Nichido Color Eyes Mascara and Eyeliner Duo: Review

Before I turn  this laptop off, I thought I should write a post first. It's been a while and I'd be lying if I told you I don't miss blogging. I don't have a laptop of my own. It broke. Me sad. I'm just borrowing my mom's for the mean time and I'm hoping to get a new one as early as I can. Hopefully soon.

In today's post, I will be talking about a local product that I have been using non-stop over the past couple of months. As pictured below, I got it on sale for only PHP168 at Watsons. It is a 2 in 1 product that saves a lot of space in my makeup bag, a mascara and eyeliner in one!

Nichido Stardust Palette (Totally Neutral): Review

Before I go on with the formal content of this post, I would like to invite everyone to join my ongoing giveaway. I will be giving away a hair dye from the Japanese brand called Dariya Palty in the shade Milk Tea Brown, which happens to be one of the popular shades they have. It is open internationally so everyone is encouraged to join. :) (You will probably see this introduction in most of my future posts up until the giveaway is over. I hope you don't mind the post by post plug. ^^)

So I was going through my hard drive and I saw this folder containing 400+ photos of unreviewed items over the past year and my initial reaction was, 'Wow! What have I been doing last year?'. I definitely have more products to review than I originally imagined. I know I've been doing good lately as I've been blogging often (every other day) and taking advantage of my free time these days. But the amount of products to review is just overwhelming, I'm not even sure I will get to blog about all of them!

But enough about that talk, let us welcome the month of July by talking about one of the products I've purchased last year, to scratch off from that pile (of unreviewed items). Do note that the photos were taken using my old camera so the photos aren't as good as the recent ones but hopefully, these shots would make do.

Plastic cover.

It had a 'Nichido' print on the shadow itself.

Just a closer look onto the shades.

So last year, I decided to do a makeup tutorial using local Filipino products only and I got this particular product from Nichido. It's their three-color eyeshadow palette called the Stardust Palette in the shade Totally Neutral. It contains three neutral (true to its name) everyday eyeshadow colors. It has a pale pink, a medium brown and a dark brown. All, when put together, creates a very lovely look.

Tried to do just show the swatches on my fingertips but the colors don't show up well.

Let me talk about each of the colors to give you more idea of the product. I will start off with the pale pink. The pale pink shadow is a nice color that I like to use to highlight my eyes. I often apply it under my brow bone and on my inner corners to brighten up the look. It is the lightest of the three and is also the least pigmented. I find that I really have to pack on the shadow for the color to hint its presence on my lid. It's especially harder when I use brushes so I like to use the foam applicator that came with the palette as it picks more of the product up.

In this swatch, the medium brown doesn't show up too much because frankly, the shade is a little close to my skin color.

The next shade I will be talking about is the medium brown. This is a really nice medium tone that I like to use on my crease area. It doesn't really create a loud eye contour effect, but more of a subtle shadow effect that I like to do especially when I (used to) go to work. At first, I didn't like the tone of the color on my lids but I eventually got used to it and it's now one of my favorite crease colors.

The last shade is the dark brown. This one is a really nice addition to the palette to provide your eyes with more definition, especially on your lash line/ outer V. It has a purple undertone so it looks a little bit purplish (Duh?) in some lighting. I received a lot of compliments regarding this particular shade when I first started using it. This is also the most pigmented of the three and my most favorite in the palette.

All three shades have hints of shimmer on the pan but doesn't appear sparkly when applied. When used all together, it creates a very neutral glamorous look. If you want to see how I usually use it, you can check out one of my old tutorials here:

The best thing about this product is that it is widely distributed all over the Philippines. I bought it from Watsons for only PHP168 so it definitely wouldn't hurt your budget. I highly recommend this especially for a neutral everyday makeup look.

Nichido High Definition Lipstick (Pretty Tulip): Review + Swatches

Since I'm feeling a little lazy today, I won't be writing down a long post today. This will only be a short review plus swatches of one of my favorite lip colors these days. This was included in my Top 5 Summer/ Spring 2014 Lip Colors so you may have seen it at least once before, if you're a follower of my blog.

 Cute packaing, don't you think? :)

Poor swatches from my old camera.

The highlight of this post is a local Filipino product from the brand Nichido. It is called the High Definition Lipstick in the shade Pretty Tulip. I put this baby to good use over the past two months whenever I felt like going for a bold lip color and minimal eye makeup. I find that instead of red (which I consider to be the best for a bold lip color), pink or orange is better suited for warmer weather. This is not an absolute rule. It's just my opinion. You can wear red if you want to, of course!

So I've been constantly reaching out for this particular product for the most part of April and have been using it interchangeably with the Colour Collection Ultimate Wear Lipstick (Headturner) that I got from Sample Room. I like it a lot as it is has good color payoff. The shade is a very vibrant pink, perfect for a minimalistic makeup. You instantly glam up even with little to no eye makeup. I use this whenever I have an important event coming up with limited time for preparation.

 Poorly taken swatches are still swatches. Just deal with it. :p

It has a bit of a satin finish which I personally prefer. It tends to dry up after a couple of hours so I highly recommend that you prep your lips with a balm prior to using this. It transfers too so you have to reapply after you drink or eat. It's not a big deal though. Especially since it only costs PHP198.00 in Watsons!

It has a tinted lip balm strategically located at the cover cap that you can use to prep your lips. I rarely use this as I prefer using my Maybelline Baby Lips as base but I've tried it before and it does a pretty decent job of moisturizing your lips.

 This is not your ordinary color cap. It's a lip balm! ;)

The shade is almost always mistaken (by my family) to be the same as the other lipstick I mentioned above but just to be clear, I will provide a swatch side by side, below, just so you have a better idea. Nichido is a hot pink lip color with a little bit of coral undertone where as Colour Collection has a little bit of blue undertone.

 L: Colour Collection; R: Nichido

 See the difference?

For those of you who are looking for an affordable lip product in the hot pink family shade, I suggest you get this one and try it out! It works well, cheap and widely distributed all over the Philippines! Bili na! (Trans: "Buy it!")

Top 5 Summer/ Spring 2014 Lip Colors

The weather here in the Philippines has noticeably been getting higher and higher. My iPad Mini says it's currently 27C (March 25, 8PM). That's pretty warm considering I'm writing this down at night time (yes, I am scheduling a post for tomorrow). Summer is really already here. Although not my favorite time of the year (my favorites are the months of December- January when the weather's colder), summer is undeniably the season for fun. I'm sure most of you are already planning your own summer getaway, may it be with your family, friends or special someones. *Ahem ahem...* (Bitter alert! I'm single, that's why! LOL!) On the other side of the world, however, it's spring time. And just like summer, spring is also a nice season to enjoy and relax.
I, however, am not really the type of person to go out that much especially if the weather's hot. But when I do, I like to make sure that I incorporate a touch of summer onto my outfit or makeup. For this post, I will be sharing with you my favorite summer/ spring lip colors. Most of the items here are local Philippine products so if you're from the Philippines, this would definitely be a helpful post for you. Brands included for this post are Nichido, Colour Collection, Ever Bilena and Etude House (the only nonlocal product from the set). If you live outside the Philippines, however, I still encourage you to view the video since it will give you an idea of the shades and maybe you could look for dupes in your very own drugstore. So how did you like my summer/ spring choices? Do you like it? What are your own summer/ spring go-to lip colors? Comment down below, I'd love to know!