Note: This is a sponsored post.

Tuesday, 2 July 2013 will always be remembered as the day I held my very first beauty event, and with L’Oreal too! I’m still high from the event and it’s no wonder why. Oh what an evening it was of fun, colour and great company!

I was a nervous wreck in the afternoon when I headed down to the L’Oreal head office at St Kilda. For the first time too, Tim came to the event with me. He called himself “the furniture cum videographer“. Awww. 😛

The theme of the evening was leopard print. It was like they read my mind and knew how much I love leopard print even though we didn’t discuss a theme for the event. We held the event at the top floor of the building which was fantastic because it had a stunning view of the city. I even managed to catch the sunset before the event began. Beautiful, simply beautiful.

The 9 winners (one didn’t turn up) of the L’Oreal hair colour workshop competition arrived just in time for some bubbly, soft drinks and chats with some of the L’Oreal staff before the evening officially began. We had cheese platters, canapes, jelly snakes, lollies and the crème de la crème: leopard print cupcakes. Died and gone to heaven right there and then. 😛

I started the evening with a very short speech thanking everyone for coming and handed the time over to Louise, who’s the brand manager of L’Oreal Paris’ Hair Colour division. She gave a presentation, introducing the history of L’Oreal, how the brand started, what hair colour ranges they have to offer and the latest balayage trends (do you know that balayage means “to sweep” in French?). Next, it was time to introduce the latest in L’Oreal’s hair colour kit ranges, which is the Wild Ombrés.

L’Oreal hair expert, Bronwyn Fraser, was the hair guru of the evening. She showed us how to use the Wild Ombrés balayage kit properly on our lovely hair volunteer, Caitlin. Caitlin has gorgeous locks; it’s thick and long yet Bronwyn only managed to use 2/3 of the hair mixture. While waiting for the hair colour to set, Bronwyn went around the table chatting with the ladies and answered a lot of our hair-related questions.

Here are a few hair colour tips I picked up that evening:

• Once you’ve mixed hair colour chemicals, either use it up or if you have any left over, chuck it. NEVER keep it for another time because once the hair chemicals are mixed, they begin oxidising (oxidising window is about an hour). That’s why the chemicals are packed separately in the box.
• Always check the box when you open it, that the hair colour number matches the one on the box. Sometimes people open the boxes in store and put the wrong hair colour back in the boxes! You don’t want to buy a blond packet and end up having black hair!
• We also learned about what the numbers on all the L’Oreal hair colour kits mean. There are 10 levels of hair colour each represented by a number from 1 to 10. 1 is the darkest and 10 is the lightest. Understanding this will help you choose your new hair colour. The first number in a shade number on the front of the pack represents the level of that hair colour. The second number are the added tones to the hair colour that complements the first colour. For best hair colour results, go plus/minus 2 shades from your hair colour.
• To remove the dye stains from your hairline, try using alcohol. Weapon of choice is vodka or even mouthwash! A way to prevent colour bleeding on the skin is to apply a bit of Vaseline along the hairline.

Soon it was time for Caitlin to get her hair washed and blowdried while the chatting continued. The results were stunning. Just look her a beautifully ombré-ed hair!

All good things must come to an end and soon, it was time to go home. The evening ended with the ladies leaving with two goodie bags each of the L’Oreal Wild Ombré hair colour kit and some haircare products to maintain coloured hair.

Top L-R: Nicole, Jenny, Mayni, me, Caitlin, Leanne, Chloe, Megan, Vicky, Trudi. Bottom left: Grace, me, Louise. Bottom right: Bronwyn and me

Since Tim was there to helped me out with photography and also took some videos of the evening, I thought I’d share some video clippings of the event. Now I’ve never edited video before so this is really amateurish. Don’t laugh, k? 😛 Some of the clips are quite shaky so please excuse that as well (Tim’s first time shooting video too!). 🙂

It was such an amazing evening and I can’t thank L’Oreal enough for hosting it with me. The decorations and resources completely surpassed my expectations and everything turned out so well. I’d like to thank the ladies for joining us for such a fun evening as well.

Many thanks to L’Oreal for making this an unforgettable evening for me. 🙂