MUA Luxe Velvet Lip Lacquers - Review & Swatches

I'm a huge fan of a bright lip on a night out but it's always annoying when you're constantly fretting about whether your lipstick still looks good after a few hours. This is why I absolutely love liquid lipsticks, they're brilliant at staying in place even after a night/day of eating and drinking, my favourites being the Bourjois Rouge Edition Velvet Lipsticks. However I recently noticed that budget brand MUA have their very own range of liquid lipsticks, Luxe Velvet Lip Lacquers and at just £3, they're a third of the price of the Bourjois ones! They're not particularly new to the market, I think they came out sometime last year but I wanted to see if they were any good for the price and let you  know the results. 

There are currently ten shades to choose from, most of which are really bright vibrant colours. They're definitely missing a trick here I think, hopefully they'll incorporate a few more everyday, neutral shades into the line in the future. I bought two Luxe Velvet Lip Lacquers in the shades Dare, a deep Fuschia purple-pink and Atomic, an orange-red shade, both of which are really gorgeous, vibrant colours that dry matte.  

Starting with the application of the Luxe Velvet Lip Lacquers, well it's safe to say that like with most liquid lipsticks, they're not exactly easy to apply. They come with a doe foot applicator that although gives you great even coverage, isn't so great for precise application particularly around the lip line. It's not altogether impossible but you may find yourself wiping it all off and starting again like I have on a few occasions! Personally I think a lip brush works much better with the Luxe Velvet Lip Lacquers  especially if you're not used a liquid lipstick before. The colour pay off is absolutely incredible however and they last for ages! I've worn these for hours on end and even after eating a three course meal plus a couple of drinks, they look almost as good as when first applied bar some slight colour fading on the inside of the lips. The colour really doesn't budge though so you don't have to worry about it disappearing off your lips and reapplying in some dimly lit public bathroom! 

I do have another slight niggle with the Luxe Velvet Lip Lacquers unfortunately. On occasion I've found that after a few hours they can go a little crumbly. It's not noticeable to everyone else but it feels uncomfortable to have little dry bits on your lips. It doesn't happen every time I wear them and you don't really lose any of the colour either, it is annoying but easily fixable with a little lip balm applied over the top.

If you're a fan of a bright lip then I would definitely recommend you give the MUA Luxe Velvet Lip Lacquers a try; they're a great price, have excellent colour pay off and there are tons of really cool, bright colours to choose from. They're not quite perfect but at £3 they're great to test out whether liquid lipsticks are for you or not.  

Have you tried the MUA Luxe Velvet Lip Lacquers? What's your favourite brand/shade of liquid lipsticks? I'll love some recommendations for more neutral shades so please let me know in the comments below!

MUA Luxe Velvet Lip Lacquers - £3 superdrug.com

Ellie x

Contouring For Fair Skin - Maybelline Master Sculpt Review

Contouring can be very tricky for the best of us, it's something you can get either spectacularly wrong or absolutely spot on. It's even more tricky however if you're fair skinned, it's so difficult to find the right shade that won't end up with you looking like you have two orange streaks on either side of your face! That's where the new Maybelline Master Sculpt comes in, a 2 in 1 contouring palette with a highlight and contour shade that is supposedly the answer to all our contouring problems. It comes in two shades; Light/Medium and Medium/Dark which, from what I can tell, will suit most skin tones. 

The handy sized palette consists of a matte contour powder and a shimmer highlight on the top, which lifts up to reveal a decent sized mirror and a small contouring brush. I really like that some thought have been put in to the design of the palette making it perfect to pop in your handbag and use on the go. 

I bought the Light/Medium shade hoping for a good match for my pale skin which in fact it is. It's more of a skin tone colour rather than an unnatural orange shade and seems to be a lot lighter than any other matte bronzer/contour powders I've seen before. It picks up incredibly easily on the brush too, in fact maybe a little too easily so you do have to take care to be quite light handed. On first use I decided to give the little brush that came with the the palette a try. It's an okay brush, it's not scratchy and the thin, tapered shape make it easy to blend the product in to the hollows of the cheekbones. The fact that the handle is so small however makes it tricky to use comfortably so after the initial use I stuck with my Real Techniques Foundation Brush and Contour Brush to blend.  

I was really impressed with how natural the colour of the contour powder looked on my skin once it was blended out. It created a really soft shadow of colour and somehow managed to create  the effect of stand out cheek bones on my chubby cheeked face! I didn't go too crazy with it because the risk of going overboard with contouring still scares me but I have to say I'm really pleased with how it turned out. I feel like it's a product I could really easily integrate into my everyday make-up routine. As for the highlighter, well the slightly peachy colour to it means it blended almost seamlessly with my skin tone to create a really subtle glow . I used my fingers to apply it and again it was easy to pick up and blend out. 

In the swatch picture above I've layered both products twice to build up the colour enough to be able to be picked up by the camera. I've left it unedited so you can get a real feel of what the colours of both the contour powder and highlighter are really like.

I'd definitely recommend that Maybelline Master Sculpt in the shade Light/Medium would be a really great buy for someone who is fair skinned and has maybe been scared off from contouring in the past. The natural finish this left me with has swayed me in to thinking that perhaps contouring isn't just for bronzed beauties after all! It's probably not something I'll be doing every day but now that I know I can contour, I'll definitely be doing it more often!

Have you tried Maybelline Master Sculpt? Are you a contour fanatic or a scared newbie like me? I'd love to hear your thoughts in the comments below!

Maybelline Master Sculpt - £6.99 boots.com

Ellie x

Bourjois Aqua Blush - Review & Swatches

Just in time for summer, Bourjois have brought out a new range of gel blushes called Aqua Blush which boast a pretty impressive 12 hr hold. They claim it 'boosts your skins natural radiance with sheer fresh colour' and is currently available in a range of 4 different colours. I ended up buying #02 Cocoricorail, a coral shade and #03 Pink Twice, a rosy pink, mainly because I thought these two shades would suite my pale complexion best. 

Having never tried any kind of gel blush before I was really intrigued by the Aqua Blush, it sounds like just the product to help freshen up my summer makeup routine. I've already moved on to a light weight foundation so why not use a light weight blush too, it makes perfect sense! And light weight it is! It's incredibly easy to blend which is something I was slightly dubious about initially as when it comes out the bottle it does look very pigmented. You really only need a tiny amount for it to blend out beautifully and leave a gorgeous sheer, natural colour. You definitely don't need as much as I've used for the swatches above.  I've found the colour to be really quite build-able too,, little amounts with each layer blended out properly create the perfect flush of colour for an evening look. It really does leave your skin very glowy too, which seeing as that's the sort of look I go for in the summer anyway is great for me. The glow lasts too, maybe not quite as long as the colour but long enough to look fresh faced throughout the day.

The big question however is does it last 12 whole hours? Well no, not really but it doesn't need to either. The bottle is handy enough to pop in your bag and freshen up as the day progresses without the need for any bulky brushes. I will say however that is does last a good 6-8 hours and the colour on your cheeks never really disappears completely. 

- #03 Pink Twice -

- #02 Cocoricorial -

Along with my Bourjois purchases I got an amazing free gift too that I couldn't not mention. Boots is currently running a great deal both in store and online where if you spend £15 or more on Bourjois products, you get a free Sunkiss collection gift set! The set includes: 1 Full Size Maxi Delight Bronzer, 1 Bronzing Powder Brush and 1 Full Size Color Boost Lip Crayon in #04 Peach On The Beach. All of this has a combined total of just under £22, bargain! I recommend you get down to Boots fast if you're keen to get your hands on this as I'm sure it wont be round for long! 

Of both the shades of Aqua Blush that I tried, I have to say, surprisingly, #02 Cocoricorail was my favourite. I mostly tend to stay away from coral blushes as they can look too orange on my pale skin but this one gives me just the right amount of colour and actually ended up looking more natural than the pink. #03 Pink Twice is a really pretty pink however and does give that girly flushed look which, actually I really like too! Well maybe it's a draw then between the two.

Have you tried the new Bourjois Aqua Blush? Do you stick to more light weight makeup products in the Summer? Let me know in the comments below!

Bourjois Aqua Blush - £8.99 boots.com

Ellie x

HUGE Summer Clothes Haul

I've got one of my favourite types of posts for you today, it's a big old haul! I'm so incredibly nosey when it comes to seeing what other people buy to the point when I make my Mum and Sister do a show and tell of what they've bought when they come back from shopping trips! I also love watching and reading other people's hauls so I thought it would be fun to share with you what I've bought recently. It's mostly summer bits but it's only now that I look at it all laid out in front of me that I realise I definitely stick to a theme when it comes to my wardrobe; black, white, grey and denim. Not exactly summery!

/ Striped dress / Grey v neck top / California top / Blue jeans / White jeans /

I always think the shops are really rubbish at this time of the year, it's like they're still trying to sell off their old stock before we move into summer. Because of that I've done a lot of online shopping recently, it's definitely a much safer bet than braving the high street on a Saturday! 

New Look is particularly good online at the moment, I got quite a few things from there including this 70s inspired 'California' t shirt which I think will go great with my favourite thing I bought, short dungarees! I also got a grey v neck t shirt which is a great staple wardrobe piece. I've already teamed it with the white skinny jeans I bought from Bershka that I also got in light blue, both of which where only £12.99! Lastly from New Look I got a versatile stripe skater dress which will be great to dress up or down and goes perfectly with the flat, pointed shoes I also found on the New Look website. They're suede at the front and faux snakeskin on the back with a little buckle strap. 

/ Off shoulder top / Dungarees / Okay jumper / Cropped grey top / Pointed flat shoes /

A trip to my local Outfit store turned out pretty good too as I picked up this gorgeous floaty sleeved, off the shoulder top and a little grey, ribbed crop top to wear underneath my new dungarees. Both where from the Topshop section. I feel like I'm going to live in these dungarees over the summer, they'll be perfect for my trip to Cornwall I have planned at the end of August! 

Other than the two pairs of jeans, I did actually pick up two other things from the Bershka store in Westfield Shepherds Bush, this amazing white, slogan 'OKAY' sweatshirt and something else I totally forgot to include in the picture, a crochet knit, fringed waistcoat. I'll include a link though so you can take a look at it on the website (see here). I'm imagining wearing it with a little top and my high waisted short for a festival sort of vibe!

I know I've mentioned before that I earn a bit of money from doing online surveys and in actual fact my entire New Look order was paid for with £50 worth of vouchers from these sites! Along with a £10 voucher code I got sent in the New Look newsletter, I ended up getting £60 worth of clothes/shoes for absolutely free! Honestly, I'm in no way being sponsored by these sites, I just think they're great way to get a little extra cash for very little effort! I'd totally recommend you sign up to a few, it's really paid off for me so far, I've used them to buy a camera tripod, makeup and all sorts of other things!

What do you guys think of what I've been buying lately? Have you been on a summer shopping spree? Tell me what you bought or leave me the links to your hauls in the comments below!

Ellie x

Welcome To BEAUTYDRESSED.COM!

Welcome to BEAUTYDRESSED.COM, formerly known as A Girl Called Eleanor! Yep I've given my blog a whole new name! It's something I've been thinking about for quite a while now, mainly because I felt the previous name didn't really say anything about what my blog is about. It made it sound like a lifestyle blog when really it's a whole mix of things. So after much umming and ahhing, I decided on Beauty Dressed which better reflects both the fashion and beauty side of my blog as well as the lifestyle posts. This is obviously one of the big changes I was talking about in my previous post but another is that after two years of blogging I've finally decided to buy my own domain name! It's so exciting because it really feels like my own site now!

Are you ready for yet another change? Well it is safe to say my posts have been sporadic as of late but I'm fully commited now to posting at least 4 times a week with all new content which will include more outfit posts, product reviews, hauls and lots more new ideas too. I already have a few things up my sleeve!

Now feels like a really great time to start making these changes as I feel like I'm ready to start dedicating more time to my blog and turn it into something that I've thought about for a long while. Plus, I definitely think we're at the beginning of a new phase of blogging where people are finally taking notice and taking it more seriously and I don't want to get left behind. I really want to be a part of what's to come in the future of blogging.

At the end of the day though, I don't really want to change what my blog is about, I can already see the improvements I've made in my two years of blogging and I want to continue to improve and create great content that you guys will want to read.

Ellie x

Blog Makeover & Exciting Changes Ahead!

As I'm sure you've already noticed, A Girl Called Eleanor has had a serious makeover! It was much needed if I'm honest, the last blog design I had I created myself which meant it lacked quite a few professional finishes especially compared to other blogs. But now look at it, all shiny and new and it even has a fancy post slider at the top! Eeeep! It isn't quite finished however, I'm hoping to get a custom header designed in the next few weeks to make it a little more me but so far I'm really happy with how it's turned out!

The blog makeover is just one of many exciting changes I have planned for the coming weeks so keep your eyes peeled for lots more great stuff! As well as this, I will be upping my commitment towards the blog with far more regular posts and hopefully an increase in the quality of content too!

I really hope you guys love the new design as much as I do! Like I said, it will be getting tweaked over the coming weeks to make it more personal, it's all very exciting! If you have any ideas as to what sort of content you'd like to see more of then please let me know below! Maybe there are some posts which you've particularly liked and want me to do again? I'm always up for trying new ideas, I've got a few up my sleeve already!

Ellie x

Going 'Bronde' - L'Oreal Preference Glam Highlights Review

I feel like I'm being really daring with my hair recently, you know what with cutting it all off into a short bob and that. But apparently that wasn't enough for me, apparently I needed to dye it for the first time in 10 years too. So I did dye it with much trepidation and low and behold it came out exactly how I wanted it to. What are the odds of that happening! 

Really though I just fancied a bit of a change up for the summer and don't get me wrong, I'm a fan of my natural brunette colour but there's something thrilling about having little streaks of gold through your hair. It just makes me feel all light and summery! And now I kinda want to go blonde. Eeeek.

It was pretty simple to do actually, even for a novice like me! I used the L'Oreal Preference Glam Highlights kit in N.03 for dark blonde to light brunette hair. It's the one from the advert with Jennifer Lopez and her amazing mane telling you to 'Go Bronde!'. Yeah that one. 

It comes with a really easy to use three pronged brush which you squeeze the dye onto and brush through the hair to create the highlights. I started slightly away from the roots for a more natural look and applied light pressure at the top and more pressure at the ends. I also applied more dye to the ends of my hair for an ombre effect. I had to get my Mum to help me do the back of my hair so I didn't leave any big gaps but I think generally if you have longer hair you could quite easily split your hair in half at the back, bring it forward and do it that way without an extra pair of hands. I left the dye on for about thirty minutes as I was worried it would go too blonde although you can leave it on for up to forty minutes. There's actually a really great video on the L'Oreal Paris youtube channel (see here) which shows you the best way to use it which I found really helpful too!

I think this particular shade (N.03) of the L'Oreal Preference Glam Highlights kit has been very popular as it seems to be sold out everywhere I go. I really wanted to get hold of another pack to put a bit more blonde in the front of my hair. Thankfully though I found that the L'Oreal Preference Wild Ombres N.01 kit contains the exact same dye products in the box, the only different being the brush so I've kept the three pronged brush to use with this instead. Boots seems to still have it in stock online however so if you want to try it, I suggest you stock up fast!

Will you guys be changing up your hair for the summer? Maybe you've already given L'Oreal Glam Highlights a try? Let me know your thoughts below!

L'Oreal Preference Glam Highlights N.03 - £7.49 boots.com
L'Oreal Preference Wild Ombres N.01 - £7.49 boots.com

Ellie x