Benefit Browzings (Light) Review Before & After

I have always liked the idea of brow kits. I tried the MUA one and it was OK but it smashed and I never bothered to repurchase one.

I was happy getting by using a matte eyeshadow to fill in my brows until I was lucky enough to receive Benefit Browzings, and now in the short amount of time I have had it it has become a staple in my makeup bag.

The kit is so handy and it fits perfectly in my makeup bag. The tools it comes with are good quality and so very useful; The tweezers actually work (I'm looking at you MUA) and the brushes are thin and stiff enough to pick up the product.

I have the kit in light and it comes with a pigmented wax and a matte powder. I use the wax first and then lightly apply the powder on top and this lasts all day. I have sparse brows and I don't have a problem with them being unruly but I would imagine that this kit is good for taming unruly brows too. For me I think it makes my eyebrows look thicker, and now I don't feel as though my makeup is complete without filling in my brows.

If you are looking for a brow product, I would highly recommend Benefit Browzings. It is a little on the pricer side of things at £23.50, but for that price you get an amazing quality product that is going to last you a long time.

Gem x

Benefit Boutique Swansea Launch

I was so excited when I found out that Benefit were opening a Boutique in my home town, and last Friday I was lucky enough to attend the launch event for Benefits newest boutique located in  Debenhams Swansea.

The Boutique
The new Boutique looks amazing - it is so girly and pretty, just like their packaging, and you can tell a lot of thought has gone into the design.

They still have the brow bar but in addition to that behind the counter there are three rooms. They now have a gorgeous waxing room, where you can get anything from half a leg to a full body wax, a spray tan room where Fake Bake tan is used, and a make-up room which you can hire out at £10 per person and have a make-up lesson from one of the lovely Benebabes. The ten pound is redeemable against benefit products too so its a win-win situation.

The Event
We were greeted by the lovely Alyson and Joanne and faced with a table full of Benefit makeup and the most amazing Welsh cakes ever. Then we were given a talk and demonstration (on one of the girls hands, haha) of the waxing procedures that they do at the Boutique.

We also had the chance to have a play with Benefits newest product launch - Colour by Benefit. Its a collection of Eye Shadows, Cream Shadows and Lipglosses. The packaging is so pretty and I particularly loved the cream shadows and lip glosses.

We were also very lucky bloggers and got to take home an amazing Benefit goodie bag. In it we recieved the Porefessional, They're Real Mascara and Benefit Brow Zings. I am a huge fan of the Porefessional and I was soo excited to try the mascara and Brow Zings and can report they are both brilliant - watch this space for reviews.

A HUGE thank you to Benefit for inviting me to the event, and to Alyson and Joanne for making it so much fun.

Also, check out Benefits blog on the launch day.

Gem x

Benefit Fakeup Blogger Launch Event Swansea

On Tuesday I was lucky enough to attend the Benefit Cosmetics Fakeup Blogger Launch event in Swansea. It was held at the Grape and Olive, which is a restaurant at the top of the tallest building in Wales. The view was absolutely amazing and we were there at sunset which made it even more beautiful.

Fakeup is Benefits latest concealer offering, which has an innovative hydrating ring which contains vitamin E and apple seed extract, that keeps the skin moisturised but doesn't crease.

I had attended a Benefit event before, so I had some idea what it was going to be like and I knew how lovely the Benefit team were. But it surpassed my expectations and was brilliant, I had so much fun learning about the new concealer and getting to meet other bloggers.

They had even brought a mini little benefit counter filled with goodies to play with, its fair to say I had so much fun swatching away there. I fell in love with the new Worlds Greatest Neutrals Palette, and was really lucky and managed to win one during the evening by answering a make-up related question!

We were so lucky and received an amazing goodie bag; We were given all three shades of the new Fakeup Concealer in light, medium and deep (although when I got home I realised I had two light shades and one deep)  plus the Hello Flawless powder foundation, for which we were matched by one of the lovely Benefit Swansea team.

I had a great evening, a huge thank you to Benefit for inviting me to such an amazing event. Keep an eye out for my review on the concealer in the coming days.

Gem x

P.S shout out to Rhian for being my lift buddy, Jade and Jessica  for being brilliant company and local bloggers...I would appreciate if you went and checked out their blogs!!

Benefit That Gal Brightening Face Primer - Review

I got this primer a few months ago when it was a freebie in Glamour Magazine. I loved it and I ended up with three of the little samples.

I don't tend to use a primer everyday, I would rather have 5 more minutes in bed than spend 5 minutes longer on my make-up and have doing my make-up in 5 minutes down to a tee. I use this primer when I am having a dull skin day, usually after a really bad night sleep due to a teething toddler.

It really does brighten my complexion and give the illusion that I have had a little more than 4 hours sleep. I really love Benefit products for a tired day, Eye bright is another great product. 

A small amount of this pink, strawberry scented cream is all you need to create a lovely glowing base for your foundation. It would also work great alone, I need a foundation as my skin is terrible at the moment.

I find my foundation goes on a lot smoother and more even with this underneath, and my skin has a healthy glow look to it, even with foundation on top. I don't think it makes too much of a difference to the lasting power of my foundation and I wouldn't think it would be great for those with very oily skin. The Porefessional would be a better choice there. 

The application is more like a moisturiser and feels lovely on the skin, much more enjoyable than the Porefessional which I find feels slightly uncomfortable on application.

Overall this is an amazing primer for when your skin needs a little pick me up. It would be great for people with dry skin as well as normal skin. I found it does not react with my sensitive skin, which is a huge bonus.

I really want to buy the full size of this, so will be saving up my pennies and hopefully I will be the proud owner of this soon :) 

Gem x

Benefit High Beam Dupe...From Poundland?

I am so broke at the moment. All my spare money is going on paying bills or saving for out trip to Disneyland Paris in November, so I have hardly been buying any new beauty products. I suppose this is a good thing really as I am rediscovering some old favourites. I have a plenty of things to blog about so that's not a problem either.

I do love a good bargain and I love to have a rummage around the 'beauty section' in Poundland. I have had some great finds in there, including a Lilac Sally Hanson Nail Polish which I love and retails for £6.99 in Boots next door.

 I usually steer clear of the brands I am not familiar with in there including this one. Its called 'Chit Chat'. The name just screams high class and good quality. I think it is aimed at the teenage market, and is a brand that is 'exclusive to Poundland'. I know many products that are in one branch of Poundland wont be in the next, but with this brand I think it is sold in all of them.

It looks such a rip off of High Beam, but as it was only £1 I thought I would give it a go. I have a mini High Beam which I love but couldn't justify buying the full priced one in my financial predicament.

I will get on with the review and compare both products...

    Top: Benefit Bottom: Chit Chat

Blended out. Left Benefit, Right ChitChat

The outer packaging is very similar, even down to the white lid. They are both the nail polish type packaging and have the little brush attached to the lid. The brush on High Beam is great, keeps its shape and applies the product nicely. 


The brush with the Chit Chat highlighter is useless. It has completely lost its shape and the product applies unevenly because of this. But I can look past this as I usually dot the product on and blend with my fingers, or use my Real Techniques stippling brush to apply it. I have never really come across a 'budget' brand that has great quality packaging anyway. 

When the products are heavily swatched there are some differences in the colour and amount of shimmer. I would say that the Chit Chat highlighter has more white in it and the Benefit more pink. The glitter in both products aren't that detectable in normal light, but under harsher light I can see it. Chit Chat it is slightly chunkier than Benefit, but not at all chunky if you get what I mean. When blended out, they look like the same product. Both are a pinky white colour and give a nice glow to the skin. 


The formulation of both is also slightly different. The Benefit is more of a creamy consistency where the Chit Chat is more watery. The Benefit is slightly easier to blend and get it to go where you want it to go, but the Chit Chat is by no means hard to apply. 


In the name of research, I wore both Highlighters on each cheek bone for a day, and found that they looked the same and lasted for the same amount of time. 


Overall I think that Benefit High Beam has a slight edge over the Chit Chat highlighter in terms of packaging and ease of use. The Chit Chat highlighter is a good product and I found that I ended up with basically the same results. It is definitely worth giving the Chit Chat a try, it is only a pound after all!


Have you bought any beauty products from Poundland? 


Gem x


Don't forget to enter my giveaway, to win an essie polish of your choice, plus other goodies.  ENTER HERE

Benefit Freebies With Glamour Magazine, July 2012

It feels like I havens blogged in ages. I have been making the most of the lovely weather we were having, as living in Wales you don't really see the sun much and when you do it is a big deal! It was glorious weather and I spent most of my time down the beach. Its all back to normal now, rain rain and more rain, boo!!

Anyway, I'm sure most of you will have heard by now that for their July Edition, Glamour Magazine have teamed up with Benefit Cosmetics and there is an amazing freebie on offer with the mag. Its a choice of either The Porefessional 7.5mls, That Gal brightening primer 7.5mls, and a mini Bad Gal mascara.

The full size That Gal is only 11ml and retails at £21.50, so you are getting £15 worth of product for £2, amazing. Being the cosmetic junkie that I am I picked up three copies of the magazine and got all 3 products on offer. I have only tried That Gal so far and I am loving it. I am planning on going out this afternoon and hunting more down!

Have you got Glamour mag yet? 

Gem x

Benefit Hello Flawless Oxygen Wow Liquid Foundation Review

I received this foundation as a result of attending a Benefit bloggers event. It will in no way affect the integrity of this review and as always, I will give my 100% honest opinion :)

Benefit are launching their new liquid foundation 'Hello Flawless Oxygen Wow' in stores on the 31st of March, and they were recently touring the country to promote it. I was lucky enough to attend an event in Swansea, where we were told all about the foundation. We were also colour matched and were kindly given our chosen shade of Oxygen Wow to try out for ourselves.

I was matched to the lightest shade the foundation comes in, which is called 'Believe in Me Ivory. I am quite pale, but I am not the palest, and this shade is a good match for me, maybe slightly a bit darker than my natural skin colour, so I think anyone paler than me will have problems finding a colour match. 

The foundation comes in a plastic pump style bottle, which could look quite cheap, but not in this instance. Like all Benefit product the packaging has been extremely well designed and is really cute. 

I was ill the day I got this from the Postman and spent all day indoors. Perfect for testing out the foundation, not so great for me. I applied the foundation at 10am with my real techniques stippling brush. 

The first thing I noticed was how runny this foundation is. It is definitely the most runny foundation I have ever used. Don't be fooled in thinking that because it is runny that you will need to use a lot of product to get good coverage. One pump was enough to cover my whole face. 

They say it is a light to medium coverage, and using the stippling brush it was definitely a more medium coverage, which for me is good as I have acne scarring. It covered them quite well, I would still need to use a concealer if I wanted to completely cover them. It didn't accentuate my pores, it actually blurred them well, and it left a nice dewy glow to my skin. 

I checked my skin every hour or so, and this foundation lasted really well, much better than other similar finish foundations I have tried. I didn't use a finishing powder or a primer and it stayed nice and dewy for around 5 hours without getting at all greasy, which is great. After that time I would definitely need to blot or powder as my T-zone became quite shiny. The other areas of my face were still great though. 

Here is a pic of me wearing the foundation. I think it gives a lovely dewy glow to the skin.

I usually have really bad skin, but when wearing this foundation I actually got a few compliments :) I am also wearing Benefit High Beam as a highlight and the two products go perfectly together to create a gorgeous radiant glow. I have got a small amount of GOSH click and go concealer on my problem areas which are around my mouth and chin, and under my eyes.

The foundation has SPF 25 +++ which is great, this really is the perfect foundation for summer as it gives a lovely healthy glow and has the added benefit of sun protection. Another plus for me is the fact that this foundation is oil free and paraben free, and doesn't aggravate my skin. It also contains Vitamins C and E to help prevent ageing, Sea water to hydrate and amino acid to smooth the skin. 

I found it quite similar to healthy mix by Bourjois in the finish, but actually better as it doesn't cling to dry patches of skin and it lasts longer with out a powder. Also with healthy mix i needed at least two pumps whereas with Oxygen Wow I only needed one pump.

I did find that in harsh lighting it did appear that there was glitter on my face. It was nothing extreme like the glitter ball mess that is Rimmel Wake Me Up foundation, but it did bother me slightly. I was assured by Benefit that there is no glitter in this foundation, I think it must be the 'Light-Diffusing Properties' that is in the product description combined with the harsh lighting.

As the 'glitter' only appears in harsh light, I still love this foundation. It gives a gorgeous luminous glow to the skin, perfect for summer. It will be nice to see how it performs in hotter weather when my skin will become oilier, and then I will make a decision whether to repurchase or not.

Pros: Glowing dewy skin, lasts reasonably well, buildable coverage

Cons: A bit pricey, might not be suitable for oilier skins, can appear 'glittery' in harsh light

Benefit Hello Flawless Oxygen Wow Liquid Foundation will be available from the 31st of March and will be £24.50.

Rating: 4/5

MeMeMe Poppy Tint vs Benefit Posie Tint: Dupe Alert!

I have a tiny bottle of Benefit's Posie Tint running a bit low and I love it, so when I saw that MeMeMe had a possible dupe for it at a great price, I just had to try it. Posie Tint is £24.50 per 12ML whereas Poppy Tint is £5.25 per 10ML.

These two products are practically identical, even down to the nail varnish-like applicator brush. They are both the same lovely petal pink colour, which gives the cheeks a lovely natural looking glow. The only difference is that the MeMeMe Poppy Tint is slightly more watery, which actually makes it easier to blend onto my cheeks. 

Overall I definitely think that the MeMeMe Poppy Tint is an exact dupe for Posy Tint, something that I don't think they are trying to hide down to the fact that the two bottles are very similar in design. 

I may even go as far as saying that I prefer Poppy Tint, because it is much more affordable and easier to apply.  

They also do Pussycat Cheek and Lip Tint, which looks like a good dupe for Benetint, so I think I will be trying this next. 

Gemx