nars

Is Chanel Recycling Good Ideas? Aragonite Glossimer vs. NARS Moon Fleet

January 5th, 2011 by Karen 46 Comments

Yesterday I almost judged a book by its cover. After reader Mahnaz asked how Aragonite, one of the new Glossimers from the Chanel Les Perles de Chanel spring collection, compared to NARS Moon Fleet, my initial reaction was, “Uh oh! Chanel must have copied NARS.”

NOTE: If you’re interested, you can see swatches of the entire Les Perles de Chanel collection at the bottom of this post.

But then I pulled out both colors and gave the question more thought. Both shades are related, but NARS Moon Fleet, a permanent color from the line, is a sheer and shimmery yellow gold, and I think it looks much darker and yellower than Aragonite does.

What about other possible Aragonite dupes? Hmm… How about Chanel Glossimer in Galactic (circa 2007)?

NARS Lipgloss in Moon Fleet (left) and Chanel Glossimer in Aragonite (right)

First cousins, perhaps?

Chanel Glossimer in Aragonite (left) and Galactic (right)
[Continue reading…]

Girls, Follow the Boys to This NARS Lip Gloss Set

November 5th, 2010 by Karen 65 Comments

karen of makeup and beauty blog wearing nars sweet revenge lipgloss from the follow the boys holiday 2010 set
NARS Sweet Revenge Lipgloss

Best part of my Friday: listening to Salt N’ Pepa’s Push It while watching Tabs lick his tummy. If you’ve ever watched a small dog or cat cross the street while listening to hip-hop in the car, you’ll know why I found it as funny as I did. 🙂

Ah, push it…

Second best part of my Friday: swatching the limited edition NARS Follow the Boys Lip Gloss Set ($40).

Sweet Revenge

Turkish Delight

Like the recent Crazy Heart holiday set, Follow the Boys comes with a selection of smaller-than-normal NARS glosses from the company’s permanent line, except in this set there are four instead of five — Turkish Delight (a creamy pale pink), Sweet Revenge (a shimmery peachy pink), Moon Fleet (a glittery gold) and Easy Lover (a sheer hot pink).
[Continue reading…]

Love Sheer Lipgloss? You’ll Crazy Heart This New Set from NARS

November 1st, 2010 by Karen 52 Comments

nars crazy heart swatches review photos glosses

I learned something oddly thrilling today. The new NARS Crazy Heart Set ($50) glosses are sheer enough to apply while walking down the street without a mirror (try it sometime), yet pigmented enough to make an impact on passers by.

This is brilliant news! Now I can devote more precious time and energy to important things, like unraveling the mystery behind Zac Efron’s allure.

The set comes with five sheer shades from the NARS permanent lipgloss line — Easy Lover (a hot pink), Babe (a reddish orange), Orgasm (a shimmery golden pink), Turkish Delight (a creamy light pink) and Misbehave (a cherry red with golden shimmer) — all of them highly wearable, with the exception of Turkish Delight, which looks kinda milky before it mellows into an attractive pale pink.

MAC Nymphette-s might like Orgasm, Nymphette’s sheerer cousin, and ladies who’ve always wanted to wear red lips but were too afraid to try should take a look at Babe.

All of them have the same silky smooth medium weight texture in tubes that are considerably smaller than usual for NARS lipglosses (0.14 oz. vs. 0.28), but that’s only a fraction smaller than full-size MAC Lipglasses (0.17 oz.).

nars crazy heart swatches review photos box

nars crazy heart swatches review photos glosses in box

nars crazy heart swatches review photos swatches arm
[Continue reading…]

NARS Trouble Maker, Please Report to Principal Karen’s Office

November 1st, 2010 by Karen 53 Comments

karen from makeup and beauty blog reviews the nars trouble maker eye set

I got in trouble today, ladies. 🙁 The principal called me into his office and said, “Karen, you are no longer my favorite trouble maker.”

Wha!?

“The new NARS Trouble Maker set is, and you’re just going to have to learn to live with it… You may go back to class now.”

The $60 limited edition kit was designed to help your eyes raise hell. To that end, it comes with a Smudge Proof Eyeshadow Base, Larger Than Life Volumizing Mascara, an Eyeliner Stylo and a bottle of Eye Makeup Remover.

NARS Trouble Maker: What You Get

Larger Than Life Volumizing Mascara: A black thickening mascara that delivers stellar curl lift and hold. Its thickening prowess doesn’t quite match YSL Faux Cils’, but it makes up for it in speed and flexibility, resisting smudges and smears. Two coats is my sweet spot. Any more than that and it starts to clump (unless I swipe the brush head first). One more knock against it? It takes forever and a day to remove.
Eyeliner Stylo in Nuits Blanches: NARS should have called this shiny black liquid liner Patience, because it takes A LOT to get smooth, solid black lines with it. The stiff felt tip isn’t as easy to maneuver as the tip on my go-to liquid liner, LORAC Front of the Line Pro.
Pro-Prime Smudge Proof Eyeshadow Base: A colorless eyeshadow primer and by far my favorite thing in the kit. It’s easy to blend, grips shadows with Herculean determination (maybe even a little better than Urban Decay Eden Primer Potion), and a little goes a long way, keeping most shadows from fading or creasing for a full eight hours. LOVE THIS!
Eye Makeup Remover: Like the name implies, this stuff takes it all off, even long-wearing waterproof eye makeup, but, unfortunately, it leaves behind a thick oily film (boo!).

nars trouble maker eye set review box
[Continue reading…]