Welcome back! And welcome if you are new here xoxo
Hope life is treating You well? Today I will share with you what’s new in my stash, what have I been sent & purchased myself this month, hope You fill find it interesting and/or helpful. Think Ere Perez, Inika, Terra Verdi, Evolve Organic Beauty, Earth Kind, Natural Wisdom Spa & more. All of these products are new to me, to they will be going into “Test Kitchen” side of the shelfie, and if You want to know what products I have been loving recently, You can check my latest post or YouTube video here – why, yes, I am freshly baked Youtuber now 🙂
Welcome back! And welcome if You are new here xoxo
I wish You safe and well! Hope You are keeping well or at least ok in these grim days? I am not having a good week, hence the delay of the weekly post, sorry about that. For this week I have decided to revive a blog segment called Shop My Stash, as You guys seemed to like the previous ones I’d done. After finishing epic amount of stuff (here) I feel I can finally breathe a sight of relief – I got my stash where I want to to be – minimal, with every single product being used and loved, no strays taking up space and slowly expiring. Nothing like being stuck at home for weeks that blend into eternity for finishing up products, eh?
Welcome back! And welcome if you are new here xoxo
How is everyone holding up during these difficult times? Today I am going to talk about The Clean Beauty Swap Campaign 2020 organized by PurPicks, a partner in Clean Beauty Awards I happened to judge this and last year. Post on that is coming up next, for today let’s focus on The Clean Beauty Swap Campaign I took part in. My clean beauty swap suggestion is natural alternative to Nars Orgasm blush, the product I replaced the last- as I found it so hard to find natural alternative to. Please step forward, Peachy Keen by Inika! More than 20 suggestions post linked at the end of this post too – at all price points.
Welcome back! And welcome, if you are new here xoxo
How are all of You? I hope everyone is keeping up well during these difficult times? If You need a distraction & are up for some blog reading, let’s revisit my 2018 Love Lula Best products & see how many of them are still standing strong today? See this FB album for 80 more Love Lula related posts here & check out their online shop here. (sadly no longer exists)
Idea for this post came when I was backing up my blog posts – being still is the best time on catching up on all the things I knew I needed to do, but never had time to actually do it. As life doesn’t stand still, my Holy Grail product change over time too, due to many different reasons – the brands sell out, products change in formulations, stop working for me or are no longer stocked by Love Lula. If You want to know my Love Lula Loves from two years ago, You are in the right place 🙂 Continue reading “Revisiting My 2018 Love Lula Favourites”
Welcome back! And welcome if you are new here xoxo
The last days of the decade are ending – can You believe that? I certainly can’t! And purely because of that, I am blending two Love Lula* posts into one – I am running out of blogging time 🙂 I think I need a blogger diary or a planner maybe? If You are new here, you might want to check out my 65+ of All Things Love Lula posts here, all housed in this FB album. Shall we get started?
Welcome back! And if you are new here, welcome ???
So it is that time of the year! Love Lula Black Friday sale time, that’s it. Everything is 15% off with the code “FRIDAY”. Time to treat yourself and maybe get all of Your Christmas presents in one go maybe?
Welcome back! And welcome, if you are new here xoxo
.We all know that plastics are bad for us, our health and the planet. And hopefully You have been taking the steps to reduce it in our every day lives & were left wondering – what about make up? Especially if it’s natural and organic? It’s about time we all took action and took responsibility for our actions – every little bit counts! Even not buying or using plastic straws. Or having a lunchbox. Because you are not producing considerable amounts of trash every single day, when it is easily avoidable. Have a Starbucks habit? Take a reusable coffee cup with you. So many people don’t actually know, or choose to ignore, the fact that coffee cups aren’t recyclable. They are not made from paper as one would assume, they are made from mixed materials, and lined with plastic from the inside. Just think what would happen if you poured hot coffee into real paper cup – it would melt within seconds. So, your every take out cup you ever got are still polluting our planet somewhere. Yeah, sorry about being the bad guy for pointing that out.
Thankfully Zero Waste movement is going strong, and more and more people people are joining it. Myself included. This post is for those of you wanting to significantly reduce plastics in your make up stash – let me show you the green beauty options!
Don’t beat yourself up about the products you currently own, just replace them with plastic free options as you go along. It is a bit tricky to avoid plastics all together as I don’t know one company who would house all of their make up products in plastic free packaging (plastic lids and pumps are common) nor I know if it can be done at all, but I wanted to highlight the companies who are trying their best. So, let’s get into it?
(Little FYI note upfront, I haven't tried all of these products, I am only one person, but give me time and I will work my way through them, ha. Ask me questions on IG about the products I own and I will do my best to answer)
Zao – refillable and recyclable bamboo packaging on most of their products. Bamboo palette for your own customized collection. Review here.
Pure Anada – cardboard packaging on pressed pans, like foundation, blushes and eye shadows. metal tube mascara & lipstick. Big fan of foundation & other powder products like blushes & shadows – the pigment is insane! Also, any naysayers claiming that green beauty is boring 50 shades of brown, should take a look at this brand. I have a few posts here, here and here.
RMS – selected products housed in glass pots. Mainly concealers and lip & cheek stains, bronzers and luminizers. Sadly new products like eye shadows and palettes are in plastic, I am not even sure why? Lipsticks are in aluminium bullets, review here..
100%Pure – cardboard palettes, lipsticks in metal tubes. Cream foundations in glass, blushes and bronzers in metal tins.
Living Nature – foundation in glass. Blushes and other products in recyclable cases.
Studio78Paris – cardboard or glass for selected products like bronzers.
PHB – eye shadows in cardboard boxes. Foundation looks like it is in glass, but I am not too sure.
Couleur Caramel – cardboard palettes, single pans, lip gloss & foundation tubes. Customizable cardboard pans. Good quality make up too, big fan!
Kjaer Weiss – ultimate refillable line. Uber expensive, so make sure to try samples first to see it is for you.
Axiology Beauty – vegan lipsticks housed in metal tubes. Not sure about lip crayons though.
Vapour Beauty – foundations, blushes and bronzers, as well as primer housed in metal tubes. *Note in 2020 – the brand has sold out since, changed the ingredients & packaging to plastic. Sight.
Avril – wooden chubby lipstick thing & lip/ eye liners. Cardboard eye shaddow palettes. Same with Benecos.
Boho Green Make Up – almost entire line is housed in bamboo or cardboard packaging. Adorbs.
Ere Perez – cream multiples in glass pots. Concealer in glass pots. Great formulas at that. Wooden pencils and metal tubes for lipsticks.
Neek Skin Australia – lipsticks in bamboo/ metal tubes.
Sappho New Paradigm – metal mascara tube, refillable cardboard palettes & single pans.
Gressa – mostly glass packaging on everything.
Antonym – how could I forget Antonym until now? Their bamboo packaging is famous! Foundation is housed in glass.
Colorisi – just discovered this brand at Content Beauty & fell for cute square bamboo packaging hard! The whole range is in my wishlist now.
Fat & The Moon – make up & other products all in tins and glass with very little plastic.
So there’s that, the brands & products at the top of my head. I hope this blog post helps at least one person, I would be very happy with that! If I missed any brand, be sure to let me know on any social media or in the comments. Let’s share the clean beauty love 🙂
That’s all for now. Please like and share this or any of my other posts on social media, it really helps to get the green beauty word out – and you will forever have my gratitude!
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Welcome back! And welcome if you are new here xoxo
As you might know, I went on holidays recently – first in four years, so it was a big deal to me 🙂 I asked you if you want me to post about what natural and organic products I took with me and you said yes, so this post is for you guys! I will be very honest with you here and will let you know what products ended up working and NOT working in the different climate. You see, I live in the cold, rainy and humid climate here in Ireland (hello +14*C to 20*C summers with rain daily or trice weekly at the very least. Heatwave? What heatwave?) and Mediterranean ain’t that, we all know it. So a couple of products I counted on working for me turned out complete disappointments while one other spoiled as soon as we touched down, I swear. I will also make a list of products I will take on my next holidays, while my mind is still fresh on what worked and not. Shall we get started? Continue reading “What To Take On Holidays – Natural Beauty Edition”
Welcome back! And if you are new here, welcome xoxo
A quick post for today, a collection of my green beauty make up swatches (and links to the reviews where apt) I have had over a course of few years. Be prepared for way for swatches coming your way on my IG, Facebook, & Pinterest too – after spring cleaning my stash I collected all the samples I own, and instead of just throwing them away, why not be of service for all of us and post a series of natural products swatches? I myself find them crucial, because vast majority of my make up comes from online – from LoveLula, Citrine Natural Beauty Bar, GlowOrganic Brighton, PureAnada, and a few other retailers.
Welcome back! And welcome, if you are new here xoxo
Today is the day I will spill one of my beauty secrets – I will reveal how you can stop your concealer from creasing. It is a common complaint I hear in the green beauty world – as natural concealers lack the silicones that are in conventional products – and the silicones are exactly the thing that makes the conventional concealers glide so smoothly and also fill in all the crevices, aka fine lines, to give the appearance of smooth perfect skin (but remember, it is only that – an appearance, while it hurts your skin in the long run!)
We won’t go into all those nasty ingredients that are lurking in the conventional concealers and foundations, that’s another post in it’s own, for another time. Since the natural counterparts don’t have those silicones I’d just mentioned, they perform a bit differently, and this is one of those learning curves you will have to get used to it once you will go au naturale 🙂
Don’t worry, the switch is so worth the extra effort – natural concealers are full of natural ingredients that are good for the skin, like coconut oil, aloe, nurturing oils and butters, depending on the formulation. So you will get not only pigment, but skin care benefits from them as well, as I don’t know how about you, but I can rest at night knowing I am doing my skin no harm, only goodness. Having said all that, oftentimes the complaint is that they are creasing – and this is where I am coming to help!
Before you ask, my favourite two concealers are Hynt Beauty Duet Perfecting Concealer & Ere Perez Arnica one. I have reviewed both on my old blog, you will find reviews linked at the end of this post if you want to see more information on them. In my concealer I am looking for the full coverage first and foremost – I don’t get the point of sheer coverage concealers, if I apply the product and can still see my capillaries and dark circles, what’s the point of it, right? I have been a fan of Hynt Beauty Duet Perfecting concealer (available from Glow Organic Brighton in UK) for a good number of years now, ever since it went through branding change and several packaging changes. Remember Christopher Drummond liquid concealer in a pump bottle? Yes, that’s what I am talking about. Nowadays is it not creamy liquid but rather balmy, and it comes in a glass pot that you swirl your finger in to apply. Still great coverage, and I still regard it as my nr1 – as you can imagine, I have tried a few in my days, but I always go back to this no matter what. Is wasn’t when I first started using it. Anyways, my shade is somewhere in between of light and medium, and as medium is getting too dark by the day (l am getting paler by the day) I need to get another pot in light very soon. Hynt Beauty is an amazing brand with wonderful ethos – and I keep meaning to get more of their products to try and review for you guys. Everything is really natural, and intentionally so, because Meryl, the founder of the brand is a breast cancer survivor – and that’s how the brand was born. Whoops, getting a bit sidetracked here. Can you tell I love to talk? Especially when it comes to all things green beauty?
Side note – please let me know your favourite natural full coverage concealers, so I could check them out!
Now, let’ s get to my actual trick of trade, shall we? There are three steps to it, and it is all really simple, I promise you that! You know I am all about simple and effective, right?
step 1
Moisturise your under eye area really well.
This stop is not negotiable for me, as a lady on the wrong side of 30s, this is something I never ever forget. It is best if you gave it a few minutes to sink in, especially if you are using under eye oils or balms. I recommend this step even if you are gorgeous peachy skinned twenty something. (if you are gorgeous twenty something and reading this, more power to you, the earlier you start taking care of your skin, the better).
step 2
Don’t over apply! Another major mistake most people make, and I too have been guilty of it in the past. Yes, it is tempting to blob it on, especially if you have a lot to cover – and trust me, I get it, I too have been guilty of burning my candle from both ends or not drinking enough water (drink enough water and trust me, you will see the difference!). I have extremely dark circles that are hereditary, and no amount of green smoothies/ exercise /sleep or products can cure, and I have acres of it, real estate! Yes, I know I am a lucky gal. So a concealer is a must for me – seriously, if you saw me sans any make up on, the first thing you would ask if I am sick or tired. No, and no, just my life story. So, yeah, less is more when it comes to the concealer – apply a very thin layer and step back to see yourself in a mirror, it really helps to see yourself a step back and not in one of those zoomed in mirrors. More often than not, you will find that one layer is enough. If you can’t see any concealer, go ahead and bin that product, green beauty world has better products, I promise you! If you really need that second layer, promise me you will be VERY light handed with it. You can set or bake your concealer or not, your choice.
step 3
OK, now we are mid day, you are working or running around and you catch yourself in a mirror, and shock horror, you notice that concealer is all creased, the under eye are looks all dry and all this is making ten years older than you are. Fear not, I have just a tip for you – and you can thank me later. I would suggest that you carry a miniature eye cream or oil with you. All you need to do is to gently pat a teeny tiny drop of oil or eye cream over the concealer and TA DA, you are looking perfect again! I carry either my beloved Bella Aura eye cream, which is wonderful and sinks in in seconds, not disturbing my make up; or some lightweight face oil (serum) decanted into teeny tiny cutesy 2ml roller bottle you see in the photo. That all there is to it, told you it will be simple! Not only you will fix your make up mishap, but you will give your skin a hydration boost, which it will appreciate. (and thank you if it could talk). By the way, I have found that using face mists doesn’t work in this case, while it might work for the whole face, I found it either moves my concealer or makes my mascara run, which is so not a good luck! So be a pro and cover your eyes when misting.
That’s all for now, thanks for reading!
If you want to read more of my tricks, see here. . For Ere Perez concealer review see this post, for Hynt Beauty Duet Perfecting Concealer review, see here.
Lots of Love,
Renata.
Enjoy my content? A tip into my PayPal Tip Jar - will get You my eternal gratitude and more awesome green beauty reviews Your way! I weed out all the greenwashing products so You won't have to.