Right so, since I've been starting to use Instagram Live and Stories, there's been a fair bit of interest to do this eBay brushes post and as someone who trawls eBay regularly I'm more than happy to share my (good) finds!
Two of the items included in this post are already in my Rose Gold Gift Guide so I won't be repeating myself here, but it's worth including in this post to see how I've gotten on with them.
Read on to check my eBay bargain brushes!

Sunday Swatches: Kiko Modern Tribes Collection

I cannot believe it's been a month already since my last blog post, but alas I'm back after a busy month with a review of the new Kiko Modern Tribes Limited Edition Summer Collection.

TBT: Nanshy Eye Brush Set Review

This is kind of a throwback post to when I mentioned Nanshy over a year ago on Instagram; I've been meaning to review these brushes for ages, but I finally got the time to sit down and write it, so here we go!

As a makeup artist, I always get asked what brushes I recommend; if you attended one of my masterclasses, you would have seen I recommended various brushes for specific uses, however if you're looking specifically for eye makeup brushes, I recommend the Nanshy 7 piece Eye Brush Set, and you'll see why below.

The Eye Brush Set 

The set includes 7 cruelty free/vegan eye brushes, made from antibacterial synthetic hairs, which are surprisingly soft.

The brushes in this set include:

• Large Shader brush - I tend to use this to pat on eyeshadow on the main eyelid, or on the brow bone as it is very dense.
• Blending Eyeshadow brush - I use this for matte neutrals, on the skin above the crease area.
• Eye Crease brush - I tend to use darker colours with this brush, in the crease/socket
• Tapered Crease brush - this is a more dense/concentrated short haired (and less flexible) brush, so I tend to use it either on the outer corner of the eye or on the lower lashline.
• Flat Definer brush - I use this on the lower lash line
• Angled Detailer brush - I use this for the brows or can also be used for eyeliner or the lower lash line.
• Precise Bent Eyeliner brush - I use this with gel liner, or to apply eyelash glue

Packaging: The outer packaging is a standard packed set with a plastic tray that holds the brushes; I initially kept the brushes in the clear plastic tray until I rehoused them with the rest of my brushes.
The actual brushes are fairly sturdy and of high quality.
The blending brushes diffuse and blend eyeshadow beautifully, and the brushes pick up enough product to work with, with no fall out of brush hairs whatsoever.
Having previously worked for Urban Decay, I can say these brushes remind me of the Urban ones (without the metal/heavier handles of course).
The only thing I would probably change is the white colour as it can easily get grubby when switching between brushes, but aside from that, I like that they are labelled on the brush handles; perfect for beginners (or teaching in my masterclass!)
 
Price: The Eye Brush Set is priced at £29.95 which works out around £4.28 a brush (usually £5.95 each); considering they're a fraction of the price of UD or other similar synthetic brushes, I'd definitely recommend getting the full set.

FrootiFactor: I give these brushes a 4.5 out of 5 for value and quality; the only thing I'd want to change is the handle colours, but hopefully this is something further down the pipeline for Nanshy <3

Nanshy Brushes are available to buy from Nanshy.com.

Have you tried any Nanshy Brushes? What are your favourite brush sets?

 

HD Brows brushes

I've recently been trying out a few different brands of brushes (yes other than Urban Decay and Real Techniques!) simply because they are quite limited in their ranges and I wanted to try out a few other brands.

I recently saw that HD Brows (the ever popular brand behind amazing brows) launched their brush range and was interested in trying some of their brushes as I'd heard and seen amazing things about their brow products.

I was sent the following three brushes:

Top to bottom: Precision Eyeliner brush, Contour Brush, Blusher Brush

The Precision Eyeliner brush (£9.95) as the name suggests does have a fine and precise tip, perfect for getting in the inner corners of small eyes (like mine!) or creating flicks. 
The Contour Brush (£14.95) is possibly my favourite of the three as it places bronzer/contouring shades perfectly with its angled edge, but with a softer finish for those that don't like obvious contouring.
And finally the Blusher Brush (£14.95) which adds colour perfectly to the apples of particularly smaller cheeks like mine!

The brushes are fairly soft and the packaging is sleek and feels durable too. I did find that the hair of the Blusher and Contour brushes shed ever so slightly, but other than this I found them decent to use, applying makeup just as I want.

The brushes are available to buy from the Nouveau Beauty website.

Have you tried any products from HD Brows? Which are your favourite brushes?

 

Illamasqua I'mPerfection swatches and review

Following my last Illamasqua post about the new ImPerfection collection, I thought I'd swatch and review some of the products after having a little play.

Blush Up Brush

The Blush Up Brush is an amazing innovative new oval brush shape that I absolutely adore and have been using everyday since I got it at the launch.
Packaging: The packaging is sturdy and definitely of high quality; the concentration of the brush hairs makes it perfect to add angled contours to the hollows of the cheeks whilst the brush bristles are surprisingly soft for such short hairs and diffuse and blend the product upwards beautifully.
Price: The Blush Up brush is priced at £28.50 but I guarantee it is worth every penny for contour lovers and makeup artists; it makes slimming the face and contouring such a doddle!

FrootiFactor: I'd give this brush a 6 out of 5 if I could, so it definitely gets my full score of 5!

Blush Duo - Lover & Hussy

In the ImPerfection collection 3 Blush Duos were released; Lover & Hussy were actually released earlier towards the end of 2012 as a preview and were received with a great response.
Colour & Pigmentation: Lover is a matte pastel-apricot shade, whilst Hussy is a matte pastel-pink shade. I actually already own Hussy and have loved using it; despite it's pastel-ness it looks pretty awesome on my NC35 skin tone. They can of course be worn together to create a coral colour. Pigmentation-wise, they're super pigmented!
Texture: Powder.
Longevity: Being a powder blush, I find they last a lot longer than creme/liquid forms.
Price: At £26 it works out £13 per shade; considering I don't tend to use just one blush (or have hit the pan on any yet!) this works out better than me spending £18 on just one blush.

FrootiFactor: All in all, I'd give the blush duos a 4.5 out of 5:

Immodest Lipstick

Immodest is the only lipstick in the ImPerfection collection (so far) and is a pretty, vivid pink shade.
Colour & Pigmentation: Immodest is a vivid blue-toned pink and although it looks more yellow toned in the packaging. I was worried about it not suiting my skin tone as it's lighter than the usual colour I wear but it surprisingly didn't look too bad. Very close to MAC Viva Glam Nicki (first one). Definitely pigmented.
Texture: Texture-wise the lippy is dry as it's a matte lipstick. A bit of lip balm or Vaseline underneath makes the lippie more wearable, particularly Carmex moisture plus in Pink.
Longevity: It lasts a long time as it stains! I swatched it on my hand and lips and the stain remained on the hand after wiping (see below).
Scent: No particular scent.
Price: At £16 it's a tad bit more expensive than your regular lipstick, but as always you know you're getting great pigmentation and longevity with Illamasqua, so it's a matter of what you find more important!

FrootiFactor: I'd give this product a 3.5 out of 5 as I'm not too sure about the shade of pink on my skin tone! Still, it would suit lighter skin tones than my own beautifully.

Speckle & Freckle nail polishes

These limited edition speckled nail polishes come in 5 shades: Speckle (neutral/brown), Freckle (lilac), Mottle (pastel/mint green), Fragile (pastel blue) and Scarce (light pink). 
Colour & Pigmentation: Both Freckle and Speckle are pigmented and have even amounts of "speckle". Bigger "speckle" bits of black glitter make up the full effect. I have to say I prefer Freckle as Speckle clashes too much with my skin tone. I think it would look better with lighter or darker skintones than my own. 2 coats needed max for full effect.
Longevity: The polish lasts a long time particularly as it has the glitter bits in them, but is a pain to take off like normal glitter polish.
Price: Priced at £14.50 each, the polishes are slightly pricey but they're a gorgeous new concept and remind me of Cadbury's Mini Eggs - yummy!

FrootiFactor: I'd give the polishes a 4 out of 5 as they are well thought out and perfect for Spring/Easter.

The full ImPerfection range is available at the Illamasqua site and Debenhams as well as selected counters. 

Do you like the products from the new collection? Which are your faves?


 

More Sleek...

Popped into Superdrug the other day & bought one of the new hyped shimmer blushes. I tried them all on my hand but Pomegranate & Sunrise seemed too dark, so I bought Rose Gold.. and I loved the fact it was two toned (like my fishnet) =D

I also bought Electro Peach pout polish seeing as I am a huge fan of them.
Here's how they look:

I'll be posting a look with these very soon ;) 

I also bought a supposed MAC 217 brush dupe: No7 eyeshadow blend & contour. Seeing as I had the £5 No7/Ruby & Millie voucher, I got this brush for £1.50.. bargain!

I've used it once since buying and its lovely and fluffy, although I think its a tad too big for my eyes :|

Newho, keep a lookout for the next look.. gonna do something with the original Sleek palette!

<3

E.L.F brand tryout

So looking at makeup tutorials online, I noticed a lot of people seem to be using Elf products, in both the UK and US (click here for website). I saw some using the Elf primer on the eyes and thought I'd give it a go and see how it matches up to my Urban Decay primer potion (UDPP).

Browsing on the site, I couldn't help but gasp at the prices; the mineral makeup (from eyeshadows to lipsticks) started from £3, whilst the non-mineral makeup started from £1.50!! I bagged quite a bit as I wanted to try the brand and seeing as many people seem to already use the products.. which must mean they can't be bad!

I bought the mineral and non-mineral eyeshadow primer, eyeshadow duo "olive" in cream shadow and powder shadow, 3 lipglosses, 1 lipstick & 1 lipliner, and accessories- 9 piece brush set and eyelash curlers:

Elf haul!

Not much eh! *blush*
First I checked out the eyeshadows:

I'm not usually a fan of cream eyeshadows. For some reason I think they have more chance of creasing, although Elf packaging says it's "crease-free" so maybe I'll learn to love them. I tried both the olive duos on my hand and I noticed the cream shadows were a little tricky to spread evenly, even though it was on my hand. However, the cream shadows had better vibrant colour than the powder one, a more golden tone:

I decided to try mixing the two shadows (cream & powder), and it actually looked better than any of the one duos alone as you can see above. It gave a much more vibrant, pigmented colour, something I'm used to with Urban Decay, and more expensive brands. So I'd personally recommend buying the powder and cream shadow and using it together if you're wanting to buy from Elf.. and for £1.50 each it's practically robbery!

I tried the primers on my hand next, both the non-mineral (normal) primer and the mineral.

They had the same peachy/nude skin tone as the Urban Decay Primer Potion (UDPP), but when I applied the powder duo eyeshadow on top, you could still see the peachy/ashy undertone of the primer :(
It did however make the green shadow stand out a bit more than when on its own, giving it a more pastel/minty green colour, and the brown an ashy brown colour.

I thought I'd try the same powder shadow over the UDPP, and the results were:

As you can see, the UDPP brought out the golden tone of the shadow, giving it a similar effect as the cream shadow, or both cream and powder mixed. Unfortunately, I have to say nothing beats UDPP, but its worth giving a try, and maybe I'll try the Elf primer using less product, as this could have made the eyeshadow look ashy.

I was pleased with the brush set; for £15 you can barely get 1 brush at MAC let alone 9! When I used the angled blush brush the hairs didn't come out as cheaper brand brushes tend to do, so I'll be seeing how that goes as I use them ;)

The lipglosses reminded me of Stila lip glazes, the clear tube and brush tip applicator, and I think the colours Elf offer are pretty great (barring a slight stickiness!)

           vs









I put my collection in colour order above, from left to right are the colours:
Honey, Maple Sugar (lipstick), Berry Cherry & Joy.

I'll be using the lipglosses in the looks to come, so keep a lookout!

Next I'll be attempting a Jessica Alba look.. where she's actually wearing visible makeup!

<3