Guest Post: Viva La Vivo ...

Aloha dolls! Hope you are all well?

I am currently sunning myself on a beach in Corfu with a cocktail in hand (jel?!) Today i am leaving you in the capable hands of Sam from The Beauty Diaries. Please do check out her blog if you haven't already, it is amazing - i have much admiration for this girl :)

VIVA LA VIVO

Hi there everyone how are you all? My name’s Sam and I write reviews on cruelty-free beauty products. I’m really excited to be guest posting for Kirsti today as I’m reviewing some products from brand new range Vivo Cosmetics (yes they’re cruelty-free, which makes me happy!), who are being hailed as the ‘MAC of supermarket make-up brands’. I also love their tag line ‘Alive with colour’ and their products certainly look very sleek and chic in the press release, another bonus is the price range, which varies from around £1.50 for eyeshadow to £6 for a baked shimmer eyeshadow palette. Not bad in my opinion! So let’s take a look at what they sent me shall we...

As you can see I’ve been sent a liquid liner, a lip gloss and a foundation to review. I’m especially excited about the eyeliner as I only have 1 other liquid liner, so it will be great to see how this one compares

First up, I tried the foundation; called ‘Toast’ (or shade 4), which is way too dark for me, so I tried it on my sister who was willing to be my guinea pig lol. I have to admit I’m not too keen on the consistency, it felt quite thick and sticky when I was applying it to my sister’s face, which she did agree with (see image below). It also doesn’t dry very quickly, as it did wipe off on her fingers after a couple of minutes. So I would probably recommend a setting powder to help last that little bit longer! That said, when looking at the ingredients I notice there are no oxides, like Titanium or Iron, which means no ghostly white faces when photos are taken with the flash (i.e. on a night out with the girlies), this is a huge thumbs up as far as my sister is concerned as she loves to wear fake tan but hates how ‘luminous’ her MAC foundation makes her look in pictures

Considering this foundation is only £2.59 I’d say this foundation isn’t too bad, especially if you like a lot of coverage! I personally don’t, so will be donating this to my sister, who even though said it felt thick, I think she will love the results it gives in pictures when the flash is being used

Next up I’m looking at the eyeliner, and this has really impressed me. I’m always worried that liquid liners with a thin brush instead of a ‘pen-like’ end will be more difficult to control, but this was so easy I literally drew this line within a matter of seconds. It’s also perfect at creating that beautiful pin-up flick at the end a la Dita Von Teese! As you can see it’s a real raven black so gives a very dramatic effect even when a thin line is drawn. Plus it doesn’t sting like a lot of ‘cheaper’ eyeliners do so I’m really impressed by that. It’s a mere £2 as well so I know I will be buying more when this baby runs out!

And finally we have the lip gloss, which is a diamond sparkle is Sheer Spice’ (or shade 3). I don’t know about you but I much prefer when products have names to describe their shades, I hate all this shade 1, 2, 3 malarkey, it feels lazy to me. Anyway, the thing I really like about this gloss is it has a brush applicator on the end, which actually feels really lovely on your lips, and makes application so much easier and softer. It’s a gorgeous sparkly berry shade so perfect for a night out due to the amount of sparkle to it. I personally couldn’t wear this to work though – bit much! It is really hard to squeeze out of the tube so be prepared for a bit of a workout there! Once it’s on though it feels soft, smooth and glossy without any stickiness or tackiness, and if there’s one thing that puts me off glosses, it’s the tackiness on your lips!! Even as it wears off there’s no stickiness at all. The glosses are only £1.50 each too

So there we have it; my first impressions of Vivo cosmetics. Have any of you used this range yet? If so what are your first impressions? Do you think it deserves the nickname it’s been given as the MAC of the supermarket? I think I will be able to get a better view when I try more of the range out. It was released on the 1^st and is exclusive to Tesco, so I can’t wait to raid my local store.

Thank you again to Kirsti for having me guest post, it’s been a real honour as it’s a fantastic blog! Thanks again for reading, and I can’t wait to hear your thoughts!

Sam

xoxo

* Thankyou so much Sam, i thoroughly enjoyed reading this post :) See you all soon *