ProductWhores

Glam Up Your Look

Stila has partnered with E! again to release a collection of fun, Hollywood-themed products that you can use to glam yourself up for a night out on the town.  How cute is the Bring Out Your Glam Eye Shadow Palette (above)?  Love the little stars in the middle of the shades!  It's a nice neutral palette that you can also use for a darker, smoky eye if you want.  I really like the mix of shades - there are some nice highlighters in there paired with darker browns.  And at only $24, it's one of the more affordable eye palettes out there right now. 

The collection also includes the Smudge Stick Duo + Forever Your Curl Mascara set, which I love because I'm a huge fan of Stila's Smudge Sticks.  This one has two shades in it - Oscar Fish (a warm brown with gold pearl) and Stargazer (a black with gold and silver pearl).  They're both basic shades, but the pearl makes them fun and a little more dressy than your average brown and black liners.  I love the smudge sticks though because they smudge really well (I should hope so!) so they're great for creating a smoky eye or a soft daytime look because you can smudge them and get away without using a lot of shadow too.  (That's why they're coming on vacation with me next month.  Less makeup in my bag means more room for magazines for my loooong plane ride.  I am emotionally incapable of traveling without a choice of 37 different things to read).  

There's also a new Lip Glaze Trio with some more new, aptly named shades.  I like that the shades are all darker than a lot of the Lip Glazes since they're so sheer already.  Here are the three colors in the collection:

• Lights - warm golden caramel with gold sparkle
• Action - deep berry with golden pearl
• Camera - soft rust red with golden pearl

Camera is my favorite.  So, so pretty. I love a nice red gloss.  I already have about, oh, twenty or so of them, but this one is really nice.  So now that I'm all Hollywood-ed up, who wants to invite me to a premiere so I can walk the red carpet?  I'm free this weekend... 

Note:  Samples of this product were sent to me by a PR representative working with Stila

Jewels You Can Afford

I love Stila's sparkly eyeshadows more than just about anything (they're pretty much tied with cupcakes for things I would need with me on a desert island) so I really need to order this Jewel Eye Shadow Trio from Stila's site.  Such pretty colors and so fun and shimmery.  I would totally already own it if I could pick it up in a store, but since it's only available only I haven't pulled the trigger yet.  Maybe I should do it today to celebrate making it through the week?  That seems like a fair trade, right?

Love at First Blush

I have a ton of pink blushes, but far be it from me to resist one as good as Stila's new Love at First Blush.  (See?  Even the name is cute!)  I didn't even have any intention of buying it, but I was picking up something else at Sephora this weekend and it was right there in those little bins they put by the register to tempt you to buy more stuff and I saw it and knew it was coming home with me.  (So well done, Sephora marketing team!)  It's a gorgeous blush with three different shades of pink and a little shimmer to it in certain places, but the best part about it is the design on the powder.  Seriously, how adorable are the overlapping hearts?  It's almost too cute to use because I don't want them to go away.  I feel like for $14 it was an easily justifiable purchase since I use a lot of pink blush and when I'm putting on makeup at 8am all tired and annoyed that I have to work for a living (because I'm terrible at picking lottery numbers) seeing the cute design will make me moderately more cheerful.  (Well, that and the jumbo-sized Cafe Mocha that comes out of my Keurig every morning.  God bless that hard-working machine).  Do you think if I asked nicely, Stila would make these in a few other shades?  Maybe a nice plum, coral and light red?  Pretty please?

In The Garden

With this Spring popping up floral pastels all over the world of beauty, I have really fallen for Stila's take on the trend!  Their In The Garden palette contains ten gorgeous eye colors which are all botanically-inspired (but not all pastel).  The collection is a wonderful mix of muted and bright colors and each and every one you will use right down to the bottom of the pot.  I love that it also comes with an exclusive smudge stick in Starfish (black with gold and green pearl - soooo pretty) and a lookbook to help you craft your garden-inspired eyes.  The palette comes with:

• Chinois - matte creamy white
• Breeze - shimmery beige
• Bark - shimmery taupe
• Freesia - shimmery violet blue
• Rosette - metallic pink violet
• Nectar - matte creamy beige
• Honey - metallic bronze gold
• Sage - shimmery translucent green
• Moss - dark olive green with shimmer
• Juniper - deep shimmery forest green

This palette is one of my absolute faves for Spring 2012 because it's completely wearable and not too washed out (I can still get my smokey eye - with a mossy-green twist!).  Totally worth the $39.00 retail.

Note:  A sample of this was sent to me by a PR representative working with Stila.

The Crown Jewels

Wow, do I love Stila's new Jewel Eye Shadows.  They're so pretty in their little containers, I almost didn't want to even open them, but I'm so glad that I did.  Continuing my obsession with all things sparkly and glittery, these fit right into my repertoire right now.  (Someday soon, I'll get over that, I promise.  Mostly because I don't even think there's anything sparkly left out there to buy).  The shadows are available in eight different shades and I've tried out four of them, all highly covetable.  I can't even pick a favorite, that's how much I like them.  (Although I have to admit, I gravitate towards Black Diamond because who doesn't love a shadow that's black with silver pearl?  That's a no-brainer).  The shadows do have a little sparkly fallout, but that's to be expected with glittery shadows, so it doesn't bother me a ton.  I've been using them wet for a more dramatic, pigmented look, but I also like using Citrine dry for a more subtle, work day sparkle (don't worry, my co-workers are used to it by now).  These almost make up for the fact that I've somehow managed to misplace (I'm not going to use the word "lose" because I'm convinced it's hiding somewhere in my apartment mocking me) Stila's Jewel Eye Shadow Palette from a few years ago.  Remember how awesome that was?  These are just as fabulous, only in single shades instead of a palette.  I must own them all!

Note: Samples of this product were sent to me by a PR representative working with Stila

Stila Rolls Out The Red Carpet

 

I was one of those people who loved Stila's last collaboration with E! and all of their Live From The Red Carpet fun, so I'm excited that they're doing it all over again.  This year, there are four products in the new collection - a Solar Lighted Compact W/All Over Shimmer Duo, a Bring Out Your Glam Eye Shadow Palette, a Smudge Stick Duo + Forever Your Curl Mascara and a Lip Glaze Trio.  They all look really fun, don't they?  I especially think I need the eye palette and the Lip Glaze Trio (because clearly, I need MORE Lip Glazes even though I already have a ridiculous amount of them).  And how cute is the eye palette, with the stars in the middle of the shadows?  E! and Stila have sucked me in once again!

Channel Your Inner Bad Girl

How excited are we all for the release of "The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo?"  I know I'll be lining up at the theater opening day.  If you're looking to release your inner tough girl and recreate Rooney Mara's look from the film, here are a few product suggestions to get you started.

• Urban Decay's Lipstick in Wanted, Gravity and Apocalypse - Bold lips will make pale skin look even paler and these shades come with tons of vitamins, a sweet crème caramel scent, and an edgy dagger on the lipstick cap.  So fun to take out for touchups.
• Stila Prime Pots - This lid primer will lay down the perfect waterproof base for even the darkest, most intense eye makeup.  Bring on the smoky eye!
• Urban Decay's 24/7 Glide-On Shadow Pencils in Barracuda and Mercury - The perfect shades to get those smoky eyes started.  These pencils have a great color payoff and last forever, so you won't have to worry about your makeup smudging when you're kicking ass.
• Nails Inc. Nail Polish in Victoria - This super dark shade looks like a delicious pinor noir and can be both edgy and sophisticated, depending on what you pair it with.  

What makeup will you be wearing to channel your inner Lisbeth Salander? 

Stila Glitters All Night Long

I know, I know.  Even I can't believe I'm still talking about glitter nail polish.  But in my defense, I just grabbed these at Stila's Warehouse Sale this weekend and I'm super psyched that I finally got to see their glittery polishes in person since I hadn't met anyone who'd bought them and was kind of convinced they were an urban myth.  At the sale, I got both sets of four for $12 ($6 each), but online right now you can buy the Nail Polish Set Combo for $24 and that includes all eight shades.  Here are the colors included:

The Delicate Set has the following shades in it:

• Icicle - clear base with rainbow multi-color glitter
• Stardust - clear base with pink and purple glitter
• Chandelier - clear base with deep purple & rainbow multi-color glitter
• Kitten - nude base with gold and silver pearl

And the Daring Set contains these shades:

• Confetti - clear base with green, red and gold glitter
• Firecracker - clear base with ruby red sparkle
• Disco Ball - clear base with purple and teal glitter
• City Lights - gold with rainbow multi-color glitter

I haven't actually tried any of them on yet because I just got a manicure that I don't want to take off until the weekend, but they're very pretty in the bottle and swatched on a piece of paper.  They seem more like top coats or layering polishes because the bases are almost all clear, but that's fine with me because that almost gives me more flexibility with them.  (Also, Confetti is perfect for Christmas, with its green, red and gold glitter.  I kind of love it for the holidays).  Hopefully these will go on as good as they look and I'll have even more glitters to add to my rotation.  Fingers crossed!

Color Me Stila

I'm obsessed with my iPad, so the more fun beauty apps I can put on it the better.  Stila has just introduced their new "Color Me Stila" app that's designed to work with the Dream in Full Color holiday collection.  It's available at the iTunes store   now - just click here to get more info on it.

The app uses patented ModiFace facial recognition and virtual try-on technology to let you "paint" on a huge range of makeup looks onto your own photo using actual Stila shades.  How fun is that?  You can see what a color would look like on you and then if you like it, run right out and buy it.  (Or order it on the Sephora app on your iPad without ever leaving your couch!)  This kind of technology is going to be very dangerous for my wallet, I can already feel it!

Stila Warehouse Sale 2011

If you live in Los Angeles, Stila's Warehouse Sale is the best way ever to stock up on all your favorite Stila products.  I go every year and love it every single time.  (Although seriously, I need to stop buying as much as I do because I still have things from last year that I've never even opened.  It's terrible).  This year's sale is this Saturday, December 10th from 8am-3pm at The Doll Factory (1910 West Temple Street in Los Angeles).  Get there early.  (Although not so early that you buy the last one of anything I want!)