IMATS Haul 2014

As it was my first year at IMATS, I made the most of the discounts available on so many of my favourite makeup brands. I spent the day with Gemma from Flutter and Sparkle (full details on IMATs in this post), who is definitely a great shopping buddy!

The first stop of the day was the NARS stand, where most products were 30% off, plus some amazing gift sets that were reduced to £15. Most of the gift sets contained limited edition products from the recent Pierre Hardy and Andy Warhol collections, so while not the newest launches, they were still amazing value. 

I went a bit crazy and bought 4 large gift sets, 2 sets of Pierre Hardy polish duos, plus a full size Orgasm Illuminator liquid. In total, this massive bundle came to about £85. 

I stocked up on a few brushes from Crownbrush, including their syntho buffing brush, which I'm hoping can act as a backup for my Real Techniques one when it's in the wash. I also braved the Hakuhodo brush counter, which are some of the most expensive brushes I've tried (and also the softest!). I bought a fluffy eye brush from them, so I'm looking forward to see if this really lives up to the hype that the brand have. 

Lip products were definitely high up on my list. I was desperate to find the Lime Crime fuchsia velvetine, but unfortunately they had sold out of this by the time I found their teeny little display about 11am. Instead, I managed to pick up the Countessa Fluorescent lipstick, which was also on my wishlist. This was on offer for £10, so not a massive discount, but better than nothing! 

I bought two of the new OCC Lip Tar Stained Glosses in Hedonist and Off World for £10 each, and also bought MAC's iconic Snob lipstick as it was 15% off the usual retail price. I don't often wear nude shades, so I'm hoping this will be a nice shade for day wear. 

Make Up For Ever was one of my favourite stands - they had so many beautiful products to choose from! I'd heard nothing but good things about their HD foundation, so decided to get that in shade 115, and also chose a bronze Aqua Cream which I'd swatched a long time ago at the Precious About Makeup shop in Shepherd's Bush and wished I'd bought. All Make Up For Ever products were 30% off, which I think is a really good discount.   

Last, but not least was a few items from NYX. They actually had a second, much smaller stand (without an hour's wait to get near it), hidden away near the back of the room which had some discontinued lines on sale. I bought 3 jumbo eye crayons for £1.50 each and also a super sparkly glitter nail polish which was also £1.50. 

I'm really pleased with all my IMATS purchases - I did spend slightly more than I anticipated, but I blame that on the NARS gift sets! I'm starting a spending ban now for a few months, but something tells me this little lot will keep me going for some time to come! 

Did you go to IMATS this year? What's your favourite thing from my haul?