Curiously Carmen

Hard Candy Colour Correct Cushion Wonder

When I first heard of the brand Hard Candy, my mind immediately went to Madonna. Even now that I’ve tried a few Hard Candy products, I still think of Madonna!

Anyways, today’s post will feature the first ever Hard Candy product on my blog! It is quite a long name – the official name is the Color Correct Cusion Wonder. For simplicity’s sake, I will be referring to it as simply a concealer from here on.

What it says (Taken from Hard Candy’s website):

This color-correcting serum instantly provides weightless color correction of any skin coloration concern.

Packaged in a tube with a cushion tip, no additional tools are needed!

Blend into your skin to target and CORRECT your skin concerns in 1 simple step!

The concealer comes with a very soft cushiony tip for convenient application. For a drugstore product at only $7, this is a really good bonus!

Am I the only one who hates ruining a beautiful, clean brush? I was so reluctant to use the cushion tip because I didn’t want to ruin it!

Application: Application was easy-peasy. It wasn’t messy to use and the cushion tip was very soft. Despite being a liquid concealer, the consistency turned soft and almost powdery upon application. It made blending very easy. This is a light coverage.

If I was going to a big event and wanted to put on my full make up face, I would definitely use a foundation and setting powder with this. But on a daily basis, the coverage will do.

Wear: Throughout the evening, the wear was very comfortable and I forgot I was wearing it until it showed up on my glasses.

  • A very good price- $7 CAD!!!!
  • Very soft cushion tip for easy application & touchups
  • Easy to blend and lightweight
  • Good for those who want light coverage

  • Wouldn’t call this a colour correcting product, better described as a concealer

Yay!

Availability: Hard Candy products are available exclusively at Walmart.

Media product featured. Opinions are own.

Weleda Evening Primose Face Cream Line (Day & Night)

Weleda is a company that I haven’t talked about, but have been seeing it gain traction in the past few months. I thought it was a small company, but was pleasantly surprised when it was the first thing I saw at Whole Foods as their featured product in front of the body care section! Their body care shelves were stocked with a variety of Weleda products.

I’ve been using the Weleda Evening Primose face day & night creams daily for about two weeks now, and here are my thoughts on it!

Before the green/sustainable beauty industry suddenly exploded in the past few years, Weleda was one of the first in the green beauty industry being founded in 1921. Weleda started by creating one of the world’s first biodynamic gardens, which after some Googling I found out that it means that these farmers/gardeners strive to regenerate crops as much as possible from within the farm itself. There are also some spiritual beliefs intertwined with biodynamic gardening, in that the earth is sacred and must be treated with respect… etc etc. You can read more about it here if you wish.

What it says (Taken from Weleda’s website):

The formula is rich in evening primrose oil, high in essential fatty acids, which helps protect the skin’s moisture barrier. Gotu-kola extract, known to increase collagen production, provides support to the skin’s structure. It’s also enhanced with inca nut oil, noted for its high vitamin E content that helps to promote skin renewal.

Packed with additional skin-nourishing and restoring ingredients, this elegant day cream will leave skin radiant, firm and smooth. For best results, use with the Age Revitalizing Eye & Lip Cream and Age Revitalizing Night Cream.

Application: The day and night creams come in a standard, no-mess tube. As with most creams, the day time cream was lighter in texture. The night time cream was thicker. It’s better to have a thicker night time cream because your skin does most of its absorption while at rest. But in the day time, a thicker cream might not feel as comfortable, particularly on a hot and humid day! They both feel cooling on the skin on contact.

Wear: I have no complaints about the wear! Both were very comfortable. My skin type differs throughout the seasons. It has changed from oily to dry in the past few months, and I’m happy to say that it is finally calming down although still a bit sensitive. Due to slightly sensitive skin, I was a bit hesitant to try this product out because I wasn’t sure how it would react. But my skin feels adequately moisturized. It isn’t too oily at the end of the day, and I don’t wake up with dry leather skin!

Scent: My favourite thing about the Weleda Evening Primose line is the smell. It smells very luxurious and pleasant. I always look forward to putting this on my skin at night and in the morning because I love how it smells. Due to the primrose, it has a beautiful floral scent… and I am weak for flowers & flower scents!!!

  • Does a great job in moisturizing skin
  • Skin feels soft and supple after 2 weeks of continued use
  • Lovely scent
  • Very gentle

Cons:

  • The tube (30ml) is small for what you pay for (Couldn’t find a CAD$ price online, but it retails for $40 USD on their website)

Yay!

Press product featured. Opinions are own.

 

 

ACI Beauty Preview Spring 2017 (Part 2/2)

Hi! If you have just stumbled upon this post and not sure what is going on, here is part 1 of the Spring 2017 ACI Beauty Preview event that I attended last week. Half of the post was me gushing about cute cat themed products from Paul & Joe. I would absolutely lose it if they came out with bunny products in the future (hint hint??? hehe).

In part 1, I talked about Stila, Paul & Joe, CLEAN, and St. Tropez. This post, I will feature Ardell, Bliss, and Korres.

False lashes are all the rage right now, and I wish I didn’t have to wear glasses so I could wear them more. Ardell is a staple in the falsies game, and it is no surprise that the releases this season look great! I love how they are so affordable too.

The two falsies on the right feature multiple layers to give your lashes more of a voluminous appearance. Gone are the days where you have to glue together two pairs of falsies!

There was only one Bliss product featured that day, which was their rubber mask, the mask-a-peel. I was first introduced to this at the previous ACI Beauty event, and was very intrigued. It comes in a powder form, and when mixed with water, it dries on your face into a rubber texture.

At $15 for one use (once mixed with water, the mask will dry and turn into rubber even if not applied on your skin), it doesn’t come cheap so I’m curious to see if this is worth the price.

The last brand we were shown was Korres! Korres has easily fallen into one of my favourite skincare brands. Their products work very well with my skin!

That day, we focused on their Greek yogurt line. After having to cut out ALL traces of dairy due to stomach problems, I’m glad that I have a use for Greek yogurt again, if that makes any sense? Haha! I used to love eating greek yogurt and miss it. =(

Anyways, we were told that in Greece, a popular way to soothe sunburns was to slather your body with greek yogurt. I could definitely see why, as it would probably feel very cooling and yogurt is rich with many benefits. So, Korres decided to incorporate Greek yogurt into their products and created a face wash, and primer/moisturizer.

I was given a sample of the Korres Greek yogurt primer/moisturizer. We were told in the morning to use it as a primer and at night, to put use it as a cream. I just use it as a moisturizer since I don’t wear face products on a daily basis, and I have been really loving it so far. But I could see it being a good primer since it makes your skin very soft and supple.

Keep an eye out for reviews of some of the products mentioned in these two posts!

 

ACI Beauty Preview Spring 2017 (Part 1/2)

Last week, I had the opportunity to attend the Spring 2017 ACI Beauty Preview. I always look forward to going to this event and learning about the new launches, and then sharing it here! Since I hate having long & wordy posts and try to avoid it as much as possible, I decided to split this event into two parts.
We started off with Stila. Take a guess what the product above is. It looks like lip gloss or some sort of lip product, right? That’s what I thought at least. But, it is actually part of their new mermaid inspired line, Magnificent Metals, and they are actually eyeshadows!

I wish I took a picture of the swatch, but sadly I only put it on my Instastory and it’s gone by now. =( The shades were AMAZING. It had some intergalactic, out of this world vibes but with a hint of sparkle and girliness. This is definitely something for the bold and brave, as you will definitely be getting some (good) attention when wearing this!
The next brand we were brought to was Paul & Joe. Paul & Joe are always super creative and detailed in their packaging, so I’m always excited to see what they come up with next. Just when I thought their cat lipsticks from previous seasons were cool, they did it again with their cat shaped lipsticks!

The pinkish-red lipstick in the middle goes on pretty sheer, while the grey ones go on to match your lip colour. I find that Japanese products (Paul & Joe is made in Japan), they are all about the sheer and subtle which Paul & Joe does perfectly, with a huge dosage of cute!
Another picture of the cat lipstick because it is just too cute.
Continuing along the cat trend, the brushes in the back are actually cat paws! How cute! They were so incredible soft as well. I believe the box contains a blush, but I was too distracted by the soft and fluffy cat paw to be 100% sure.
Paul & Joe usually house their products in paper boxes, that have very cute and detailed designs. These are the new blush and bronzer releases.
Perhaps one of the only Paul and Joe products that weren’t cat themed? I was given a sample of one of their nail polishes here and will be writing a review for that this week as well!

You’re probably tired of me gushing over how cute and girly Paul & Joe’s products are, so we will move on to CLEAN. CLEAN is a perfume brand that I haven’t seen around much apart from in the blogosphere, but they do deserve more attention and love.

As their name suggests, CLEAN products smell very fresh and well, clean. One of my favourites from them is a perfume that smells like fresh laundry.

This season, they focused on two summer fragrances, Ultimate Beach Day and Lovegrass. At first, I was a bit reluctant of how the Ultimate Beach Day could smell like a day on the beach, but damn, it really did smell like a day on the beach. It smelled exactly like summer and sunshine, which I am not sure how they perfected it but they did.

The second one was Lovegrass that I didn’t like as much as the Ultimate Beach Day. To me, it had more of a heavier scent and I prefer lighter scents on myself. I think it would be suitable for both females and males.
I’ve never been one to try self tanners or even go to the tanning salon, and have never done both. Does that make me a bad beauty blogger? =P

The main reason why I’ve never tried self tanners is because they look so intimidating and daunting! I always hear horror stories of people not doing it correctly and ending up looking like an orange or waaayyy too dark.

But, I think I do want to try using a self tanner one of these days. I would probably start with the St. Tropez gradual tan, on the left. That way, I can slowly adjust to it instead of somehow messing it up.

The blue bottle in the middle is the same day tan that you spray all over your body. What’s new about it is that it has a 360 degree nozzle so it’s easier to reach your back! The squeeze tube beside it is essentially a body highlighter, you rub this over the parts of your body that you want to have a nice tan sparkle.

This post is getting quite long so I think I will end it here! Part two will be shorter and feature Ardell, Korres, and Bliss.

Heme T-Zone Peeling Mask

When I think of peeling masks, my mind always diverts to the Biore pore strips. I used to use those in high school, until I found a drastically cheaper method to make my own pore strips, that work a lot better than the Biore strips. I do the gelatin & milk mask, which smells unpleasant, but it seriously WORKS. I might do a DIY post on it, so let me know if you’re interested!

Anyway, Cinnamon gifted me with another Heme product, the t-zone peeling mask. It looks like this version is a collaboration as the top reads “Heme x C…..” but ain’t nobody got time to decipher what the C says.

After doing a Google search, it looks as if this product is the same as the regular t-zone peeling mask, but just with a different packaging for the mysterious C collaboration.

What it says (taken from Heme’s website):
-Exclusively formulated to cleanse skin, clear up blackheads and refine pores
-Contains bamboo charcoal and grapefruit oil 

It seems as if charcoal is all the rage for beauty products right now, both in the Western and Asian realm!

I enlisted the boyfriend’s little brother to test this with me as well. He is 16 and has taken an interest in skin products as well, and was more than happy to use this. =P I warned him before that if it’s anything like the other peeling masks I did, it would hurt pulling off but he said it was fine.

Application: Due to the what I am assuming is the charcoal, this mask comes out REALLY black and slightly goopy. Like jet black. It reminded me of squid ink. Even though it was goopy, it applied thinly so I needed to put about 3 layers on it.

Here I am waiting for the mask to dry, sans any makeup. When it is completely dry, the mask will become matte and loose its shine.

Then came the most dreaded part of all peeling masks… the PEELING. I braced for the worst, but surprisingly, it didn’t hurt or make me tear up which was a bit disappointing. Because when it hurts and makes your eyes tear up, that’s when you know it is pulling out all the blackheads and crap out of your pores.

I’ll spare you the picture of the afterwards, but it wasn’t that gross. I would say it took out about half of the nose junk, but then again, I didn’t exactly count. My nose felt slightly smoother but I could still see some blackheads.

However, I did like how the mask was super black, so it was easy to see all the junk that was lifted out of my pores.

  • Mess free and easy to use
  • Travel size, good to bring on vacation when you want to just do a quick and easy mask

  • Not as effective as the other peeling/nose strip masks I have used

It was hard finding the price of this online, but I stumbled upon another blog review who purchased this for $14.90 Singapore dollars, which is $13.71 Canadian dollars.

I wouldn’t pay more than $7 for this mask, especially since it is a pretty small size.

Meh!