Beauty addicts anonymous! A wonderful community of hoarders!

[Experiment627]

New thread!!!!

Sorry I did not see the other thread getting full!!! Really hope you guys will find this new thread!!!

@JunieSpoony

I want to buy DH a new aftershave (do we still call it that?) for Christmas. He used to wear CK One. Anyone know any similar-ish scents for men?

@supadupapupascupa (love the name!). What sort of scent was the Bain de midi?

I'm rubbish at describing scent so I've copied this from the Liberty page

EDITOR'S NOTES
Bain de Midi is a floral, oriental eau de parfum from Parisian perfume house Maison Matine.
Created in Paris by perfumer Philippine Courtière, Bain de Midi is a lively yet smooth composition that captures the joys of being alive. Vibrant top notes of bergamot and coconut descend into a sunny heart of tiare flower, ylang ylang and gardenia and a subtle base of vanilla and musk. Brimming with lightness and simplicity, it is a celebration of life and new discoveries.

@Experiment627 - Ha! I wish!!!! I was an opera singer for a while, a million years ago and not at all famous. I use Instagram but am not an influencer. I’m just a boring old fart now, studying nursing for my midlife crisis. (I might actually have the beginnings of an endgame… You’ll be the first to know when I get my act together.)

But as part of my course (mostly to get out of one of the dryer, academic subjects) I did a stage makeup artistry class. That was lots of fun. I love MacGyvering special effects bits and pieces together.

Thanks @supadupapupascupa. Sounds like quite a mix. Can you smell the vanilla much?

@JunieSpoony - Can you get Penhaligon’s fragrances there? Quercus is lovely. It’s another fresh, unisex one. Has more lasting power than CK One. (Which it should, as you need to sell a kidney to pay for it in Australia). I’m not sure if CK All is still available. It’s delicious too. Failing that, I really, really love the Hermès Eau d’Orange Verte and all of Hermès Un Jardin Sur… range (I think there were about four or five of them… all lovely citrus, fresh, clean unisex fragrances, but they last.)

Why thank you @JunieSpoony ☺️

@Justilou1 WOW!! Opera!!! Amazeballs! Definitely a star ⭐️ then!

Thanks @Justilou1. You can indeed get Penhaligon’s from a couple of importers. I like the sound of Quercia.

Two empties here - Sol de Janeiro hair repair mask - which is lovely and I would RP; and Weleda lavender bath milk, which ditto.

I suspect from memory I have the Sol de Janeiro in an AC actually. I wish they would put more bath and hair products in advent calendars, that's what I use a lot of.

I am in the presence of stars of the stage and screen! Highly honoured. Wish I could sing. I have lots of projection but not far off tone deaf.

I am getting better at using up products though - yet another 10ml Nuxe oil empty. Never purchased so they must all be from beauty boxes (M&S?). Nice enough, but would never purchase as I have so many body moisturisers.

Using an Elemis frangipani body oil now and it is lovely. A bit of a faff as you have to warm the bottle in hot water to melt it first (it comes solid) but it is really luxurious. One from the Elemis AC a couple of years back.

@WellTidy sounds interesting... does the frangipani smell of marzipan? 😋😋😋

I can’t really smell it at all to be honest - had covid a few weeks ago and my sense of smell is barely there. But the oil itself is light and a little goes a very long way. Won’t be reporting this as an empty for a while! I like Elemis body products but a lot of their face products cause a reaction for me.

Forgot to report my empty sachet of Occitane Divine Eyes eye cream. Absolutely loved this - super light, sank in so easily and didn’t cause any irritation (unlike my Estée Lauder advanced night repair eye cream which I was so disappointed by, especially as I have 3 x 7ml pots in the stash).

Every time I’ve tried Occitane face product samples I’ve loved them. Their immortelle range was also lovely to sample. Anyone buy this or use Occitane face products on a regular basis who can give a view please?

Three empties today - one Olaplex 8 (the mask which I love, but I have a few other masks to get through first including two tubs of the Garnier banana one), the Chantecaille rose cream from the Liberty box which I'm trying to forget about because I can't afford to RP .

Third is a sample sachet of Malin+Goetz vitamin e moisturiser, which has infuriated me as my skin felt fantastic (I got three goes out of the sachet) but it smells so revolting I don't think I could use it. I have a feeling I've got a bottle in my stash, and if so I'll be ebaying it.

Socks I’ve bought the Garnier banana hair mask tub too. I’m hoping it will replace my olaplex no.3 (which I love) or at least be an in between for the olaplex due to cost.

How long do you leave the Garnier on for please? I know it says 3 minutes, but do you think it improves if left on for (much) longer?

@WellTidy sorry to hear about the CV and loss of sense of smell.

I've tried the Garnier banana mask before, it's not bad, but I didn't find it particularly better than other drugstore conditioners in a similar price range, but then, I wasn't bowled over by Olaplex 3 either.

The best hair mask/ conditioner I've found is the Christophe Robin Hydrating Melting Mask. Not cheap, but lasts a while. I try to pick it up when there are offers.

I wasn't overly fussed by the banana hair mask either. I left it on for about 30 minutes but I don't think it did anything that a decent conditioner wouldn't. :/

Rather liking the Aldi glycolic and bit c serums at the moment. The jelly face wash is decent for the price too. (I double cleanse using the Body shop chamomile butter first)

Have managed to use a couple of non descript face mask sachets (7th heaven I think... Used to be montage jeunesse or something) and got to the end of a Burt's bees lip balm. I quite like the lip balm but I've got 77million varieties to use up from various calendars/gwp so won't be repurchasing for a while yet!

@WellTidy I wouldn't replace Olaplex 3 with the Garnier mask because they're used differently and for different things; I include both if I have time (I always leave the mask on for as long as I can and follow it with normal conditioner, but my hair is long and it took a while to get it in decent condition after I had years of box dye stripped out of it a couple of years ago).

If you're looking for an Olaplex 3 substitute Revolution have a whole range of dupes (including 6 which I also use; I don't know how many of the others they make) which is less than half the price? I haven't tried it, but they get good reviews .

Hi all!

Just a few empties to report.

Another skin and me tube - it's working well.

No7 eye make up remover. I bought this as a dupe for the Lancôme bifacil but it didn't measure up.

I've chucked the ordinary's argelinine (sp?). I didn't use it enough and I couldn't be bothered to finish it.

However. I've bought olaplex 4P even though I haven't finished my existing purple shampoo and a colour wow shampoo too. I'm my own worst enemy.

@SocksAndTheCity, I’ve also recently been using (and liking) the Olaplex 8, and would RP if I ever run out of hair masks. A bonus is that, unlike Olaplex 3, I get more than 4 uses from a bottle

@WellTidy, I’ve also only had samples of the L’occitane immortelle range, but I’ve really enjoyed using them when I have them.

Bumper lot of empties this week; just a co-incidence that quite a few things finished at the same time. I’ll comment on just a few:

BS hyalauronic acid serum. Realised I still had this from a 2020 advent calendar. It’s a very nice serum, but certainly not over £200 nice!

Beauty Stat Vitamin C I’ve seen great reviews for this, but really didn’t enjoy it. I didn’t like the quite thick cream like consistency, and it made my skin tingle unpleasantly. Was glad to finish it.

Chantecaille Just Skin Good stuff. It’s marketed as a tinted moisturiser, but to me isn’t that different to the EL Double Wear light I was using previously. Have RP when it was on offer.

Votary cleansing oil. Love this.

Omorovicza foam cleanser I wasn’t expecting much, as I’d tried a previous very meh cleanser from this brand, but I really enjoyed using this - smelt good, cleansed well without being too drying.

Aromatherapy shower gel although I do like this, I got bored of it and ended up switching to smaller gels in between. Glad to get it finished.

Christoph Robin shampoo was fine, nothing too exciting.

@AprilLady - my jaw on the floor reading £200 for HA serum. CFery Alert!!! 😱😱😱Is that even more expensive than the iniquitous Barbara Sturm one?

I think I want some kind of unscented body wash and body lotion next, so that I can decant it into smaller bottles and mix in my own fragrance so I don’t get bored. Even though it’s spring here, it’s already mid-high 30’s. (Dying). I can only find sweet, cupcakey scents or florals which clash with my current fragrances which tend to be fresh, light citrus or herbaceous scents. I’m eyeing off the LRP giant bottle of Atoderm, industrial-strength body lotion, but have no idea if it has an of our (even though it’s unfragranced, sometimes they’re still very overpowering.)

@AprilLady

Wow! That is a lot of empties!

That BS serum is next in my serum queue (also from an ac last year!). Looking forward to trying it out, but currently trying to get through a Dr Sabagh hyaluronic serum, which appears to do nothing detectable to my skin.

Lots of empties @AprilLady!

So hypothetically if one was to plan a trip home to the U.K. to coincide with delivery of advent calendars, early November would probably be good so that I could order to my brother’s house and they’d be waiting for me?? Someone up thread said they had received their Cult Beauty already. I thinking next year btw. Have not been back since 2019

@JunieSpoony

Sounds like a good plan! 😂. Many of them weigh a ton though...

I find it funny how Americans, Australians and Europeans seem to like to order their advent calendars from the UK. The shipping must cost a bomb! It would never even cross my mind to look for something like this abroad.

Are beauty calendars a British thing? Do you have different versions in other countries? Given the demand from overseas buyers, it seems surprising that other countries don't do them.