Right Now: Vogue’s Fashion’s Night Out with Chanel

Posted on September 4, 2012 by The Makeup Mole

Every year Chanel do incredible events for Vogue’s Fashion’s Night Out, around the world. Here’s a lovely video from London a couple of years ago, with two of my favourite people, makeup artist Kay Montano and lovely British supermodel, Daisy Lowe, getting into the spirit of the evening:

Chanel is also renowned for launching special, liimited edition products for the occasion, and this year in Sydney is no exception. This Thursday, 6th September, will be the launch of Les Twinsets de Chanel, created exclusively by Peter Phillips, Creative Director at Chanel Makeup. Les Twinsets will be available exclusively at The Chanel Makeup Studio, Myer, Sydney City for Vogue’s Fashion’s Night Out.

There are three unique harmonies in the range, matching lips and eyes like a twinset – resolutely feminine.

ROUGE ALLURE VELVET and LE VERNIS:

LA PROVOCANTE & PROVOCATION: a unique Autumn plum shade.
L’INFIDÈLE & INFIDÈLE: an intense pink with a burst of energy.
LA DÉLICATE & DÉLICATESSE: a refined expression of beige to play on the
natural side of sophistication.

This is the perfect excuse to indulge in a bit of Chanel lipstick and nail polish action – like you ever need one of those.

Current Obsession: Top Shop Nail Polish

Posted on August 6, 2012 by The Makeup Mole

One of the biggest revelations for me from my recent sojourn to London was getting to try Top Shop’s range of makeup. One of my very first (in fact embarrassingly fast after we landed) trips was to the Top Shop flagship store on Oxford St, where I was, literally, like a kid in a candy store. The nail polishes are like yummy gum drops, the range of lipsticks is to die for, and they have all these cool lip markers and chubby lip and eye crayons in all sorts of amazing colours.

So I picked up quite a few pieces whilst I was there and then as soon as I got home I did some fancy rearranging and muscled them into my kit, and now with summer shoots coming up, they are doing me proud.

My absolute favourites are the nail polishes and the lipsticks. When I was in London I was on a job with a top manicurist – I won’t say their name as they have a contract with another company, but they were raving about the staying power and the colour selection of the Top Shop polishes, comparable to some much more expensive brands on the market.

I snapped up the nail polish in Late Show, a bright purple which for some reason reminds me of Willy Wonka (don’t worry, that’s a good thing!) as it’s the exact shade of his jacket in Charlie and the Chocolate Factory:

PS How crappy is that machine in the Willy Wonka YouTube clip? It looks like something that Sooty and Sweep might have put together. But I digress…

and Easy Breezy, the perfect turquoise robin’s egg blue which I pulled out recently to use on a Virgin Suicides shoot as it’s 70’s girlish innocence in a bottle. It’s the colour of the dance (if a 70’s high school prom could be a colour) from the Sofia Coppola film. It also fits perfectly with the season’s blue obsession. It’s like a mintier version of Chanel’s Nouvelle Vague from a couple of season’s ago. Delish.

This season nail colours have all been a bit off, a slightly kitchsier, more interesting take on classics and these were no exception. I’ll be doing more Top Shop beauty reviews over the next few weeks as I’m yet to find a product from the range that I don’t like – and they’re a bargain as well. Top Shop, you can do no wrong!

www.topshop.com

In My Makeup Kit: Revlon Top Speed Fire Nail Polish

Posted on September 29, 2011 by The Makeup Mole

Helmut Newtown 1977

If you fancy a little bit of this in your life - You need a bit of Revlon Fire.

At the moment I am loving high octane glamour – full on, no holds barred, take it to the edge over the top Alexis Carrington style glamour. The type of woman who oozes diamonds and confidence in equal measure. I love red lips, expensive hair, and a blood-red nail, as epitomized in Helmut Newton’s classic photographs. And I’ve found the nail polish his models would be sporting (if he were still alive, which sadly he is not. Luckily we have his incredible work archives to remember him by).

The polish is Revlon Top Speed in Fire. It’s the perfect glamorous red as it’s just on the orange side of a pure red. It is decadent, luxurious and gives a nod to the late 70’s, early 80’s which I’m all about at the moment.

I used Revlon’s Top Speed nail polishes years ago and I’d totally forgotten how good they are. They dry fast which is great at work as no one wants to sit around waiting for nails to dry when there are pictures to take, and I now use it personally as well as I always seem to be doing my nails whilst I’m running out the door/on a call/packing my kit – the curse of the multi-tasking modern life I suppose.

revlon.com

Hot Polish – Illamasqua Gamma

Posted on July 11, 2011 by The Makeup Mole

This is, quite literally, a hot polish. It’s a fluoro orange colour that’s so bright that it hurts your eyes, and it’s exactly what I need at the moment. I’m in desperate need of a holiday and I’ve been quitting caffeine, so when you’re tired and the only vices you have left, are well, nailpolish and other assorted beauty items, you want them to be retina searingly fun. And Gamma is that. It’s the type of polish that looks like Gidget in Hawaii on acid, and I for one am currently in need of both (well, Gidget in Hawaii yes– less so the acid part.)

Roll on les vacances!

www.illamasqua.com

Hot Polish: Paul & Joe no 16

Posted on September 13, 2010 by The Makeup Mole

Why is this my new favourite hue? I’ve had it for awhile and I pulled it out to use it yesterday, only to discover the most perfect scarlet polish ever. It’s just the right balance between blue and orange and makes me instantly think of Betty Draper in Mad Men. (And I think we all know how I like to think about her).

Since red is one of the hot colours for European Autumn/Winter I’ll be wearing this frequently, and coming over all 1950’s housewife – except for the stifling girdles, obsession with what the neighbours think, and cripping bouts of depression to be medicated by cocktails, cigarettes and Valium. You know, just the good bits.

www.paul-joe-beaute.com

Sophy’s Polish Pick of the Month – July

Posted on July 15, 2010 by The Makeup Mole

London mega-manicurist Sophy Robson has been at it again, this time nailing (excuse the pun) the provocative new Tom Ford Eyewear campaign (see image above). If that doesn’t make you look, I don’t know what does!

The campaign was actually shot by Mr Tom Ford himself who has added photographer to his already pretty impressive CV, and the model is the ever gorgeous Dane, Freja Beha.

The deep blackened purple on Freja’s nails is Sophy’s Polish Pick of the Month, and it is a new colour for autumn, Dior’s Black Plum. Set to be huge again this autumn/winter are variations on black, so Dior’s new nail polish is typically of the moment.

Sophy has another nail tutorial as well – this time a Chanel nail tutorial, which I’ve included below.

She’s been a very busy bee the last month, shooting campaigns for Jil Sander, Tom Ford Perfume, Loewe, Armani and Givenchy, and editorial that includes a cover of Marion Cotillard for Paris Vogue and M.I.A for Interview magazine as well as her usual slew of editorials in British and Japanese Vogue and Love magazine. Phew!

Sophy Robson’s Polish Pick of the Month

Posted on June 3, 2010 by The Makeup Mole

The mannequin nail is not going anywhere in London as it’s the perfect complement to bronzed skin and those hot summer nights. Sophy’s Polish Pick for June is what she used on super stylish Paris Vogue Editor-in-Chief, Carine Roitfeld – OPI in Barefoot in Barcelona.

Illamasqua Nail Competition

Posted on March 3, 2010 by The Makeup Mole

By starting my blog, I have discovered a few strange things about myself that I didn’t know before: I don’t like writing in the afternoon, I’m obsessed (and probably always will be) with Shu Uemura eyelash curlers, I’ve never met a primer that I didn’t think was a load of old bollocks , and I have a secret, unexplored fetish for nail polish. Bizarre in that I have no desire to wear it myself (can’t be bothered), but I absolutely love all the colors it comes in. So when I found out about this new nail polish comp from Illamasqua, I just had to let you know.

They are launching a global competition to discover the ‘It’ colour of 2010 – right up there with the Chanel nail stars like Jade and Particuliere. Simply send in your entry describing in 50 words or less why your color should be the one. Include an image or photo of the idea (the grey of your cat’s tail, the inside of a crocus, your favourite cupcake frosting – whatever floats your boat), and the winning idea will be put into production and sold at Selfridges around the UK by October 2010. The judges are indeed a stellar line-up – the world’s most creative makeup artist Alex Box, manicurist to the stars Sophy Robson, and Pixiwoo, the YouTube makeup artists who leave Lauren Luke in the dust.

Get those thinking caps on fellas!

From the Front Lines: Matte Nail Polish from Marian Newman Nails.

Posted on June 19, 2009 by The Makeup Mole

Prepare to be dazzled by a revolutionary new polish coming out from Marian Newman Nails in the near future – it’s matte and it’s nude but the finish is completely different to others of this type that are currently on the market. The ones that I have seen so far tend to be chalky, but these babies give a flawless, satin texture that still dries perfectly, deliciously matte.

And we all know that’s we’re going to be wanting for the colder months!

Plus Marian knows nudes like no-one’s business, as she’s pointed me in the direction of some fabulous ones in the past. (If it wasn’t for her I’d still be standing in the nail polish section of Boots right now!)

She used the new polish which can be applied alone OR mixed in with other polishes, on a very big advertising campaign last week, and quite frankly the client went crazy for them. As did we.

Matte Daddy indeed!

Marian Newman Nails – the Inks

Posted on May 27, 2009 by The Makeup Mole

Marian Newman The Inks Marian Newman is one of the world’s top manicurists – her work can be regularly seen in major campaigns like Dior and Lancome, and she is officially the manicurist with the most Vogue covers to her credit – 41 at last count! She has been working as an editorial manicurist since 1987, switching from her previous career as a forensic scientist (sorry, but how cool is that?) to tend to the digits of the most beautiful people of our era.

She is the manicurist called on by Nick Knight, the photographer responsible for most of British Vogue’s magic cover moments of the last five years, and works regularly with other fashion greats such as Patrick Demarchalier and Mario Testino. Her celebrity client roster is no less illustrious, including Nicole Kidman, Gwen Stefani, Gwyneth Paltrow, Keira Knightley and Cate Blanchett, amongst many others.

In short, Marion Newman is the business.

But what makes Marion even more special is her brand new and completely innovative product line, called the Inks. Pure pigments, packaged as pens (so they are super-lightweight, a God-send when you have an already overloaded kit!) that are designed to be painted on nails and sealed with a special sealer. What this means is that you can whack the polish on, and even if it goes all around the nail as well as on it, it just washes off the skin because once that sealer is on, the nail color ain’t coming off! The other amazing thing about them is how fast they dry – 20 seconds to touch dry, 60 seconds to smudge proof, and 90 seconds to rock hard. Now I don’t know about you guys, but nails are not my forte (probably why I am a makeup artist and not a manicurist), so anything that makes my routine easier is a winner for me.

The Inks come in 15 colors with a sealer and a cute little disposable removal towel, and are the first in a line of Marian Newman Nails products coming out.

PS The gold color is possibly the best gold I have ever seen, and Victoria Beckham has been rocking the gorgeous grey called Pewter recently. And Marian told me last week that the black is called Black Beth because Beth ditto of Gossip fame loves it so!

Marian Newman Nails are available in the UK through Selfridges and select Charles Worthington salons and international orders through the website at www.mariannewmannails.com

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