Sunday, July 13, 2014

The Cork Meetup ♥

 One thing on my bucket list for 2014 was to organise a blogger meetup and I'm both proud and glad to say I ticked that goal off my list yesterday when myself and my fellow gorgeous Irish beauty blogger Sarah from At the Beauty Desk organised and held the Cork Meetup. We were super excited to get everyone together, meet our fellow beauty bloggers and enjoy some beauty and makeup demos while having some laughs, chats and giggles. I'm happy to report that it was an amazing day and from what I read on Twitter last night everyone who attended loved their experience too and their goodies but I shall be posting about them in another post so stayed tuned for that!

 We kicked off our day at Lush Cork who had put on an amazing event for us even though we just had an hour to spend in store, we were seriously blown away by the experience. Lush even had their window decorated with #irishbbloggers #corkmeetup and other hashtags, it was so welcoming and we couldn't help but take a group photo outside the store. Once inside we were greeted by the lovely friendly staff who are an absolute pleasure to be around, the staff are one of the reasons why I love popping into the Lush Cork store anytime I'm in the city. We were separated into groups of four with each group getting to experience five different aspects of the Lush range - the makeup range, bath bomb making (my favourite part of the Lush part of our day!), the skincare range, the new sun care range and finally the face masks, scrubs and cleansers. Going through each of the stations we all got to try out the products, experience some products we had never tried before and we even got lots of hand massages from the staff due to all the lovely product testing, I seriously could have stayed there all day just for the massages! I discovered some new products which I just have to get my hands on next time I pop into Lush, namely Ocean Salt (a scrub which has vodka and lime in it, what more could I want?!) Rub Rub Rub and Lifesaver. I want to thank the lovely staff at Lush, especially Kaz for organising such a wonderful experience for us, it was amazing and I shall be definitely back for one of Lush's parties - did you know Lush do parties? I didn't until yesterday but shall be definitely going for one next time I have an occasion to celebrate.

We then headed over to Debenhams on Patrick Street who had put on an absolutely amazing beauty showcase event for us, I'm sure if you were on Twitter yesterday you'll have seen the #beautifix hashtag floating about - that was us! We were greeted by Alma and Paul who really outdid themselves with the event, everything was organised to perfection. We were taking to a meeting room behind the scenes in the Debenhams store and everyone was amazed when they saw the drinks, gorgeous cupcakes and beautifully made Twitter cake waiting for us on arrival. There was also a jaw-dropping hamper prize up for grabs to whoever tweeted most about the event and included pictures of all the #beautifix products Debenhams were showcasing. Alma had outdone herself with this one and really made it an extra juicy prize, so jealous I couldn't win. We all took a seat and were treated to a cupcake and drink, my choice being Prosecco, this was a special day after all and were treated to a talk by a lovely lady named Sarah from Clarins about their anti-aging serums, something you're never too young to begin using! The lovely Emma, PR for Debenhams then revealed that she had a €50 voucher for us all to spend in the store, that revelation was greeted by gasps of surprise, so funny! Seriously, how lucky were we?! We were then given our name badges for our groups, I was part of 'The Naughty Nakeds' suitable not only for my love of Urban Decay but also for my surname! We were then escorted to the beauty floor, Prosecco and camera in hand to enjoy some of the beauty counters and tweet to our hearts content. My group which included my aunt Maria and Bridget from B the Makeup Junkie started off at the Urban Decay counter (my favourite!) where we got to try out their gorgeous flushed palettes, we then moved on to Elizabeth Arden who treated us to an exclusive in their skincare range, on we moved to Dior where makeup artist Brian showcased some of the brands gorgeous makeup, I was super impressed with the coloured mascara and the lip plumping product, definitely ones to pop on my wish list! We then moved on to Lancome where we were told about their Genefique range which really sounds unbelievable! We then were talked through some of Clarins cleansing products and finally finished up in Benefit where we were shown the new They're Real Push Up Liner which I got to try out, I loved the look it gave to my eyes, a product to invest in for sure. I loved the fact that each station had a different theme which really showcased the branding of the products. The Benefit girls were dressed up as a cop and criminals, the Urban Decay girls had a rocker vibe to them and the other stations all had a very polished and clean look which represents the high-end factor their brands have. All the staff on each station were so friendly and really made our experience a memorable one so thank you to each of them, Jamie and Carolyn from Urban Decay, Eimear and Rosin from Elizabeth Arden, Brian from Dior, Vikky from Lancome, Gillian from Clinique and Lynn and Sarah from Benefit. We then went back up to the room and were greeted by our goody bags, we were well and truly spoilt, more about these to come in the next post. We then said our goodbyes and rushed downstairs to spend our vouchers, I opted for three gorgeous products from my favourite - Urban Decay, more of them to come later too. A huge thanks to everyone at Debenhams, especially Alma, Paul and Emma who put on such a fabulous event for us which was so fun, exclusive and special for us all.

 We then moved on to Costigans on Washington Street for the final part of our event which featured skincare and makeup demos from Shiseido (another favourite of mine!), Gosh and MeMeMe all of which were so informative and fun to watch. I was delighted to get familiar with some new products, namely MeMeMe whose products are now on my wish list, I actually want to get my hands on their Goddess Rocks and Shimmer Stack in 'Pink Zest' today if I can, do you ever get that where you can't stop thinking about a product because it is that amazing? I love MeMeMe's branding and product packaging too, anything with angels is a winner for me! I now really want a cleansing brush from Shiseido too as I think it'd be fantastic for giving your skin a deep clean and removing any excess makeup which may be hidden in your skin after cleansing. I'm also really intrigued by their new Ultimune product which will be launced in September, this product sounds amazing and is unlike anything on the market already so it really was great to get an exclusive taster of something which is going to bring a bang to the world of skincare. I loved the Gosh demo which featured a range of their gorgeous makeup, I love the bright colours which Gosh have to offer and am a fan of their eye shadows already so it was great to see more of their range. A huge thanks to Emma and Grainne from Shiseido, Geraldine from Gosh and Joan from MeMeMe for showcasing at our event and for the wonderful goody bags they gave us all, again, more of that to come later!

I'd also like to say thank you to my fellow, gorgeous Irish beauty bloggers who attended our event. It was so great to meet you all and hopefully it won't be the last time. Thank you Stephanie, Claire, Zoe, Rebecca, Kriss, Sarah, Aisling, Shelley, Bridget, Etáin, Kayleigh, Lara, Holly, Susie, Dale and Lisa, I hope you all enjoyed your day! Finally, a BIG super dooper thank you to the wonderful Sarah Hamersely who I really couldn't have organised all this without. Sarah is such a doll and such a lovely, fun person to be around, blogger meetups are definitely better planned with those you can have a good ole laugh with!



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10 comments

  1. Looks like such a fantastic day well done you on organising it all, I love the look of Me Me Me products too definitely on my list to try :)

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  2. Wow it looks like you all had a wonderful day! Thanks for sharing xxx
    It would be a great idea for a party get together at Lush, so thanks for sharing that too x

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  3. OMG!! Such a lovely event!! You are quite a large community there, that's great!! All the experiences you've had look and sound fantastic, but if you ask me, you could lock me up in a lush store for a couple of days. So many colours and flavors. <3

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  4. well done you on organising it all , looks that it was a perfect day for all of you

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  5. It was fab thank you so much for organising it :)

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  6. That looks amazing. Am gutted I couldn't go in the end, stupid bug. Ye had a damn sight more fun than I had yesterday I can assure you. Well done to both of you got organising such an amazing day.

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  7. It was an amazing day Fiona, you and Sarah did a brilliant job organising it :-)

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  8. Wow, looks like you all had a fab day! Congrats on organising such a successful event!

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  9. Ahhhh if only I was at home a few days earlier! I would have loved to have been at the meet up. Glad it went well!

    Eilish x

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  10. Oh I really hope there will be one next year. Definitely going to join that then.

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