I Wasn't Suppossed To Shop...

A "Super Drug" on Kensington High Street caught my eye so I went in. The way all the products were arranged and neatly packaged I knew it meant trouble. Under the advisement of Lady Catherine, I was en route to visiting B Never Too Busy To Be Beautiful and knew I would probably spend money there, so I quickly exited...and wisely so.

I visited the location of Carnaby Street. Carnaby/Oxford/Regent Streets are all good streets to shop - if you're looking for a one stop shop kind of deal. Perfect if you don't have a lot of time. They have some tourist shops, but have the necessary basics such as Next, H & M, Super Drug, a Victoria's Secret equivalent "La Senza" and even high end shops. I bought a classic logo mug from the Whittard location there.

After taking another brief and childish stop at David & Goliath, I headed for the B Never cosmetic shop. And Gata was right - I definitely could not come all this way and not visit this place! I spent quite a bit of time there lingering, admiring the packaging and mostly figuring out what to buy because I wanted everything! The funky-girly packaging is all handmade in India (Fair Trade) and everything is natural and vegan which I love especially since my whole skin care line is natural. The carved wooden pots of glitter and jeweled eye shadow casings decorated as cakes made me feel like I was 16 and going through my glitter indulging time period and also like a child in my Barbie faze, but the cosmetic feature matures and adds the element of "woman" to the entire experience. Bottom line whatever mixed feelings you get, you could probably narrow it down to a completely womanly-girly thing, the sort of things any woman can indulge in.

I ended up playing with colors and had a multicolored left hand by the end of it all. I bought liquid cream eye shadows that you can use as a liner or smear and blend as a shadow. Mixing a light golden base with a purple or green was simple exquisite. And don't think you can just see a color without trying it. A color could look really bold, but when put on, it's iridescent tones soften it up. At the same time, to achieve really bold color (which I have to admit, scares me a bit) can be done by laying - first a cream shadow, sweeping the lids with a complementary shade of pressed powder and finishing with glitter. The look is really dramatic and looks Friday-night ready. On the flip side, the eye shadow can also be used lightly for a daytime look. My profession requires me to be in and out of corporate environments so I will be keeping it light. The quality and luminosity is just crazy-good!

In the end, I bought some as gifts, but ended up with 5 pressed eyeshadow powders, 2 cream ones, a glitter pot in Iris and purple hair mascara (one or two streaks framing the face is brilliant). Gata why did you introduce me to this place?!? They also had lotions and cleansers, bath products as well as fragrances but thankfully I'm all good in that department. Good news is, they are connected with Lush and will be expanding to North America starting in Canada. Their goal is to have one BNever store next to every Lush. I cannot wait, first of all to have access to one nearby, and second of all to be paying dollars instead of pounds!