Archive for the ‘hair’ category

Tousled locks

August 20th, 2009

tossled

I watched this vid and tried it myself. It’s brilliant. I have curly, frizzy hair and I normally pull and tug  my hair straight when I blow dry. But this technique is much gentler and leaves my hair much softer and bouncier.

I didn’t use hot curlers as shown in the vid, and instead used a smaller radius brush at the end to add a few tighter curls. The tip about apply the hair spray before doing the tighter curls is a good one. If you spray after creating a curl, while hair is still warm, the curl tends to fall out…in my experience anyway.

Vintage Clothing Extravaganza this weekend!

July 24th, 2009

You no doubt know that we love us some dressing up and vintageness, ala Amy’s 30th, so we were quite stoked to receive this from Kylie:

Vintage Clothing Extravaganza this weekend!

This Sunday 26th July 1pm onwards at the Kelburn Church Hall, 81 Upland Road
Do you want to look the part but don’t know how? Are you looking for inspiration? Do you need some new threads? Then this event is for you!

Join two of our resident vintage gurus Amy Jansen-Leen and Ness Kirkham as we step back in time to educate you on the vintage world of style from the 1920′s jazz age through to 1940′s wartime. We will cover fashion, make-up advice and hairstyling tips for both men and women and everyone will receive a booklet to take home to refer to.

Shopping galore!
We have well over a hundred pairs of shoes for sale from $5-30, several racks of vintage and vintage inspired clothes from $5-80 and lots of accessories catering for both ladies and gentlemen so make sure you bring plenty of cash along (or visit the ATM down the road before you arrive)  as it is CASH SALES ONLY!

Order of proceedings:
1pm – Ladies to be seated, styling session to commence
2.30pm – Ladies shopping session with Amy and Ness on hand for advice
3.30pm – Gentlemen to join us as we break for afternoon tea
(everyone to bring a pretty plate of savoury or sweet nibbles for the table)
4pm – Gents styling session
4.45pm – Gents shopping session with Amy and Ness on hand for advice
5.45pm – Curtains close on ‘The Extravaganza!’

Tickets are $20 in advance, $25 on the door (limited ticket availability on the day) and can be purchased in class or reserved by emailing vanessakirkham@hotmail.com or calling 021 345 716. Friends, family or colleagues interested in the era are very welcome to join us.

On behalf of the Full Swing Team “)
www.fullswing.co.nz

If you’re going along, do let us know how it went, please.

Ingredients to avoid

May 3rd, 2009

skull

totalbeauty.com has an easy to follow, researched list of ingredients to avoid when buying beauty products. I know you’ve read these like  a thousand times, and when you look at the ingredients list on a bottle of shampoo at the supermarket you can’t remember the bad ones.

Below, I’ve listed the bad ingredients by name, and attempted to make a memory devices to help us remember them. For example, I have Sodium Laureth down-pat now, because it bubbles like soda and laureth rhymes with death – Sodium Laureth – soda of death).

  • Sodium Laureth (aka 1,4-Dioxane) found in your bubbling products. Remember, ‘soda of death’
  • Phthalates found in deodorants. Remember, it rhymes with ‘pilates’ where you’re likely to use deodorant.

OK, so to be honest, I only came up with memory devices for those two. Here are the others. Can you help me out here?

Thimerosal in your mascara

Dibutyl Phthalate or DBP, Toulene, Formaldehyde in nail poilsh

Quaternium-15, DMDM Hydantoin, Imidazolidinyl Urea and Diazolidinyl Urea

Image from http://www.magentastudios.com

Anyone for a head rub?

May 1st, 2009

The Powder Room on Constable Street, a hairdresser that I would love to try out one day except I can never get a booking and also Amy does my hair just fantastic anyway, has this sign outside it today: 

 

$10 for an aromatherapy scalp rub? Yes please!

Saben Bag from Rodney Wayne

April 24th, 2009

I saw these bags up close today, and they do look lovely. The products cost about $90, 10% of which goes to Breast Cancer Research.

saben

Rodney Wayne is behind ‘Ritual for a Cure’, a six week multi-faceted campaign beginning in April. The campaign aims to raise at least $40,000 for the Breast Cancer Research Trust, which will go towards our goal of finding a cure for breast cancer within the next 10 years.

Rodney Wayne salons nation-wide are inviting clients to experience a ‘heavenly’ in-salon Kérastase ‘Ritual Cure’, which can also be matched with one of three Kérastase ‘Home Care Cures’ specific to dull, dry or damaged hair.

Clients who choose one of the Home Care Cures also receive a handbag with signature Saben-designed print. For every in-salon ritual bought, Rodney Wayne salons will donate $3 to the breast cancer cure cause or 10 per cent of the purchase price of any Kérastase Home Care Cure.

Tonight, Matthew, I’m going to be…

March 31st, 2009

Maria Callas!!

Here’s my friend Siobhan before going to a party as Maria Callas…but which one is she? Ok, so my ugly curtains are a dead give away. Siobhan is on the left.

Me and Siobhan played around for ages – thanks for your patience Siobhan. First, we did hair. The key was using a tail comb for a perfect middle-part. We used mousse and back-combing to maintain some volume (so not slick and flat on head). And Siobhan’s hair is actually too short to make a big bun at the back so we improvised with a rolled up pantyhose leg (pictured) I made a little pony tail at the nape of her neck, wrapped the pantyhose around (like it was a scrunchy) and then pinned hair in the ponytail back around the pantyhose so you couldn’t see the pantyhose at all.

Then we clipped in the big fake flower.

Make-up was basically loads of black liquid eyeliner, bold red lippie, loads of blush for cheek bones, heavy brows, and of course attitood, hehe.

I’d also like to add, that the amazing Siobhan made her own dress for the party – a beautiful red satin number that you can just see in the first pic above.

Review: Wondercap

March 28th, 2009

NZ company Wondercap approached us to review their ingenious product. It’s a wheat-sack type cap that, upon heating in the microwave, is used with hair treatments to make hair wonderful. Aside from moisture treatments, Wondercap can also be used to speed up processing times of home-dyes and henna dying.

If you haven’t tried hair treatments at home you might not know what a nightmare they can be -  wrapping glad-wrap around your wet hair, or hot wet towels. And when I received the Wondercap in the post I was dubious about how it could make life easier.

But in the name of ‘pretty’ I persevered, and I’m glad I did. You see, after trying it, the next day at work a colleague actually said “Amy, your hair looks so soft and shiny today”. Honest-to-god, true story. And that stuff doesn’t happen to me often!

Back to the Wondercap, it’s easy to use. Just wet hair, glob on treatment (which was provided with the cap), microwave the Wondercap, pop it on your head and relax for while. The heat of the cap is in itself quite therapeutic, and I’m gonna enjoy using it on cold nights.

So thumbs up on the Wondercap.

The only downside is the cap made me feel a bit like the mushrooms from the MArio Brothers.

See a video of the Wondercap here.

wondercap1

Natural blonde

March 27th, 2009

blonde_bombshell_e_mail_1

(Most of the following is from  blog.wired.com)

 Hydrogen peroxide is still used to blondify even the brunettest of us. But a newer, gentler, natural bleach has been developed from forest soil fungus by the Kao Corporation. I’m looking forward to this gentler bleach being developed as I’ve thought about going lighter, but the damage it does to my hair is real bad, especially since I straighten my hair so much.

Proctor & Gamble have also developed a colouring system they say “is the first significant advance in dye jobs in 50 years”. The new process works at a much lower pH. That makes it less alkaline, so it strips away much less of the lipid coating.

The other key advancement is a molecule that gobbles up free radicals. Free radicals form when those chemical bonds are broken, causing damage to the hair’s structure.

The system is already in stores: it’s Clairol’s Perfect 10.

Apparently, the dye won’t be available at your hair salon though for a while as they’ve created just 15 colors, which aren’t enough for fancy hair stylists. But the chemists said they’re adding more colors as fast as they can — when they get to 200, the salons might start carrying it.

Servilles hair show

March 24th, 2009

Fans of Servilles salons in Auckland might love this vid from the hair-art stage show at the Chch town hall, or else anyone who loves pretty hair.

Just a couple of observations. I don’t know why they thought they could get models to dance. Or why they have a bobble-head doll hosting the vid.

Clinique Bonus Time

March 18th, 2009

march-0021Yowser! Selected Life Pharmacy’s have a great Clinique gift with purchase at the mo.

You get:

  • Eye shadow compact
  • High Impact mascara (it’s pretty good)
  • Lip gloss
  • City Block 25spf (great under make-up)
  • Repai wear eye cream
  • liquid facial soap
  • make-up remover
  • DD moisturising lotion.

If you’re wondering what two products to buy, here are my recommendations: