Red or dead

My love affair with Red lipstick has been a long one, but recently I realised that most of my favourite red lipsticks are very drying. Generally I wear tinted balms because I hate having dry lips, but sometimes I want an intense colour, so I've been buying buying buying! I've been taking advantage of the Superdrug 3 for 2 mix & match deal (across loads of makeup brands, it's very good!) so here are some of my purchases....

 I had a lovely matte red lipstick from Dior (velvet rather than matte really) but the perfume in Dior make-up makes me feel sick so I got rid. I got the £1 MUA matte red lippy to try, along with the matte nude. As it was 3 for 2 I also lost my mind and got this super frosted coral colour from the MUA One Direction range.... basically it is just like one I had when I was first allowed to wear make-up. I remember it very clearly, it was from Avon, it was from a Christmas range, it had a white case and there was a icy ridge shape around the base of the actual lipstick. I adored it, even though I never wore it out!

 I love the Red matte, for £1 it's a bargain and I like the clean white packaging too! The nude is a bit too light for me (they always are!) but I think it might come in handy as a base for other colours or gloss. I have no idea when I'm ever going to wear the coral one.... it has the look and texture of an old ladies lipstick, but it still love it!

It's hard to show the colours 100% accurately, but you get the gist I hope! The fact the 1D lipstick is called 'I want Liam' makes me sick.... I might not have bought it had i realised. Just for the record, I don't 'want' any of the children in One Direction!

 I've got a couple of things from Miss Sporty (dunno what's sporty about their make-up but whatever!) and I've never been blown away by their lip products until I found these. I've got a couple of 'perfect colour' lipsticks (plain blue tubes) and the texture is not great in my opinion; a tad dry, but these new lipsticks (annoyingly also called 'perfect colour') have a better texture, a much more extensive range of colours (including black) and nicer packaging than their predecessors. It seems that they're so new that even the Miss Sporty website doesn't have them yet! Luckily for me Superdrug have them in store and online, so at £2.59 each I had fun trying them all out!

I'm loving the cheap and cheerful packaging with the little windows making them easy to find in my makeup drawers, but I wish Superdrug would stop using sticker alarms that destroy the packaging; so much sticky shit all over them, it's totally ruined the tubes! Anyway, back to the bit inside the tube....It's hard to show the subtle differences between the tones but wowzers they have a good range of reds!

I'm not sure how to describe the texture? It feels moisturising and has a bit of a sheen when first applied, but isn't too glossy and dries into a more matte look. It's almost 100% flat colour, not at all frosted thank goodness! I think a lipliner would be helpful with them for a really polished look. I always think Miss Sporty lipsticks and balms have a watermelon candy smell & taste...not sure if that is the aim, but that's how it comes across to me.... I much prefer fruit to powdery or floral scents!

Again it's tricky to get a 100% accurate image of the colours, but I'll describe them in my own particular makup (well... food!) language and hope that you get it! On Fire is a bright orange toned scarlet. It's the sheerest of the batch, but looks juicy and sexy on.... blood orange! Malaga is what I think of as a classic Hollywood red; bright, rich and luscious with a bit of fire..... strawberry! High Red is what I would describe as a burlesque red, deep and sultry..... red cherry!. Sweet Berry is almost pink, but still works as a beautiful berry red.... raspberry!

Looks like I'll will be wearing lots of red lippy this autumn / winter. To top all this off Ms Danielle Vanier has reviewed one of the best looking reds I've seen in years - Clarins Red, which I now want of course!