A pop of confidence

Look Beauty is more than the small beauty child of popular Look magazine, more than the company who brought the high street an fantastic dupe of Chanel Peridot. They are a company, which, right from the word go, all year round (and not just throughout the month of October) has been donating money to an amazing cancer support charity from EVERY product that they sell.

The Charity is called 'Look Good, Feel Better' created to help women with cancer to look and feel beautiful again, empowering them to regain their self-image and the confidence to face the ordeal of cancer.I feel very ignorant as I had no idea that this charity existed and that Look Beauty was so actively engaged in the Charity.





In honour of the cancer awareness month of October, Look Beauty wanted to give even more to the Look Good Feel Better programme with an extra donation of 50p on each item from their Flirty Five pink products on top of the normal donation they give from the other products that Look Beauty have in their extensive range.





Today, I have for you some swatches of the beautiful corsage nail polish (£5) which applied so easily and gave me the beautiful glossy opacity you see in 2 coats.




  






There could never be a better time for you to adorn this corsage, as Look Beauty still has the 2 polishes for £6 offer on the website. Be quick, as I have no idea when this offer is finishing.



Finally, I wanted to reassure you that the rock candy lipstick is nowhere near as neon as the stock photo above will suggest. If I can get my act together in good time, I'll do my best to show you a more accurate picture. In the meantime, please pop over to my friend Adrienne, writer in chief of the Sunday Girl Blog for beautiful swatches of Rock Candy.


  







Further information:
http://www.lookbeauty.co.uk/index.php/look-good-feel-better
http://www.lookgoodfeelbetter.co.uk/site/index.cfm
disclaimer: corsage was received for promotional and review purposes

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Hot Pants, Mink and Glamrock

Forgive me father for I have sinned. I have had photos of these beauties in my possession for an embarrassing long time and I've  only come round writing about them today. But maybe it's a blessing after all. You’ll understand why at the end of this post ;)


If there is one polish which has totally captivated me  this year, it's Look Beauty 'Kimono' the fabulous and bargainous £5 dupe of Chanel Peridot. I couldn't wait to try other polishes from the brand and today I have 3 other shades to show you. Ladies, allow me to share with you my impressions on Mink, Hotpants and Glamrock.









First this is Mink, a gorgeous creme finish polish which shade reminded me straight of 'London' Nails Inc, one of my ultimate  favourite polishes. Like the purply greige taupe colour was not gorgeous and elegant enough, the polish applied with such ease and gave me a flawless opacity in 2 coats only.















Next this is Hot Pants, which is so gorgeous it could give Kylie's iconic shorts a run for their money. Some of you will know that I am  absolutely crazy about gold polishes. I am also quite fussy about them. The shade needs to be spot on, not too yellow, not too brassy, a bit coppery and this one is just how I like it: with flecks of green and red for extra depth and dimension.










Unlike one of the Barry M gold  polishes which I made the mistake of buying on a blog sale, Hot Pants is super easy to apply and in 2 coats I was ready to go to show  my gold fingers to the world. You can see some very minimal amount of brushstroke action on some fingers but this is hardly  noticeable. On my thumb, and perhaps because of the lighting, the polish appears almost like a foil, or like a sheet of gold  glistening in the sun light. I am convinced that there is a a shade of gold to suit everyone. I wish I knew more about colour theory  to guide you but one thing I know is that Hot Pants is just the perfect shade against my skintone, and it nearly makes my skin look a bit  tanned?








Last but not least, this is Glamrock, a gorgeous 'vampy' dark purple, with the most delightful glittery specks of bright red. Again  super easy to apply and just 2 coats got the job done. The finish of this polish is not as shiny as the others so this would suit  those of you who prefer their glittery/shimmery polishes on a matte side. Do not worry about the concentration of glitter/shimmer of  Glamrock as it didn't affect its removal. Glamrock was as easy to remove as Mink and Hotpants.














In short, 3 gorgeous shades of nail polishes which are so different from one another that it's difficult to choose a favourite. Each  polish retails at just £5 but Look Beauty is treating us to a special offer at the moment, in celebration of the bank holiday week  end: Everything is at 1/3 off and postage and packing is free.









The last time I counted, Look Beauty has 31 polishes (I made a montage of them all for you HERE, minus the Limited Edition  'Britannia' which Milly from Pearls and Poodles has reviewed here) I think the time has come for me to finally get my hands on sequin ,  one of the 'rainbow flakies' top coats from Look Beauty.












what: Nail Polishes from Look Beauty, in shades of Mink, HotPants and GlamRock
how much: £5 RRP (1/3 off until the end of August 2012 Bank Holiday week end - Tuesday 28, 10am, basically)
where: Look Beauty online.
disclosure: nail polishes were sent for review purposes, like 15 years ago. Oopsie xx

  

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Kimodot Nails

At long last, and very late to the party, I managed to get my hands on a bottle of Look Beauty Nail Pop Kimono nail polish. My fascination with this polish started about roughly 6 months ago when beauty bloggers celebrated its similarity to Chanel Péridot nail polish. I don't own Chanel Péridot, I can't tell you how similar Kimono is to Péridot. What I can tell you is that Kimono costs 4 times less, retails at £5 and that I don't own any other nail polish like it.





Application of kimono was a walk in a park on a sunny day. It glided very easily on my nails, gave me opacity in 2 coats, dried quite fast, with no bubbles, no patches, no streaks: just pure delight. But it was its unique colour effects which blew me away. I expected a true duo chrome, where I would see at all times, a heart of bright green shining in a sea of antique gold, depending on what kind of lighting would hit my nails. Instead I was greeted with a colour changing polish: One distinct colour under the shade, and another distinct one in the brightest environments, with the best colour around 5.30pm - 6pm, when the sun starts to go down


Other than the fear of a streaky polish (one of my biggest pet peeves in nail polish) I was scared that Kimono would be very similarly disappointing as Chanel Paradoxal, where the most interesting colour (the elusive flashes of purple) would only be visible on the first day, on freshly applied polish, and under bright light, and that most of the time, the polish would be dull and grey. None of that happened with Kimono. Put under bright light and in bright sunshine Kimono wears a antique gold/bronze suit. Indoors and in most typical cloudy/low light situations, the polish would be bright yellow/green which really suits me as it is the bright green colour which I like the most in this polish.








The colour changes so dramatically according to the lighting that one of my friends thought I was tricking her and had changed nail polish twice on the same day. One drawback to Kimono is trying to capture its special effects on photos and I can only hope you can get a glimpse of its beauty and of its potential on your nails.









Before purchasing this polish, I also heard many people commenting on the disappointing durability of the polish. I am not sure if this due to my base coat (more on that in another post) but I only started to have visible tip wear on day 3. Day 4 the tip wear became too noticeable for my liking and I just needed to take it off, but i still didn’t have any proper chip. 3-4 days of durability is more than enough for me, as I am usually bored of a polish after day 2.





I guess, all I have been trying to say after this avalanche of words and photos is that I have absolutely fallen head over heels with Kimono.  I own no other polish like it and it's worth every penny of its 500 cost.

 
What: Look Beauty, Nail Pop Polish, in shade Kimono
How much: £5.00
Where: extremely limited amount of Superdrug stores. Your best bet is the online store really
Disclosure: totally bought it with my own money




Want to see more? I have made a montage of all the polishes from the vast collection here (about 40 polishes!)

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The wait is over. Nail Pops are here :)

Can there be anything more exciting than a 4-day long week end? Yes, there can. A 4-day long week end with the launch of Look Beauty online store. You've heard it from the brand themselves on twitter. I heard it from my friend Loulou who like me has been waiting for this moment for months on end.


This brand is nothing new but getting hold of their products is easy as getting products which are only sold ... outside the United Kingdom. Right from the very beginning, Look Beauty has suffered from a very poor presence in physical Superdrug shops. It's not their fault. Had it been up to them, they would have been in every Superdrug shop in the UK


What's so special about Look Beauty? In my eyes, a huge range of makeup products designed for people on a small budget, and (don't laugh) a cute font. I am ashamed to say that I am irresistibly drawn to the font and the packaging of the products. Most importantly, I have been obsessed with the brand since I've known that they created the most affordable dupe of Peridot nail polish, to date, in the shape of 'Kimono'.

As luck would have it, the very day I receive my bottle of Kimono from my friend Nicola, who kindly sold it to me, Look Beauty finally opens a web store *rolls eyes*

Anyway, the range of makeup products offered by Look Beauty is huge, very aesthetically and purse pleasing, postage and packing is low (£2.95) and they accept paypal.


Today I wanted to show you the whole range of Look Beauty Nail Pop nail polishes available, at £5 a pop. The watermarked flower will give you a clue on my favourites and I am hoping to play with Kimono as soon as I can.

What are your favourites?

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