Tutorial- Nail art designs that are cute but work appropriate
  • Tutorial- How to cuten up ugly green eco bags
  • Tutorial- Making your own lip gloss
  • Q&A about blogging in general (if you want to submit a question click here)
  • … and lots more ^_^

If you have any suggestions for the site or would like to suggest a tutorial I would love to hear from you! Either leave me a comment or if you would like to talk privately feel free to email me at the new address 🙂

Ere Perez Natural Beetroot Cheek and Lip Tint Review

This lip/cheek tint was in the MBBE gift bags (I’m sure you’re all tired of hearing that by now!)

I really love lip tints, I think they’re the key to having really pretty colour without having to re-apply all the time 😀 This one by Ere Perez is made from Beetroot which I suppose makes sense considering how red my mouth ends up looking after eating anything with beetroot XD

MBBE

It comes in a handy little roll on container and it is quite an orangey red shade. You can apparently use it either on lips or cheeks though I don’t know if I would suggest this colour of cheeks considering how bright it is.

Here you can see the bottle, an area I’ve just rolled it on and the area above that where I’ve rubbed it into the skin. It kind of looks like a mosquito bite XD

Beetroot Tint Review

On the website it costs $29.95. I do think it would be more of an investment if you liked the colour because this bottle would last for aaaages even if you used it everyday. To get a lot of colour you really don’t need a lot of the product. I found the smell to be a little odd and it tasted the way it smelled which was icky.

Like most tints I’ve use it was a little drying on the lips so I prefer to use in combination with a gloss or a lip balm under.

One gigantic plus is that the website actually lists *all* of the ingredients so those with allergies or sensitive skin can make sure the products are ok to use.

Here’s the bare lip comparison:

Nude LipsBeetroot Tint Review

Something about this colour just didn’t speak to me, in person it’s got much more of an orangy tint to is. I like the idea of it but it just didn’t look that great on so maybe I would have liked it more in general with a different shade.

VERDICT: Bright colour which works well for layering, all natural, a little high on the price side. TAKE IT OR LEAVE IT.

Nuffnang Competition- Win a Barina Spark!

This post was sponsored by Nuffnang and Holden.
For more information on sponsored posts please click here.

I am all kinds of not a car person. Other than getting me from point A to point B via shopping at point C I couldn’t care how many horses were squished into the engine to make it go so fast.

James loves cars. Well not all cars, he loves classic (pre 1974) muscle cars. He used to spend hours telling me all about his 1963 Valiant with a bored out slant 6 engine with triple SU carburetors, racing needles and a torque flight transmission. Unfortunately  my mind tends to play this when ever he starts:

That’s why when Nuffnang approached me about doing this post about a new Holden Barina Spark my mind started playing a nice happy version of the “I Dream of Jeannie” song. I feel a little bit bad for Lynda for that phone call because I’m sure there was a long awkward silence as I day dreamed between the word “car” and “design your own” (which is what eventually snapped me out of it) XD

So as I eventually understood, this competition isn’t so much about cars as it is about creativity! I like being creative 😀

Barina

The idea behind the new competition that Holden is holding is that you get to personally design your own Barina Spark however you want and then if yours is voted to the top (via Facebook, Twitter etc) you win a Barina Spark!

Now that’s the kind of thing that I can get on board with, I don’t even have my driver’s licence but I want my own VioletMobile! XD

So want to see what I came up with?

Barina

I went through a whole lot of design ideas before I finally settled on one. I wanted to incorporate everything I loved and what this blog is all about! I wanted it to leave a trail of sparkles every time it drove somewhere screaming “VIIIIIIIIIIIIOLET” XD But you know, apparently sparkles are not road legal so I settled with it just looking awesome!

I downloaded the Photoshop template and started playing around with it…

Barina

This is the design I decided on after much contemplation:

Barina

You have to make a cute little wall for your car to be displayed with too so I made this:

Barina

The next step was to upload it all to the site! If you don’t want to use Photoshop you can build your design on the site using their tools too.

Barina

Next you make the wall thingy and submit it all!

Barina

So this is my finished design! I called it the “Wheels of an Ingenue” mwahahahahaha get it??

Screen shot 2010-11-05 at 4.35.10 PM

Stripes, flowers, pearls and my monogram on top… you know so all my rich friends with helicopters will know it’s me XD

Very me right?

Screen shot 2010-11-05 at 4.36.47 PM

If I had a Barina Spark like this I would totally learn to drive mwahahaha XD

So if you enter the competition on www.designerspark.com.au you can win a Barina Spark but you can also win prizes like these just by voting:

  • Myer vouchers
  • iPads
  • Goldwell Hair Products
  • subscriptions to Harper’s Bazaar and Cleo
  • Kit Cosmetics Packs
  • Terry Biviano Vouchers

If you want to vote for me just click my design below to be taken to the page or go make your own! If I win I am so going to have to actually decorate it like this!!

Barina

I would love to see how creative you guys get so leave me your url in the comments if you enter so I can go look ^_^

So what do you all think of my big pink frilly Barina Spark? James says that if I win he refuses to drive in it because it’s too un-manly so I’m going to actually have to learn XD

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