I love matte lipstick, but these shades tend to be drier on the lips. It is therefore very important to prep the lips with a high quality, moisturizing primer before applying a matte shade (or any shade for that matter). Your lips will thank you for it!

How about a highly moisturizing lip primer that also goes a few steps further by promising to add plumpness to your pout? Here is yet another brilliant new addition to the Sephora range: the GlamGlow Plumprageous Matte Lip Treatment. 

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Princess Diana has gone down in the pages of history as arguably the most striking beauty to have lived in the Buckingham Palace, but a lesser known fact is that she had highly sensitive skin. As a public figure, the pressure was always on to look her glowing best and she brought together the world’s best dermatologists to create a special potion to keep her skin at its optimal best.

No expense was spared, and only the finest of ingredients were used. The secret ‘recipe’ got leaked, and the Lush Gorgeous Facial Moisturizer was born.

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Retailing at AED 330 for a 1.5 oz pot, Gorgeous is one of the priciest products to be found on the shelves of Lush, and for good reason too. It is absolutely loaded with the finest of skin-loving ingredients. As an ardent Lush fan, it was high time I got my hands on a pot of Gorgeous. After all, if it is fit for a princess it will surely be good enough for me, right? Read on for my verdict.

I’ve always been a fan of mud masks. Nothing seems to work quite as well at really pulling out the excess grime that a daily scrub and face-wash fail to retrieve. However, in most cases, slapping on a mud mask can be a messy affair that is often reserved as a specified weekend chore.

I am already a huge fan of StarSkin face masks, and was therefore absolutely elated to receive samples of their brand new clay face masks. But wait! These are in sheet mask format. How does that work? I was intrigued.

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I haven’t done a #motd (‘makeup of the day’) post for a while, so today’s write-up is a breakdown of what went on my face to create my last selfie upload on Instagram:

They say a significant portion of your selfie game is determined by the state of your hair, and I can’t agree more. I have already been raving about the balayage blonde coloring I got done by the very talented Roger from Station 10 salon (located in Ramada Jumeirah) – click here if you missed it. For more information and appointments, give them a call on 04 7027098.

I had the pleasure of being invited for a sneak peak of Sephora’s Winter 2016 lineup, and let me warn you to tighten those purse strings… the new season range, set to hit the stores from 1st December 2016, is sure to make you go broke! There were just so many things I have added to my Christmas wishlist… a brand new storage system for all my makeup stash being one!

However, space should not be an issue with Sephora’s very own Geometricolor Palette. With 80 eye-shadows, 32 lip glosses, 6 eye-liners, 4 brow powders, 4 blushes, 4 contouring powders and 1 generously sized mirror, you have an endless list of makeup possibilities with this beauty!

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Great news Tarte lovers, we can now buy their fabulous range right here in the Middle East in all leading Sephora stores! Hailing from New York, the Tarte Cosmetics range has a cult following the world over. I was recently sent the Tarte Tartiest Lash Paint Mascara, and have been using it all week.

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Sephora has always managed to stay a few steps ahead of the beauty game by bringing in some of the world’s most sought-after brands exclusively under their umbrella for the Middle East region. Brand new on their coveted list is the South Korean brand Tony Moly.

Tony Moly is a skincare brand with a difference – ‘Tony Moly’ translates to ‘putting style into packaging’, and we are not talking suave and sophisticated here at all; their packaging is just way too adorable!

Take the Tony Moly Banana Hand Milk for example. The cream itself is refreshingly light and absorbs quickly into the skin, yet it also manages to be very moisturizing thanks to the key ingredients milk and banana extracts. But the product itself is completely overshadowed by the cuteness of the packaging… an actual replica of a banana!

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Contouring and highlighting is here to stay. Struggling to achieve the perfect balance of chiseled and glowing? I have a secret to share with you… I am absolutely obsessed with the BECCA Lowlight Highlight Perfecting Palette. This powder palette features a ‘highlight’ and ‘lowlight’ for adding light and shadows to bring out the best in your features. Being powder-based, the colours can be worked up to go dramatic for a night out or subtle enough to use on  daily basis.

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For centuries, natural oils have always been a part of beauty rituals across many cultures. Beauty advocates have stressed on the importance of weekly hot oil treatments for the hair, and in the recent past, there has been a huge influx of facial oils in the market.

Being quite the pioneer in the beauty business, Gosh Cosmetics has created a brand new oil-based product, specifically for lips. It is rather surprising we haven’t seen this earlier; lips are, afterall, the most susceptible to dryness and chapping. Introducing the Gosh Cosmetics Lip Oil, a must-have for enviably soft, smooth lips!

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As many of you might have noticed from my last few posts, I have recently gone significantly blonder (click here if you missed it!). I’ve been a little cynical about going lighter as, in the past, my blonde streaks (often mixed in with a red base) tended to go a brassy orange after a month or so.

Scanning through the shelves of Lush, one of my all-time favorite beauty brands, I came across these bottles of Lush Daddy-O Shampoo. A helpful staff member recommended it for keeping my blonde streaks bright and brass-free, and I was sold! They had a sale going on, so I actually walked out with their largest, 500 ml bottle. Nope, never tried it before this financial commitment… I’m pretty much a sucker like that!

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Two weeks in, I am relived to say I am so glad I bought the bigger, more economically-sound bottle. Lush’s Daddy-O Shampoo really is a God-send for ‘unnaturally’ blondes!