As a preteen and young teenager, I had a brief flirtation with witchcraft. There was something in the air at the time: The Craft had come out several years before, the Harry Potter series was gaining worldwide popularity, and bookstores were full of titles like Spells for Teenage Witches. Growing up in San Francisco made… Read More In Search of Lost Witchcraft: NYX Simply Vamp Lip Cream in Enamored
By ordering Eugenie, a matte plum lipstick from the six-piece MAC x Giambattista Valli collection, I broke four of my cardinal makeup-buying rules: No limited-edition makeup, and especially no limited-edition products from MAC No makeup that I haven’t seen in person first No makeup that isn’t certified cruelty-free No near-dupes of anything I already have… Read More I Have a Plum Problem: MAC x Giambattista Valli Eugenie
Name: Revlon Lip Butter in Candy Apple Date Purchased: November 2013 Grade: A Notes: After my last post, which took me forever to write, I thought I’d clear my palate with a quick installment of my Lipstick Chronology, now approaching its end: this is the penultimate post! I started my blog in early 2014, so… Read More Lipstick Chronology #34: Revlon Candy Apple
Just call me Virgil. To save some money in the coming school year, I’m moving at the end of the summer into a two-bedroom duplex apartment. As moves go, this one will be almost comically easy, since my new building is next door to my current one. But I’ll be sharing the apartment with a… Read More A Journey Through Purge-atory, Part 1: Lipsticks and Glosses
I like buying makeup to commemorate happy occasions. Lipsticks and nail polishes and eyeshadows function as little pins that secure my memories to the material world. That’s why I started my Lipstick Chronology (which reminds me, I haven’t added to the chronology since March). And that’s why, when I learned two weeks ago that my… Read More Beauty Abroad, Part 16: Topshop Rio Rio and London Beauty Shopping
I’m not currently abroad, but this lipstick came from abroad, so I’m going to slide it into the “beauty abroad” tag and hope the gods of blogging consistency don’t strike me down. When I bought Topshop’s Matte Lip Bullet in Get Me Bodied last September, I noticed a few other colors in the Matte Lip… Read More Beauty Abroad, Part 14: Topshop Matte Lip Bullet in Plastique
Name: Urban Decay Revolution Lipstick in Streak Date Purchased: January 2014 Grade: B+ Notes: This “chronology” has gotten so woefully out of order that it doesn’t even deserve the name, but the weather is finally above freezing and the sun is out and I’m drinking an iced coffee, and I’m going to review my springiest… Read More Lipstick Chronology #33: Urban Decay Revolution Lipstick in Streak
But first, how my local CVS crushed my lipstick-collecting dreams for the 837th time. But first, how I ended up at the CVS, a place I do my best to avoid, for the 837th time. I was lying in bed a few nights ago, lamenting the state of my skin, when it hit me that… Read More Milani Moisture Matte Lipstick in Matte Naked, or How I Became a Vampire
If you’ve had Internet access in the past year, you’ve almost certainly heard of ColourPop, a small online-only brand with a formidable range of lipsticks, lip liners, and cream-to-powder eyeshadows, each a mere $5. Launched just last year, the brand has risen to prominence almost overnight, largely through partnering with popular bloggers and YouTube gurus.… Read More ColourPop Reviews, Part 1: Lippie Stix and Lippie Pencil in Frenchie
An especially frivolous post tonight, inspired by Lena’s comment on my review of NARS Angela. I mentioned in the post that Angela was a perfect match for one of my favorite nail polishes, OPI Ate Berries in the Canaries, and Lena wrote, “I used to pair up lippies and polishes and even labeled them, so… Read More Playing Matchmaker
Auxiliary Beauty 