I am not joking. This has a silly amount of pictures. If you have a slow, rubbish laptop/PC like mine, please leave because you will be waiting for my pictures to load until your next birthday or something.



Superdrug has set up a dedicated stand for certain GOSH products that I think they're phasing out (or perhaps have all simultaneously come dangerously close to their expiry date, I dunno) and are selling them at half price. So these lip balms come in at £3, and I used my Superdrug voucher for an extra 10% plus my NUS card on top of that to bring it to a 20% discount on the total price. If they had more, I would have bought them - as it stands, I've managed to get back ups for Soft Touch and Kiss, but that's it. I've checked three different Superdrugs as well :(


I can't remember which blogger it was (swear it was A Vain Woman, but after checking her blog it doesn't appear to be) that posted about these initally, but the review was so convincing that I really wanted some. Unfortunately, I couldn't find any (and the price point was a bit steep anyway) so I soon left it alone. Fast forward to very recently, when I discover that they're on sale (so basically free) and all the old memories came flooding back. I slow-mo bounded towards them with an orchestral score in the background, young loves reunited...
 
^The shades I managed to rescue.

Some woman and her kid were in the way of the stand so I (politely) shoved them out of the way and got to work, taking all the unopened ones there. Woman and kid were opening the lipbalms and swatching them on their greasy hands. GROSS. STOP. I don't want to buy that if you've done that with it. Vile.


They're slightly vanilla scented but don't taste of anything.


One of the things that attracted me greatly was the classiness of the packaging. It's so sleek and functional - slips easily into a pocket, makes for precise application - that it looks more expensive than it actually was. These are the poor man's MAC Slimshines. I wanted to invest when MAC brought out Korean Candy but GOSH's Irony is just as good, aesthetics wise. I've renamed it Korean Candy and talk to it softly at night.





Left to Right: 30 Barbie, 31 Passion Pink, 32 Angel, 33 Scarlet (which is not scarlet at all and confused me greatly)

More gratuitous shots of the gorgeous:



Hand swatches!

Left to Right: 30 Barbie, 31 Passion Pink, 32 Angel, 33 Scarlet
Same lip balms in a different light:



Left to Right: 35 Antique Gold, 36 Mocha, 37 Soft Touch, 40 Irony, 41 Kiss

Lip swatches (I did warn you that it was going to be a long one):

30 Barbie
 
Barbie is a sheen finish light pink, leans towards lilac in some lights.

31 Passion Pink

It's passionate all right. Hot pink/fuschia blend! Doesn't go on the lips quite as smoothly as Barbie but feels good and moisturising nonetheless.

32 Angel

Quite similar to 37 Soft Touch, but with a little gold shimmer.

33 Scarlet

Like a darker version of Barbie...probably don't need both.

35 Antique Gold
 
One of the most unique colours in the range, you can tell from the bullet that it has a very fitting name...brown base, lots of gold/green shimmer. More flattering than it sounds!

36 Mocha

A very flattering 'jelly nude' (nice and translucent) on me, it's got a hint of pink in there which keeps it looking lifelike rather than corspelike. I like, I like a lot.

37 Soft Touch

As I said earlier, similar to Angel. A browny/purple/pink type colour, which looks pretty natural on the lips.

40 Irony

My cheapass Korean Candy, this looks orange on other people but coral/peach on me? Can't work that one out. Anyway, this is one of the least pigmented that I own, but it looks so cool in the tube that I can't help but love it.

41 Kiss

Insanely bright, pigmented neutral red! This is one in the line that I'd recommend having a mirror to apply.

These balms leave my lips feeling pretty moisturised, on top of the awesome colour/cool packaging factor. Taking into account the discounted price I paid, win win. Had I paid full price...not so much.

I love tinted balms, but dislike pot/finger application, so to have even more pigmented balms in stick form is exciting to me. GOSH, you have done well with these.

Anyone else seen these on sale?

Colour Tattoo. I'm sorry, the word doesn't look right without a 'u' in it. You sell in our country, you spell by our conventions dammit. I jest, I jest.



There has been HYPE over these shadows. I'm not surprised. I've tried many a highstreet (i.e, cheap) cream shadow in my time and they've all been crap, so to hear of one that isn't is a big, big thing in the makeup world.

 
Tops are plain, no tacky stickers or anything.

I hate creasage. It drives me mad. My eyeshadow doesn't crease because I layer on that primer like it's nobody's business. So to wear this, and not have it crease at the end of the day, sans primer? YES.



The consistency is a little oily, not creamy as you might expect, but as soon as it's on your eyelids the consistency changes to a nice paste-like substance. Once you've got to that stage, move quick. You have about ten seconds before it becomes unblendable.

I purchased On and On Bronze (it's more a platinum/pewter/bronze, but I'll let it go) and Turquoise Fever, to start with, though I'm likely to be going back for more considering payday was very recent. Swatched:



Turquoise Fever has visible silver glitter particles in it, which give it a lovely reflective quality. I look at it and just think of a gorgeous Caribbean beach or some other place that I can't afford to go to. Very summery.
The glitter in this doesn't fall out on me or during application, which is one pro it has over powder eyeshadows. Mess free, fuss free glitter is a win win situation.

On and On Bronze is a shimmery finish (no glitter) that is more complex than it first appears. Sometimes it appears almost metallic brown - others, it's leaning towards silver. I really understand why there is hype around these, because the colours are phenomenal and the products perform. Maybelline, feel free to pat yourself on the back.

Application for On and On Bronze is fine. With other cream shadows, I find I carefully measure the amount I use so as to not induce creasing, but this is fine - I can go for a sheer wash with eyeliner for a really lazy/rushed school look, or build it up for opacity. If you blend quickly enough, it finds uses as a highlighter either for the brow bone or the Cupid's bow - I find that it's staying power means it won't move from my lips if I eat/drink/sneeze or whatever. No idea whether it is lip safe or not, but that's how I use it.

Turquoise Fever can be a little patchy upon initial application, but to combat this I go in for a second layer and then just pat rather than rub the colour onto my eyelids. No problems with opacity, and it stays put for however long I want it to. Not 24 hours, I do like to wash in that time, but still. Clearly, to adequately test the 24 hours claim, I need to take these on Duke of Edinburgh with me...

At £4.99, I think these are pretty damn affordable (and you never hear me say that), considering they double as a coloured eyeshadow primer, too. I've used On and On Bronze as a base for the grey eyeshadow in the Sleek Paraguaya palette, and this results in a slightly shimmery, copper/grey colour. Gorgeous, and of course went the distance in lasting power. With the brighter colours in the range, you can use these as a base to make coloured shadows pop, and especially with the finicky mattes from the Sleek palettes, the slight tackiness of these shadows as a base really helps to 'grab on' to the shadow and keep it in place for more vibrancy. I'm very pleased these finally made it to the UK.

I'm going to open with a little anecdote about some of the poorest timing I've ever had in my life.

In October/November 2011 (ish) having just started Sixth Form and getting used to being a mature college student (and part time lifeguard).Visualise the Science block as being one long, narrow corridor with classrooms on each side. I walk out of one and bump straight into a friend and colleague (she's a lifeguard too) in the year above leaving her own classroom. Recalling at the weekend, she mentioned something about a gym induction on Sunday, and today being Monday, I asked her 'Hey! How was your gym induction?'
Her: 'Oh, it was....fine, thanks. Yeah.'
A little hurt, I turned to walk away, only to realise that a teacher was following her and she was holding onto a friend having a panic attack...

LENATIMING. ALWAYS PERFECT.

Anyway, I had this post schedueled but in the light of recent events, thought I'd edit this in because my internal appropriateness clock seems to be broken.

I made my first order from EyeCandyLens.com in the run up to my school musical. It took a couple of weeks to get to the UK (from South Asia, so pretty impressive I guess).

 
 The phials they come in are SO CUTE. Very sharp edges, though :/


 I'm not a noob to wearing contact lenses, but I only wear daily disposables so don't really have to faff with correct cleaning and storage. With these, I was really quite stupid and didn't read the leaflet properly, so put them in the supplied case (cleaned with hot water first, obviously) with some saline solution and allowed them to soak. Needless to say, when I put them in my eyes they were really quite uncomfortable? I could feel them every time I blinked, and they itched. But, having heard that circle lenses are less comfortable anyway and that they were a bit thicker, I put up with it, thinking I was just new to circle lenses. I soaked and cleaned them religiously, but not with the correct solution. I'm a numpty, I know.



Did this for three or four cycles, before realising that they were meant to be soaked in multipurpose solution, and not saline. I don't know if I've ever had a bigger Eureka moment than the first time I put them on after they'd spent the night in that...almost as comfortable as my usual daily disposables. Reading is fun!

Without:


With:


Please ignore the eyebrow forest and failed false eyelash application in both cases.

I ordered prescription lenses in the design 'Flower Black'.

Postage was free (and they came with a cute bag and a free contact lens case) which is what initially attracted me to them. I paid £14.19 in total which was pretty much the cheapest for just one pair of lenses that I could find, on the internet. Because I have poor vision, I needed prescription lenses. Lots of places on the internet, even some in the UK, do prescription lenses, but you have to participate in a 'batch order' which I thought was stupid and didn't want to do. Why not just keep a few of each in stock? I don't want to have to wait for everyone else to finish ordering before the store sends off for them, waits to recieve them, then package them up and send them to ME. I'm impatient, deal with it.

Some lens shops that I found on my searches only had a couple of very very popular plano (no corrective power) lenses in stock and everything else was marked either 'out of stock' or 'batch order only'. Go away.

Anyway, I was going to end this review with a little 'I'm very happy with how this went and I'm already saving up to order again' but yesterday my Twitter feed came up with this.

This is the 'poor timing' I was referring to earlier on.

I've got to reconsider now, my previous attitude towards my contact lenses...all that time I was happily soaking them wrong, cleaning them incorrectly...could have done some serious damage to my eyes. And that would have been entirely self-inflicted, through ignorance and carelessness - HystericMint was as careful as you can get and through no fault of her own, something this bad could happen to her eyes, so imagine what I could have done to myself?

The worst thing about her post, in my opinion, was that, considering the huge costs incurred in the damage to her education, optometrist bills, etc. (I always forget that not everyone is lucky enough to live in a country with an NHS-like system) the compensation she was offered was pretty minimal. The company isn't named so I don't know which one it is, but I would hope that the next time I shop with a circle lens supplier, in the event of one of their lenses being faulty (not due to my own cack-handedness) that they would fully support me in any way necessary, as a paying customer. In future, when I next purchase lenses, that will be something I investigate before buying - whether companies can man up and take responsibility when required.

Just to clarify, my personal order was great - nothing went wrong at any stage.

For the time being, I am happy.

So I'm just going to copy and paste (every time I type that I start singing the BoA song, lol. I like K-pop too much!) this from one of my earlier posts as an explanation of sorts before THE PRETTIES. Wow.

Sleek have finally made good on their promise (six months later) and have been distributing the 50% off codes. WOOT. I recieved mine a couple of days ago and decided that since they did eventually do what they said they would, I'd give the brand another chance. So I spent all the money I'd saved up for circle lenses...on Sleek products. *facepalm*. Oh, and then some. Total came to like £63, sans discount, and I didn't even get everything I wanted as I had to cut down somewhat and then the website didn't have some things in stock. Like the Perfect Plum Pout Polish. ARGH. I wanted that colour so badly. *sniff*. I neeeeed it.
That and concealer in my shade and some lipsticks I wanted. Not to mention the distinct lack of online/accurate swatches for many of the products that I wanted but couldn't buy in store. Urgh. Anyway, that's another post. If you tried to order in the sale, have you recieved your code yet? Let us know. Also, if Superdrug decide to do another 3 for 2 on cosmetics (or, you know, just Sleek) do give us a heads up because there is still loadssss I want to get now I've cooled down on my pissed off with the company period.

 So I ordered:

Skin Revive Liquid Foundation (Henna)
Face Contour Kit (Dark)
Ink Pot in Dominatrix (Black. They seem to have stopped selling all their other colours...shame. The yellow colour was quite quirky, I wouldn't have minded some of that)
Bad Girl iDivine Palette
Original iDivine Palette
Sunset iDivine Palette
Storm iDivine Palette
Sheer Cover Lipstick in Calico
Pout Polishes in Chocolate Kiss and Sugar May
Blush in Pan Tao
Lip Pencil in Rich Brown
Total came to £34.60, including postage but minus 50% from the discount.

I placed this order late at night on Sunday. I recieved this today, on Tuesday. INSANITY. And postage is flat rate, which means that you could have a huge heavy box like mine and still only pay £2.95.

I'd walked into the car, all dressed in my Karate gear (before people start, I'm only a red belt) ready to go to Karate, when the next door neighbour calls Mum over. I'm sitting there, tutting because we're going to be late and then it's really embarrasing because you have to stand by the side until the Sensei lets you join in, and then after like five minutes she returns with this huge parcel. Apparantly the postman had given it to them to sign for...even though we'd been at home all day. Smooth. She said they hadn't given it to us earlier because they were at a funeral. But it was still good timing! I had something to look forward to opening after Karate.

I panicked when I saw the labels, I was like "Oi! I didn't order a Chaos palette!" but they just reuse the packaging, I think.

Everything was wrapped really securely, no eyeshadows were broken or pencils snapped in half.

Bam! As it came out of the boxes.

I was practically weeping just looking at all of it. I can't WAIT to play with and review all of this.

Loosely arranged by function and/or collection.

A teeny weeny part of me wishes that I'd had the opportunity to be this excited back in November...but what's done is done, right? And I'm pleased that they did eventually distribute the codes. I'm totally, completely (almost, anyway) broke now, but it was worth it in my opinion.

What do you guys want to see first?

I recieved this about a week ago. It was the same day on which my beadpassion order came in, which was a convienient, if random detail.

 So this is basically a little pot of metaphorical gold. Like, the Elixir of Life for eyeshadows or something. It goes above and beyond all the hype, in my opinion. Let me demonstrate why:

 Below are some shades from Sleek's glitter terrorism Sparkle palette - Tinsel, Cranberry and Star Light (from left to right). While all but Star Light had incredibly pigmentation on their lonesome, the Epoxy really refines the colour and makes it more vibrant while holding onto the glitter to make it stand out more, and not causing you to be publicly humiliated.
Above are the shadows without any base or the Pixie Epoxy.
And again, with the magical potion. The difference is insane, and it makes applying shadow a lot easier.

I actually ordered two Pixie Epoxies (one for my mother, and one for myself) and my order came with a free sample of Polar Bear eyeshadow, which I got to swatch exactly once before my mother promptly relieved me of it. :( Anyway, it was gorgeous. 

Fyrinnae state that the Epoxy isn't intended to act as a primer, but I personally find that it holds shadow on me for even longer than my Elizabeth Arden Eye-Fix. Even though it's being posted from the USA, it's still far cheaper. Fyrinnae, in my eyes, are above and beyond most other mineral makeup companies. They've invented their own product and their postage charges are extremely reasonable.

Hey everyone. Can you tell by my tone that this isn't going to be a happy post, lol? I sound so depressing. Sorry.

Disclaimer, because I know there's going to be SOME illiterate fool out there who rages at me for this.
 - I love Sleek (product wise, anyway) and I like the way they interact with consumers on social networking sites.
- I'm not accusing anyone of racism. This is not a "pity me I'm black" post.
- I'm not ungrateful for the sale.
- This is all just. my. opinion, and what I've observed. If you don't like it, reply in an informed way please or just cry moar.

I assume almost everyone, UK resident or not, knows or knew of the Sleek 50% sale that began at 12:00pm today.
Not going to lie, I was pretty excited for it. I'd saved my job money for a bit and woke up early to leave instructions on the computer for my Mum to order the products for me (as I'd obviously be away at school and I didn't want to wait the three and a half hours until I returned as Sleek have some pretty hardcore stans who'd buy up all the good stock) and basically went through school in a happy daze despite the fact that we had double Maths. Yes, double Maths, I kid you not. I'd usually just sleep through that lesson but this time I pretended to pay some sort of attention. Well I tried anyway, so sue me.

But I get home and Mum starts talking about the website crashing, people can't find the code and other apocolyptic goings-on on the internet. At first I was pretty sceptical of that, but I went to the computer myself at about, I don't know, half three? And I'm still here at half eleven, typing this up.
The Sleek website has been on and off all day, painfully slow, and when you do (eventually) managed to fill your cart up, you go to the checkout and everything from your cart is emptied. If you leave the computer, the products that you want/are most desirable (for example, their recently released Bad Girl/Good Girl palettes) will sell out quicker than it takes to watch Usain Bolt do the 100 metre sprint. The website went down for about an hour (in total) so that the server capacity could be increased and of course angry consumers took to the Facebook page and Sleek's Twitter to report a glitch of multiple orders, trouble paying, emptying carts, general chaos and just raging really.

The whole thing was to celebrate 20,000 "likes" or "fans" on Facebook. It was mentioned as a goal a while back and the staff said they'd hold this sale to celeberate that occasion, and it just so happens that a makeup fan with a good memory reminded them of this and they held the sale. Now, I can't blame Sleek for having good quality products. Hell, I'm a huge Sleek fan and love their products. How couldn't I? I'm black living in a majority white country and most of the makeup is either a) not my colour/tone (drugstore foundation shades dark enough are always patronisingly named "Cocoa" or "Chocolate" and come with like no choice of undertones or anything. I suppose very pale people on the other end of the spectrum have the same problem. We can suffer together lol or b) expensive. This is a blog aimed at students, lol. Students generally don't have the money to spend on MAC or Chanel foundations just to get a match, and nor should they have to. The nearest MAC store is far, far away from where I live and I wouldn't know where to buy Chanel. :P
Where was I? Oh yeah. So the website crashed and burned terribly, and everyone was understandably upset. While some complaints were being addressed by the staff (who must have been really stressed by all of this, I do feel for them) others went under the radar. I guess the point of this post is that the sale just didn't seem well thought out, at all. It's been reported that over a million people tried to access the Sleek website today. Over a million! Did Sleek not see this coming? Did they not anticipate the need for more server space?
Sleek generously added a "10 for £10" deal on their eyeshadow dusts and said they would add Pro makeup brushes to the line up. I believe the eyeshadow dusts only actually appeared on the website at about seven or so o clock? The sale commenced at 12. I think people are still waiting for the pro brush set to be available on the website. The paying system is quite frankly messed up, it keeps showing error messages but yet deducts money from your bank site and some international buyers found that it did not accept their local credit card and there was no option for PayPal which is pretty much universal, so found they could not participate.

 No offence to the lovely men and women of Sleek but the sale just struck me and many other consumers as rushed and hurried. It was announced last week, but on Wednesday a list was put up of all the products that would be out of stock - many of them extremely popular, such as the Pout Polishes, palettes, foundation testers and concealers etc. If it had been better thought out, in my view, then Sleek could have got plenty of stock in of those products and then people would not have felt the need to stay online for so long, futher tying up the website (I admit to being guilty of this) in the fear that the remaining products would be sold out (not unfounded, Bad Girl was sold out and then kindly restocked by Sleek who had some backups for press events and all the Pout Polishes that were still in stock that I'd wanted were sold out, foundation testers, concealers and Contour Kits all went) and possibly stemming some of the frustration that customers were feeling on the Facebook page. After the initial wave had passed, many of the international buyers could actually access the site and make their purchases which seemed to annoy the UK customers a bit as products then began to sell out without UK customers even getting an opportunity to get them. Not to mention that a lot of people, international and domestic alike, had been up very early for the sale. One user had the sale start at seven am in her time zone and was understandably frustrated when so many hours later nothing had been achieved. All of this just basically pissed people off and stressed out the staff. Sleek, we love you, but please think out things like this a bit more. ELF, for example (though a bigger company) regularly holds little "free shipping" or "30% off of x line" deals on their Facebook page and don't have anywhere /near/ this kind of meltdown. Someone suggested staggered time slots like Next do, perhaps you'd want to look into that?

Anyway. I was one of the lucky ones who managed to order - eventually. Anyone else ordered (or has any horror stories)?

I apologise for the sheer incoherency of this rant. I can write better, swear!

Oh wow! I have 100 followers :P Thanks so much guys!

You're probably all sick and tired of the long speeches so I'll keep it short...didn't expect this. Thank you so much :P I'll have to go giveaway shopping now. Watch this space :)