bellaoggi – Beauty Playbox

Manicure Monday: Oriflame, Golden Rose, BellaOggi, Bourjois

Oriflame The One Nail Polish in Gold Splendor 31195

I mentioned this on the blog before, but mistakenly named it ‘Gold Splash’ there. It was part of a limited edition winter collection of the year 2014/15. As all Oriflame The One nail polishes, it comes with a wide flat brush. Relatively easy to apply, likes to mess up the edges just a bit. Spreads evenly, is moderately shiny. Two layers are completely opaque. This is definitely a gold nail polish, but it’s not an ‘in yer face’ gaudy gold. It’s more of a non-refined metal kind of stuff.

Golden Rose Rich Color in 05

Easily one of my favourites. I’ve extolled the virtues of Golden Rose polishes before, and this is one of the prime examples of their Rich Color line. Easy to wear shade that is suitable for any occasion. Shouldn’t be difficult to wear against any skin tone. It’s one of my go-to polishes when I can’t decide what to put on my nails.

BellaOggi Gel Effect Keratin in Ladylike 43

A relatively new introduction to my collection. I’ve seen a post about it on a Russian ‘review anything’ site, fell in love with the colour, pinned it *, and hunted it down in local shops. The photo doesn’t translate it that well, but it’s actually a very decent marsala polish. It has a very muted and, dare I say, sophisticated look. Its name, Ladylike, is very fitting. This BellaOggi nail polish also immediately evokes images of cosy sweaters and warm cuppas in my mind.

The application was good. It spreads evenly and doesn’t try too hard to run off the edges. The brush is good. It dried pretty fast. My only gripe was it started bubbling on the second coat, which was a surprise. I only had one polish do that on me before. I don’t know if it was a one time occasion (temperature in the kitchen or any other factor) or if it’s a ‘feature’ of the formula. I’ll report back when I use it again.

* By the way, follow me on Pinterest! I regularly pin my wishlist items there.

Bourjois So Laque! in Rouge Diva 11

Expect a full report on this in my upcoming ‘Outgoing’ post. Spoiler alert: Not my favourite. The gloss looks good and the colour is a nice blue-toned deep red, but seriously. I can find it within a million other nail polish brands out there. I didn’t bother with clean-up for this photo, because the polish was literally applied so I could just quickly snap it to give you an idea on how it looks on the nails before I say goodbye to it. It will go to a new home, to an owner that has more patience.

BellaOggi Trendsetter Eye Shadow Palette in Naked Feeling

How I wanted this quad.

I’ve been circling around BellaOggi Trendsetter in Naked Feeling for good three months before finally giving in and taking it home.

How beautiful is it?

Very beautiful.

Now let’s get to everything else.

Packaging

Something about these round black pans with a transparent cover speaks to me. I really love it on eye shadows, blushers, and powders. The size is good, it’s very nice to hold in your hand.

You get 4 g of product overall, so roughly 1 g of each shadow.

Formula

All shadows, including the matte one, are buttery soft to the touch, almost cushioned. Fallout is present, but nothing too severe, perhaps aided by the fact that three of the shades are so light. This is also perhaps what aids blending.

Pigmentation

The most pigmented out of the 4 is the bottom one. The light peachy pink right next to it gets the second place – it doesn’t show up on the swatch (really, it doesn’t – see below), but you can build it up. The very first one would work great as a really light highlighter for pasty people (read: me). It shows up against the skin, but it’s not overbearing, to put it mildly. Unfortunately, the light brown shadow (the only matte with a very light sheen) barely shows up. I’m not even sure you can see it in the swatch below. In fact, I’m not sure you can see any of them in the photo below, aside from the very first one I mentioned.

The palette is ridiculously poorly pigmented. It’s so poorly pigmented, it grinds my little stony heart to dust.

In conclusion

Another quad in the BellaOggi Trendsetter collection I’ve been eyeing is Burlesque. I went for Naked Feeling first, because a) you can never have too many neutrals; b) if it turned out to be poor quality, it would be easier to at least attempt to work with. In the end, I passed it on to a more patient person. I just couldn’t work with it. All my tries to use the matte as a base/ transition shade and to work with the lighter shades as inner corner and brow bone highlights ultimately did not work out. I would get frustrated by the poor pigmentation every time I would use it, so it went to a new home.

Needless to say I will not be buying Burlesque, although the colours are very, very lovely.