Everything's Coming Up Purple

Much like a 5th grade girl, I go through obsessive color phases. Right now I'm going through something of a purple period. It's the color of royalty and the namesake of one of my favorite Hole songs. The shades range from subtle pastel lavender, rich red violet, and cool, refreshing blue violet. Besides, Gogol Bordello has subconsciously instructed me to do it.

Gogol Bordello-Start Wearing Purple Super Energetic! from geldemlen on Vimeo.

            To that end, I decided to change my two tone black and red hair to two tone black and purple. I picked up the Splat hair dye kit in Purple Desire, and while I was at Ulta nabbed Urban Decay’s Last Call eye shadow. Onward to the reviews!

            First, let’s start with the Splat hair dye kit. The label touts a “one step process,” but really it’s a two step process. There is a bleach kit to apply first, followed by the color. I will preface this by saying I’m a little uneasy about bleaching my hair. Horrible visions of chemical burns and clumps of dry hair falling out flood my mind. For this reason I washed the bleach out after 15 minutes. The instructions indicated that it should be lifted to an ash blonde. My hair was more of an orange with blonde here and there. I was hoping I’d be safe and the cool purple tone of the dye would simply show up as a warmer purple. It wasn’t to be. After the whole process the “purple” side turned into black with slight cool purple highlights. This goes to prove that not every do it yourself project is a success story!

After the bleaching

Final product after Splat Purple Desire- slight purple highlights

            And now on to Urban Decay’s Last Call. The shade is a subtle, warm purple with a slightly metallic tone. It looks like a bright, wild color but wears like much more of a neutral shade on my fair skin tone. It has an almost cocoa undertone. 

Wearing Last Call

            To complete the purple haze I’m in I tried out OPI’s cool lavender in You’re Such A Budapest. Please don’t hold the name against me. 2 coats gave me a nice opaque finish. I topped it off with the Funky Fingers confetti and glitter topcoat in Anna. My finger and toe nails looked like cupcakes!

Left: OPI You're Such A Budapest, Right: Funky Fingers Anna

Urban Decay Reviewage:Revolution Lipstick, 24/7 Liner, Lip Primer

If you're a shopper of Urban Decay directly sometimes they're lovely and send you a coupon for a free eyeliner on your birthday. With that and a leftover gift card I took the opportunity to grab a few things I had been eying in the digital shop window. My haul: 24/7 glide-on eyeliner in "Vice" (Royal purple), Revolution lipstick in "Shame" (Dark berry wine), lip primer, and a free sample of their upcoming Naked lipgloss.

Urban Decay lip primer

Their new packaging is a little more sleek. The new lipstick box is made of recycled material. (Yay!) Previously, they packaged in plastic instead of cardboard. Greener and vegan-friendly.

urban Decay Revolution lipstick in "Shame."

First, I'll start off with the lip primer.  I expected it to be a bit drying based on what it was and a few  reviews I read on the Urban Decay website. It goes on fairly smoothly. I feel like I'm putting on a lip balm. In fact, it does have sunscreen and vitamin E in it. I have only tried it with the new Revolution lipstick on top. I'm not sure if it's the liner or the lipstick, but it didn't have a real lasting staying power. It seemed to help marginally with feathering without the aid of a lipliner, but I wasn't wowed. I'm glad this was an item I bought on sale. It was a product I wanted to try, but I would have regretted paying $20+ for it. Overall, I'd say this is something that needs a formula tweak. Good idea. Not nearly as invaluable as as their eyeshadow primer potion.

On to the Revolution lipstick. They kicked the dagger packaging to the curb. I'm sure a lot of people are happy about that. Personally, I didn't mind the clunkiness because it just looked so damn cool. When examining the lipstick itself you'll notice there isn't a whole lot of product for a $22 lipstick. However, it goes on thick and very pigmented. "Shame," the shade I bought, is a deep berry/wine red. It's a rich, deep red without veering into the brown territory. It was exactly what I thought it was. It didn't seem to have much staying power on me, nor did it stain my lips. It doesn't last nearly as long as say, a lipstain or matte Mac lipsticks.

Wearing "Shame" on my birthday dinner.

And finally the 24/7 eye pencil. "Vice" is a true cool royal purple. It goes on creamy and smooth. Nothing but good things to say about it.

I have yet to try the Naked lipgloss sample. Expect updates when I do!

Getting Schooled: Eyeshadow Primer

There are a lot of superfluous makeup products out there; foundation primer, finishing powder, finishing spray. Eyeshadow primer, however, is not one of them. It really is something I would consider to be a necessity. There are quite a few products on the market- Too Faced's Shadow Insurance and Urban Decay's Primer Potion are the two most notorious. There are a few indie labels that have products along those lines as well. (See the bottom of this blog post for a list of helpful links.) Personally, I will swear by Urban Decay's Primer Potion. It's a daily makeup application essential. What's so magical about it, you ask? Did they bottle essence of unicorn? Maybe. What I've noticed it does for me is prolong eyeshadow color, make the color more vivid (even with less expensive drug store shadows), and help keep it in place. These are important factors to not only help you use less product, but to also help for those of us with naturally oily skin fight the battle of the crease line.

For those glamor addicts out there, I would also recommend Too Faced's Shadow Insurance Glitter Glue. It will literally glue the glitter to your face. It can also be mixed with loose glitter to make a nice glitter eyeliner. It is more difficult to wash off at the end of the night. You will have to scrub. But how else do you expect glitter to become glued to your face?

For those of you who are new to eyeshadow primers here is a helpful link list to get you started:

Urban Decay Primer Potion

Too Faced Shadow Insurance

Too Faced Shadow Insurance Glitter Glue

Lime Crime Eyeshadow Helper