Wantable Subscription Box - Review, Photos, Swatches

You may or may not be aware of my obsession with subscription boxes; this is not limited to beauty boxes, either - lifestyle, food, fitness... you name it, I'll try it! Today I have a have a review of my very first Wantable box. The cool thing is that Wantable tries to send products according to your preferences, based on a fairly thorough questionnaire that the customer is asked to fill out prior to purchase. Wantable promises to never send you products you mark as a 'dislike'. For example, if you indicate that you don't wear liquid eyeliner, don't expect to receive it; likewise, if you say you aren't fond of nude lipsticks, you won't be sent any in that color family. I automatically went through my survey to 'dislike' all skincare products offered as I've got enough of those from my now defunct Birchbox subscription. Overall I tried to guide my box to include a large amount of colorful makeup products, especially lip products, nail polish, and eyeshadow and liner. Each box costs $40. So what did I get? Let's take a look!

The items come directly inside the shipping packaging, with no second inner box:

Here are all the items included in my box, unwrapped:

The items you see are: Color Club nail polish, Be A Bombshell eye shadow, Be A Bombshell eye liner, 29 Reserves lipstick, Benecos eye shadow, Cailyn lipstick, and Milu Amber Sugar Scrub. Everything is full-size apart from the scrub (which I believe is a bonus item).

Here are the eye products:

Left to right: Be A Bombshell eyeliner marker in Provocateur (deep blue), Benecos Natural Baked Colours in Amazing (shimmery teal), Be A Bombshell Eye Shadow in Tease (shimmery teal).

I'm familiar with the BaB eyeliner marker as I've gotten the black one in an Ipsy (I believe) box some months back and have used it often for its precision and staying-power. I think the color included in this Wantable package is a very pretty one, and I've no doubt I will be using it with some regularity. I'm mostly pleased to have gotten this! Now let's move on to the painted elephant in the room, shall we? Tease and Amazing are very, very similar hues. Tease is a bit more intense, more pigmented, and softer in texture. Like some baked eyeshadows, the Amazing cake is hard and a tad difficult to get into with a brush. Besides that, it's on the sheer and powdery side, definitely not as smooth as Tease. I do like teals, though, and I expect to reach for Tease when the mood arises; I am, however, miffed that I got two shadows that are, for all intents and purposes, the same color! :/ Boo, it's disappointing.

Moving on to the lipstick:

Left to right, we have 29 Reserves Moisturizing Lipstick in Expressive Rose, and Cailyn Mineral Lipstick in #1 Lovely in Pink. 29R is a bright raspberry and Cailyn is a light peachy pink with fine, sparse glitter. I've yet to wear either of the shades, but I can tell you that these colors are right up my alley and I'm excited to try them. Wantable was pretty bang-on with this one!

Finally, I received a nail polish from Color Club's recent Fiesta Collection - Flamingo, an uber-bright neon pink:

Hmm... I suppose I'll take it! I do like Color Club polishes, generally, though I don't wear pink all that often. I am a sucker for neons, though, and this vibrant color will fit in well with the summer weather, if it ever decides to show its face (my area is having an unreasonably chilly late March, so far!).

Total value of my box -

Cailyn Mineral Lipstick - $15
29 Reserves Moisturizing Lipstick - $25
Be a Bombshell Eyeliner Marker - $14
Be a Bombshell Eye Shadow - $14
Color Club Nail Polish - $8
Benecos Natural Baked Eyeshadow - $12.99
(I'm not including the Milu Amber Sugar Scrub, both because I believe it's a 'bonus' item and because I've no idea how much product was included in my sample; for reference, however, a 250g jar is listed at $43.72.)

Total, excluding the Milu scrub: $88.99. Not bad, eh?

To summarize:

Yes, Wantable is more expensive at $40 than other beauty box services such as Ipsy, Birchbox, Glossybox, Beauty Allure, and Beauty Army; however, the biggest distinguishing feature is the ability to fairly thoroughly customize your package, short of choosing the exact items. I felt my products were as a whole decent and fit with what I expected from my questionnaire answers. Additionally, the value of the box was more than twice the price tag. The big, glaring negative is, of course, getting basically two of the same eyeshadow colors! I assume the samples were pulled randomly without any check. Still a bummer, though.

I'd be willing to try another box, and I do recommend checking Wantable out if you love these kinds of subscription services. It's a pretty neat service!

You can sign up for Wantable here! What do you think/what have been your experiences with Wantable?

New Year's Eve Celebratory Manicure Ideas!

Today I have for you a few New Year's Eve nail ideas! Note that there are no reds or golds featured here; I know some of you ladies love those colors for ringing in the new year, and that's totally cool, but my interest in them fizzled after three or so weeks of Christmas manicures! The shades I gravitate to this time of year are silvers, blues, blacks, and, of course, glitter (which is definitely a color, in my highly esteemed opinion ;).

I'll start with a classic: a shiny silver foil. My favorite, pictured below, is Zoya's Trixie. This is a flashy silver that doesn't veer to 'blindingly bright', and will match most outfits well. Unfortunately, it freaks my camera out a bit, but hopefully you can still make out its beauty -

If Trixie on its own is lacking in shine for you, never fear! Here it is layered with various silver and holographic glitter topcoats:

Pointer to pinkie: OPI Save Me, KB Shimmer Ice Queen, Nail Pattern Boldness Tin Man, Color Club Platinum Record

And if Trixie is too flashy for you (perhaps it's overkill to an already flashy outfit), you can try overlaying the silver with a half-moon manicure using circular binder tape. Shown below is my most favorite, most pigmented, smoothest black, CND's Blackjack. One coat is sufficient for full coverage -

I love deep, vibrant blues, and New Year's Eve is a perfect time to wear them! I picked two from my collection which offered a bit of sparkle in addition to lovely, dark pigmentation. Feast your eyes on these beauts! If I did not love the enough already, the Dr. Who reference is a sure-fire way to steal my heart ;)

Pointer and ring: Nail Pattern Boldness Bigger on the Inside; Middle and pinkie: Revlon Sparkling Midnight  

Another great hue for NYE is a black lacquer with holographic glitter. Here is Zoya Storm, which is stupidly, stupendously gorgeous -

Lastly, you can try the simple but elegant glitter gradient manicure, offering just the right amount of bling for a night out. For the photos below, I used Hungry Asian's Mumbling over one coat of OPI Don't Touch My Tutu -

Of course, this barely scratches a tip of the endless possibilities for a fun New Year's manicure! How are you doing your nails on the 31st? Let me know so that I can live vicariously through you - my nails are currently on a self-imposed detox to repair and restore length, so no nail polish for me for a few weeks. (Sad, but necessary).

Thanks for reading, and I wish you all a happy, healthy, and fun New Year's!

Nail Polish Hodgepodge Vol II - Studio M, RBL, Color Club, Laura Mercier, Wet n Wild, Zoya, NerdLacquer

Sorry to post two nail polish entries in a row (I'm sure it goes against some unspoken beauty-blogger rule!) but I had a RIDICULOUS amount of fun writing my previous Hodgepodge post and rediscovering old (and oftentimes forgotten) lacquers from my collection. So, here is the next set of my random polish swatches!

 This is two coats of Studio M's Bluecicle, a frosty light blue-silver foil. Studio M is a relatively new brand to me; I first spotted it a few months ago during a rare Meijer visit (the closest store is nearly 30 miles away). I guess the company is kind of a big deal, as Meijer had a nearly full-wall display of their beauty tools and polishes. The lacquers are $2.99 each and come in a range of impressively chic shades. Bluecicle is from the current holiday collection. It's a perfectly wintry color, if not very unique. I do have a complaint about the product, however - the brush is reeeeally long, making for less control during application; sort of like reaching across the room with a broomstick to flip a light switch. (If you've never tried that, you haven't LIVED.)

Wet 'n Wild's Caribbean Frost, a soft, jungle green... frost. I believe this was three coats. The color and finish of this polish seem a bit retro, vintage-y. It's all good! I wish the formula wasn't as sheer, but it's a solid product for the price ($1.99).

Here's the gorgeous Delilah from Zoya ($8). It's a beautiful, bright, cool red with amazing sparse gold microglitter. Overall one of my favorite red polishes. This shade makes me so happy :) The formula is fantastically smooth and the consistency is spot-on. Zoya rarely disappoints!

I love finding new indie brands to try, and above you can see Event Horizon from one such brand, NerdLacquer (formerly By StringTheory). I'm so pleased that I ordered a slew of polishes from the company's Etsy store, as they are wonderfully colorful and glittery and joyous! Event Horizon is a deep blue-green/teal jelly base with multicolored glitter, some hexagonal. A two-coat application lends itself to fully opaque coverage. Lovely and space-y.

Oh, Rescue Beauty Lounge's Insouciant ($18) is spectacular. It's a light lavender-gray base with stunning blue-purple microshimmer, and the formula is first class. A great neutral alternative.

I like the shade of the Color Club polish - a warm, slightly dusted chocolate brown - but I disliked the thin consistency of the lacquer. It would drip off the brush, if I wasn't careful! Three coats were required to bring Color Club's Positively Posh up to snuff, though I must say I quite like the end result.

I'll admit Laura Mercier's Twilight was a thoughtless buy, surely to bring an order into discount territory or to qualify for free shipping. And since that impulsive purchase it has been sitting, lonely and neglected, in my makeup drawer. I'm glad I finally took it out for a spin - it's an ultra pretty murky purple with brighter purple/fuchsia shimmer. Very broody and romantic. Perfect for any season, but especially for the cool autumn days. 

We're almostnearlyhalfway-ish to the weekend, kind of.. :D Thanks for reading, as always. If you enjoy this blog, I would love for you to follow me (no pressure, though!).