Guest post! Lip Poison review by Elimy

As mentioned in the last post, I ordered a Lip Poison for my dear friend Elimy and passed one of the free mini ones onto her as well. She kindly volunteered to do a guest review of those two colours :) check out her blog for her thoughts on writing and reading!

Now, I’m a newcomer to the Indie Makeup Scene, so please bear with me if I am somewhat naive. Jade introduced me to this wonderful world, and to be honest, I am only in it for the lip colours. I’m a fairly girly girl, I like vintage and floral prints, but I also don’t like to draw attention to myself. That means, no blue lippie. It’s a simple rule, and it keeps me from looking like a Smurf. Some people, i.e. Jade, can pull it off, but I have accepted that I cannot, and moved on. (Weird colours, for me, are for nail polish... the bright green paint incident of Christmas ’07...)

Alright, so let’s do this thing.

ROCKET TO THE MOON
I’ve taken to affectionately referring to this lip poison as Rocket. I’ve been looking for a nice red colour for quite a while, and on the homepage of Venomous Cosmetics, this actually looks quite red, and you can see the blue undertones that are supposedly there. Forgive me if I am wrong, but this is orange, no?

This picture was taken this morning, but I actually wore the colour out last night.  Even though it’s not the colour I thought I was getting (and really, that’s on me, I should have looked at some reviews and stuff), I have to say, I love it.  This simple ordering mistake has found me a new favourite.  And I think it looks kind of good on me. 

One problem is that it is difficult to put on without darker, clumpier bits appearing at the edges.  I found I could get around that by gently swabbing with a q-tip.  Like Jade said, these feel fantastic on your lips; I don’t even have to put PawPaw on after taking them off.  At the movies last night I was all prepared for a stealthy duck to the ladies’ to wipe the orange stains away from around my mouth but... nothing!  Amazing.  I would rather walk out of the cinema with little to no colour left than look like a clown, wouldn’t you??  Thumbs up, Venomous!

AUSTIN BOY

So you know how when you’re younger, and just starting to feel fascinated by make up, you experiment by putting highlighter on your lips?  (No?  Just me?!)  This kind of looks like it’s going to turn out like that.  It’s more fluoro than the most fluoro lippie I owned previously, which was Face It Extreme Rouge Gloss in PK102.  And I thought I was being daring when I wore THAT!  This colour would do Barbie proud.  But don’t misunderstand me, that’s a GOOD thing.  This colour is fantastic.  My hair has red undertones but it doesn’t make me look like I am permanently sunburnt.  It took a while to get a good photo though...

It even made my teeth look whiter!  Wow!

I’m going to wear this one all day, even though I’m not really going anywhere.  Just being it makes me feel pretty.  J

All in all, I give both these Lip Poisons two very enthusiastic thumbs up.

Elimy 

Thanks Em! 

Swatch and review: Venemous Cosmetics Lip Poisons

I placed a second order with Venomous Cosmetics which included a mini lip poison for myself and a full-sized for my dear friend Elimy. Tracy, being the super generous soul that she is, wrote me a note thanking me for my review and including TWO free purse sized Lip Poisons! I passed one onto Elimy, and kept the other. I thought I'd swatch them all for you. I'll definitely be getting more of these, I adore the formula.

Hallucinate 

(purchased from blogsale)

I wore this at work, layered over Morgana Cryptoria's Roses and Violets lipstick, and received a compliment from a customer on my "really pretty pink lipstick" :) it's a milky fuchsia-pink with an incredible blue-violet iridescence which is incredibly hard to capture on camera. 

Flamingo 

(free)

Quite a sheer one, this tints my lips a pretty, soft pink. A swipe-and-go colour suitable for absolutely anything. My bottle was a bit streaky but this didn't translate to the lips, it came out quite even.

Northern Lights 

(purchased by me)

This was by far the most opaque of the Lip Poisons I purchased, which was a shame because it's FAR too light for me to wear! I did a lip swatch but honestly, it looked so awful, here's a hand swatch instead.

What I DID do was layer it lightly over Morgana Cryptoria's lipstick in Cocoa, a soft nude beige. I think this is definitely more of a layering Poison for those of us who aren't ghostly white anyway ;) if you're the right colouring for this, or just a fan of pale lips, apply it thin and slow, it tends to streak.

Comparison swatches: Northern Lights alone, Cocoa alone, Cocoa with Northern Lights on top.

A note on the formula: this is an amazing gloss. It contains Jojoba and Almond oil, so after you wipe it off your lips are oh-so-smooth. Layered over lipstick the results aren't as moisturising, BUT they're not at all drying either. It's the perfect consistency and weight for me - I can tell that what's on my lips isn't a balm, but it's not oh-god-my-hair sticky either. It's tacky enough to have staying power, doesn't feel greasy, and has great slip. They wear pretty well, fading after 3-4 hours and retaining a fair bit of colour after eating or drinking. None of these three stained, but Hallucinate does leave a little hint of blue/violet sheen behind.

The price? $3.50 for a mini tube and $5 for a full-sized one! Like I said, I foresee a lot more of these in my future. The mix of conservative and unusual shades have you covered no matter what your taste, colouring and needs.

Review: Venomous Cosmetics

To be honest, I was a little apprehensive about ordering from Venomous… but only because I hadn’t read a lot of critical reviews about them. I know that doesn’t sound like a terrible thing, but I like to really know what I’m getting into.

My order was quite small – I got the everywhere palette and two pressed shadows. It ended up getting shipped a little later than anticipated, and so make up for it, Tracy gave me a bunch of loose shadows – some of which I definitely would have ordered later for myself. Some of them are from the new [edit: now discontinued] fairytales collection and are SO PRETTY. She also provided me with a 20% off code for my next order, which was just SO generous of her. My trepidations were absolutely dissolved and after swatching, felt absurd.

The two pressed shadows I ordered were Death Adder and Meteor. Both are pretty much for work.
My free samples: Faraway Galaxy, Spell-Breaking Kiss, L.A. Smog, Boomslang, In Orbit, and Enchanted Forest.

The pressed shadows are quite hard, I can see them standing up to a heckuvalot of abuse... but it also means they're a little tricky to use. You really have to work the brush into them to get any product.

Spell-breaking kiss

Violet-purple with red and blue glitter

Far-away galaxy

Lavender with aqua glitter

L.A. Smog

Medium grey with an icy blue sheen

In Orbit

Taupe with a silver sheen and a smattering of pink glitter

Boomslang

Bright, blue-based green

Enchanted forest

Blue-green shimmer on a black base

Meteor

Taupe with a stunning, metallic rose-gold sheen (almost duochrome!)

Death Adder

copper-gold shift

I haven't had much of an opportunity to play with the non-neutral shades but they're SO lovely, I have actually already placed another order for some more pressed shadows, the pressed blushes from the My Fairytale collection and one of the much-hyped Lip Poisons. Tracy's just put up a new collection with some really awesome speckled shadows. If you haven't ordered from Venomous yet, definitely go check out their site!

One more thing I have to mention is the Anywhere Palette.

It's slightly smaller than the Sugarpill palettes, but it's the same concept - sturdy, matte black cardboard, strong magnetised close, magnetised base and instead of a mirror, has a clear plastic top so you can see what you've got in there. I LOVE IT and I'm going to get another one, so I have one for neutrals and one for brights :) they're also incredibly affordable at $5.50 US.