highlighter

My Second Foray into Highlighter | Benefit Girl Meets Pearl

I’m quite the fan of highlighters in general, but I’m sure this is not surprising considering that I’m a lover of all things glowy. More surprisingly, however, I don’t have a large number of highlighters in my collection but I do reach for them often without talking about them. The Benefit Girl Meets Pearl ($36/ 0.4 oz) was the second highlighter that I ever acquired and it remains one of my favourites. I say ‘acquired’ because I did not actually purchase or rather, pay for the “liquid pearl for face” – the full-sized product was part of the first 500 Point Perk that I redeemed from Sephora.

DSC_0461DSC_0464It’s not what I would think of as a traditional highlighter and was my first foray into the world of liquid highlighters that I’ve come to adore. Unlike most liquid highlighters, it doesn’t have an overly runny texture and is not nearly difficult to deal with as the typical liquid textures. The formula is slightly sheer in the nicest way possible – but this does make it impossible to photograph in its true glory – and is a relatively light pale pink-hued shade with a golden champagne sheen running throughout and no obvious shimmer. I love how it reads on the skin as natural luminosity rather than any sort of product and how it sits half way between pink and gold. It’s extremely blendable into the skin and I have to say that I enjoy that it blends seamlessly into my dry skin even when I’ve been naughty and have applied the cream product over powder.

It’s quite pricy but I might say that it’s worth the money as the product goes such a long way and it’s simply gorgeous on the skin. It doesn’t hurt how versatile it is, either, working underneath foundation to add a glow and even things out, used on top as a traditional highlighter and mixed in with foundation to sheer things out while adding some luminosity.

What’s your favourite highlighter?
Maggie, x.

Maybelline Master Hi-Light By FaceStudio Hi-Lighting Bronzer in 60 Deep Bronze

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Generally drugstore blushes do not entice me in my frequent sweep of the cosmetics aisle as they’re one of the few products that I don’t have a drugstore favourite of. Even the hyped Milani blushes do not compare to my MAC, NARS and Benefit favourites. I’m pleased to admit that I found a radiance boosting cheek product in those very aisles that does impress me, and this is it.

These mosaic blushes and bronzers come with a great deal of product (0.31 oz) and feature a good-sized mirror and a questionably flimsy blush in the compartment beneath the product itself. Both in Canada and the US, this product is fairly expensive for a drugstore offering; it seems to retail for $7-10 US and $12-16 CDN depending on where you pick them up. There are six shades in all (four blushes and two bronzers) and I picked up the darkest shade of the latter offering, Deep Bronze.

The mosaic design of Deep Bronze features a matte chocolate brown, a shimmery bronze, a satiny rosy burgundy and a golden champagne in sections that allow you to to control the colour by concentrating the product you pick up from certain areas of the product. In short, the general colour I seem to get is a luminous copper-leaning warm rosy bronze. I use this as a blush but it’s just as easily a shimmery bronzer. I also use a smaller brush focusing on the lighter colours and am able to get a nice highlight out of the product as well and this shade is remarkably different than the blended shade. I find this to be incredibly versatile – can you tell I’ve fallen in love?

light vs heavy swatch
light vs heavy swatch
comparison to MAC Stereo Rose (center) and Milani Red Vino (left)
comparison to MAC Stereo Rose (center) and Milani Red Vino (left)

 

The formulation of the blush-bronzer-hybrid struck me as remarkable upon my first use and my opinion hasn’t changed in the least since then. It’s pigmented, finely-milled and luminous, transferring as a sheen more than a shimmer or frost. While still being quite blendable and versatile in the colour intensity, Deep Bronze has better-than-good longevity. This strikes me as a less frosty version of a MAC Mineralize Skinfinish with slightly better longevity and pigmentation in a traditional powder form at a fraction of the price.

Maybelline markets the highlighting bronzer with the tagline, “our multi-tonal bronzer palette highlights skin and softly contours cheeks for an instantly defined glow” and now that I’ve been using this product for weeks, I can say that I agree with reservations – the highlighting is a given but the contouring is so difficult to achieve due to the size of the different blocks of colour and mosaic products like these get muddled after a few uses, making it difficult to pick up any product without shimmer. Nevertheless, this is a fantastic product. On my dry skin, the product wore for 9-10 hours without fading which is similar to my favourite high-end blushes. Summary: colour me impressed.

If like me, you want your cheeks to look luminous but not artificial, these seem to be the happy medium. This could suit fair to quite deep skintones by the virtue of the pigmentation although it might be difficult to pull of on those on the fairer end of the spectrum with cool undertones. I’m warm-toned for reference.

the blush/bronzer worn sheerly using a stippling brush
the blush/bronzer worn sheerly using a stippling brush
worn more full on (but can be built up much more than this!)
worn more full on (but can be built up much more than this!)

Overview

Pigmentation: 10/10

Texture: 9.5/10

Longevity: 9/10

Packaging: 8/10

Overall Value:  9.5/10

Total: 46/50= 92% or A+

Have you tried these?

Maggie, x.