Oden's Eye is a Swedish indie brand and their inspiration behind their aesthetic is Norse mythology, which is such a cool concept. They have a relatively small range of products, only 3 palettes and a few blushes and lip stains. I really like the look of what they've brought out so far, so I'll be keeping my eye out for their future releases.

The product that really caught my eye is this palette, the Älva palette. For you non-Swedish speakers, Älva means fairy. All of the shade names are inspired by flowers, even coffee bean, (although I did google that to check because I wasn't sure about that one) which is really cute.

I believe I originally heard about this brand on Julia Mazzucato's Youtube channel and I think that's where I first saw this palette too. Call me basic, but these kinds of colour stories get to me. I LOVE warm pinks and purples, so of course I fell in love with this palette and of course I had to have it. I also really liked the fact that these shadows are quite small, the palette as a whole is quite slim and would be easy to travel with.

I started by using Jasmine as a transition shade, then I used Morning-Glory in my crease, outer V and along my lower lashline, creating a winged out shape. I did use some more of Jasmine to blend that shade out a bit. I then put down some glitter glue all over my lid and inner corner. I then placed the shade Coffee Bean on the outer part of my lid and and Cosmos on the inner half of my lid. Then in my inner corner I used Golden Tulipa.

I used Daisy in crease, outer V and lower lash line. I then used Sunflower all over the lid and Golden Tulipa layered in the centre of the lid and on my inner corner.

For this look I used Jasmine as a transition shade before using Camellia in my crease and lower lashline. I deepened my crease using Morning-Glory, then placed that same shade on the inner and outer half of my lid, creating a halo-eye shape. Then I deepened that even more using Peony, then I ran that same shade along my lower lashline. Using concealer in the centre of my lid to 'cut' my lid for the halo eye shape and set down some glitter glue in the same area. I packed on Lilac where I had placed the glitter glue,. then on either side of that I used Dahlia. I finished by using Lilac on my inner corner and in the centre of my lower lashline.

First I used Camellia in the crease and lower lashline, then I took Peony ever so slightly in the crease and also used it as a liner. Finally, I packed on Baby's Breath on the lid and inner corner.

On the inner half of my crease I used Daisy and for the outer half of the crease I used Camellia. I then cut my crease using concealer (which you can't really tell from the photo) and packed on Sunflower on the inner half of my lid and Cherry Blossom on the outer half of my lid. For my inner corner highlight I used Golden Tulipa.

In my crease I used a combination of Jasmine and Morning Glory. I then used Carnation all over the lid and on my inner corner

For this look I used Lotus in the crease and lower lash line. Then I used Morning Glory to deepen the crease, outer V and took it down onto my lower lashline too. On my lid I used Cherry Blossom on the outer half and Dandelion on the inner half of the lid and inner corner.

So there are a couple of different formulas within this palette, there are your standard mattes and then a couple of different shimmer formulas, where the difference is the amount of base pigment and the amount of flecks of glittery particles. In case you're worried when you hear the word glitter, don't worry, this formula does not contain polyethylene terephthalate (PET) which is the kind of glitter that is harmful to the environment.

The mattes are so easy to blend, I don't have to think or work too hard about what I'm doing when blending the mattes. The matte I had the hardest time working with was Peony, the dark purple. I think this shade is slightly harder pressed than the other mattes, as it was harder to pick up as much colour as I wanted in one go. I had to layer this shade a bit to get the desired effect I was after. but other than that it performed just as nicely as the other mattes.

I like the variation of finishes of the shimmers, some are straight up intense shimmers but then you also have more metallic, glittery type formulas too. As mentioned before, some shimmer shades don't have as much pigment as the the others, so they are more like eyeshadow toppers. I would recommend using a glitter glue with the shades that have an intense glittery finish, as I think they wear better on the eye and look more intense. (I have started using a glitter glue more regularly anyway even when I'm using traditional shimmer shades just to get a more intense effect.)

The shade I like the least in this palettes is the shade Cosmos, which is a shimmery shadow with glitter flakes in it. This is gives a gorgeous effect on the eyes but it does also mean that this shade is very prone to fallout because of that. Even with a glitter glue, I had a lot of fallout under my eyes after a couple of hours. Also, I think I got a speck of fallout in my eye and although it wasn't painful it just was sort of uncomfortable. My eye is fine by the way, I don't think this is dangerous in any way but I will probably be hesitant when using this particular shade in the future.

I really love the formula of these shadows! I really enjoyed playing with this palette as I didn't have to work too hard and it still performed nicely on the eyes. Every time I created a look I was happy with the result.

The colour story is beautiful, these are some of my favourite kinds of shades when it comes to eyeshadow. However, this colour story isn't revolutionary, in fact the colours remind me a lot of the Huda Beauty Desert Dusk palette. (I have a One Month One Palette on the Huda Beauty Desert Dusk palette if you want to see my thoughts on that palette.)

One of the limitations with this palette is that I found that some shades did look similar on the eyes. When I used Lotus and Morning Glory together, it basically created the same colour as Camellia. Baby's Breath and Carnation also do look quite similar.

This palette retails for £24 on the Odenseye website, which is a pretty good price. They do ship from Singapore though, so just be aware that they'll probably be extra charges for shipping. I ended up paying £28.29 in total, that included a discount code (there's quite a few out there) and the shipping cost. Considering the quality I think the price is well worth it!

Overall, I really like this palette! It isn't perfect but I can see myself reaching for this on an everyday basis as it's so user friendly and inspiring. If you like this colour story I definitely recommend it.

Thanks for reading!

You may remember a couple months ago I tried some of Glisten Cosmetics Wet Liners, and I fell in love! I was so happy when I found out that they were not only releasing more shades but also that they were releasing primary colours in this formula! I have wanted cake eyeliners in primary shades (plus a black and white) for a while now, so that I create any eyeliner colour under the sun.

Swatches top to bottom: Bananas, Sapphire, Lobster

I picked up the shades Lobster, Bananas and Sapphire. These are vibrant primary colours and I'm so exited to not only wear these shades by themselves, but also to mix and create different colours of liner. These retail for £6.50 each but you can get certain shades in bundles, plus there are discount codes out there so you can get these for slightly less than that. Glisten have released a ton more shades, even some metallic colours so definitely check out their website.

I did mention this in my first review, but I am so happy that Glisten Cosmetics Wet Liners come in a smaller sizes. However since my last review Glisten Cosmetics have created a larger version of their Wet Liners! I only own the smaller version of these as I know I will never be able to go through enough product to warrant buying a larger size. If however you know you're going to use a lot of product, then definitely go for the larger size! The larger sizes retail for £11.50 each but again you can certain colours in bundles. Personally I prefer having more variety and I don't like feeling like I'm wasting product. When compared to the SUVA Hydraliners, the one I own from SUVA looks massive next to the the Glisten Wet Liners.

Swatches left to right: Lemonade, Bananas, Sapphire, Lobster

So I was curious how Bananas compared to Lemonade, as you can see from the swatches above Lemonade is far more neon and it has a hint of green in it. I was worried they'd be too similar but they're very different.

I thought I'd demonstrate how these shades look when mixed in different ways, plus how they perform on the eyes. I first mixed Sapphire and Bananas together to create this gorgeous teal colour. For the second look I used Lobster and Bananas but also mixed the two shades (I used the lid of one of the liners to mix the shades) so that I could create a gradient effect.

Wearing Bananas and Sapphire mixed

Wearing Bananas and Lobster

These colours have such a high impact and are so vibrant, however if you can make them more wearable by mixing in other colours. If you are curious to try out cake liners or have been looking for affordable ones, I can't recommend Glisten Cosmetics enough. Thanks for reading!

So a couple of months ago when I last got my hair done, my hairdresser used a hair waver on my hair and I was immediately obsessed with the result. I had always wanted my hair to look like how he styled it, so when I got home I googled how much this particular hair waver (the GHD Wave Wand) cost. It usually retails for £129, although it tends to be on offer for about £100 from time to time. Now, I love using heat tools on my hair, but I couldn't ever justify that kind of price as a student. I had the GHD Wave Wand on my wishlist since January, in the hopes it would one day magically be 50% off or something. Then a few weeks ago, I saw a hair tool that looked kind of similar, the Babyliss Big Wave Wand. Not only did it look similar, it retailed for about £40.

I started scouring the internet for reviews online, hoping it would be just as good for a fraction of the price of the GHD wand. I found one review by Nadine Baggot on Youtube, where she compared the two wands I've mentioned. (Her video will be linked down below if you want to watch it!) She said in her review that the Babyliss wand worked pretty similarly to the one from GHD, except it was both longer and lighter. This was music to my ears; as you may or may not know, I have reasonably long hair so I like it when heat tools are slightly longer. I also liked the fact that she said it was lighter because I have a lot of hair and trying to heat style hair while your arms get tired is not fun. I pulled the trigger and bought it, as I managed to find it for an even better price, £19.99! For the past 2 weeks, I have been trying it out to see if it's a tool worth investing in.

Before I start my review, here is a background on my hair type and preferences. My hair is relatively long, thick and I have a lot of it. It is slightly bleached, as I like getting highlights in my hair, overall though it's pretty resilient. It can hold a curl in my hair for quite a long time and I typically only heat style my hair once after washing and it lasts pretty well until I wash it again. What I usually do is curl my hair using a 25 mm barrel and let my curl drop until its a soft wave. I am pretty low maintenance considering I like curling my hair so much.

Before styling

When styling my hair using the Babyliss Wave Wand, I set it to either 180°C or 195°C alternated the direction of curls to get a more natural looking wave effect. I've yet to try curling in the same direction as I'm not sure how that would end up looking like. This wand does come with a heat protecting glove, I don't always use it as I'm pretty used to heat styling my hair but that being said I have burned my fingers in the past.

About 30 minutes after styling

PROS:

I really like the result this wand gives. As I said before, when I use my 25mm regular curling wand, at first my hair looks a bit too ringlet-ty, like it just turned 16 and is wondering whether her dad got her a BMW or a Mercedes. Its fine after a couple of hours when it has some time to drop slightly but at first I don't love it. This Babyliss Wave Wand gives more of a beachy- cool girl- red carpet feel, once your done styling you can hairspray it in place and you're done.

The wand heats up really fast too, it only takes about 10-15 seconds and then you're ready to go. It has 4 different heat settings which I feel like gives a nice amount of versatility. I've only used the middle two settings so I can't say if theres a massive difference in how the heat settings affect the waves. It's a pretty basic design with the buttons but then again it makes it very easy to use and understand. Also, I love the fact this has a swivel cord on it too. I can't remember if the GHD has that too but I love having a swivel cord on this one as it makes it more user friendly.

CONS:

I found that with the waves this wave wand creates, hairspray is a MUST. I can usually not worry too much about hairspraying my hair or not, with the obvious exception of if it's really humid outside. Trust me, you need to load up on the hairspray when using this. Or prep your hair beforehand to hold a curl, it's up to you. Even when I do hairspray, the waves don't last the way my 25mm curling iron does. I can get a good 3 days wear out of the curls before its basically gone, whereas with my 25mm I can get twice that. I don't think it has anything to do with the quality of the Babyliss Wave Wand, as the same thing happened when my hairdresser used the GHD Wave Wand on my hair.

Overall I'm really happy with this purchase! I definitely want to try using this tool in different ways and experimenting. I think if you're prepared to prep and lock your hair in place when using the waver you'd enjoy it. As for the price, it's a steal! If you're unsure about investing in the GHD I think this is a great alternative.

Also sorry for posting so late, I've had some tech issues the last few days (you may be able to tell by the quality of the photos) it'll have to do for now but please bear with me. Thanks for reading!

Nadine's video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WfVfvAGs_IY&t=824s&ab_channel=NadineBaggott