Thursday Chats: Beauty Brands Launching Sister Brands

Hello, beauties! Today is another post that’s part of my Thursday Chats series, where I talk about hot topics within the beauty community. Today’s topic is beauty brands coming out with sister brands. It’s not a new concept, but we’ve been seeing it a lot in the past year.

Many beauty companies are owned by about half a dozen big parent companies, including Estee Lauder, L’Oreal, Proctor and Gamble, LVMH, and Shiseido, to name a few. You know how everyone raves about Bite Beauty but hates on Kat Von D? They’re actually both owned by the same parent company, Kendo, who also owns Fenty Beauty, Marc Jacobs, and Ole Henriksen. There are also smaller parent companies, such as Seed Beauty, who owns ColourPop, Kylie Cosmetics, and KKW Beauty. Of course, many independent beauty labels still exist out there, but your every day makeup consumer probably doesn’t know that some of their favourite brands are either created by larger parent companies, or end up being acquired by them.

Review: Bite Beauty Amuse Bouche Liquified Lipsticks

Hello, everyone! Today I’m talking about the Bite Beauty Amuse Bouche Liquified Lipsticks, a review that is a long time coming. I never really hear anyone talking about these on social media, BUT these lipsticks have 1,000 reviews on the Sephora website with a rating of 4.5 stars, which means they are truly loved by a lot of beauty lovers! I’ve made it no secret on my Instagram that I am completely in love with these, but I’ve never done a detailed review of them before. They’re currently on sale at Sephora and have been for a while, so I want to let everyone know how great these are in case you want to get your hands on them!

I randomly tried these for the first time back in August when I saw that they were part of Sephora’s Weekly Wow sale. I knew absolutely nothing about these lipsticks at the point, but they were half price, and I thought, “A Bite Beauty product marked down by half? Heck yes, I am going to try this!” Since then, I’ve purchased 3 more of them whenever I saw them on sale. Buying four lipsticks from the same line is saying a lot about the quality of these, considering I usually only own two or three of any lipstick formula. I like to try a lot of new lip products but I don’t want to own 49,274,910 lipsticks, which means a lot of the time I can only buy one or two of from each line so I can try a bit of everything. However, these are too good to pass up!

Review: Cirque Colors Thermal Polish – Colour-Changing Polish!

Hello, everyone! Today’s post is a review on the thermal nail polishes from the brand Cirque Colours. Last month, I mentioned on my Feel Good Friday post that I was curious as to whether these actually worked. Not long after, I ended up caving and buying one of the shades to try out.

I picked up the shade Terra from Harlow & Co., my favourite indie polish retailer. Originally, I had wanted Luna, which shifts from aqua to purple, but they were sold out of that shade, so I picked up Terra instead. Unfortunately, all of their thermal polishes are sold out on Harlow & Co at the moment, but is still available on the Cirque Colors website. The thermal polishes retail for $14.99 USD on the Cirque Colors website, or $15.99 CAD on Harlow & Co.

March Monthly Makeup & February Update

Hello, everyone! Today’s post is an update on my February Monthly Makeup, a series I’m doing where I chose a handful of products to focus on using for the month. The point of this Monthly Makeup is not to try panning these products (although that is a bonus) but to simply rotate my products around so I can use and appreciate what is in my collection instead of continually chasing new products. Before we begin on the products I chose this month, here’s an update on February’s products!

Focusing on the Too Faced Just Peachy Mattes all month made me realize it was a little difficult to wear on its own for work – it’s just too red-toned and intense. I ended up using at least two shades from this every day, BUT often paired with colours from other palettes for more toned down looks. I absolutely loved using the NARS Blush in Sin in February, but of course it being a blush, I didn’t even make a dent in it. It’s one of the oldest products I own and one of my first high-end (aka Sephora-purchased) products, but I still love it. I hadn’t touched the Becca Shimmering Skin Perfector Poured in Moonstone since last June, so it was great getting some use out of it – I quickly remember why I wished this formula was still around!

The Monthly Makeup made me fall in love all over again with the Shiseido Perfect Rouge Lipstick in the shade RD732, BUT I realized that the colour (a medium warm pink) didn’t really go with the other berry tones I chose. I still did use it as much as I could, though. In terms of skincare, the only product I had in my Monthly Makeup project was the Drunk Elephant TLC Framboos Glycolic Night Serum. I don’t really understand how this mini size from The Littles kit has lasted me MONTHS, even with regular use?? Why would I ever buy the $110 full size of this?! Anyways, I was finally able to polish this off in February. I’ll have a review of Drunk Elephant products up soon (ish) but spoiler alert, I think this product is really effective! The one thing I didn’t get a lot of use out of is the Urban Decay All Nighter Setting Spray. I consistently forget to use setting sprays, even though I used it a little more than usual this month because my skin has been SO. DRY. and this has helped my foundation melt into my skin a little better.

My First Experience with Nail Stamping

When it comes to doing my nails, I tend to prefer plain nails and have never really been into nail art. However, I always see people on Instagram with amazing designs on their nails, and I always admire how beautiful and precise they are! I first learned about nail stamping from Nova of Super Nova Beauty, and the whole concept seriously fascinated me! I mean, how do you transfer a design from a plate onto your nails? I also always thought that almost all nail art was done free-hand, so the idea of just being able to stamp it on seemed like such a unique ideas. Nova’s nails are always on point, and all of the videos I’ve seen of nail stamping made the process look so easy. After watching video after video of other people doing it, I was really curious about whether or not I could be successful at it myself. Read on to see what my first nail stamping experience was like!