Europe KIKO Haul!

It will probably not come as a great surprise to you that when I traveled around mainland Europe I bought a lot of stuff I didn't need, but really, really wanted. And if there's one thing I could win a gold medal for, it's buying stuff. Super good at it me. The trouble was, practically every country we went to had a KIKO MILANO store, and we went into as many as we could. KIKO is an Italian brand, and one that I don't think gets enough love. All the products are really well priced, every time I've been in there there's been a sale on (I don't think I've bought any of these eyeshadows full price), and every product I've used has been of seriously high quality. I rate this brand a lot, and tend to go there for eye products mostly (more on that later on in the post.)

First off, I picked up (in the sale) the Glow2 Blush and Highlighter in the shade 01, which I cannot find anywhere on their site, and either this is only available in certain countries or they've discontinued it, I'm not entirely sure. Anyway, this is a blush and highlight in one handy stick, the pretty rosy pink blush on one side and a shimmery iridescent highlighter on the other. I haven't quite got to grips with this little one yet, but feel like it will be very useful on the go as it's essentially two products in one. The formula is lovely and creamy and blends well, and the colours are lovely and pigmented, and I just know I'm going to love it when I've learnt to use it! The second product is the Glassy Lipgloss in the shade 06 (again doesn't seem to be on the UK KIKO website, how strange). I absolutely love the sleek silver packaging of this lipgloss. The colour is a vibrant barbie pink that looks lovely and sheer on the lips, it's not too pigmented which I like about it. The formula glides on very nicely and is not that sticky. All round a cracking little lipgloss.

The third product is available online! It's the Long Lasting Stick Eyeshadow in the shade 07 Golden Beige, and you can purchase it here for £6.90. I really, really love everything about this little beauty. The shade is so intensely pigmented that it looks almost metallic on the eye, and this golden colour is immediately brightening without being overbearing. It also promises to last for eight hours and I promise, once this is in place and dried it is not going anywhere, yet it's really easy to remove. I'm sure witchcraft is involved. I am a total sucker for a gold eye, but I don't always have the time for my usual several blended colours. But with this stick, I can rub it over my eyelids, blend with a finger and bam! Good to go. Being a 'one wash wonder', this will be absolutely great for lazy uni days, and this eyeshadow is also available in 31 other shades! That's a blummin' lot to choose from.

Now onto powder eyeshadows, and man oh man am I excited to share this little lot with you. I am a massive fan of the normal KIKO eyeshadow in cute little compacts, and was very proud of myself when I only bought four whilst I was away. In this range there is a massive 81(?!) shades available, and they are a mere £2.90 each. That is not that much for an absolutely fantastic little product, and they are often on sale for £1.40. I mean, it's practically daylight robbery. You can shop the range here.

The reason I love this shadows so much is not only because they are super cheap and look adorable in the sleek black packaging with the embossed KIKO, but for the price they are also an incredible product. Each shade is highly pigmented and gives great coverage with minimal fallout, and the formula is also really creamy and super easy to blend. Honestly, I can't really tell the difference between using one of these KIKO eyeshadows, and using the eyeshadows in my Urban Decay palette they are so damn good.

The first one I picked up is one of my good friends holy grail eyeshadow (she owns 5), and this is the shade 139, which is a really wearable light shimmery shade that is good on a 'no makeup day', or as a base colour on the inner corner if you're doing a smoky eye. My personal favourite of the lot is (of course), the golden colour which is the shade 102. In the pan this looks like a really dark golden colour, but on the eye it provides the most gorgeous wash of gold that really looks like you've covered your eyelid in gold leaf. I like to use this if I'm doing a more complex golden smoky eye look.

The other two shades I picked up are slightly out of my normal comfort zone, which is golds and browns and general neutral colours. First off, the light pink colour in the shade 143. This is the most gorgeous almost white colour that contains the most beautiful finely milled glitter. I may have picked it up because it is so damn glittery, but it's easier to wear than it looks, although I do reserve this one for the evening. I like to wear it dabbed over the outer corner of whatever eyeshadow I happen to be wearing as it's fairly translucent and just adds a shit ton of glitter to your eyeshadow and that makes me extremely happy. The purple colour is the shade 149 and honestly, I'm not sure why I picked this up, but I'm so glad I did. I'm not generally one for a bold colour, and this is a very deep purple, but it's so much more wearable than I thought (although I reserve it for when I'm feeling more confident). I really do love the colour of this one, and it's made me want to branch out a little! (Although 99% of the time, I still opt for golden eyes).

If you haven't tried out KIKO yet then what are you doing? I'm joking, but honestly, give them a go. I haven't found a product yet I hated, and their eyeshadows are seriously the bee knee's, and it's so affordable, which is especially great if you're a uni student like myself! If you've tried KIKO out, let me know which products you love in the comments below! And if you haven't, let me know what you'd like to try!

Sephora Haul

Possibly the worst thing about living in England/the UK is the lack of a Sephora. So many of the American bloggers/youtubers go to Sephora and buy all kinds of beautiful things, and it just seems like a majestical palace of mystery and wonder, so you can imagine my excitement when (whilst I was travelling around mainland Europe) I realised that not only where we going to Paris, home of this amazing store, there was also a Sephora in nearly every country we visited. Possibly too happy about this fact, but I was very restrained in what I bought!

The first thing my friend and I picked up to try from the Sephora in Verona, and I don't have with me now to photograph, is one of the sheet masks that Sephora sells and the likes of Louise from Sprinkle of Glitter have bought and loved.The idea of a sheet mask makes the large lazy side of me so damn happy, because you just whack it on and Bob's your uncle, Fanny is your aunt. I picked up the green tea mask because my skin was getting disgusting and tired, and needed a serious pick-me-up. I really enjoyed using the mask, and could definitely see a difference after the required twenty minutes or so was up. 

From Verona I also picked up three cute handbag sized scents in long glass bottles. They were on special offer, and obviously this meant I just couldn't resist the damn things. I got the scents green tea, peony, and mango. Peony is in the pink bottle and possibly my favourite fragrance. It's floral and light, and just really lovely to pop in your handbag and spritz on when you are feeling not so fresh. Good job Sephora.

So far, so good. But, then Sephora in Paris happened, and my brain went to a place where money was no object apparently, and I bought the Urban Decay Naked On The Run palette, and a Sephora lipstick. I kind of really shouldn't have spent the 49 euros on the Urban Decay palette, but it spoke to me and I couldn't resist! And honestly, I do not regret this purchase.

The palette is amazing for weekends away or overnight stays with friends, as it has essentially everything you need, bar foundation/concealer/powder and brushes. In the (beautiful rose gold) palette you get six eyeshadow shades, a blusher, a bronzer, an eyeliner in a dark brown, mascara, and a full size lipgloss in a beautiful pinky-nude shade. The eyeshadows are a mix of shimmers and mattes, all fairly neutral with good pigmentation and a creamy formula that is so easy to blend and looks so beautiful on the eye. The 50/50 shade, which is slightly bigger than the others, also doubles as a good highlighter so you can still contour on the go! The mascara is really good quality and makes my lashes look long and thick and black (essentially a miracle), and the eyeliner glides on easily and stays in place all day. I've never owned/used Urban Decay products before, only lusted over them, but I have fallen head over heels in love with this palette, and know when I'm at uni it's going to be so useful when I come home just to pop this in my bag alongside my face products and head off. Good space saver, good investment.

The lipstick I got was around 10 euros, which I thought was a pretty decent price, and me oh my was it tricksy to choose a shade. There were hundreds, I swear. But in the end I plumped for a dark pinkish shimmery shade (Fever), which feels lovely and moisturising on the old lips, has decent staying power, and is actually more like a 'your lips but better' shade, which makes it ideal for everyday.

The crux of this post is that Sephora has become my everything, and I have no idea how I'm going to function without it! Thank goodness they ship here now.

Favourite Cities: Berlin Edition

Back in December, just before Christmas, I was given the opportunity to visit Berlin with my college on a history trip, and obviously jumped at the chance. It was billed as a trip to allow us to get to grips with more German history and help us with our A2 coursework, though of course we all saw it as a chance to eat tonnes of bratwurst, drink far too much beer, visit some amazing markets, and maybe do a little bit of history!

The Reichstag - where the German parliament meets. We got to tour here on the last evening and it was incredible.

I had the most incredible time in Berlin. It wasn't as cold as I thought it would be, which was nice in some ways but I was somewhat hoping for snow! Alas, we got a small bit on the last day, but that was our lot. Lack of snow aside, we managed to cram so much into the four days that we were there for that we were all utterly exhausted when we got home on the Sunday. I love trips like this, exploring new cities and meeting new people. All the people on the trip attended college and did history, but I knew only two of them. But by the end of the trip I'd made the most magical group of amazing friends and I love love love them all. Our room slept eight, and we all bonded over the lack of boundaries! I was my usual majestic clumsy self, and frequently left the shower door open for people to walk in on me! Smooth as f, I know.

Moving swiftly past the embarrassing moments, the city itself is amazing. We stayed in the east, and visited so many places steeped in history, but I wish we'd stayed longer, there was still so much more to see.

The Brandenburg Gate

Highlights of the trip included:

Walking tour around the city: on our very first day, running on about 30 hours of no sleep after working early the day before and travelling through the night, the leader of the trip lovingly decided to take us on a tour of some of the sights, and of course we got lost! It was a great introduction to the city though, and we saw the Reichstag, the Brandenburg Gate, Angela Merkel's offices, the Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe, the place where Hitler's bunker was and where he shot himself in the last days of the Third Reich, the book burning memorial in Bebelplatz, several Christmas markets, Potsdamer Platz and then we came back to the hostel and all I saw for a few hours was the inside of my eyelids!

Alexanderplatz: this was the place where we came to go to the big Christmas markets! I am a massive lover of a good market, and Christmas markets are my all time fave because you can wrap up against the cold and it's all magical and festive and ooo I just love them. And of course, no one does a Christmas market like the Germans do! We ate plenty of bratwurst (sausage in a roll), drank strong, spicy mulled wine, ooohed and aaaahed over all the pretty things, ate crepes and waffles and other delightful things, and just had a really splendid time. Much recommended.

Museums: Yes, I know museums are meant to be dreadfully boring and dull, but these museums broke the stereotype! We visited two in one day. The first was the DDR museum, or the museum that showcased what life was like post 1949 in Soviet controlled East Germany, which was actually much cooler than it sounds because it was an interactive museum, with plenty of things to touch and fiddle with and loads of original artifacts to look at and play around with. Did a thoroughly good job of keeping a bunch of rowdy teenagers occupied. In the afternoon we visited the German Resistance museum, which was very interesting. There wasn't much of a German resistance, but learning about the little that there was was very interesting. For example, I didn't know how close two people came to assassinating Hitler before he came into power, but they very nearly succeeded.

Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe

Sachsenhausen concentration camp: I believe Sachsenhausen was one of the first concentration camps set up, just outside Berlin in Oranienburg, primarily used for political prisoners. There's not much I can say about this, other than it was one of the most overwhelming, sobering experiences of my life, and reduced nearly everyone in the group to tears by the time we'd reached the foundations of the gas chambers and cremation ovens. It's one thing to learn about the holocaust, and another to go to a place where the horrors took place. There's a feeling in the place that will never leave, and it should never be forgotten. 

Berlin Wall Memorial: most people know about the Berlin wall, I imagine, and it was pretty amazing to see the parts that are still standing, marking the border between East and West. On one part there is some incredible artwork that we saw from the bus, and I didn't get a picture of.

1936 Olympic Stadium: I've never been to any Olympic stadium, so that in itself was pretty cool, and seeing the names of the victors engraved on the stone of the stadium was somewhat weird, but really amazing. The whole place has a rather somber feel about it, and it's hard to imagine what it would have been like there during the games, at the beginning of Hitler's reign of terror. We also got snow whilst we were here, and like the children we are immediately started to play in it! Great fun.

The site of Hitlers bunker. There's nothing there save a sign to tell you what it is, it's just mud, grass, and a small car park

Hofbrauhaus: in other words, a German beer hall! No trip to Germany would be complete without a trip to a beer hall, and we had such an amazing evening here! The service was impeccable, and I had the most amazing potato soup. The beer was cracking, the oompah band were amazing, and the whole group was up dancing, much to the entertainment of the Germans. If you're ever in Germany I highly recommend going to a beer hall, it's a completely different experience to one of our beloved English pubs but totally, totally amazing.

Reichstag: on our last evening, we went to a pizza restaurant (good old fashioned German cuisine?) and then on to a tour of the Reichstag. This is where the German parliament still meets, and we were led around the buildings to see some of the offices, the great hall where the parties meet, the northern corridor where some of the Red Army graffiti has been preserved from 1945 and then on to the massive dome at the top, which gave us the most incredible views across the city, and I feel in love.

Quiz night!: Of course, no trip would be complete without the good old fashioned pub quiz. There were 39 of us on the trip, and we all met in the rooftop bar of the hostel, split into teams, grabbed yet more beer and enjoyed several rounds of a quiz. Quiz's are made at least 500 times better with the addition of beer, and thanks to the varied knowledge in my group, we won! A fantastic way to round off our trip.

The book burning memorial, to commemorate the night around 20,000 books were burnt during Hitler's regime

Stalin's tower: basically a big middle finger to the west

A building covered in the scars and bulletholes of WWII

Waffle sticks!

So much beer consumed.

Inside the 1936 Olympic Stadium

Please excuse the rather crappy picture quality, the only camera I had with me was my phone!

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