Luxury Candle Sets: Not For Sharing

bella freud candle set christmas

Some great candle sets for you here; but don’t think you can start divvying them up into little individual stocking fillers. Oh no. These were not made for sharing: they are little boxes of pure, selfish candle indulgence, each fragrance carefully chosen so that you have a kind of “scent experience” going on*.

jo malone travel candle collection

Take, for example, the Jo Malone Scented Travel Candle Collection, £64 here. There’s a classic Blackberry & Bay candle and then two scents that are more festive – Roasted Chestnut and Pine & Eucalyptus. Pine could be burnt now, to get into the Christmas spirit, then warm Roasted Chestnut to take you through the New Year and finally, once the tree has been packed away and you’re sat feeling glum in a sea of debris, Blackberry & Bay to lift the spirits.

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Complexion Rescue: The Total Tiredness Turnaround

BareMinerals Complexion Rescue in "Wheat"

This is the second time in only a few weeks that I’ve gone to write a rave review about something and then found that I’ve already done a rave review about it. On the one hand, it’s very annoying, because I invest quite a bit of time testing things, photographing them, checking the ingredients and taking various pictures (if relevant) of them on my actual face. On the other hand, it has to be a big old tick against the product if I’ve gone to rave review it not once, but twice. Don’t know what an earth it says about my memory, but we’ll brush over that…

So the Complexion Rescue from bareMinerals. Yes I have reviewed it before (you can find the original post here) but at that time I had shade 2, which was a bit pale, and now I have shade 4, which is exactly the sort of my-skin-but-a-bit-warmed-up tone I’ve been looking for. It’s perhaps darker than I need, but so sheer that I can get away with it – nothing drastic, but definitely noticeable. My perfect summery shade.

This Tinted Hydrating Gel Cream is one of the most hydrating tinted moisturisers I’ve ever tried; fresh, plumptious and can, unless you have incredibly dry skin, be applied over the top of serum rather than having to wear a proper moisturiser in between. I’ve worn it both ways (numerous times) and I’d almost say that wearing it over a serum and moisturiser is too much moisture

 

Weekly Window Shop: The Beach Queen

queen of the beach window shopping

This week’s window shop was going to be all about how to recreate the beach experience at your own home, but these summery morsels are too good not to show off. Maybe I’ll do the beach-in-your-garden theme next week – I just need to source some nice, golden sand that doesn’t smell of cat piss or contain bits of building rubble and I’ll be sorted. (Mr AMR would have a total fit if I poured sand all over the lawn – HA! He mows it every week, makes those alternating stripes and everything…)

Let’s get started, then, with the bits and pieces that will make you Queen of the Beach this summer.

lisa fernandez bikini

Behold: the ultimate bikini, from the Queen of Bikinis Lisa Marie Fernandez. So expensive that you will never want to dip a toe anywhere near chlorine or seawater, but hey – proper beach people just pose on their loungers. Don’t they? (I don’t often go in the sea or the pool unless I’m so hot that my toe hairs are catching on fire. I just don’t like lying there all soggy afterwards and I hate having to reapply my sun lotion when there’s sand about.) You can find this Holy Grail of Bond Girl bikinis at Net-a-Porter here – the price-tag will make your eyes water…

miu miu acetate sunglasses

…but nobody will notice if you have your amazing Miu Miu shades on! (See what I did there?) These cat-eye beauties are completely OTT – just add silken headscarf and bright coral lipstick. £135 at The Outnet.

Clarins Radiance Plus-Golden-Glow Booster

To get the bod to a good level of beach-bronzeness without even stepping foot in the sun: the Radiance Plus Golden Glow Booster for Body from Clarins. A few drops of this, nightly, mixed into your preferred body lotion, cream, oil or serum and you’ll build up a beautiful tan. It’s very gradual, but you can speed things up by adding more drops. Find it here online –  £22.85.

roberts radio

Picture the scene: you’re in your retro bikini, wide-brimmed sunhat on, sunglasses looking sharp, body all bronzage and shimmering, reclined on your wooden sunlounger on one of those beaches where they have proper toilets and people that come and bring you drinks and cold flannels… What are we missing? Sounds. Music. I mean, you could just plug some headphones into your iPhone like everyone else, but who wants to fade into the crowd? I’ll be honest, this Roberts Radio was a more of a “recreate the beach at home” sort of item, but boy does it look pretty. It’s £169.95 at John Lewis here.

slydes white cocacabana

“Slides” (those rubbery shoes with a thick band across the toes) have fast overtaken the flip-flop as my casual summer shoe of choice. No longer do I have to endure the initial pain of breaking in when I dig out my Havaianas, when I spend about three days feeling as though someone has driven a large chisel into the gap between my big toe and – er – next biggest toe. I just slip on my slides and go! In all honesty, I do find them a lot less delicate than flip-flops and it’s unlikely I’d ever wear them with a pretty dress, but for now, I am enjoying my non-splayed feet. You can find these palm print slides (made by the appropriately-named brand Slydes) at ASOS here – they’re a mere £18.

Browse more Weekly Window Shops…

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© 2016 A Model Recommends®: all opinions are my own and any sponsored or paid posts will always be very clearly marked. I accept press samples and receive product and services to review as part of my job. Outward links to retailers will usually be affiliate links. Please see here for full “about” section and disclaimer.  A Model Recommends and Ruth Crilly are registered trademarks.

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The Science Meets Nature Box.

With ‘green’ and organic beauty, there is often the misconception that these products won’t perform as well as their standard non-natural counterparts. This simply isn’t true anymore. With new research, development and money going into this niche market, there are more high-end brands and complex formulas than ever before.

The latest Naturisimo box embodies this with its curated selection of 8 luxury products that make use of cutting edge technology for their all-natural ingredients.
The box is worth £67 but costs just £13.95 – a great price to try some very expensive products. The Skin & Tonic Brit Beauty Oil sample costs £13 on its own if you were to buy it from the sample section!

Inside the box:
Madara Cellular Repair Serum, 15ml.
Skin & Tonic Brit Beauty Oil, 10ml.
Aurelia Cell Revitalise Day Moisturiser, 10ml.
Dr. Hauschka Tinted Day Cream, 5ml.
Caudalie Resveratrol Eye Lifting Balm, 5ml.
Bloom & Blossom Rejuvenating Spritz, 40ml.
Jurlique Nutri-Define Rejuvenating Overnight Cream, 1ml.
Kae Argaroyale Serum, 2ml.

I was most excited about finally getting to try Skin & Tonic! The Brit Beauty Oil is a blend of just 5 oils to hydrate and smooth. The oils (thistle, chia, borage) are ones that you don’t commonly see in facial oils, so I feel like this is unique enough to have a place in my skincare collection.
The Dr. Hauschka day cream is a cult product that I’ve always wanted to try and now I finally can, I hope it lives up to expectations as I’ve loved other products I’ve tried from the brand. I’m also going to save the very generously sized Aurelia moisturiser for winter when I will need that extra cushy layer of cream for drier skin. I know it’s dreamy.
Lastly, after not paying it much attention at first, I’m all for Madara lately. Affordable, effective and simply elegant. I have loved their peel mask and micellar water so I’m really interested in this serum which claims to ‘dramatically boost the cellular renewal cycle to visably improve skin’ … It’s more for wrinkles, but it can’t hurt to see how it works for me 😉

Dont miss out and get the box here, it’s a good’un!

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Mastered: The Val Garland School of Makeup

val garland school of makeup

If you’re really into makeup, fashion and the world of beauty then you may have picked up on the buzz surrounding the new Val Garland School of Makeup. Val Garland is absolutely legendary in the fashion world; I have always admired her for the way that she constantly pushes beauty boundaries, challenging our preconceived ideas about what “good” makeup should be and creating faces that often lean more towards works of art than straightforward beauty looks.

Through her School of Makeup, Val will be sharing her expertise and creativity with a selected group of makeup artists (the applicants must be professional makeup artists already, so slightly different to your usual makeup school!) in order to take them to the next level and give them the tools and knowledge to really be top of their game. The three-month course is kind of like an online apprenticeship with Val; it has been designed to offer the makeup artists the sort of information that you’d only be privy to if you were assisting her. The syllabus is packed with practical assignments, live Q&As and interesting video content to really fast-track the makeup artists towards a new level of professionalism. One of the Val’s quotes on the website really struck me as being quite potent; “A lot of people think that once you’ve learned makeup, that’s it – you’re a makeup artist. The actual skill of applying makeup is only 30 percent of the job…nobody teaches you how to create a world-class business. And I think you need both of these skills to succeed.” It’s not just a course to improve artistic skills or to provoke new ways of tackling makeup briefs, it’s about building a business and knowing how to get those high-end jobs.

val garland school of makeup

One of the most interesting features of the course is the inclusion of a wide panel of experts and industry insiders  – think Nick Knight, Vivienne Westwood – who will be setting makeup briefs and giving invaluable advice about working in the highest realms of the fashion industry. I am incredibly honoured to have been asked to be an industry insider on the course*; I’ll be talking about my experiences as a model, both good and bad, and speaking openly about what it’s like to be on a shoot, to be the “canvas” for the makeup artist. I’m really looking forward to dusting off some of my favourite anecdotes!

Professional makeup artists can apply for the course here – the applications process closes on the 6th May, so do get cracking if you want to be considered for a place. The course team are looking for applicants with ambition and talent and who are truly passionate about what they do. The course runs from May 15th until August 15th and is open to all professional makeup artists wherever they are in the world. You can find out more on the course content, fees and application details by clicking over to the website:

Mastered: The Val Garland School of Makeup

*disclaimer: I am being paid for my time as an industry insider.

The post Mastered: The Val Garland School of Makeup appeared first on A Model Recommends.

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