Our first autumnal box of the year is here, and it doesn’t disappoint. It’s a very high value box – the highest, in fact, that I’ve ever had over the 16 months I’ve now had a GlossyBox subscription. This box has a nice set of five full size items with some pampering products, an accessory, a brush, and some interesting new colours for our autumn make-up.

First off is the Bellapierre Shimmer Powder in the shade ‘Whesek’ – this is a cute, ‘loose foundation’ style container with small holes to tip and tap the product out of. It’s a shimmery silver with hints of greys, blues, and whites, and at 2.35 g in weight it’s valued at £12.99. We’ve had some Bellapierre before – in the form of a popping red lipstick, and a nifty multi use lip & cheek stain – and we’re getting what I’ve come to expect from the brand, a really nice, easy to use product with good colour pay off. You really only need a little to get a vibrant colour. Wear wise, since this is a loose powder it does have fallout i.e. the powder drops all over yoh face as you apply it, but it’s not the worse I’ve seen and you do pretty much expect it from this type of product. You can very easily apply it wet – either getting the product on the brush and then wetting the brush, or tipping some powder into the lid and spraying it in the lid, which is how I tend to prefer doing it if I can. Applying it wet removes the fallout problem entirely, and makes for a very different look. Either way it’s a really lovely eyeshadow/shimmer powder – more expensive for sure than a high street single eyeshadow, but it has a bold colour, it lasts well, and is pretty versatile.

Next up is the Marsk Eyeshadow Brush Pro. It’s a nice, pencil sized eye shadow brush, with a smooth, well made feel, and soft, dense, firm bristles in a packed together, rounded tip that’s great for carefully applying shadows, and can be used for blending – though other brushes are better for that job. Tip to end it measures about 14.5 cm, and the bristles measure about 1.5 cm long. It’s valued at £16.70. We’ve had some Marsk before – a nice single eyeshadow pot, similar to the shimmer powder above – and it’s a nice, premium brand. It’s probably not something I’d buy myself, but it’s solid brush that I will use.

The third item in our box, and this is the lovely pampering one – Maria Nila’s Luminous Colour Hair Masque. It’s another Swedish brand like we’ve seen featured in the last few month’s boxes, and it’s really neat to see these new brands and products in the box – they’re pretty exciting. So, this is a large twist lid tub with a plastic seal inside – full of genuinely lovely hair masque. You get 250 ml, which is a fair amount, and it feels heavy – it’s valued at £18.95, making it the highest value item in this box. It’s a really thick, cream consistency masque with a sweet smell which you’re directed to apply to towel dried hair for anything from three to ten minutes depending on how much pampering you need, after shampooing but before conditioning. And of course like most hair products you’re definitely recommended to use them with the rest in the series. It does really feel good, both as you’re using it, and after – my hair and scalp (’cause I can never be bothered with the whole ‘don’t get conditioning type stuff on the scalp thing’ – I just get it on and rub it through) feel nice and pampered, my scalp doesn’t feel dry, my hair feels really nice and soft. It is a bit of a pricier hair masque, but does seem to really work, so if you were looking for a bit of premium pampering I would recommend this – it’s pretty much my favourite item in this box (in close competition with the Nails Inc Polish), I have short enough hair that this large tub is going to last a good while, so I can see the long term effects, and probably talk about that in whatever empties it ends up in – but so far it’s been a much better experience than the August 2014’s Elasticizer – which wasn’t suitable at all for my fine hair.

Our accessory in this box is a set of Invisibobbles – these are described as traceless hair rings, which you can wear without damaging the hair, pulling at the scalp, or splitting ends but they still hold well. The traceless part I’m a bit confused by – I think it means you can wear it without it showing, but my hair is pretty much too small/too short/too fine to wear it like this, and I have to double wrap them anyway. It’s a shame I’ve gotten something that’s a bit unsuitable to use now that I’ve had all of my hair cut off, but I can see how it would work – it’s a squishy, flexible, telephone cord like material with no metals bits, or sharp, single edge to grip the hair – so these could be good to use if you have the hair for it. I can’t really tell you definitively since I can’t really use them but I will keep them to use when my hair grows out. You get three in a box, they seem pretty hard wearing, and are valued at £4.

Lastly, is the Nails Inc Nail Polish in the shade ‘Battersea Park’ – this month was a coin toss between getting this shade, a kind of grey/green Khaki, or a blush pink colour. I’m pretty glad I got the more interesting colour here, I have a lot of pink and red shade nail polishes already from GlossyBox so it is nice to get something more unusual and more seasonal – it’s a cool, bold, autumn colour. And again, it’s what you can expect from the trusted brand – it’s a rich colour that applies well, and dries fast, staying nice and shiny afterwards, and wearing well. You could get away with a single coat for day to day wear – since most people don’t really look that closely at nails – with the colour being so richly pigmented. With two coats you’re totes ‘Instagram close up of my nails’ ready. You get 10 ml, and it’s worth £11, both of which are the usual deal with Nails Inc – I really like the colour, and I’ve already worn it a few times so I’m pretty happy with this. I’d definitely consider buying it for reals.

So, that’s the whole box; five items with one brush, one eyeshadow, a hair masque, a set of hair bobbles, and a nail polish. In total the box was worth £63.64 – making this the highest value box ever, over taking October 2014 (so nearly a year’s previous) box value which was around £60. I really like this box, and all the stuff in it – though yeah, some of it is more useful than others – but it really is worth way more than the monthly cost of the subscription.

We also have a sneak peak for the October 2015 box, our second autumn box – and it’s full size day cream from a luxury French brand – I’m looking forward to this since our French box we had in July has some really lovely skincare things. Until Next Time.

August is sadly over, and while we haven’t had that sunny or indeed summery a summer this year, it still feels like summer ends when August does. On the one hand I love the fall and winter for all the dark colours and winter clothes I can wear, but summer has it’s good points too, right? Anyway – here’s the last summer GlossyBox of the year, the August 2015 UK box. This one is just a regular pink box, with five items inside and you can see my un-boxing here.

It’s a nice understated box, with a high value and some nice items. The cards list it as having four full size items, but really it’s five, the fifth item has the same amount of product, but cheaper packaging, compared to the version you’d buy in-store. I think this totes counts, as we’re really here to try these things out – and more product means you can try it for longer and really see what it’s like (and it’s better for the box value).

First is MeMeMe’s LipGlide in the shade ‘Playful Peach’. This is another neat, pencil format, easy to use product (like the blue eyeshadow pencil received previously in May) this time for the lips, and in a relatively neutral coral shade. It has a creamy matte finish, and it’s about what you’d expect size wise from a lipstick pencil – it’s big enough that you get plenty compared to a lipstick but not so big you can’t carry it around easily. Like other chubby style lip pencils I have it’s not as dry as wearing just a traditional lip pencil or as wet and movable as a traditional lipstick (so you don’t have to blot, set, repeat apply if you want it to last) – I really like these pencils because of this happy medium. It does smell a bit like a crayon if that sort of thing bothers you, but I don’t mind it personally. And like with other MeMeMe items it’s really good value for money at just £6.95 – I’ll definitely be tempted to buy more in another colour, and it’s really nice to try this brand in GlossyBox since it’s an online only store.

Next up is the Manna Kadar Lash Primer – a US brand which is a new type of product for me – it conditions and primes the lashes, and can be worn under mascara. I’ve taken the value of this item as £15.3, rather than the £14.55 listed on the card by converting the US price of $24, but currency rates change over time. You get 4 g in this little tube, which is smaller than your average mascara, but still a nice size. The ingredients it lists are going to be good for your eyelashes, but I’m not really sure if it makes mascara look better with it used alongside it, it just looks different. The lashes are perhaps a touch thicker because they’re already coated with something, but I think they can easily start to look clumpy – so the lash enhancing aspect works much the same way using multiple coats of mascara does. The white colour doesn’t fade right away in my experience but you can put mascara over it pretty much straight away. The other advantage it may have over simply using one product multiple times is the wax in the ingredients, as it could set the shape of your lashes in the same way a waterproof mascara will (the wax in waterproof mascara is what waterproofs it as well). But I can easily see giving lash primers a miss, especially since you can get conditioning mascaras anyway for less money (Sleek Makeup’s I’m Conditional Mascara at only £7.99). You can see some ‘in action’ shots of the Manna Kadar primer below and decide if it’s better or worse for yourself.

The third item in my box is the Emite Artist Colour Powder Blush in the shade ‘108’ – this is a Swedish brand and it’s a lovely big pan (10 g) of soft, smooth powder that is mostly matte, but does have some tiny sparkle in it – it would be a great find – if the colour was for me. The idea behind this from GlossyBox is to use it as a Blush/Bronzer hybrid, and it kind of works. It’s still probably a bit too dark for pale people – you can use it super sparingly but it’s very easy to use too much, and I think it looks almost bruise coloured on me when I do. I have seen some suggestions to use it as an eye colour, which I might try, otherwise it seems a shame that it’s such a big pan that won’t be used up before it expires. Again this is another one where the value changes with price conversion rates, the web price for this is 200 SEK or Swedish Krona, which converts to £15.20 – very different from the cards listed £20.59. Either way it’s a little pricey to justify a repurchase for me, when I tend to be quite light with blush.

Next is the Naobay Calming Face Toner – a Spanish certified eco-brand with cute, fuss free packaging that we’ve had before on GlossyBox (March 2015’s box) – like everything else it’s full size at 200 ml and is worth £10.65. It’s ingredients are 99.13% natural and 12.16% organic – so it’s all about trying to put more things on your face that are good for it, and for the environment. This is a really simple toner which has a light smell, like apple juice, and contains calming ingredients such as camomile. It is a nice toner – cleaning the skin gently while not leaving a residue and I will use it all up, since I actually use toner – but it is more money than I would pay for a toner, and there are cheaper similar (and also eco friendly) products available.

Finally, we have our fifth item, and this is the one that is full size at 100 ml, but comes in cheaper open top bottle – at retails it comes with a pump. It’s the SASS Purifying Cleanser – our third repeat brand this box (we first had SASS in May), and yep – it’s the stuff you put on your vagina. This time it’s a simple intimate wash to use when you bathe regularly. This stuff is interesting, certainly. It has a creamy consistency, and a clear sort of pearly look. My skin felt tingly when I used it, and sure it felt clean and nice, but no more so than regular washing. As other people have pointed out with this brand, a lot of this is stuff you really don’t need – washing with any mild soap is fine. It’s worth £7 and like last time isn’t really something I’d buy for myself at all – but it is interesting to try.

So, that’s the whole box. It’s worth £55.10 – a nice high box value – not the highest ever, but comfortably over the box average over the year. I’m probably the most happy with the LipGlide, funnily enough the lowest value item in the box. Maybe I’m cheap? The rest of it is nice enough, and I’ve honestly never been that unhappy with any box yet – it’ll all get used up, just at different rates.

So our sneak peak for next month’s box – the first Autumnal box, I guess, is a full size hair mask from Maria Nila – which I’m looking forward to, we haven’t had a hair item in a while now.

Until Next Time!

Hello again for another indepth GlossyBox review – this one is for the UK 2015 July edition, the ‘Vive la France‘ edit – which just like French beauty ideals is understated, but lovely. This edition also focuses a lot on skincare, and more minimal make-up, with recommendations of finishing any looks with previous GlossyBox items, such as a classic red lip, for a true French beauty look. This awesome box is a limited edition print from fashion artist Jamie Lee Reardin, and is super cute and stylised, with classic French colours.

This month we have five items, one an accessory, and the rest are beauty items. I do think it would have been nicer to have five samples and the pouch, since while it’s a cute tie in item with the theme and can be used to store stuff, I think people do expect five samples since that’s what we usually get, but other than that this is a very positive box.

Going in card order, first off is the noxidoxi Enhancing Serum Base, the deluxe sample we received is sized at 25 ml, and honestly I think they should have just given us the full size one, since it’s just 5 ml more to the full size at 30 ml. This is also the first item with a confusing price given on the card – it lists the full size being worth £33.46 from noxidoxi.com. However, the actual euro price that you buy it at is €39.90 – which puts the total value full size (converted using the Google) at £27.80, and this deluxe sample at that figure is worth £23.17. So in this instance it’s lowered the box value, but later on the price differences actually put the total box value back up, so it’s not really a problem, it’s just a strange price difference. Anyway! This is probably the item I’ve used the most so far out of this GlossyBox. It’s an interesting sort of combination moisturiser primer serum type product – with the directions stating to use it day and night before your normal moisturiser to give even more hydration, tightened pores, and anti-ageing effects. It has a strange yellow colour, but a lovely melting with your body warmth consistency that absorbs into the face really well – a little goes a long way and it feels good. This isn’t priced so high for a high end style skin care item and I’d definitely consider trying more noxidoxi.

Next up is the Lollipops Lip Balm Delicieuse. This is the second time I’ve had a Lollipops make-up item from GlossyBox – the first one being a black eye liner in the November box – and it’s the usual I’ve come to expect from this brand. It’s a very cute French product that is very nice for what it is, and sits pretty low on the price scale – it’s cute, nice, budget make-up. This is our full sized item at 10 ml and is priced at £4.15, my minor complaint of the packaging for this item also still stands. As many other people have pointed out, the container is only half full, it’s not emptied out or gotten lost or anything – this is just how full it is, I think if they’d cut the container a little smaller or narrower it would have felt like the right size for the contents and avoided the confusion (or I guess made it more full?) It’s a creamy translucent balm with a melting on the lips feel too, that is also antioxidant and skin enriching with vitamin e, and contains UV protection. This seems to be the real strength of French cosmetics – even the super budget stuff contains ingredients that are good for your skin. I did initially think it was scentless and flavourless, but it does actually smell and taste faintly sweet, but not overpoweringly so if that sort of thing bothers you. It’s another great Lollipops item, and I’d totes get more.

Back to skincare items with the third item, and it’s Teoxane Cosmeceuticals Perfect Skin Refiner. This is a Hyaluronic Acid based night treatment cream, with directions stating to apply to clean skin in place of a normal cream, and to not use it every night as your skin gets used to it. Full size it’s 50 ml priced at £70, and our deluxe sample is 15 ml, making it worth £21, which I think makes it proportionately the most expensive item in this GlossyBox (to be fair, as Hyaluronic Acid items tend to be). I haven’t actually had the chance to use this that much so far, as I’ve travelled to a few events and didn’t want to risk upsetting my skin and feeling like I look awful, as my skin can react unexpectedly. But in short the idea is that it sort of chemically exfoliates the skin and renews it, while also containing things that soothe the irritation this can cause – so you have newer fresher looking skin. It’s very nice sounding, and I’ve had good experiences with previous Hyaluronic Acid things from GlossyBox so I’m definitely going to be using this one up. As usual with the higher priced items, I’m usually more reluctant to consider buying more when I’m usually confident there are cheaper alternatives. £70 is a lot for anything, let alone a small container of face stuff.

Our final actual beauty item is a perfume – the Yves Rocher Comme Une Evidence Eau De Parfum, this is the second Yves Rocher perfume sample we’ve received (the last one being in the October 2014 box) and the third Yves Rocher item in general (I got some nail polishes in August 2014). This is also our second confused price item, as the card lists the full size value at £24.50, whereas the actual Yves Rocher website, which used English Pounds as well, lists it as £34 full size. Full size it’s 50 ml, and our deluxe sample is 7.5 ml, making it’s total value £5.10. This is actually a pretty generous size for a perfume sample – it’s the biggest one we’ve gotten so far. It still comes in an open top bottle which I think is a shame, as I prefer the little spray atomiser style tops. Other than that it’s basically what I was expecting from the last Yves Rocher perfume, it’s a strong musky floral perfume, which is nice enough, if a little generic. I do find these samples are good for travelling with or carrying around with you if you really really feel like you’d need more (you won’t, since it’s so strong), but I don’t think it’s for me.

The final item in the July box is the cute GlossyBox Exclusive Travel Pouch, with art matching the limited edition box design. The pouch measures about 23 cm by 19 cm and is a flat style one rather than having built in sides, it’s valued on the card at £3.99 which is about make-up bag price I guess. It’s nice for what it is, I like that it’s clear and you can see what’s in it, the bag material and zip are strong and it’s a good size to fit a whole bunch of stuff in it. It’s cute and practical enough that I’d have probably bought one, but like I said earlier, I think having five make-up samples still would have been nice.

And finally, we’re at this total box value – this month with the four beauty items and the ones accessory, with the updated priced as I’ve explained them – I’ve valued my box at £57.41, which while not the highest value ever is still pretty up there, and is definitely higher than average over the last year. Next month is a regular August box, which we’ve already had a few sneak peaks from – we’re getting a lash primer, which sounds interesting and is something I’m not sure I’ve used before, and a blush/bronzer hybrid, which also sounds interesting. Depending on me getting my feedback done for this box (which is also the month of both GlossyBox’s birthday, and my birthday), this box should be free for me.

Until Next Time!

We’ve started the summer months now with the June 2015 GlossyBox and it’s appropriately summer themed. There’s less make up in this box, and more skincare/body care type items, but since the warmer months do mean I’m less likely to wear make up I think this is a good move on GlossyBox’s part. We’re also continuing with having new and interesting types of products in our boxes which has been really good – while they’re not all things I’d necessarily buy myself, a common complaint for a long time about the service has been the lack of variety – so it does feel like they’re trying to address that. My video unboxing and first impressions is already up, and now we’re onto the review proper.

First off this month we have a new type of product card in the box – a larger more glossy magazine type material than the rougher cardboard (not that I’m super bothered about the finish) that has all the information in one place now combining the editor’s letter, the actual product information, and the sneak peak – I guess it’ll save on paper. The product descriptions have been swapped with little quotes which serve much the same purpose. Inside the June box we have five items, three of them full size and two deluxe sample/travel size items.

Our first deluxe sample is the MONU spa Rosewood Reviving Mist, this is half the size of the full product at 50 ml, and worth £5.97. I did find it a little annoying that the information card didn’t state how big exactly full size is, since it makes it hard to portion out the price, but oh well. This is an interesting little spray that claims to hydrate and refresh skin, as well as set make up. It reminds me a little of the Lush toner sprays in format, and does have a nice smell (I liked it anyway) – strong and a strange mix of musky, floral and citrus. It does feel quite nice and refreshing on the skin, and I assume mentally the smell is supposed to refresh you too. Moisturising wise it definitely isn’t a replacement for a proper cream moisturiser bit it’s another nice pick me up (like the Etre Belle Aloe Vera gel in last months box) that can be used when you’re feeling hot and/or dry, and like that gel it’s smaller size makes it very hand bag friendly. We’ve had MONU before in GB and it’s a nice brand, I’m sure I’ll use it all up.

The first arguably full size product is the Flash Tattoos, with designs chosen by GlossyBox. Flash Tattoos are ‘grown up’ temporary tattoos that use metallics and simple designs, and are a neat idea done a bit poorly. There were eight designs in total on the sheet we were give, all of them 10 to 12 cm lengths with thickness varying from 1 to 3 cms, and the listed price is £6.50. There are a lot of dot based designs, one fish scale one, a braid one, and a GlossyBox symbol set.

They’re really easy to use, you just press them in place, dampen and peel off the backing. The reason I use the phrase ‘arguably full size’ is because you can’t actually buy a selection this small from Flash Tattoos anyway, you buy a set from them and you get a few sheets of designs for more like $20, so the set we have doesn’t really feel like fantastic value. There’s also more variation in the type of tattoo with necklaces and little decal type ones too, both of which I suspect would wear better. The real downside is the size, they’re sold as faux tattoo jewellery for adults and can’t really wrap around a wrist, let along the upper arm – which has made most people assume they’re really for pre-teens and teens, which is a shame, as I think it could be fun.

I did experiment with cutting one tattoo into two lengths and this does make it wrap around, which was neat, but you won’t be able to do this with all designs anyway. I think if we’d had more decal type tattoos this would have been less of a problem, I also suspect they’d have lasted longer – since the only place really to put these is the wrist on me, they look pretty worn after a day, since hands and wrists are pretty mobile. They also didn’t survive a bath (and wouldn’t I assume a shower). So these lasted nowhere near the week they were stated to be able to. First on though the design is vivid and very pretty. I think if they were long enough for real adults to wear, and you had a better selection these would have seemed a lot better. I also think some less boring designs would be fun – something more make up based, or cute animals or anything would be more interesting.

Next is another deluxe sample/travel size item, and it’s the Halo Fragrance Free Facial Wipes. It’s a little 10 wipe packet, small enough to fit in a hand bag, and the price is listed as £1.20. They’re suitable for sensitive skin, and are enriched with vitamin e and Aloe Vera. They are nice, though it’s a bit more of a basic or ‘staple’ type item than something more new or ‘wow’. They do clean without drying, didn’t set off my sensitive skin and are small enough to carry around. I would say that the price is a bit much, and would be much happier paying half that for the size it is. Other than that it’s a nice little summer appropriate item.

Back to the full size items, and it’s the Kueshi Anticellulite Booster. This is another interesting and new type product, and it’s not something I’ve tried before, or honestly really worried about. Full size it’s 150 ml which is actually pretty big, and it’s listed price is £14.55. Like our previous Kueshi item it has a simple packaging design using just pink and white text. It has a nice mild smell and a good formula – not too thick coming out of the bottle, but it actually feels pretty rich and non watery as you rub it in. A little does go a long way if you only do your legs, and I do like the cooling refreshing feel is has. Some of the active ingredients claim to inhibit and reduce fat cells in the legs, but some of the are also just for improving the appearance of the legs – such as blood flow and swelling. I could see myself using the cream for it’s moisturising and nice feel even if it doesn’t really help cellulite, which I’m not sure if it does or not, I guess I’d have to use it regularly for longer to really tell.

Finally, the last full size item is another nail polish. Essence The Gel Nail Polish in the shade ‘4 ever young’ which is a bright, glossy red – it’s 8 ml which is generous enough for a cheaper nail polish and is worth £1.71. The deal with these gel nail polishes is that they are imitating real long lasting gel polish nails in colour and in how long they should last, without needing a bunch of equipment like a UV lamp. The full treatment consists of a base and a top coat which aren’t provided but are cheap enough to pick up if you’re interested. It’s the top coat itself that provides the long length, so we won’t have that with just the colour coat. It is a lovely formula in terms of really high colour pay off and a lovely thick glossy look – it really imitates the look of gel polish at least. Like a lot of Essence nail polish, they don’t wear super well, and chips after only a day to two. If I don’t get the extras to make it last long, I still think the colour is lovely enough to warrant wearing it – you just have to not spend longer putting the polish on than it’ll last. These are also such affordable nail polishes, so it doesn’t feel like such a waste – if the top coat really makes them last nearer to a week I can see it being a really good purchase, but I still have so much nail polish that I really don’t want to buy more.

So that’s the complete box, with three full size items, and two deluxe samples – I would say arguable only one make up item with the nail polish but you could consider the flash tattoos to be in that category. The final box value come out at £26.93, which is a little on the low side, though it isn’t the cheapest box we’ve gotten, it is well below my last years average. The contents don’t feel as poor value as the lowest value box (April 2015’s box) anyway, so I’m not disappointed. The sneak peak for July says we’re going to be getting a French themed box, with a limited edition design, so I’m looking forward to that since I like getting the limited edition boxes. Until Next Time.