Le Metier de Beaute King of Prussia Exclusive - All About Me

Today's post is brought to you by the word: multitasking. All the pictures you see were taken with a sleeping baby in my arms. The pictures may not be professional photographer quality, but I'm, pretty impressed at how I can multitask.

All About Me - please note my daughter's lovey as the background.

I am completely falling in love with Le Metier de Beaute. Everything I've tried so far (granted, not that many) I have loved. Most recently I've purchased a King of Prussia, PA exclusive Lip Creme called All About Me. This color was developed for the Neiman Marcus KoP counter by a personal Shopper.

The color is a lovely mauvey-brozne with a ton of sparkles. I mean this is sparkley. Really sparkley. However it doesn't make your lips look garish. It just gives them a lovely, neutral shimmer. Their Lip Cremes usually have a synthetic sweet smell to them, but no taste. I can't quite place this one - maybe some type of berry.

Look at those sparkles!

Here's the bad news. This puppy is Limited Edition. Limited Edition and only sold at the King of Prussia Neiman Marcus counter. Luckily KoP is 15 minutes from my house, but if you want one, I would call right now because as of yesterday, I think there were less than 25 left.

You can reach the Le Metier de Beaute counter by calling the store at (610) 962-6200 and asking for the LMdB counter.

I'm now having a hard time walking by the LMdB counter without making a purchase. I'm waiting to dive into a kaleidoscope, I just have to find one that really, really grabs me.

Le Metier de Beaute Purple Haze

So, earlier this year the fashion director for Neiman Marcus, Ken Downing, teamed up with Le Metier de Beaute and put out Ken's Koral Kollection (again, I'll forgive him gratuitous overuse of the Ks). I loved this polish. So, when Ken collaborated with lMdB again this past September and put out his Bordeaux collection, well I knew I would end up buying something from the collection (used the c that time, there...)

This time around I picked up the two lip cremes. The two that were released were Purple Haze (pictured above) which is a lovely shimmery lavender-pink, and In the Know Bordeaux (not pictured) which is a vibrant berry red. I initially bought both of the lip cremes, but the deeper berry color just wasn't my style. It is beautiful, but just not me. I passed it along to my mother, which was right up her alley.

Purple Haze, on the other hand, is most definitely right up my alley. This color is a very flattering color. A creamy lavender-pink with subtle shimmer. The shimmer is very evident in the tube and on the swatch, however it doesn't make my lips shimmery. Shiny, yes. Shimmery/frosty, no.

This is a very pigmented product. While it's glossy, it's not a lipgloss, but more of a liquid lipstick. And the staying power - well let's just say it sticks around for a long time. It will still be visible on my lips after snacking and a drink or two. The one thing I don't like about this is the scent. The scent of the creme is a very strong sweet smelling scent - coconut, maybe? It does fade quickly and it is tasteless, but it still throws me for a loop when I put it on.

I love this lip creme, and I'm very glad I splurged (and at $36 a tube, it is a splurge). I love the color, the formula and the staying power. And I think I love Ken Downing, too.

Guerlain Rouge Automatique

My VIB status at Sephora was recently renewed (a.k.a. - I spend too much money at Sephora) and I got a 10% off coupon. I thought this would be the perfect time to try my first Guerlain lipcolor. I have been wanting to try the new Rouge Automatique since I saw its debut on the blogs recently.

The color I picked was 164 Chamade. It is a lovely rosy pink color, not too light, but not too dark. I've been on an orange kick recently with lipcolor (I'm always on an orange kick, I love orange) so I decided to try something different.

The gold tube was wreaking havoc on my camera

I love this design. You place your thumb on the square lever and pull down - one handed opening and application. There is a small door on top the the lipstick that keeps it save from random purse debris and best of all - no cap top pop off inside your purse!

However, the packaging, as novel as it is, is actually the least impressive part of this lipstick. The formula of the lipstick itself is fantastic. There is a faint floral smell, but it's so faint that you need to put the bullet quite close to your nose to smell it, and there is no smell or taste on the lips.

It is silky smooth, but light as air. I can barely tell that I have lipstick on. There's nothing worse than feeling like you have a thick layer of wax on your lips all day, and this definitely does not feel that way. I have never tried Rouge G or Kiss Kiss, so I can't compare this formula to either of them. And shiny, it was quite shiny once applied. It has terrific staying power. Lipstick normally doesn't last as long on me as some others because I frequently press my lips together, or am always drinking something, but this lasted hours and hours on me.

If there's one issue I have with this, it's the shape of the tube. It is a square tube and when you bring the tube up to your lips, it obscures the view of your lips a little bit, so it's hard to precisely see the outline of your lips. But that's it. It's not enough to turn me off to this. Even with the price ($35) I think I will be purchasing more of these. It's easy to see why the blogging world raves over this brand.

Chanel Rouge Coco Shine Monte Carlo

Yesterday Chanel released their Rouge Coco Shine collection. It is a new sheer, moisturizing lipcolor that comes in 25 new shades. The spokesmodel for this new collection is the very lovely Vanessa Paradis, aka Mrs Johnny Depp. Chanel released Boy - a sheer pink, in a limited release back in February. The whole collection is available now, and retails for $32.

Being a Chanel junkie, I ran to Macy's yesterday to pick one up. After trying a few colors, and having the sales associate color waaaay outside my lipline, I settled on Monte Carlo, a sheer deep pink.

The formula is very moisturizing, and very sheer, just like it claims to. In comparison to the Dior Addict lipcolors, it is just as moisturizing, but Chanel is a bit less pigmented. In order to get a swatch to show up, I had to swipe quite a few times. Although it didn't take as many to show up on my lips.

Depending on how pigmented your lips are, the pigmentation may be a bit underwhelming for this lipcolor. My lips are fairly pigmented on their own, so I chose a bit of a darker color and it showed up nicely.

Just a hint of color. I have a feeling some of the lighter colors, like Boy, may not show up as well on my lips. If you are a bit paler then me (I'm an NC25 in MAC), then the lighter colors will show up better. The nice thing about the counters is if you grab a color, they will give you a sample card with 4 colors on it and a little application brush.

It comes with Adventure, Liberte, Boy and Monte Carlo. Unfortunately, it contains one of the colors I bought, but hey, a sample is a sample, right? On the whole, I do like these lipsticks, and I probably will be purchasing more. Of the two - Dior Addict and Rouge Coco Shine - I think I actually slightly prefer the Dior Addicts.

Enjoy!

Dior Addict Lipstick review and swatches

Dior has recently revamped and relaunched their Addict line of Lipsticks. This newest incarnation is said to have 25% less wax and contain a reflecting gel to make the formula extremely smooth and shiny. Does it live up to these new claims?

The ad campaign features a very lovely Kate Moss sporting some extreme winged eyeliner. Because j'adore Dior (heh) lip products, I knew I would have to try some of these. During a recent Nordstroms visit, I nabbed two of these lovlies.

I picked up 750 - Rock N Roll and 881 - Fashion week. They have the same casing, with a cylindrical shaped product rather than a bullet-shaped one. One issue I do have is with that bulb on the end of the tube. It makes it near impossible to store my Dior lipsticks label side up - because they wobble - but I can deal with this inconvenience.

Top - 881 Fashion Week, Bottom - 750 Rock N Roll

These lipsticks to go on sheer. Some colors are more sheer than others. I was looking for ones that were more on the sheer side, and I succeeded.

Fashion Week is a sheer plum with a subtle shimmer. The first picture shows the product that is more true to color, the second picture is to show the shimmer.

Rock N Roll is a sheer orangey red. I can't pull off red very well, but when it's sheer and with a tinge of orange, I think I can handle that one.

Pigmentation was surprisingly good for lipsticks that are sheer. The texture of the lipstick is exactly what they say it is, soft and creamy. It glides on and shines very nicely. The color does fade quicker than normal lipsticks. I got a little over 2 hours for this, where I get a little over 3 hours for some of the nicer formulas of lipsticks (I tend to rub my lips together a lot, other people get longer wear out of lipsticks).

Dior nailed this one. I have plans to collect more of the line as I think these are great for spring and summer lips - pigmented, but still sheer and shiny. They retail for $28, and are well worth it.