Just a Paw Picture!

For various reasons, I haven't managed to get anything posted today, but I thought I'd just come on quickly and post a little picture that I thought was quite cute. It features a paw that belongs to my cat, Chloe, just after she'd turned over the Sky channel whilst she has having a cuddle with me (it was a race to get my camera and take the photo before she moved her paw completely) - I was quite impressed with her abilities, but less so with her choice of TV (some old western film... really?). I think paws are really cute, is that weird?

You'll notice the bright pink fluffy robe behind the paw - that's one of the few robes that I have to have on my knee when Chloe wants a cuddle as she LOVES it. Bless.

Quick Reminder of Today's Elemis QVC Today's Special Value!

As posted about here: http://www.thebeautyscoop.co.uk/2011/11/elemis-qvc-todays-special-value-sunday.html 

Contains:

• 1 x Pro-Collagen Marine Cream (30ml) - award-winning moisturiser helps to actively reduce the appearance of fine lines and wrinkles whilst hydrating your skin
• 1 x Pro-Radiance Cream Cleanser (150ml) - formulated to deeply cleanse your skin, gently dissolving make-up and daily grime to a radiant, youthful-looking complexion
• 1 x Pro-Radiance Hand and Nail Cream (100ml) - luxuriously rich hand cream quickly absorbs to instantly hydrate hands and condition your nails. Only available at QVC
• 1 x Frangipani Monoi Body Oil (100ml) - super-hydrating oil designed to leave your skin feeling silky soft and beautifully fragranced. It can be used as a massage oil and a hair treatment
• 1 x Tranquil Touch Bath Elixir (300ml) - enriched with cocoa butter, patchouli, cedarwood and vetivert to leave your skin felling soft and delicately scented
• 1 x navy patent wash bag - 26.5cm x 17.5cm x 8cm (10.3" x 6.8" x 3.1")

QVC Site!

Celeb Sunday - Emily Blunt For Yves Saint Laurent (YSL) Opium!

It would be rude not to show you the gorgeous (and exclusive) behind the scenes footage I've been sent of Emily Blunt in the new TV Campaign for Yves Saint Laurent's Opium fragrance. Opium hasn't had a TV Campaign for 10 years, so it's nice to see that they're putting such a classic fragrance back on our screens, don't you think?!

I think Emily looks amazing, I am totally loving the smoky eyes and glamorous hair and am looking forward to seeing the ad in full - weirdly, I only really like beauty advertisements, the rest get fast forwarded! :-)

The full advertisement will be showing from December 4th but have a little preview with some behind the scenes footage below!

Selling/Advertising Tactics - A Little Rant, If You Please!

My mum called a couple of days ago, and told me to put Ideal World shopping channel on to see if I thought that some Silk 'Oil of Morocco' products showing on there were worth buying. I couldn't help but be a little wound up by the selling tactics used on the show though.

Firstly, they kept talking about 'another well known Argan Oil product' and how it was full of rubbish, not good for your hair and didn't get good results etc - it was quite clear to me, that they were talking about MoroccanOil, a product I use very regularly and a product I am over the moon with, every time I use it... and a product that many others that I know feel the same about, including reading on other beauty blogs.

They then demonstrated the 'other oil' on a model, and put it all literally in one small section of hair, which would make any hair oily and limp, using ANY product - even their own. I assume this was to make it appear that using this 'other' product would give you greasy, lifeless and limp hair which is simply not true. Look at the difference in how they apply it in the photographs below (please click to enlarge):

Now look at the finished result of the  (what I believe to be) MorrocanOil hair:

They then applied their Oil of Morocco to the other side, in a much different and much more normal manner. This of course gave the appearance of a better result, and thus a 'better product' - am I being cynical? Have a look:

See, a much lighter and natural application!

The other issue I had with the show is their before and after photographs. Their before pictures (on the left) are clearly un-styled and untreated by anything, in fact I'd say in the blonde model's photograph, they looked like they might have messed her hair up for the before photo, what do you think? Then, in the after photographs, the hair had clearly been styled to within an inch of its life for a lot of the photographs.

The red-headed model's hair actually looked greasy by the time they had put their product in, I don't know if it comes across in the picture but it really stood out to me, probably because they were going on about how it DIDN'T make the hair greasy at the same time. It's also quite obviously been properly curled, using some tool, which will always make the hair less frizzy - especially if it's a heated tool.

Surely it would have been better for them to style the hair in BOTH pictures in the same way, so that the result being shown would be a fair, and realistic comparison for people to then make an educated decision on whether to buy the product or not?

I know this is a tactic used by many brands, to make their 'after' results look even more amazing (I'm thinking lash inserts and other, similar advertising 'tricks'), but to do it so blatantly and whilst slating another brand just seems to be taking it a bit too far if you ask me... which you didn't, but I'm telling you anyway, haha!

It actually made me feel that I couldn't really trust the products being shown, it's like they can't show more realistic results because they wouldn't have as much of a 'wow' factor to them (or any factor, maybe?)! I obviously told my mum to just continue to use MoroccanOil as she knows and loves it, and I didn't want her to waste money on, or be disappointed in another product that neither of us knew much about!

I would much rather see a realistic image/piece of video footage that shows exactly how the product performs - even if it had less 'wow' factor. It would make me have a million times more faith in the brand, and product and would surely cause them less problems with advertising standards and complaints being made! This is why I rely on blogs (and why I started mine) as for the most part, you know you're getting real people showing real results! :-)

What do you make of it, is this something that annoys you with advertisements? Have you tried this brand's Argan oil products before?

More Beauty Deals and Codes!

Cheap Smells - Use code 'SkinCare10' anytime before Sunday and get an extra 10% off Roc, Guinot and Darphin!

Cheap Smells - 25% off Nail Rock nail wraps and also Wella Weekend where everything is £4.99 (and I LOVE this Wella range, it has been a staple for many years)!

Superdrug - For 4 days only, selected Ghost fragrances are 2 for £26, normally retailing at £23.50 each. Plus, if you spend £50, there's still the £10 off code GIFTGUIDE11 available to use until 22nd November. Perfect for Christmas presents!

Debenhams - 20% off when you spend £50 (although it excludes quite a lot, including beauty, which I know doesn't fall under beauty deals, but I thought some of you might be able to make use of this anyway?!) using code RX92 (between 21st and 27th November)

Gorgeous New Kooky Nail Wraps For Christmas!

Just how gorgeous are these? I adore Starry Night, Christmas Eve & Baby It's Cold Outside in both red and gold... I have no self control or decisiveness when it comes to choosing between things I like so I'm thinking I'll end up with all 4 designs and not enough fingers to wear them on over Christmas - ha!

Available from http://www.kookynails.com priced £5 per sheet (I think it's £2.50 postage per oder), with lots and lots of other designs also available on there!

What do you think, would you wear these? x

Gel Nail Swatches - Final Thoughts!

You may remember the gel nails that I had done at Professional Beauty North a while back?! Well I thought I'd do a quick update post showing the polish after 3 and a half weeks of wear and what I thought about how they left my nails after.

As you can see, all brands stood up well in how well they lasted, none of them chipped, wore away or changed in appearance at all - and that is pretty damn impressive. Nothing I did made any difference to how they looked. In fact, they were all still so very pretty, that I did feel a bit bad when I removed them.

Saying that though, I was definitely ready to remove them as you can see, my nails have grown quite a lot and there was a huge gap between my cuticle and where the polish started - and normally, I'd have taken the polish off way before I did, but this was an experiment, and so they stayed put.

After removing them, the only nail that appears to have suffered any damage was my thumbnail, which had the Calgel on. It feels so dry and is hugely marked, even buffing didn't smooth it out - I'll spare you the photographs I took, it's not pretty at all!

I'd certainly recommend the NuBar Gelicure and Artistic Colour Gloss without hesitation, and would just say to make sure that the Calgel system isn't going to damage your nails before you have it done as other than the damaged nail, I was still very impressed. I can't honestly say if this damage was a one off as this is my one and only nail/experience of it, just approach with caution and make sure you know everything there is to know.

Do you have gel nail polish? If so, which one and do your nails ever get damaged with it? x

P.S - The Kooky Nail Wrap lasted 2 weeks, although there was tip-shrinkage quite soon into that but it wasn't awfully noticeable!

Fake Bake Beauty Salon Launches In Selfridges Beauty Hall, Manchester!

Two weeks ago, I attended the brand spanking new and totally fantastic Fake Bake Salon in (also brand new) Selfridges Beauty Hall in Manchester. It’s a gorgeous little salon, light and bright and with the most amazing chandeliers hanging from the ceiling (instantly alerting that magpie in me – ooooh sparkly) – everything you’d expect from a salon located in a Selfridges store! Refreshments are provided with a smile (I even had a glass of the fizzy stuff) and it really feels that nothing is too much trouble – great service.

I was very surprised to see the range of treatments available as I expected that it could just be mainly focussed around tanning and possibly nails too but there’s a whole host of treatments to choose from, from bronzing to Botox – just have a look (and apparently there’s more to come)!!

I went for a resurfacing facial, using a Dermaquest 10% Glycolic mask which isn’t a nicey nice facial where you relax, but it is a facial that delivers results almost immediately (I will do a separate post on that very soon)! The therapist was informative throughout the treatment, telling me exactly which step was being done and what it did. She was also very friendly, and seemed genuinely interested our conversation whilst doing the treatment!

Whilst there I also met, and had a great chat with the king of tanning, James Read, who has bronzed the bodies of many celebrities throughout his career, and who was giving fake tanning master classes for 2 days in the Manchester salon. I found James to be utterly fabulous and so friendly too - he definitely knows his stuff where self tanning is concerned and this knowledge really shone through as he talked me through tanning trends and the Fake Bake range.

All in all, I am VERY impressed with the salon and its staff. If you fancy a visit, you can find it nestled in the new downstairs beauty hall at the side (ish) just near to the MAC and Illamasqua concessions.