My very first beautybox: #LFbeautybox

(photos coming soon)

I am always in love having butter biscuits with hot green tea (it makes me feel so English-like) while I'm writing, but today I am particularly in love, because a couple of months ago I discovered LookFantastic.com, and feel for this site.
So, because of I've ever wanted to join the beautybox madness, but have never been really sure (are the products going to be worth it? And how many of them are going to be inside? And what kind? For what value? I'm not sure I like this mistery, as the control-freak person I am), and because I've read aaall of the countless amazing reviews about the february box, I decided to go for the march #LFbeautybox .
The baddest point I have to say is that the shipping time is always a little bit more than the announced international one - more or less three to five days more, but for free worldwide shipping and no extra taxes at the Italian costumer house, I can definitely handle it. No one ever died because of a couple of days, right?
(To Italian readers: ho sempre dovuto fare i conti, in tutti i sensi, con la costosa dogana, che a ogni ordine di cosmetica ferma il pacco e chiede la dichiarazione dei prodotti ed il pagamento del 30% di tasse. Non so esattamente che tipo di spedizione usino e mi fa strano che possano non passarla o pagare loro le tasse, eppure nessun ordine da questo sito mi è mai stato bloccato con conseguenti lettere, pagamenti e le consuete almenoduesettimane di ritardo. Con mia grandissima felicità.)
This little elegant black and white box came to my door with an other gold product, the Phyto "Secrèt du Nuit" hair elixir. I will review this one also soon.
At first sight I couldn't find all the products among the black soft holding-paper, but even if I did spoiler myself the products before on blogs who already received it, it was immediatly love.
The box was only £15, while the actual prize of everything is over £70, and the brand were names like Caudalìe, Lord&Berry, NUDEstix, Bliss, Wet Brush and Cowshed. Pretty much half of the brand i wanted to try in my last order but which I skipped for not enough money at one time. Do I need to add something more?
Here's what I found inside:

Lil' Wet Brush handbag size brush (worth £7.99)
The first product I found inside made me soo happy. Because I have a lot of thin and damaged hair, and I love to wear scarves and necklaces, you can easily tell why my desperate head was about to buy a good little brush to carry with me all day long. Yes, I should have bought it long time ago, but that way I wouldn't be so happy finding in the beautybox today. Among various colours, I recieved a pretty light violet brush, which is also one of my favorite shades. One of the best I've ever tried, untangle and leaves soft hair without stressing it. But you can easily find about it on the web, so I won't bother you.

Cowshed lippy cow natural lip balm (0.18oz/5ml, worth £5)
This one is the first product from a brand I was about to try. Leaves lips "soft and supple", and has no paraben, sulphate, mineral oil and oetrolatum. Filled with certified organic ingredients, pure essential oils and botanical actives too, it's the kind of stuff I was looking for my natural-but-quality shift. Also, it's suitable for vegetarians. And plus, I adore the oranges scent (from the natural oil, and no added parfum).

NUDESTIX magnetic eye color eyeshadow stick in the shade "Gilt" (full size, 0.10oz/2.8gr, worth £24)
The NUDESTIX eyeshadow pencil almost made me scream of surprise when I discovered it was inside this beautybox. Like, seriously? A full-size of the top product of the new brand, head of the trend right now, just after LookFantastic began to sell it? If it's not pure joy for a make-up addicted, then I don't know what it is. I got an (obsessed, in truth) eye on the brand from their beginning, 'cause as much I like to go for strange and bold colours as much I'm a believer for the nude everyday look. But honestly, I was a little bit scared by the price, and I didin't know if I'd spend £24 on an eyepencil…well, this product alone costs more than the price of the entire beautybox, and it's completely worth it. Waterproof, perfect to built or as base, perfect alone for a speed make up, perfect for everything. I also think I'm going to try this as a bronzer or a highlighter when I'm getting tanned on spring and summer. I am surely about to buy some of their sculpting pencils, and don't know what else to say more than #gonenudebutbetter #nudeisthenewblack

Lord&Berry kajal and eye pencil in "black" (travel size, 0.02oz/0.7gr, worth £4.50)
And yes, Lord&Berry is an other brand I had in my mind-list ot "to buy before or later, as soon as possible". Please, don't tell me I'm the only one who has it.
A black eyeliner is always the answer if you don't know what to carry with you or what make-up to wear today, and this one is soft with a nice pigmentation and quite long-lasting. A perfect pair whit the NUDESTIX eyecolor for a running-late morning makeup.

Caudalìe polyphenol [c15] antri-wrinkle defense serum (sample size, 0,33oz/10ml, worth £11,66)
Caudalìe is one of the brand you can't go wrong with. And was, obviously, the last one I wanted to try so badly. Even if you don't have wrinkles -but in a couple of year I will have to start preventing them, and it's never too early to do that- this one works preserving the skin, protecting against enviromental factors as said in the LookFantastic description, and of course preventing and fighting wrinkles. Moreover, a good serum is one of the things in skincare you should really invest into.

Bliss's fatgirlslim body firming cream (2oz/60ml, worth £10.41)
Even if I'm completely disappointed by the name (not just as a girl, but as a person) I heard good and bad things about this, but more good ones. It's a cream containing high levels of caffeine and QuSome to firm and tone the skin and to riduce cellulite. Really watery and clear, you should massage it into your target areas for 20-30 seconds, but when I apply it dries within 10-15 seconds. I guess you are supposed to keep rubbing it for a deeper effect, however it feels light, leaves a nicetouch feeling and I am enjoying using it; still I don't have any opinions on the effects by now.

Lime Crime order: the best and the worst

Well, then.
I guess there is no need to introduce Lime Crime: and if you don't know the brand, just take a look at the officiale site and at the instagram page. I'm sure no words will be necessary then.
As lot of people, I've stalked the instagram account for months, waiting for the Velvetines to be restocked. I mean: liquid lipsticks (the most easy to apply, to my opinion), matte finish, super-long lasting and these killer colours. They are surprisely flattering on everyone. On every skin colour. On every skin tone.
I have no idea about how this is possible, and I have to suggest that maybe phosothop and instagram filters give a good hand, but the fact that they suit everyone is a damn truth. Applauses to the brand colorist.
I got a couple of different colours of the range, dark, neon and neutral (Wicked, Utopia and Cashmere), and I tried them at home with no make up, concealer, foundation, primer ectera, and so far I'm pretty impressed.
If testing their lastings I will keep being satisfied as I am now about colour pay-off, I will certainly going to buy others as Pansy, Pink Velvet and Salem at least, and Riot when it will be released.

But, just allow me to talk about two things not-so-good before making some swatches and reviews in the next post.
We can move on from the "Lime Crime drama", which I think is however a story to read (I'm still not sure about what I think on that, but you can find something more clear right here, for example) I was seriously disappointed when, a couple of weeks ago the website crashed when a crazy number of costumers assalted it for the Veltetines' restock.

Yes: it was a crazy number they could never expect (they said, more and more than the Black Friday ones) and we literally assalted the site, costantly refreshing pages, but the Velvetines didn't sold out…so I guess they were prepared to sell that amount, but their server wasn't. And hundres and hundres (seriously) waited up to twelve hours or more refreshing the site hoping to get their products.
And yes, I know this sound as a beauty madness or a costumers-hysteria, which I'm quite sure it was: I have personally spent about two hours for complete the order and checking out (getting mad with my poor boyfriend and going crazy with the friend I was making the order with), and I have been one of the luckyest -having no idea of how it was possible to took me just two hours from Italy, when people in America had to wait up to twelve.
However, they said they got more employers to get trough the orders working double-shifts till all were shipped, and that this madness would never happen again. Thanks, 'cause I'd lie if I'd tell that it has not been a personal suffer waiting, and refreshing, and checking out comments on instagram, and looking for pages to work.

At the end, they completed and shipped the orders in a quite fast way, which tooks me to the second bad point.
I was expecting to wait up to months for international and over-seas shipping, and I was prepared to have my little heart bleeding and checking the mail all of this time. I knew the frontier-customhouse was about to write me asking me to declare all of the stuff I got and to pay all the taxes on it.
But…it simply didn't happen. I went to the Italian mail to get my package believing it was from an other order (this one) and when I saw the little Lime Crime's one I looked at it like…whoa, wait a moment. It was supposed to go trough the customhouse as any other international extra-UE orders and to be declared and with taxes to be paid on it.
When I took it, my heart lost a beat. On the packaging there was written "inside: make up. Quantity: 1. Price: 10 $". I will upload a photo.
Wait, seriously, what? I ordered four Velvetines, 20$ each, and two eyeliners, 14$ each. Even if it was a mistake and they sent me just one of the lowest-price products, it wouldn't make sense anyway.
So I opened it freezing, and the first thing I saw was the order pink sheet whit the description of all of the products inside, and the blue paper holding all of them.

So, I really don't know what to think. I am happy I got this order in neither three weeks when I was expecting to wait at least two or three months (as they right declare on the site, and up to six in periods of sales or restockings), and I am quite happy, yes, that the customhouse didn't call me asking to pay the 30% of the price in taxes, but…I don't know if it was an innocent mistake, maybe I could believe it if it was declared one of the 14$ eyeliners: there was nothing in my order about 10$.
And you can easily guess what would happen if a country mail, or the U.S. customhouse, or the Italian customhouse checked a declared pack of 10$ finding inside an order of more than 100$.
I think I'm going to write to the Lime Crime's customers service, just to hear what they're going to tell me about that, and than let you know.
However, so far I am simply in crazy love with the Velvetines and I am experimenting and playing with the eyeliners. I am simply obsessed with these products and I will post a review as soon as I make some photos.


With love,
whiterosesandtea

Lookfantastic

Recently,
I have been a lot into mailorder and web-shopping.
For a lot of time I haven't been sure about it, and telling the truth, a little scared also, but when I started…I just can't have enough. I should stop, maybe. But…
But I found some pretty sites I now can't live without (seriously!) and I have to force myself not always scrolling them all the way down. Yes, I know this is not as normal people do: it's just as women do.
So let's face and accept it, and go on.
What are the best points of shopping online?
First at all, you don't have to get off and move from the couch. Which, excuse me, is awsome.
But moreover, most of e-shops offer more competitive prices than the regoular ones. There's always an offer, an unexpected sale, or, even better: your birthday discount code!
And I swear, I am not like people who destribuite their birthdays all over the year on every different website to have promotional codes along the year. Well, maybe just a little bit…I mean, what's wrong? They would send me the codes however, just all togheter in single period. So I wouldn't use all of them and it wouldn't be a good affair to anyone of us, right?
Sometimes, with coupon codes you're going to get free shipping, or some gift, or samples.

My current favorite site is the best I've ever found for these: it offers free shipping worldwide, with all orders, always have some great offers or sales, and costantly sends you a 20%off discount code (seriuosly, I recieve one in the mail like every two weeks) and is always full of free gifts, samples, 3x2 across a range or a brand, and so on.
If you, dear beautyaddict, want to make your beloved self happy, check out Lookfantastic . For example, they have now an amazing selection of the 25 top beauty products you should need on January to trow away your old and unefficient routine and start the new year the best way possible. And, of course, they are offering the 25% off on these.

The thing I am in love with the most is that they don't want to make their costumers wait too much to receive orders. Which means, above the FREE worldwide delivery on every order, they will despatch things separetely whit no added costs. In simple words, if half of your order is in stock and could be sent immediately but the other half is out and you'd have to wait to see the whole box shipped, they will ship them in two different times so you don't have to wait.
When I was looking at my order, I was thinking "oh, my free trio is not in stock. They're probably not going to send me (all of the promos are usally "till stocks last") or I will have to wait to get my whole pack". Then I scrolled down while reading, and discovered it. I have never seen before a shipping policy like this one and, well, if this is not real costumer care, I don't know what it is!
I received the signification that my order arrived while I was not home (how dares a simple university lesson bring me away from my beauty order!), so, if you may excuse your dear beautyaddict, I have to first box to catch up.

Sincerly,
Your addict to beauty, roses and tea.