Sephora arrived to Berlin!

When you spend a lot of time abroad and generally on the road, you get acquainted with great brands and products and you would love to have them at home too. One of my biggest frustrations of beauty shopping in Germany - I know, very first world problems - is that I couldn't shop from Sephora, the store I started to buy my make-up as a rebel teenager. Their products were maybe always a bit over my daily budget, but it was always a great investment. In Germany, you have Douglas which is very top notch, without the middle range offer aimed at middle class, young customers. It was something I was missing, and apparently not only me.

This year, everything changed as Sephora, the chain with 2,300 stores in 33 countries added Germany on their shopping map. In the last months, the 1969-founded French store, opened its stores in the Galeria Kaufhof stores from Munchen, Bonn, Hamburg, Heidelberg, Frankfurt and Düsseldorf, big German cities with a high concentration of wealth, expat community and tourists. The latest add is the store in Alexanderplatz, inaugurated the 9th of November, considered the biggest in Germany.

The problem with Galeria Kaufhof in Alexanderplatz is that it is always very busy, and as the store is not independent, meaning part of the big hall hosting other beauty stores, it doesn't provide the best identity branding, if not for the typical brand name placed in various corners. What a connoisseur would know for sure though, is that you can find here brands not available in Germany before, such as Marc Jacobs Beauty, Too Faced, Becca and Huda Beauty, in addition to the products created by Sephora itself. 

If you are looking for the best presents, here is the best place to find excellent choices. This pinky agenda on the top is more than it shows: it hides a 2018 daily agenda, plus some gorgeous make-up sets. An excellent present for any modern woman!

My longest stop was at the colourful cute corner of the Korean House, with products that I will definitely be testing in the next months. 

Therefore, I can only welcome the newest Sephora store, looking forward to more awesome beauty opportunities, that I can't wait to share with my other modern women readers.

Beauty purchases from the Body Shop

There are a couple of skin care and beauty products I always purchase from Body Shop, mostly green-tea based but also some Vitamin D face spray - to be reviewed in a later post. However, I haven't tried too often their make up products. Celebrating the summer, I made myself a little different present: the smoky blue eye definer and the eye palette groowing gold.

I always loved the eye definer, but I mostly used the black one. This blue is decent, from the dark ultramarine family. It is very light - 1 gram only - and is provided also at the other end with a correction pencil. In the last month, I used it frequently, with good and stable results. After half of a busy day, the eye liner did not smashed and looks as fresh as it was in the morning. It also has the advantage that can be easily adapted to various circumstances, from casual to dating and evening glamour. 

Very often, I am using the pencil together with the eye palette colour choices. A good match and, for my makeup needs, a very fine combination. The colours are on the list of favourite in clothes too, but go well also with yellow or just black outfits. As in the case of the pencil, it is pretty adaptable and it lasts long. It brings a touch of discretion and elegance to the outfit and allowed me more than once to focus the weight of my look on the eyes. The box is provided with an eye colour brush which works very efficiently. Another advantage is that on the back of the box it offers a sample of makeup. To be honest, I've found the idea of applying the gold-yellow one at the corner of the eye as a very inspired one, as it gives width to the eye, especially if you have the almond shaped type as I do. 

In conclusion, both products were a good and long-time investment.