What It Is Like To Work At Lush

Hello beautifuls! 

So before I crack on with todays post I just want to thank you all for helping me reach 20,000 readers. My little blog is growing at such a rapid rate it is incredible. So thank you all for your continued support. Today I thought I would answer a question I have been asked SO MUCH the last few months which is "what is it like to work at Lush?"

People who have known me a long time will know that Lush is a brand I have wanted to work for for a VERY long time. I love their ethics, their branding and most importantly their products! So when I got offered a job with them I was more than a little excited! (okay I went into Jessie J octave...) 

So to answer the question "what is it like to work at Lush?" I have to say, it is amazing. It is a lot of work and you really do have to be a people person BUT it is by far the most incredible and rewarding job you could wish for.

 To start with what some people may consider the negatives you do have to talk to complete strangers all day every day and some of them will not be nice to you and will tell you in no uncertain terms where you can stick your help and product knowledge... However that will be the same as ANY job. You also have to memorise a LOT of products and a LOT of ingredients. So if that doesn't phase you then chances are Lush would be a great fit!

Now on to the MANY positives! 

Lush look after their staff in a way I have never seen or heard of before, they are a very caring company which is full of incredible people (more on this later). They pay you well and train you thoroughly. It is fair to say I have learnt more about skin care and product ingredients during three months at Lush than I have two years at college! 

You will develop so much as a person working with Lush, you will certainly become MUCH more confident dealing with people that is for sure. 

It is fair to say I love working at Lush more than I thought possible, it is weird how big a part of your life Lush becomes. I have spoken to a LOT of Lushies around the country and they all say the same thing. 

During my time at Lush I have met some of the most incredible, unique, lovely and at times inspirational people. I don't think I have worked a shift where I have not cried with laughter at some point or another. 

So to answer the question "what is it like to work at Lush?" the only answer I can give is INCREDIBLE. 

If you ever get the opportunity to work for them I really recommend grabbing it with both hands.  

How To Dye Brown Hair Bright Red

Hey Dolls, 

As those of you who have been following me for awhile will know, if my hair isn't either red or black I feel very very odd. So today I am going to be talking you through how to dye your brown hair a bright red WITHOUT using damaging box dyes. 

The first and gentlest way of dying your hair red without using chemicals is by using henna. My absolute favourite being Rouge Henna by Lush Cosmetics. Rouge contains persian red henna and loads of natural, organic butters to leave your hair silky soft and with a gorgeous red hue. Rouge is a much more natural red than some people may be wanting so my next recommendation is by Manic Panic NYC.

Manic Panic make incredible, semi permanent hair dyes which are vegan and cruelty free. In my opinion they are hands down the best in the business. The best red to use on brown or dark hair is the colour Vampire Red which is a dark true RED. It also lasts amazingly and can give incredible results if it is looked after properly.

Here is an old picture of just how red Vampire Red can turn your hair. It is such a gorgeous colour and as it is natural it does no damage at all to your hair. 

So, these are some of my favourite products for turning brown hair red WITHOUT permanent dyes. What are yours? Let me know in the comments below! 

OCC Hollywood Lip Tar Review

Hey Dolls,

Today I am reviewing another metallic lip tar by OCC, this time in the colour Hollywood which is from their Plastic Passion collection.

Hollywood is one of the more wearable colours made by OCC. Again this is their Metallic formulation so it is much thicker than the traditional lip tars. Hollywood is a warm beige with a metallic gold pearl. 

This colour highlights dry lips like nothing else on this earth, if you are going to wear this colour on its own USE A LIP SCRUB. It will show dry skin you never even knew you had. 

However this colour is amazing to either mix with other lip tars OR to use as a highlight on a red lip (trust me it is awesome!)

Like all OCC Lip tars it lasts amazingly, it also has the lovely fresh mint smell which is amazing. 

Okay so I admit you can't really see it much swatched against my hand but you can see the gorgeous gold shimmer. 

I think this is one of the most versatile of the OCC lip tars and like always OCC include a free mini version of their lip brush with every one of their lip tars!

OCC Technopagan Lip Tar Review

Hey guys, 

Today I am reviewing a product I was SO excited to get in the mail today by my favourite make-up brand OCC (Obsessive Compulsive Cosmetics). The colour in particular is from their A/W14 Unknown Pleasures collection and it is called Technopagan. 

Technopagan is a metallica lip tar. It is MUCH thicker than any other lip tar OCC have brought out previously. It is a dark eggplant purple with a bright cobalt blue metallic shimmer. It is by far my absolute favourite lip tar and hands down the stand out colour by any make-up brand this season!

It is a very unique colour that I am 99% sure there is no dupe for. Around the edges it is a warm plum purple  before turning in to a vivid, electric cobalt in the light. It is so out there and flattering for cool skins. It is gorgeous! 

As you can see from the swatch it is completely opaque and looks STUNNING in the sunlight. 

A tiny bead of Technopagan is enough to completely cover the lips. OCC lip tars also have a strong, fresh mint scent which is a welcome break from the over used MAC vanillary sweet smell. 

The only way I would fault this (and all other OCC lip tars) is that it is very drying. However it is this formula that gives them the insane durability and wear time. I also love that in the price OCC includes a mini version of their lip brush so it is (in my opinion) great value for money. 

I also think that that they are packaged in sterile squeezy packaging rather than the traditional lipstick packaging. It makes them MUCH more hygienic. 

I can not rave about Technopagan enough. It is gorgeous! 

Why I Don't Like Christmas

Both at work and online I am currently surrounded by hundreds of people talking about one thing, Christmas. A few weeks ago I got a bit ranty and posted a tweet about how Santa could go *insert rude word here* himself with a candy cane. Since then I have been called a Scrooge, a Grinch and a meany. So today I am pitching my reasons for hating Christmas. 

1: PEOPLE!

People at Christmas make me want to scream, hit my head against a wall and then jump in front of a bus. Manic shoppers, screaming children, rude shop staff, crazed religious nutjobs. Few things stress me out like people in "the festive spirit". 

2: Till Add Ons!

This one really boils my blood, you finally get to the front of the mile long queue, the person on the till scans your items and then utters the dreaded words "Can I interest you in one of these at all?" NO! NO I DO NOT WANT THE CHEAP CRAP YOU ARE FAILING TO SELL. Fine, I admit businesses need to make money but when EVERY shop and EVERY till says the same thing it really annoys me. 

3: Festive Marketing!

Okay, I admit, I look forward to the John Lewis advert as much as anyone BUT there are only so many times I can live through children cuddling stuffed animals and a man in red with a white beard. Over cheerful adverts selling cheap toys and tacky gifts are the absolute bane of my life and the reason I never watch TV. 

4: Over Eager Shop Staff!

If there is one thing in life I HATE, like really HATE it is when shop staff can not take the hint. No I do not want help, yes I am content to browse. No I am not looking for a gift...NO I will not be spending money in your shop. This isn't related to just Christmas but when stores are desperate to make as much money as possible of course they step up their sales game. The amount of times I have walked into shops and had every member of staff descended on me like a swarm of flies are countless. Nothing like feeling like a rotting steak to put you in the festive mood. 

5: Food!

I hate the fact that 364 days a year I watch what I eat with religious devotion but after Christmas I feel sluggish, bloated and heavy. It is the one time of year where everyone overeats and then we have to suffer through  the inevitable dieting adverts. 

So these are some of the many things that annoy me about the festive period, what, if anything annoys you? 

Let me know in the comments below! 

xx

Neill Gorton's The Prosthetics Event Haul

Hey Dolls, 

So earlier today I posted a review of The Prosthetics Event (review found HERE) and I thought it would be interesting to share what I bought, why I bought it and what everything does.

Skin Illustrator Zombie Palette:

The first thing I bought was a new Skin Illustrator Palette. Skin Illustrators are solid make-ups that are activated with 99% alcohol and offer brilliant, translucent colour which looks amazing for colouring prosthetics and casualty makeups. 

I picked up the "Zombie" Palette which has some amazing mixing colours and adjusters as well as two blood tones, a bruise tone, a vein tone and a gorgeous dark blue and black. Although this palette was designed for zombie makeups it will be my go to pallette for casualty simulation as I love grungier, blue toned colours. I purchased it from ScreenFace London's Stand for £89 however I did later see the same palette for nearly £15 cheaper at another stand. 

Go-Cast Life Casting Silicone:

This is a product I HAD to pick up, anyone serious about prosthetic makeup will know to get good quality, form fitting prosthetics you HAVE to do a life cast. Now, the traditional material has always been a product called Alginate but this product sadly has a LOT of disadvantages (it is wet so you can't cast a lot of materials in it, you have to destroy the alginate cast to remove the lifecast and alginate warps as it dries so it has a limited shelf life) so some clever prosthetics technicians created life casting silicones which capture greater detail and the casts they take will last for years when looked after properly. 

I paid roughly £35 for the 1kg set from P.A.M. 

Monster Makers Monster Clay:

The next item I picked up from MouldLife and it is something I have wanted to try for a LONG time but I was always put off by the insane delivery charges needed to deliver a 5lbs block of clay to my door. This is a meltable, oil based clay designed for creature and prosthetic sculpture. It also apparently has a unique, elastic texture making detailing easier...and with my lack of aptitude for sculpting, anything that makes that job easier is a miracle product to me. My only regret with this product is that I bought it early on in the day and had to lug a 5lbs block of clay around with me. 

Sculpt Gel Flesh Toned: 

The next item I picked up from MouldLife is another set of Sculpt Gel. Sculpt gel is a platinum silicone of which you mix equal parts A & B (plus a little bit of part C, a silicone softener to give enhanced flexibility) and apply directly to the skin to create a variety of wounds and effects. It is one of my all time favourite materials for casualty simulation and the first thing my hand goes towards when I need to create one off wounds. I always opt for the flesh toned as although it is a weird colour it has some flocking in it so it takes less colouring later. It is one of those products that every special effects artists should have in their kit. 

Super Baldiez & Blood!!! 

The next few items I picked up from various places, the main product I am going to to talk about is Super Baldiez which is also known as encapsulator plastic. You can use this product to create (you guessed it, BALD CAPS!) or my favourite use, to encapsulate prosthetics to give you edges that literally melt into the skin. I picked this up from Neill's materials for £29 

The next items I picked up were a couple of bottles of blood, my absolute favourite being the thick, dark blood from Bloody Marvelous, It is the best coloured blood I have EVER used in my 10 year career. 

The final item I picked up was a litre bottle of I.PA from MouldLife which I use for literally everything. I spent a small fortune at the prosthetics event but I am thrilled with everything I purchased so luckily I have no regrets! 

Neill Gorton's The Prosthetic Event: Review

Hey guys,

So yesterday I was lucky enough to attend The Prosthetics Event which is a small make-up artists trade show ran by renowned make-up effects artist Neill Gorton. This is the first year the event was run and featured expos, sellers, lectures and demonstrations. 

First off I absolutely LOVED the fact the event was hosted in Birmingham, I can not tell you how much of a pain in the ass it is to get to London every time I wish to go to a trade show. It makes the whole experience obscenely expensive before I have bought anything. 

As the name suggests this event revolves around prosthetic makeup, be it casualty simulation, creature design, animatronics or character makeup. There was an absolute wealth of talent on display. 

Images taken from The Prosthetics Event official Facebook Page

The demos themselves covered things like specialist character make-ups using encapsulated silicone prosthetics and animatronics. These demos were highly informative and gave everyone in attendance the chance to ask Neill questions one to one.

In terms of retailers there it certainly wasn't IMATS however the sellers there were of high quality and had everything you could want on offer. The retailers were Mouldlife, ScreenFace London, Charles H Fox (Kryolan UK), P.A.M, Bloody Marvelous, Neill's Materials and a few others. 

Everything there catered to the prosthetic artist or sculptor, apparently there was body art supplies but apart from a few palettes I personally didn't see much in the way of that there. 

I really hope this event continues to grow and flourish, it is SO lovely having a trade show located centrally in a location that is NOT London. 

I certainly will attend if they decide to run another one Next year and really look forward to seeing how this event evolves and grows. 

Hurraw Moon Balm Review

*This product was kindly sent to me for consideration by the lovely people at www.mypure.co.uk : All Opinions are my own* 

Hey Dolls, 

One of the things I dread every winter is the horrific, unsightly and quite painful annoyance of dry, sore, cracked lips. So I decided to try Hurraw's much raved about line of lip balms. Specifically their Moon Balm which is their richest formula designed for overnight usage. 

All the Hurraw lip balms are deliciously scented and the Moon Balm is no exception to this rule. This particular lip balm is scented with vanilla Peru Balsam and blue chamomile and it smells AMAZING. It is very soothing and relaxing and smells deliciously sweet. 

This is a lip balm with staying power. I really can't believe how moisturising it is and how smooth it leaves your lips after just one usage. It is very thick but it does not feel at all sticky on so I also use it during the day too. (I am such a rebel). 

Unlike SO many lip balms Hurraw's are vegan and not tested on animals which is fantastic. I also really love the packaging. This particular lip balm is absolutely incredible and I love it more than I can put into words. Now I have discovered the brand there are SO many of their lip balms I want to try: coffee, almond, chocolate, Chai Spice, etc etc. Their scent range is incredible and they would also make amazing cruelty free stocking fillers. 

The difference I have seen after a week of using this product is unmatched and I can't rave about it enough. I will 100% be investing in several other Hurraw lip balms (if not just for the yummy sounding scents) VERY soon. 

You can buy Hurraw's Moon Balm HERE for £4.49 from the lovely people at www.mypure.co.uk

Trilogy Ultra Hydrating Face Cream Review

*This product was kindly sent to me by the lovely people at www.mypure.co.uk all opinions are my own.*

Hey Dolls,

Today I am reviewing a product by the cruelty free brand Trilogy. Trilogy is a fantastic high end brand that does not test on animals and is Vegetarian friendly. 

I am reviewing their Ultra Hydrating Face Cream today which is designed for skins on the drier side. 

I absolutely ADORE the packaging. It looks sleek, minimalistic and straight out of a high end spa. This product also has some lovely ingredients in it such as lavender and Manuka Honey both of which are amazing, soothing and protecting ingredients. 

This is how Trilogy describes the product: 

Rich but easily absorbed, you'll banish dry skin with this intensely nourishing cream. The ultimate in hydration, it's designed to deliver immediate relief and lasting comfort for a soft, smooth complexion. 

You get 75ml of product for the £24.50 price tag which seems good value considering the key ingredients. 

It feels lovely on the skin, hydrating but absorbed quickly, leaving the skin feeling clear and non sticky. It is absolutely perfect for the winter months as manuka honey is incredible at healing and protecting the skin and it beautifully soothes dry patches of skin. 

All in all this is an amazing product, PERFECT for girls and guys wanting to look after their skin this winter. I love the fact it is so moisturising but doesn't make your skin feel heavy or congested like so many rich moisturizers can. 

You can buy this product HERE for £24.50 from the lovely people at www.mypure.co.uk