Category Archives: Bronzer

Is Weighty Makeup Automatically the Most Luxurious?

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The D&G Blush, ABH Highlighter, VBB Lid Lustre, and PML Quad are not pictured here, but they will be discussed in this post.

After the bombshell that was dropped regarding the Louis Vuitton Beauty line and their prices, I started to think about which items in my collection were the most expensive, which ones I thought had the prettiest packaging, if the prettiest was actually the most luxurious looking, and which ones had the most weight. I was surprised to discover that so few items fit into all of these categories.

I was happy to see the people I follow enjoying their La Beauté Louis Vuitton products, but some felt they needed to justify their reasons for making the purchase beyond just stating, “I wanted it, so I got it.” Across the board, customers who thought the items were or were not worth buying seemed to at least come to the consensus that the price (besides paying for the brand recognition), was largely due to the packaging. The lipstick components were said to be fully metal, along with the bespoke metal packaging of the eyeshadow quads. “You could hurt someone if you hit them with this,” was stated more than a few times by various people.

How a product looks and its weight are my top two criteria for feeling like the item I own is luxurious. Looks are subjective, but weight can be measured and precise. I started to think about the heaviest packaging in my collection (proportionate to its size dimensions) in order to answer the question…are these automatically the most lux?

Lisa Eldridge Rouge Experience Refillable Lipstick (68 grams)

In order to highlight how great this packaging is, I need to do a deep dive into comparing it to another brand. Please, bear with me on this, especially if you’re a fan of LV. I don’t judge anyone on how they spend their money, and this is just me working out why I am perfectly satisfied with Lisa’s lipstick being the height of luxury for me.

Lisa Eldridge took great pride explaining in her launch video how her refills were mono material, made of 100% aluminum and could therefore be recycled without degrading once repurposed, unlike the vast majority of other brands’ refills that have mixed metal with plastic.

According to Google: “You cannot usually recycle a lipstick refill that has both plastic and metal components together, as most curbside recycling facilities cannot separate the mixed materials and are not equipped to handle small, complex items.”

There is plastic inside the forever case by Lisa Eldridge, as this has a click closure, but she wanted the actual refills to be sustainable.

I cannot compare the LV lipsticks from personal experience, but it is my understanding that the refills are all metal as well and come with plastic caps that can be removed when recycling. The lipstick cases have an aluminum shell and brass detailing, but the magnetic closure that is so satisfying to use (and adds to the weightiness of a product) keeps it from being recyclable as well.

Summarized from Okon Recycling: Recycling magnets is technically possible, but challenging as it involves disassembling the magnet and removing any non-magnetic materials. However, there are some magnets that cannot be recycled.

So, it sounds as if both LV and Lisa Eldridge have cases that aren’t realistic to recycle but have refills that are fully recyclable. The LV lipstick case has a lot of expensive details like the product names and logo being etched in, the monogram flower-shaped refill bottom, etc. Lisa Eldridge has her logo etched at the top of the cap, allows the customer to personalize the base of the case with their initials etched in (up to three letters), and the case shape had to be custom made as well. Perhaps some prefer the sleeker LV design while others appreciate the vintage inspiration of Lisa’s more.

LV’s Lipstick Case + Refill is $160 and the refill alone is $69.
Lisa Eldridge’s Lipstick Case + Refill is $63 (engraving price included) and the refill alone is $30.

Sure, LV’s refill costs the same amount as other high end and luxury lipsticks in their completed form, but considering the details I listed above, is the LV case really $100 better that other brands’ cases, particularly Lisa Eldridge?

It can’t come down to the actual lipstick formula, because that’s part of LV’s $69 refill price.

At the time that I bought the Lisa Eldridge lipstick, I felt it was incredibly expensive. It is still the most expensive lipstick in my collection, based on what I paid and not the retail price. I rationalized my purchase because of the sustainability aspect, all the custom elements, the personalized touch, and how heavy it felt.

Taking branding completely out of the equation and thinking about the components alone, I do feel like this product by Lisa Eldridge is among the most luxurious out there, and I am no longer gritting my teeth at the price.

It would be nice if I liked the lipstick formula more, but there is some hope for me! I wrote a comment on Instagram that the brand responded to, and while the Velvet formula won’t be put in the refillable form, there might still be the possibility of the Lucents that I enjoy so much!

There are other things they’ve been “working on” that has taken years, such as making the empty eyeshadow palettes available for purchase alongside the eyeshadow singles, the return of the liquid blush in better packaging, etc. So, I’m prepared for this to take a while to happen.

If I can get the Luxuriously Lucent Lip Colours and/or Baume Embraces as refills, I will definitely get more use out of mine!

Olivia Palermo Beauty Eyeshadow Palette (226 grams) and Lipstick (79 grams)

Whenever I think about heavy makeup packaging, the Olivia Palermo Eyeshadow Palette immediately comes to mind. I’ve had it for years, yet I’m still not sure how I feel about the pattern, and I’m not sure what it’s technically called (perhaps wicker, woven link, basket weave, oyster strap, etc.). It just makes me think of the types of patterns I’ve seen for watch straps, which isn’t too terribly off track. Apparently Olivia drew inspiration for the packaging, “by a vintage Art Deco bracelet she was given for her 21st birthday.”

The eyeshadow palette has a magnetic closure and mirror, which further increases the weight, on top of the fact that the packaging is metal.

Although I’m not sure if they could have created a different pattern that I would like more, I can say it’s at least cool, unique, and easily recognizable. Plain flat gold is always beautiful to me, but this packaging looks different from any other I’ve seen. Well, almost. As of a year ago, Hatice Schmidt released a refillable lipstick range called, “The Gift,” with a case inspired by jewelry and the pattern reminds me of a curb chain/Cuban link style. So, there are at least two jewelry inspired components from brands that I know of.

I bought the Olivia Palermo lipstick at the reduced price of €32 (originally €40) from Niche-Beauty, and the eyeshadow palette for $28 (originally $58). I’ve discussed how I procured the eyeshadow palette in a past review, but it was during the time that I started working on this post that I felt the compulsion to finally get the lipstick. I have checked in on the brand on and off over the years, waiting for them to release additional products. Earlier this year, I saw a notice on the official website that the beauty products would no longer be sold and that they were turning the website into an influencer style page (oliviapalermo.com now redirects to her affiliate shopmy page). I assumed that meant the brand was shutting down, especially since I’ve only heard two beauty reviewers reference the brand one time each within the last three years. However, I was shocked to see the products appear on the Douglas website in either August or September, and then I saw them at Niche-Beauty as well. I don’t know if Olivia has better sales in Europe, or Germany specifically. I’m not even sure if she still has products available elsewhere in the US.

I felt Lisa Eldridge’s lipstick deserved to be in the post, but Olivia Palermo’s lipstick is the only one in my collection that is heavier. OPB’s lipstick is less expensive, but it isn’t refillable and the central part of the lipstick component is made of plastic. The outer packaging is what makes this seem so fancy.

Regarding the eyeshadow palette, it definitely screams luxury. It isn’t something you want to carry around in your purse or travel with it. Olivia wanted the old Hollywood glamour look and feel to her products, so this is something that you would want to keep on a vanity.

This is by far my most luxurious palette, and though it doesn’t have some of the additional premium features of the LV Quads, it makes me feel a lot more content about my collection and avoid FOMO. If I want heavy eyeshadow packaging, I certainly have it with this product!

Westman Atelier Beauty Butter Powder Bronzer (112 grams)

This is my golden pebble! It is tiny in size but mighty in weight!

Chantecaille is another brand with nicknamed “pebble” packaging, but theirs is plastic, thin, and it doesn’t feel substantial, even though they cost the same amount!

I bought my WA bronzer at 20% off, so the title of most expensive bronzer in my collection belongs to Hermes, even though I only bought the refill. Had I paid for the compact too, that wouldn’t have helped it to feel more luxurious than the Westman Atelier bronzer, considering Hermes’ thin plastic packaging.

This has a tiny mirror that I don’t use, and a magnetic closure. The brand has highlighters and face powders in this same style of packaging. I haven’t used their cream sticks or drops, but they don’t look as luxurious to me. The only other Westman Atelier packaging I have handled are the powder duos, which are certainly substantial and pretty to look at, but I don’t think it compares to this gold compact.

When it comes to the prettiest bronzer packaging, I think of Gucci’s and Charlotte Tilbury’s powder one, even though they are much lighter in terms of their size. However, I would never call something that’s a solid gold color ugly. So, it may as well be my most glamorous bronzer.

Fara Homidi Essential Bronzer Refillable Compact (106 grams)

This compact is about the same size and weight as the Westman Atelier Butter Bronzer. The amount of product from FH is 3.5 grams and the amount of product from WA is 8 grams. That is close enough to accounting for the 6 gram difference when I weighed the two products, which is why I’m still including it in this post.

Aesthetically, I find the Westman Atelier bronzer to be more appealing. Shiny things get me. However, I still think Fara’s is classy and pleasing to hold in the hand. Her other products come in red and blue packaging of the same weight. I don’t like the red, but the blue is very eye-catching. If the next product she releases is in purple or green packaging, it just might surpass WA’s as a favorite compact for bronzers.

D&G Cheeks&Eyes Match Blush (91 grams)

I have plenty of blush packaging that is bigger than this, and therefore heavier. However, for this small size, this is very heavy! Nothing really comes close to the weight, but I have to say that Gucci’s powder blush packaging is quite nice too, even if it’s lighter. Visually, I like Gucci’s more as well. In fact, I have a lot of blushes that aren’t luxurious feeling, but I love them anyway (such as YSL’s Make Me Blush Bold Blurring Blushes and Too Faced Cloud Crush Blushes).
So, this is one of the few categories where my heaviest blush might be the most luxurious, but it isn’t necessarily my favorite packaging. I do like it a lot though!

I have to add that this packaging feels like a mixture of plastic and metal components. I believe there’s something in the base of this compact adding weight artificially, especially since it doesn’t even have a magnetic closure. It has a push button instead.

Victoria Beckham Beauty Products:
Matte Bronzing Brick (166 grams), Eye Wardrobe (116 grams), Cheeky Posh (37 grams), and Lid Lustre (41 grams)

Similar to Olivia Palermo Beauty, VBB has a certain aesthetic that they maintain across most of their products. I like the horn brown/tortoise pattern, and it can be fashionable, but I don’t automatically associate it with luxury because of how many cheap products I’ve seen made in tortoiseshell style. The gold colored trim helps to elevate the look of the packaging, but it is the weight and feel of these components that make them undoubtedly luxurious.

The Bronzing Duo and Eyeshadow Quad are among my heaviest based on size. The Cheeky Posh blush is small and doesn’t have that much extra weight, but I figure that’s because the component isn’t refillable like the other two. I’m including it because it has the same style of packaging as the others, and I still feel bougie when I handle it.

I rarely buy single eyeshadows, so I don’t have much to compare in terms of weight. The prettiest I own is probably the Charlotte Tilbury Hypnotizing Pop Shots, but those have lightweight plastic packaging and they are powders, which I don’t believe is fair to compare. It would be interesting to see how the glass packaging of Charlotte’s Eyes to Mesmerise stacks up, but I don’t own that.
I no longer have the glass packaging of Maybelline’s 24 HR Color Tattoo, but the best I’ve got is Melt’s Gel Liner (47 grams) and a MAC Paint Pot (56 grams).
I like glass as a component material, but it’s not uncommon to find for eye products. The Lid Lustre packaging has an elevated look compared to MAC’s, for example. The Melt Cosmetics Gel Liner that has the gold lid and butterfly print around the rim with the glass base is prettier to me, while also being slightly heavier. However, the font for the brand logo makes it look less sophisticated. I don’t think eye related categories of makeup follow the trend of weight indicating how luxurious a product will look and feel.

One thing about VBB packaging that does take away from the experience is the issue with the closing mechanism. I heard this was a problem in the past, and I never had an issue with my Bronzing Brick, but my eyeshadow quad doesn’t always stay shut when I snap it closed. Sometimes it’s fine, but other times it likes to pop back open with the slightest touch. I haven’t heard about anyone else having an issue with the quads, so perhaps I’m unlucky in getting one of the few faulty ones.

Pat Mcgrath Mothership Palettes (392 grams) and Eyeshadow Quads (122 grams)

All the previous components I’ve discussed had metal or a mix of metal and plastic packaging. The Mothership Palettes are fully plastic, but they are quite hefty in weight. The palettes are big for only holding ten eyeshadows, but that black shiny lacquer with the gold bottom still look lux to me. My Victoria Beckham and Olivia Palermo palettes are the only ones I can recall from my collection that aren’t made of plastic or cardboard. In fact, the Victoria Beckham Eye Wardrobe quad is only six grams less than a Pat Mcgrath quad, but Victoria’s compact is almost half the size!
I still chose these PML products as the next heaviest in the luxury category, though I have to admit that I have some lightweight quads that look fancier because they are gold colored. For example, Tom Ford (the trim technically), Guerlain, YSL (trim), Prada (mixed gold and silver), Lisa Eldridge, etc.
I find it difficult to equate weight with luxury in the eyeshadow category because of how many bulky heavy palettes brands have released over the years. So many of Jeffrey Star’s earliest palettes, Plouise, and Glamlite’s Food palettes were huge. I also recall when Stila had the Luxe Eye Shadow Palette in Happy Hour, which was a similar weight and size to the Mothership Palettes, but I bought it for $36. I can’t remember what the full retail price was, but it cost nowhere near the same amount as a Mothership.

So, I’ve come to the conclusion that weight doesn’t automatically equate with luxury in this category either. However, because of how uncommon it is to find hefty quads and palettes that are reasonably sized (Olivia Palermo, Victoria Beckham, and Pat Mcgrath), the ones that are weighty feel extra special to me.

Beekman 1802 Milk Tint SPF 43 Tinted Primer Serum

I didn’t want to include skincare, but this technically falls under the makeup umbrella. If I count it as a primer, it might be the heaviest I ever owned (even heavier than the glass bottle of Rituel de Fille Thorn Oil). Beekman’s looks like ceramic, but it’s colored glass.

I have to say “might be the heaviest,” because I don’t recall how it compares to the Guerlain L’Or Radiance Primer (now called the Guerlain Parure Gold 24K Radiance Primer), which is definitely the most luxurious looking primer I ever bought. The look of the Beekman product doesn’t appeal to me at all, but I was so impressed by how it felt in the hands. I had to leave it behind though because it was so heavy that I didn’t want to bring it back in my luggage.

If this counts as a skin tint, then it’s a lot less special. Plenty of brands make glass bottle complexion products. That’s why I didn’t include any true foundations or concealers in this post, because the prettiest bottles in my collection tend to look and weigh around the same.

When it comes to heavy primer packaging being the most luxurious, I have to say the Guerlain primer squashes that theory.

Anastasia Beverly Hills Smooth Blur Bronzer (112 grams) and Glow Seeker Highlighter (125 grams)

This bronzer is larger than the one from Westman Atelier, but it weighs the same. The reason I decided to include it anyway is because it’s still substantially heavier than the remaining bronzers in my collection. Plus, the highlighter component is a similar size and even weightier.
I cannot think of a single highlighter I own that comes in heavy packaging, other than this one.

I have noticed over the years that ABH has gradually been upgrading the packaging of most of their products. Their two most recent mascaras felt like either super heavy plastic or a mix of metal and plastic. The Smooth Blur Cream Contour Stick has a brushed gold colored metal cap and additional gold details. The Smooth Blur Matte Bronzer and Glow Seeker Highlighter have a magnetic closure and they feel quite substantial in the hand. I’m impressed with the packaging and find it to be quite pretty, but this is still another example of how weight doesn’t necessarily equate with a luxurious look. This packaging feels so much more substantial to hold and interact with than pretty much all others in the drugstore, mid-range, and high end categories. It feels like it should cost more than it does, and it looks appropriately high end to me, but not quite broaching luxury territory. I still think the Gucci Bronzer packaging tops it, despite it being lighter in weight, because it looks classier overall. As another example, MAC’s Sunstruck Bronzers look so beautiful, even though they are in lightweight compacts as well.

Final Thoughts

Based on my own personal collection, I’ve confirmed that in certain makeup categories, the most luxurious packaging is the heaviest. At the same time, I have many other products with a timeless and elegant look to them that are lightweight and made of plastic or other inexpensive materials. Essentially, the weight of a product enhances the luxury experience, but it does very little to elevate plain looking packaging. The best example of this is the Beekman 1802 Tint.

If I can get an Olivia Palermo palette that retails for $58 and feels ultra lux, but I can also buy a limited edition plastic Chanel quad for $86 and still feel like that’s luxurious as well, would that be considered silly? Should I be raising my expectations for all luxury brands?
At the beginning of this experiment, I would have said yes. However, I now see that if Chanel, Dior, Gucci, and other designer brands used higher quality materials, their products would likely fall in the LV Beaute range of prices (if not more). Some examples of that are the Chanel 31 Le Rouge lipsticks in the glass case, Dior Rouge Premier Lipsticks with the ceramic case and “formula infused with 24k gold,” along with the Guerlain Rouge G Exceptional Piece lines. There is only so much a person is willing to pay for a product from a luxury brand if the materials are the same as a mid-tier brand. So, that keeps designer brands from going overboard with their prices. There are also advantages to using lightweight materials, such as them being more convenient to take on-the-go for customers or makeup artists with large kits, sitting at attainable prices for aspirational shoppers, thinner packaging contributing to less waste of materials and sustainability efforts, etc.

So, when I really think about it, I wouldn’t be able to buy as many products in the luxury category if the components were more expensive to make or if they were made from higher quality materials. In fact, the majority of the products in this post were purchased with some kind of discount. Of course, I would love to have all my luxury goods in weighty packaging, but if that means I would have to accept those products being less likely to go on sale and/or accepting that the prices of them would double or triple, I am unwilling to do so.

The Dior Powder-no-Powder is one of my favorite makeup products of all time, yet the most I was willing to spend was €45 (essentially just paying full price) to get my name etched onto the compact. If I had the opportunity to buy it in a gold colored compact with a magnetic closure or some stunning limited edition pattern for €100, I don’t think I’d be willing to do that. This tells me that despite a product having a holy grail formula that is unable to be duped, I still have my limits. Some makeup will just never be worth it to me to buy, past a certain pricepoint, no matter what it’s made of. That means I cannot use the product’s weight, materials (including formula), or looks to justify a super high spend amount. However, I know that when a product gets hyped up, it can be much easier for me to consider crossing that price threshold if I can make a case for it being top tier from every other angle.
I bought one of the Chanel Boutons quads directly from Chanel because so many influencers were told by their SAs that the collection would be extremely limited, and I feared missing out. Less than one month after launch, I found the quads at multiple retailers for a minimum of 30% off.
FOMO works similarly to getting caught up in the hype of a product. I sometimes make purchasing decisions that I normally wouldn’t.

This is why I decided to make this post. I know there are others like me who enjoy luxury makeup and don’t have the biggest budget to work with. There are those who will be tempted by the exclusivity of a certain new beauty line and would normally not even consider getting anything at those prices, but the hype may be wearing down that resolve.
To those that want to be talked out of buying makeup at $100 or more…just remember that luxury makeup with fantastic formulas and high quality packaging can be found at a lower price. This post is full of examples of this. If one brand is out of your price range, you might be able to get similar products from another prestige brand. Other amazing and beautifully packaged products are just around the corner.

I hope this topic has been interesting, and even helpful.

Thanks for reading!

-Lili ❤

2025 Charlotte Tilbury Instant Look in a Palette

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I’ve been using the Hollywood Instant Look in a Palette (in Dreamy, Bronzed Beauty) sporadically over the past two weeks, so I feel ready to share my thoughts.

Before we start the review, I’d like to highlight the fact that Charlotte Tilbury used to have annual face palette launches, but they were usually not deep-skin friendly. The photos below are of the three darkest palettes the brand created until this year. I didn’t end up buying the one on the left because of how light it looked on tan reviewers I saw on YouTube. I didn’t get the one in the middle because I feared none of the cheek products would work on my skintone, especially since I was darker in 2021. I didn’t buy the one on the right because I rarely reach for blush and highlighter palettes. A face palette doesn’t feel complete to me without at least a blush, bronzer, and highlighter together.

Photo Credit: CharlotteTilbury.com

In 2023 and 2024, the brand took a break from making larger face palettes, so I’ve been waiting at least six years to finally try one! That’s why, despite my pledge to quit buying face palettes, I made this exception.

I wanted to acknowledge this history because I have always been critical of Hourglass for their limited shade selections in Ambient Edit Palettes, yet I haven’t said nearly as much about the Charlotte Tilbury ones. I think it’s because as much hype as Charlotte Tilbury powder products get, it’s never to the level of Hourglass. So, I was far more disappointed when I could not use an Hourglass Palette vs one from Charlotte Tilbury.

Starting with the eyeshadows, the 1 Brighten shade is described as a warm tan with silver shimmer. On my skin tone, the tan color is only visible if I apply it wet (as seen in the photo above), and technically on top of a darker shadow. So, if I just tap it on top of my lids without dampening it, only the silver particles show in a scattered-effect-topper kind of way.

2 Enhance is described as warm copper with pink shimmer. As seen in the second pair of eye looks, it is difficult to tell the difference between the two shades on my lids. In real life, if I put Enhance on one eyelid and Brighten on the other, my eyes wouldn’t be closed long enough for anyone to be able to spot the difference. So, I can’t help but feel like I got a duplicate eyeshadow in this palette. I don’t mind having what amounts to one topper shade, but to have two out of three is a bit disappointing. That being said, they’re at least pretty. If I want a sparkly and slightly less scattered look, I reach for Enhance instead of Brighten. It is also true that I can get a slightly pinker look when I dampen this eyeshadow shade, or much pinker when I use the blushes on my eyes too.*

*If you’re concerned about whether or not the face products are considered eye safe, based on your government’s regulations, I recommend checking the official Charlotte Tilbury website and ingredient lists for information regarding that. I have not looked into this, and have tried them at my own risk.

Regarding fallout, applying the shimmer eyeshadows damp ensures that I don’t have too many particles under by eyes by the end of the day, especially if I also use the Nyx Glitter primer. Plus, I get the bonus of these methods intensifying the amount of sparkle that’s on my lids.

3 Smoke is described as a rich burgundy matte. It is indeed dark enough that I can be satisfied with creating eye looks using only this matte and one of the shimmers. I don’t like how rounded my natural eye shape is, so I prefer to use at least three eyeshadows to create a high contrast look with a sculpted outer corner in an almond shape that detracts attention from how rounded my upper lash line is.

I get decent pigment from this shade, though I still have to build it up a little to be satisfied. Layering and blending with it is fine, but not super quick. Basically, this isn’t an amazing eyeshadow quality, but it’s nice enough. I at least don’t have issues with patchiness. For those wondering, I use the Lisa Eldridge Liquid Silk Eyeshadow as my main eyeshadow base.

I have attempted to create eyeshadow looks using the bronzer and blushes as well, but they are not deep enough to give me the depth I require in my eye looks. I have to end up using Smoke or reaching for a different palette to finish the look.

So, if I include the brown bronzer as a blending out or softening shade, the face powder as a brightening shade, the raspberry-pink matte blush and shimmery glow blush as ways to intensify the pink elements of eye looks, the Smoke shade for dimension, and I use the two shimmers damp, I’m content enough with the variety of pink and purple eye looks I can create.

Moving on to the face products, I thought it was a good opportunity to show the differences between the Flawless Finish powder shades.

The swatches look quite stark and ashy, but all of these work for me under my eyes. In fact, Tan looks the best suited for me in the swatch, but I rarely use it on its own because it darkens the look of my under eye concealer if I’m using one that’s already a skin-tone shade.
My go-to combination has been to use a mixture of Medium and Tan together. When I’ve used Light Peach, it has been for its color-correcting elements, lightening a blush, or if I’m in a hurry and don’t feel like reaching for a different powder shade while I already have this palette open. This also applies to when I’m using the Soulmates Duo, which is where Light Peach (it may also be referred to as Flawless Peach) was first debuted by the brand.
It’s the same great quality I’m used to from the permanent line of face powders.

As for the Tan-Deep shade in the brightening formula, I bought a mini for color-correcting purposes once again. I have only used it once, so I don’t feel comfortable posting a full review. However, I wanted to at least demonstrate how it looks for anyone curious.

I have a bigger Charlotte Tilbury post I’ve been working on for a while, so if there is any information I need to update, I will post about it at that time. That post might not be ready until next year though. There are a lot of other reviews I’d like to complete first.

Next up to discuss is the bronzer. When I heard it was the shade Tan, I was a bit disappointed because that shade has never worked for me in the past. However, the one in this palette does faintly show up!

I wish I still had my older version of Tan to be able to compare it to the new one and see if there has been a slight color change. The reason I think it’s possible is because it’s stated on the website that this bronzer is actually a new powder formula. So, maybe the brand made this version the tiniest bit darker. Maybe it’s not actually darker, and is just easier to see because it’s a warmer tone of orange that stands out more on my skintone. The third possibility is that I might be lighter now than when I was in Florida, so I have no idea if the older powder version of Tan would work for me by now. The cream version of Tan has always worked though.

Shade match aside, I do believe there is a difference between the old powder bronzer and new one. My powder version of Deep is fairly old by now, so I don’t know if that could account for the new one feeling the tiniest bit softer and creamier, whereas the older one has a more powdery consistency. The older one had a beautiful airbrushed finish, which also accounted for a more obvious makeup look. The newer one has a more skin-like finish, which I would normally consider a great thing. However, I reach for Charlotte’s bronzer specifically when I want a slightly heavier glam look. The airbrushed blur is what made it stand out from most of my bronzer collection. As nice as this bronzer finish is now, it’s not as unique.

The reformulated version matches the quality of many of my high-end and luxury products, which makes it a great addition to this palette. The blendability is nice. I have no issues with longevity. So, I wouldn’t go out of my way to reach for a different bronzer if I’m already in the process of using this face palette. This difference might just effect whether I would buy an individual compact of the brand’s reformulated bronzer if they do end up launching them, considering it wouldn’t be giving me something different from what I already have from Hermes, the older Dior bronzer formula, etc.
Powdery airbrush type of bronzers I love are by Victoria Beckham, Gucci, Vieve, etc. It’s just that Charlotte’s ranked above all of them for this specific look. The new formula is still good, but I would want it when I’m in the mood for a different makeup style (like neutral or natural).

Moving onto blushes, I don’t think Charlotte Tilbury has expanded their permanent powder blush range since the addition of Pillow Talk Intense in 2020. There have been limited edition powder blushes, but it’s interesting that the brand’s focus for the past several years has been to extend the options of Beauty Wands and various cream formulas. The limited edition powder blush shades intended for those with medium, tan, and dark skin have been just different enough for me to justify owning them all. However, I can understand some of the frustrations I hear my fellow makeup lovers talk about regarding the options. People are ready for something distinctly different, and not just in liquid or cream form.

Blushes are still currently my favorite category of makeup, although eyeshadows are getting close to reclaiming their former position. So, these blushes were what I was the most excited to try. When I saw 6 Cheek Matte Blush in person, I was nervous because it reminded me of YSL’s Berry Bang that I got in August. However, I was very happy that I find Charlotte’s to be a prettier tone on me. It’s pigmented, soft, and buildable. To have a little more control of the matte blush and get it to have as light of a layer as it appears in the demonstration photos above, I used the Sonia G Soft Cheek Brush.

This blush lasts all day without fading. It also doesn’t look too matte for my dry skin, although I prefer to add a little of 7 Cheek Glow Blush on top to make my cheeks appear a bit more supple.

I was surprised to see that the Cheek Glow Blush is the only one not inside a pan. It feels like a gelee or slurry formula on top of plastic netting/mesh. Some products like this can be hard pressed, but this one is not. I have no issues getting enough product onto my brushes, but since it’s not as pigmented as the matte blush, I like to cut to the chase and use a brush that’s a bit denser and picks up more, like the Hakuhodo G6440.** One other brush I’ve been loving with it is the Bisyodo B-P-03 Perfect Fit Powder Brush.* I haven’t written an official review for it yet, but I want to share the fact that it lays down these blushes so well and it’s great to blend with. Despite being large, I can dip the lower angled portion of the brush onto the surface of the blushes, and then when I blend, there is a portion of the brush that doesn’t have product on there. So, I can diffuse the blush without packing on additional product in the process.

*DISCLOSURE: Every link (in this Bold Blue Font) is a regular non-affiliate link. The brush link (in this Bold Black Font With a Blue Background) is the only affiliate link in this post. This means I would get a commission from anyone who decides to make a purchase from CDJapan after clicking my link. Athough chances are slim that anyone who has used my links in the past will see this message in a post that isn’t dedicated specifically to Japanese Fude, I still want to show my thanks and appreciation. As someone with such a tiny blog, it’s still a shock to me whenever I see that someone has used my link, or even to just see the number of people who have clicked them. Thank you very much. ❤

**Side Note: I feel compelled to point out that when I bought the Hakuhodo brush almost a year ago, it was listed at 19,000 YEN. Between Black Friday discounts and the shipping fee via shopping through Fude Bobo, I ended up spending a little less than that on the brush, and it still felt like quite the splurge for a brush of that size. Four months ago, Hakuhodo raised their prices again, so this brush costs 26,000 YEN now! As much as I love this brush, I cannot recommend Hakuhodo anymore at these prices.

Returning to the subject of the glowy blush, one downside is that it emphasizes texture a little bit. It’s not as intense or metallic looking as certain shades of the brand’s Blush Wands can appear, but it could still be too much for some people’s makeup preferences. Also, this blush shade shows up enough on me to consider it a usable standalone blush, but I find it more practical to regard it as a blush topper. It’s shiny enough to add glow like a highlighter, but the tone matches so well with the blush that I feel it doesn’t stands out enough or draws enough focus to my cheeks like a traditional highlighter would. So, I prefer to add the Cheek Glow Blush to the apples of my cheeks and/or the top of my cheekbones, but still apply a real highlighter on top to finish the look. Perhaps I would feel differently if my undertone wasn’t golden, since pink highlighters don’t pass for natural on me.

The YSL All Hours Couture Palette in Golden Oasis still feels new to me, so it’s natural to want to compare these two products. In USD, YSL’s face palette contains three blushes and three highlighters for $85. Charlotte’s face palette contains three eyeshadows, two blushes, one face powder and one bronzer for $69. The differences in Germany were much smaller as it’s €72 for YSL and €69 for the Charlotte Tilbury palette. I essentially liked half of the YSL palette, but would only really use two blushes (and I already owned one of those two). With the Charlotte Tilbury palette, I can use everything in multiple ways and I like all of the shades. I can finish a good portion of my makeup by whipping out this single palette. I like it more than the YSL and more than the Nars Hot Escape Cheek Palette. I still stand by my thoughts that the ones from YSL and Nars could be good in particular circumstances, and what I actually paid for them was a pretty good deal. This one just turned out to be even better.

I don’t believe it’s recency bias if I consider this to be among my most useful face palettes: Hindash Beautopsy, Sephora Microsmooth Multi-Tasking Baked Face Palette, Hourglass Ambient Edit Palettes, and now the Charlotte Tilbury Instant Look in a Palette. Considering the fact that I don’t like to use any of the others on the eyes, this palette has that edge. Hindash’s still has my best contour color, Sephora’s has a true highlighter, and Hourglass’ has a glowy bronzer option. So, I like and use these on different occasions. I believe the reason I would end up getting a lot of use out of the Charlotte Tilbury palette is for convenience. It’s just easy to have so many usable pretty products in one palette, which is the whole appeal of having a face palette in the first place.
I am glad that this one turned out to be such a good purchase!

That’s everything for this week. Thank you for reading!

-Lili ❤

Hourglass Swan Palette and Dusk Quad Reviews

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Today’s post will be a review of the Swan Palette and Dusk Quad, plus I will show some mock ups of the DIY custom palettes I’m considering making using the Ambient Lighting Powders.

I already reviewed the Fox Palette, so if you wish to see more details about that one, please click HERE.

If you’d like to see even older Hourglass Palettes, I have a list HERE with the links to all of them.

Hourglass Ambient Lighting Edit – Unlocked- Swan (in Deer Packaging)

The Swan Palette comprises of Color Palette 2, generally known to be geared towards those with medium skin. I will admit the reason I bought another palette after Fox was because I could not let that beautiful Deer Packaging go. I like the original Swan design, but I felt an even stronger pull towards the Deer. So, I needed to put something inside it. I contemplated going for the Fox color story again, but I thought it might be more helpful for review purposes for me to choose Swan’s Color Palette 2 and see just how many shades I could get away with using. Plus, the blushes all looked pretty. So that’s what I did, and it’s not the first time either! I own the Owl Palette from 2023 that holds the Leopard color story, and I’ve gotten a surprising amount of use out of it!

DIM LIGHT (Finishing Powder) – This is one of the most frequently repeated shades among the Ambient Edit palettes, but thankfully only my second time getting it. It’s the lightest finishing powder Hourglass makes that I can pull off if I use it lightly, and if I’ve stayed out of the sun enough. At the moment, it’s a bit too light for me to wear with my regular foundations, but I have been successful in using it to lighten some of my foundations that are too dark or too orange right now.

In my review of the Fox palette, I mentioned that the quality seems better than it has been in the last few years. The powders feel softer and less dry. Out of curiosity, I felt my older Dim Light Powder from the Leopard Palette compared to the newer one, and this year’s feels the tiniest bit silkier. When I swatch them, the shades are identical, but when I rub them into my skin, I can see slightly more of a cast from the older powder. I hope my photo helps, but it’s a bit difficult to try and demonstrate the results from a sheer finishing powder on the skin.

This change probably won’t make much difference on someone with a light skin tone, but it works out better for me. Realistically though, I’m going to stick to using Eternal Light or Desert Light instead. So, Dim Light might be ignored by me when I open this palette.

GOLDEN HOUR (Highlighter) – This is a new shade for Hourglass and I feel it is one of the more refined highlighters they’ve made. There’s no avoiding that this is quite beaming, but it doesn’t look as crazy on me as I expected. In swatches, it is clear that Golden Hour is lighter than Divine Strobe Light, but it blends into my skin so well that I feel I can pull off Golden Hour even better.

Darker highlighters are obviously going to look better on me, so I don’t foresee myself using Golden Hour very much. However, it’s nice that I could if I wanted to. Since the quality is great, I think most people who like intense highlighters will be happy with this one.

This photo demonstrates my best efforts at applying a sheer amount of Golden Hour to make it work. It is incredibly easy for it to look beaming and intense if that’s what I wanted.

NATURAL BRONZE (Bronzer) – It’s no surprise that this doesn’t work for me as a bronzer. I can just barely see a cool-toned tinge on my skin in person (it’s invisible in photos). Hourglass finishing powders can be used as bronzer, so the reverse is true as well. However, because Natural Bronze leaves a slight grey tone on me, I cannot use it for either purpose. I’m fine with that considering it’s the only truly unusable powder for me out of six.

One of the complaints a lot of people with a lighter skin tone have is that Hourglass bronzers tend to lean too warm/orange. So, I wonder if this particular color will make the majority of customers happy. It is apparently not a new shade, but I don’t know where else it has been.

LUMINOUS CORAL (Blush) – I really like this color! It is a little darker than Ethereal Flush, and warmer than Coral Haze, which makes it my favorite of Hourglass’ coral blush shades! It’s vivid enough to pop on my cheeks without looking clownish and it doesn’t require too much effort building it up.

SUNSET FLUSH (Blush) – This blush has the Nars Orgasm effect on me: a slight tinge of pink may be seen when I face forward, but a gold sheen is all that shows when I turn my head towards the light. I could use this as a highlighter, but I prefer how it looks as a blush topper for Luminous Coral and Mauve Fusion.

MAUVE FUSION (Blush) – Although this blush is lighter than Amethyst Haze from the Fox Palette, it has enough pigment to look extremely bold with enough layers and a dense brush. In swatches, Mauve Fusion looks fuchsia-pink and Amethyst Haze looks magenta-pink. On my cheeks, Mauve Fusion looks like a normal pink blush. I still think it’s pretty, and between the two, I do think Mauve Fusion looks the most purple on my cheeks. However, I find Mood Flush to look like a truer mauve. Perhaps Mauve Fusion will look different on other people with a different undertone than mine (and a different ratio of color marbling in the blush).

Overall, the Swan Palette colors work pretty well for me. Luminous Coral and Golden Hour were my favorites, but Luminous Coral, Sunset Flush, and Mauve Fusion combined are the real standouts.

As much as I like this palette, I don’t love any of the powders enough to say that I’d have been missing out if I skipped getting Swan. However, I don’t regret my purchase when the goal was to have Deer Packaging, and I ended up with five usable products to boot.

Hourglass Ambient Lighting Edit Quad – Dusk

As you might already know, Hourglass released five curated quads in May 2025, plus the option for US-only customers to choose 4 out of 24 Ambient Lighting powders to put in a custom quad.
In my Window Shopping Hourglass post, I said the smartest move would be for me to wait and see if any of the shades I want will end up in one of the deeper holiday palettes I planned to buy anyway. This was my plan, but I kept thinking about the Hourglass Barney’s Volume III Palette that had my two most sought after shades (Lucid Glow and At Night in the “edit” size), and how it was never restocked. So, that compelled me to get the Dusk Palette in its final restock, which sold out a minute after I ordered it. Considering At Night did not make it into this year’s holiday palettes, I really don’t regret my decision. Plus, I got a discount on it.

I’ve had this quad for quite a while, but I figured the start of the holidays would be the best time to review it.

SUBLIME FLUSH (Blush) – I knew this blush would look cool-toned on me, and potentially ashy. Sometimes this shade doesn’t look too bad on me if I mix it with other blushes, but it’s really not for me.

MOOD FLUSH (Blush) – I have to build up this color quite a bit, but I love this blush. It’s a duplicate shade for me, as I already own and depotted one out of the Sculpture Quad, but that just means I can keep one in two different custom palettes of my own making.

OASIS GLOW (Blush) – I knew the chances were high that I couldn’t use this as a blush on my skin tone. I wanted this shade as a subtle highlighter, and that’s exactly how I’ve been able to use it.

AT NIGHT (Blush) – I own this in the full-size, but wanted it in the smaller Ambient Edit size to be able to put it in custom palettes. I love the one that came in the Dusk Quad because I have a larger section of deep red marbling, making it easier to get more of that dark color and less of the tan-beige color. This means it’s even deeper and requires less building up, so I’m very pleased.

I have been content to leaving this quad as is, as a blush/highlighter palette. However, with the additions of Fox and Swan, I’m feeling even more of an impulse to rearrange one or even two Ambient Edit Palettes!

Have I Achieved Creating the Perfect Palette Yet?

2015 – Ambient Lighting Edit Palette, 2016 – Surreal Light Ambient Lighting Edit Palette, 2017 – Ambient Lighting Edit Volume 3 Palette, 2018 – Ambient Lighting Edit Volume 4 Palette and Unlocked Ambient Lighting Edit Palette, 2019 – Ghost Ambient Lighting Edit and Ghost Ambient Lighting Blush Quad, 2020 – Sculpture Ambient Lighting Edit Palette and Sculpture Ambient Lighting Edit Quad, 2021 – Ambient Lighting Edit Universe and Ambient Lighting Edit Universe Unlocked, 2022 – Butterfly, Elephant, and Tiger Ambient Lighting Edit Unlocked, 2023 – Jellyfish, Leopard, and Snake Ambient Lighting Edit Unlocked, 2024 – Dragon, Evil Eye, and Lotus Ambient Lighting Edit Unlocked, 2025 – Deer, Horse, Swan, and Fox Ambient Lighting Edit Unlocked.

With this year’s launch (and my purchase of the Dusk quad), I have procured nearly every shade from Hourglass that I’ve wanted from the beginning of the launch of these palettes until now. Iridescent Coral is the only one missing, but it would likely be another highlighter shade on me, so I’m giving up on it.

I have experience depotting and rearranging these myself, which is great considering the brand still hasn’t made that option available to those outside of the US. I could continue to wait for this to happen, but there’s no telling when they will roll it out internationally, when they will use 6-pan palettes instead of quads, whether the palettes will be made of tin instead of plastic (which is more ideal for depotting without ruining the packaging). So, I am feeling a bit impatient when I see that creating my perfect palette is now within reach! My biggest obstacle at this point would just be procuring the right magnets and trying to depot the powders old-school style without my Z-Potter.

Below is a mock up of the first concept palette I decided upon, which I gave the name Panda for no reason other than to wish it into existence. I’d love a Panda design in next year’s Hourglass Palettes!

CONCEPT PALETTE: “PANDA”

Eternal Light (Finishing Powder) – Lotus, Permanent Shade
Solar Glow (Highlighter) – Fox
At Night (Blush) – Dusk Quad, Permanent Shade
Mood Flush (Blush) – Sculpture and Dusk Quad
Mystic Flush (Blush) – Snake
Solar Bronze (Bronzer) – Snake

When it comes to choosing the best shades for me, as a person with a medium-deep skin tone, I think I’d put Eternal Light in any palette to be on the safe side of working for me, but Desert Light poses a very tempting second option.

There are plenty of pretty highlighters from Hourglass that I can make work, but the newest one from Fox is the clear winner. Solar Glow would be in any version of my ultimate palette, but if I made a second custom palette, there are a few blushes I use as highlighters that I’ve come to enjoy enough to put in the running.

My two bronzer contenders are Solar Bronze and Solar Fusion with one being my best shade match and the other being similar to that with an added sheen. At times, Solar Fusion will be too light, so the Solar Bronze would need to be in my alpha palette (Panda).

At Night is one of my favorite blush shades of all time, so a perfect palette would be incomplete without it. Mood Flush is typically my second favorite. It works alone as a subtle blush, but also pairs well with At Night. Mystic Flush is the most pigmented and easy to blend of the medium-dark pinks, so that’s typically my third blush option, but Sunset Glow is such a similar color that I go back and forth as to which I like more.

Desert Flush, Luminous Coral, and Ethereal Flush are the next ones that grab my attention the most from the blush swatch photo in the Luminous Coral review section. Truth be told, I haven’t been wearing Desert Flush because I’ve gotten more sun this year and that shade is really only usable for me when my skin is at its lightest. Luminous Coral is brand new, so I’m not fully committed to moving it around. Ethereal Flush is one that I keep forgetting about since it’s in my palette with lighter shades (Owl).

Speaking of lighter shades, Mood Exposure also shows up as a solo blush, depending on the time of year, but I also like using it to calm down punchier blush shades. So, I could see myself adding it to a custom palette as well.

Mood Exposure on the cheeks.

It wasn’t until this week that I started to question whether I should put all of my favorite Hourglass blush shades into one palette considering At Night and Mystic Flush can sometimes look alike. I need to have blush variety, but the colors should be the ones I wear most often. I considered placing Canyon Heat instead of Mystic Flush for the greater difference between shades, but ultimately left it as is.

The more I look at the Panda Concept, the more interested I am in making it.

CONCEPT PALETTE: “RABBIT”

Mood Exposure (Blush) – 5 Holiday Palettes, Permanent Shade
Lucid Glow (Blush as Highlighter) – Fox, Ghost Quad, Sunset Quad, Barney’s Volume III
Desert Light (Finishing Powder) – Fox
Luminous Coral (Blush) – Swan
Canyon Heat (Blush) – Fox
Bronze Fusion (Bronzer) – Fox

Since Desert Light and Bronze Fusion were close to matching my top picks, and Luminous Coral is the best of the corals, I decided to create a second mock up called “Rabbit.” The majority of shades in this one are from Fox, and while I might’ve been content to leave that palette as-is, rearranging them might help me get even more use out of them.

Lucid Glow and Oasis Glow are my top two blush-as-highlighter products from Hourglass, but Lucid Glow has more shimmer impact, so it won out. I did contemplate putting Infinite Strobe Light, but it’s just easier to keep Lucid Glow within the Fox Palette to minimize the amount of depotting I have to do.

For a similar reason, I’m leaving in Canyon Heat. It’s too new for me to know if it can top my other favorite blushes, but I’m still looking to have variety. This is the best of the oranges.

I could use Mood Flush a second time, since I have two now, or Sunset Glow to act as a duplicate for Mystic Flush, but I want to see how well this arrangement can do first.

It’s a little ironic that Mauve Fusion and Amethyst Haze didn’t make it into either of my theoretical custom palettes, considering they were the two blushes I was the most excited to see this year. They both have the potential to rise up the ranks though. I just need more time with them.

At this point, I can finally say that I don’t need additional Hourglass powders. I have all the shades I want. However, it’s not even about the powders anymore. I enjoy collecting them and whether I end up loving or hating the offerings, it’s one of the most exciting makeup events of the year for me to talk about with other makeup lovers. So, as long as the brand doesn’t do anything cancel-worthy next year, I will likely buy another palette. I will just try my hardest to limit it to one and not two!

That’s all for today! Thank you for reading!

-Lili ❤

Hourglass Ambient Lighting Edit Fox Palette

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In my post called Window Shopping the Hourglass Custom Quads, I came to this realization:
“The more I think about it, the more I realize having a quad isn’t necessarily what I want. A palette with one finishing powder, one highlighter, one bronzer, and three blushes sounds like heaven!”

So, Hourglass is off to a great start by having the Fox palette, the darkest of this year’s holiday offerings, meet those exact specifications. In addition, this palette contains 5 new shades and the only repeat is Lucid Glow, which I don’t own and have been trying to get my hands on. Fantastic!

Today’s post is going to follow my usual format when discussing Hourglass products.
First will be the review with comparison swatches included, next will be the assessment as to how well the brand has done this year, and lastly a list of things I wish to see in the future.

I received this product early because I purchased it prior to the official launch (shortly after the links were available online), and I paid for express shipping. However, I also ordered the Swan Palette (in Deer packaging) via standard shipping. It arrived too late for me to include anything but comparison swatches in this week’s post, but I will publish the review as a bonus post as soon as it’s completed. A review of the Dusk Quad will be in the Swan post as well. If you haven’t already, be sure to click follow to be notified by email whenever a new review is out!

DISCLOSURE: I am not affiliated with this brand. All thoughts and opinions are my own. I used two random influencers’ codes that I found online (via Retailmenot) to get 10% off my orders.

Anyone who wants to see a list of links to my past Hourglass reviews can find them HERE.

What We Got

Hourglass Ambient Lighting Edit – Unlocked- Fox Palette

IMPORTANT NOTE: Any Hourglass powders that have a swirl/marble/veining can differ in color from palette to palette. For example, Lucid Glow could look lighter and yellower or a darker coral-pink than mine depending on how much of each color is present in the blush. Amethyst Haze can look more of a plum-purple if it contains less of the shimmery pink. So, even though I am sharing swatches, mine may look different compared to what others have.

SOLAR GLOW (Highlighter) – I finally have a perfect highlighter from Hourglass! In terms of shade, last year’s Gilded Strobe Light from the Lotus Palette was everything I wanted, but the strobe formula tends to enhance texture more than I like. For some reason, this new one does not. Gilded Strobe Light is a golden shade with the same color depth as Solar Glow, but Solar Glow has warm yellow-gold veining along with marbling that looks identical to Gilded Strobe Light. Although Solar Glow is described as a “golden bronze” on the website, the yellow veining keeps it from having as much of a golden-orange tone as Gilded Strobe Light. So, the color stands out a little more on my skin, but it’s still in the right color family for me.

The shade match, plus the level of shimmer refinement makes this not just the best highlighter I own from Hourglass, but the kind of highlighter I like in general. Infinite Strobe Light from the Snake Palette was also a decent shade match, a little less reflective than the typical strobe highlighters, and it is slightly darker than Solar Glow. Divine Strobe Light from the Tiger Palette worked too, but neither than one nor Infinite Strobe Light became favorites. With Solar Glow, I can use my best brushes to get the exact level of shine I want, as it blends easily into my skin.
The shine doesn’t fade or dull down as the day goes on, nor does it have any other longevity issues.

I have swatch comparisons below, and a photo with me wearing the highlighter is in the Canyon Heat section.

LUCID GLOW (Blush) – If I wear this like a blush, I can see a faint peachy-pink tinge (the brand describes it as coral) on my cheeks. However, I feel this looks the best on me as a highlighter when paired with Amethyst Haze. Although Lucid Glow is a warm shade, the pink tone still manages to compliment the cooler pink-berry color of Amethyst Haze better than Solar Glow, which is even warmer.

Lucid Glow also makes a great blush topper for Canyon Heat. I prefer to wear a radiant blush the majority of the time, so the sheer color from Lucid Glow doesn’t alter the color of Canyon Heat that much, and just adds the glow.

I see this color as the warmer version of Iridescent Rose, a shade that Hourglass has put in at least 4 palettes by now. It’s around the same depth as Lucid Glow, and the brand calls it a warm rose, but it has a pearly-mica type of sheen that makes it appear cooler toned on me. Perhaps Iridescent Rose would look even better with Amethyst Haze on those with a cool undertone, but Lucid Glow helps to bridge the gap in making that shade work on me. Therefore, I don’t mind having this in my palette, even though I don’t wear it as a standalone blush.

The lightest blush from the Lotus Palette, Desert Flush, is still darker than Sunset Flush from the Swan Palette and Lucid Glow from the Fox Palette. The Lotus Palette continues to be the darkest Ambient Edit Palette thus far.

DESERT LIGHT (Finishing Powder) – The performance of all Hourglass finishing powders are the same on me, as long as the shade isn’t too light, which then makes my skin look dry, textured, and ashy. These powders are lightweight, sheer, easy to blend, have minimal ability to lock in makeup, and minor blurring capabilities. So, choosing between them comes down to whether or not there is visible shimmer and if the shade is a good match. The palest one I can wear from Hourglass is Dim Light, but it can slightly lighten my foundation if I am too heavy-handed. Desert Light is darker and warmer, so it suits me even better. It is technically still lighter than my skin tone, but I could only tell by applying a heavy swatch to my face. When rubbed in, the slightly brightened area did not look unnatural. So, it’s no surprise that using a normal amount on my face works well as a finishing powder.

My closest match, especially right now, is Eternal Light. Eternal Light is the tiniest bit darker than my skin tone (again only detectable when swatched heavily), but applying a normal amount looks perfect. I always have to preface that the Eternal Light shade from the Ambient Lighting Palette Trio in Volume III had noticeable gold specks in it, but Eternal Light from the Ambient Lighting Edit Unlocked Lotus Palette does not. This is why I prefer Eternal Light from Lotus and that’s the one I consider to be my best finishing powder shade from Hourglass. This new one, Desert Light, contains gold shimmer again, but the particles are far tinier than the Volume III trio. So, I don’t mind the beautiful sheen and the brightening effect. Desert Light is particularly well suited to calming down a “loud” blush, like Amethyst Haze, plus it adds a little warmth. I just have to be careful using it in my bronzer zone because it can make Bronze Fusion look even more subtle than it already is.

CANYON HEAT (Blush) – This is finally an orange blush I can get behind! Past orange blushes from Hourglass were metallic, to the point of seeming more like highlighters, and were just too saturated for my liking. Canyon Heat is more of a slightly muted terracotta with a soft matte finish. The earthy orange-brown hue is quite flattering. It shows up on me, but a little more pigment could have made this blush better able to suit those who are darker than me. This is probably going to be too light for some people I know.

I find it interesting that of the three blushes, this one has the least amount of sheen. However, it still contains Mica, Synthetic Fluorphlogopite, and Boron Nitride as the first three ingredients. There is a possibility that other people could have a stronger sheen in theirs than mine. Then again, the Desert Light finishing powder also has those top three ingredients, but still has even less of a sheen than Canyon Heat. In any case, Canyon Heat is not flat matte, but isn’t shimmery like the other blushes either.

I like Canyon Heat, but I need more time with it to decide if it can surpass my older favorites.

AMETHYST HAZE (Blush) – Hourglass has a few mauve blushes (Mood Flush and Mood Exposure), and they released a deep-pink berry blush called Rose Heat from Universe Unlocked in 2021, but Amethyst Haze and Mauve Fusion are the closest they’ve gotten to making a purple blush. Amethyst Haze is like a magenta-berry and is one of their darkest blushes, alongside Red 0 from the Lotus Palette in 2024 and Rose Heat from the 2021 Universe Unlocked Palette. Mauve Fusion from this year’s Swan Palette is a slightly lighter, cooler, and less pigmented version of Amethyst Haze. I consider it to be a fuchsia-pink. Mauve Fusion has a touch more blue tone, while Amethyst Haze has a little more red.

I’m always happy to see a dark blush option from Hourglass, and that it’s less pigmented, making it easier to work with than Red 0. Amethyst Haze is also only moderately metallic, so I think it has a pretty finish.

BRONZE FUSION (Bronzer) – This bronzer isn’t as light as Lustrous Bronze Light from the Leopard and Elephant Palettes, but it’s just barely dark enough to show up on my skin while the last of my summer color is clinging on. Solar Bronze has been my correct bronzer shade up to this point, but what Bronze Fusion has going for it is the fact that it’s the darkest shimmer/glow bronzer Hourglass has made so far.

The foundation shades I wear most of the year are Nars Light Reflecting Foundation in Caracas (but in some formulas, like Sheer Glow, I wear Macao), Hourglass Ambient Glow Foundation 13.5W, Danessa Myricks Yummy Skin Serum Tint in 11, and Chanel N1 in BD91. I should theoretically wear BD101, but I make BD91 work even outside of winter. I used to mix BD91 and BD121, but BD121 is too orange.

Why this is important is because I can see the bronzer on me when I wear BD91, but when I wear a full face of BD121, I can only see the warmth the bronzer adds in person. The sheen is subtle to begin with, but even harder to see in photos. So, once again, I find myself liking a product that will unfortunately be unusable for a lot of makeup lovers that have come to expect the “Color Palette 3” of the holiday palettes to be deep-skin friendly.

Wearing Chanel Foundation in BD91

How well this continues to show on my skin throughout the year will determine whether it’s above or below Solar Bronze as my favorite.

When it comes to using these powders on the eyes, it’s once again something I’ve done for review purposes, but will rarely do in my everyday life. It’s similar to how I dislike using Hindash powders on my eyes, but love them on my face. They just look so dull on me as eyeshadows.

How Did Hourglass Do This Year?

My Tiger Palette in the top left contain two blushes from the Butterfly Palette. My Owl Palette contains the color story of Leopard, but I swapped out one blush for Mood Flush. My Leopard Palette has contains the color story of Snake.

Regarding the Fox Palette specifically, I think Hourglass did a fantastic job in catering it to my preferences. I’m thrilled about that for myself, but it’s a step backwards from being inclusive towards those with deeper and richer skin than mine. There are four options this year, if we count the Sephora-US exclusive Horse Palette. Considering that one has all repeat shades, I’m willing to overlook it, but I understand why some of the people I know are disappointed that Fox is their only option and that they can only use half of the palette.

Staying on the topic Fox, I feel that the quality is better this year. The powders feel slightly less dry. The shimmers are more refined. The choices to make most of the shades warm-toned suits me well. One of my biggest complaints with how they used the marbling “miscelare technique” in the past was to combine a color with beige, effectively ensuring the combination would turn into a medium value color at the darkest. As fascinating as the swirls look, I would have rather Hourglass make dark palettes with solid colors (like they did in Lotus) to ensure there aren’t huge shade discrepancies among the same palettes. Lucid Glow isn’t new, so I’m lucky mine had enough pink veining to be wearable. Amethyst Haze and Bronze Fusion look solid from afar, but they are actually the combination of two dark colors on each tile. I believe even the Solar Glow highlighter has the subtlest bit of marbling between dark warm gold and bronze. I’m happy they’ve done this successfully for the darker powders.

Although the depth of the colors could be be improved, I feel like Fox has the most cohesive and complementary options for those in the warm-toned Tan to Medium-Deep skin category. For example, with the Lotus Palette, I felt that I was forced to use the two blushes together to create a middle-ground color because the two had such a huge difference in depth. The person who could rock the lightest blush alone wouldn’t be able to use either of the two highlighters. In Fox, I can use Lucid Glow in various ways with both blushes, and technically by itself. The highlighter, bronzer, and Canyon Heat blush are beautifully warm and clearly go together. If I feel Amethyst Haze is too dark or too cool, I can fix both issues once I put the finishing powder on top. I can also use all three blush shades to create the perfect medium toned neutral flush on the cheek that isn’t too muted or too bold and isn’t too shimmery either.
The only downside is that I have to be careful using the entire face palette together since the combination of Lucid Glow and Desert Heat can tone down the vibrancy a bit too much. Some examples of this are in the photo below, but I would realistically only use 4-5 shades at a time.

I’m still gathering my thoughts about the Swan Palette, and I don’t own Deer, but it seems Hourglass intended for Deer to suit those with fair skin who want not only light Ambient powders, but ones specifically formulated to require building up. Both Han Beauty 101 and Theresa is Dead seemed less than pleased by the Deer Palette, even though it was intended for people like them. It really highlights the fact that it’s not enough to match someone’s skin tone depth. Preferences play a big part, which is why being able to customize these palettes in the future is so important. Hourglass makes a lot of money off people (like me) who buy more than one palette, but they also know fatigue is starting to set in. The limited availability of custom quads was likely a test, and I hope the customers passed that test.
Also, regarding Deer, Han Beauty 101 said that she has used the palette enough times that she’s getting more pigment now, especially having switched to a denser brush. So, perhaps that’s something to keep in mind for those who want to buy Deer.

I think the amount of repeat products Hourglass put in the palettes are acceptable (Deer – 3, Swan -2, Fox -1, Horse-6), because I view Horse as no different than the Owl Palette from 2023 that didn’t have a Color Palette attached to it. Besides the holiday palettes with special packaging, Hourglass releases a few repeat palettes and trios each year anyway. They just don’t get talked about as much and disappear off their website just as quickly as they arrived.

Overall, I’m quite happy with Fox. Usually it’s the blushes that have me the most excited for the holiday palettes, but this year it’s the highlighter, finishing powder, and bronzer. I think this is a good addition to my collection, which is quite the relief considering I am supposed to be cooling it on buying face palettes. It’s nice to know the hefty price was worth it.
I didn’t get all holy grail shades, but many of them have become second favorites instead.

Future Wishes

I liked the animal options this year. The new artist they hired, Sasha Unisex did a great job. After all, a good portion of my decision to buy a second palette was for the packaging.
I am still hoping and wishing Hourglass will commission a Panda and Rabbit in the future.
Since we’ve had non-animal ones like the Barney’s cover, Evil Eye, and Lotus, I would go crazy for a star/moon/celestial design. I’d also love to continue on the mythological train and have a phoenix, mermaid/siren, unicorn, etc.

I’m still hoping Hourglass will take the two colors within At Night to be mixed into one solid color, with an increase in pigmentation. If they made a solo blush out of the darker of the two colors in At Night, I think that would be pretty great too.

Hourglass makes a lot of pinks and berries, but I’d love a red-brown similar to Pat Mcgrath’s Paradise Venus or Benefit’s Terra. Perhaps the reason Hourglass has zero true red blushes is because they don’t use carmine. Red 0 from Lotus was still an ultra deep pink. I would just like to have less pink and orange, and I’m still hoping we’ll get darker nude blushes that will look natural on someone with dark skin.

The creation of a rich dark bronzer is still on the wishlist for so many people. That would be great to finally see next year.

Sometimes I create mock ups of what my perfect Hourglass Ambient Edit Palette would look like, if I was in charge of the arrangement. It was easy to decide my top two finishing powders, bronzers, and highlighters, but I have been so indecisive about the blushes that I decided to cut that portion from today’s review. I think I will try to include it in the Swan post instead. So, if you’re interested in seeing that as well, please visit my blog again soon!

That’s all for today! Thank you for reading!

-Lili ❤

Kess 365 Bronzer Review

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Welcome to the final entry in the Summer Bronzer Series where I post a bonus review every week in the month of July! Linked in blue are Part 1 and Part 2, plus Part 3.

Kess Berlin 365 Bronzer in Tan to Deep

The majority of what I buy is makeup that generates a lot of hype, but I knew nothing about Kess prior to making this purchase. The 365 Bronzer popped up on the Douglas and Niche-Beauty websites in May, and how the texture appeared in photos is what caught my interest. It looked like a baked gelee product, which I tend to love, and indeed it has a “patented gel-to-powder formula.”

I expected it to look a bit shimmery in person, but I was surprised to see only a few gold specks here and there, and not an obvious sheen. The mica is something I couldn’t see until I used it enough to wear away some of the embossing on the surface.

From the moment I first dipped my brush into the bronzer, I was instantly reminded of the Huda Beauty Glowish Soft Radiance Bronzing Powder and the Hatice Schmidt Bronzer (which is quite similar to Nabla’s Skin Bronzing). The formulas aren’t the same, but they share some ingredients in common.

The bronzer from Kess feels smooth and picks up as well as the Hatice and Huda bronzers, and is better than Nabla’s. It has a little bit of a creamy feel, but it’s not as emollient and doesn’t have as much slip as the others. This may be due to Kess not using dimethicone, unlike the others. The brand’s website specifically touts being “Talc-, silicone- and perfume-free,” so they may be intentionally avoiding all the “-cones.”

When I first used this bronzer, I was so impressed with how smooth it looked on my skin, and the amount of luminosity, but when I started using my new and older favorites, I was reminded that those are even smoother than this one.

This looks the best on me when I apply a light layer with the amount of product I first pick up on my brush, but it can get out of hand sometimes in the process of trying to slowly build it up, combined with my lack of patience. The color is neutral leaning warm and dark enough to have a simultaneous bronzing and sculpting effect.
In the set of swatches below, one can see how Tan to Deep is similar in color to Deep Bronze from Dior’s previous bronzer line, and I always mixed that shade with another to get it to appear lighter. I tend to not use bronzers darker than Nars Laguna 6. However, it’s not the darkest in my collection. I can make this work, but it’s not as effortless of a process purely because of the shade. A darker bronzer will usually require more effort, even when it blends nicely.
And this does blend well, but I have bronzers that are even better performers. That being said, I still liked this enough that I scoured the website to see if there was anything else of interest to me by Kess. When I find a good product, I usually want to try something else from the brand in the hopes of discovering another gem.

Regarding longevity, how it looks when I put it on early in the day is how it will look at the end of the day. There’s zero fading, not that it’s difficult for powder products to be long lasting on me, but I still have to give credit where credit is due.

Overall, this would place somewhere within the Top 25 of my bronzers. That might sound low to some people, but between all the individual bronzers I own, duos, and face palettes, I have an absurd number of bronzers to begin with. So, this is really good!

I compared this to Nabla’s Skin Bronzing (discontinued in some countries already), the Glowish Bronzer (discontinued), and the Hatice Schmidt Bronzer. The Hatice Schmidt brand (formerly Hatice Schmidt Labs) technically completed its multi-years long rebrand, but has been slow to progress since the influencer running it is going through many life changes. I’m not sure if she plans to bring the bronzer back once the remaining stock with old packaging is gone. I’m not even sure how much longer the brand will stay in business. So, I consider the Kess Bronzer to be the closest alternative that I can recommend for all of these disappearing products!

I’m not sure how readily available Kess/Kess Berlin is outside of Germany. I believe Niche-Beauty offers worldwide shipping, so that’s at least one option for those interested.

So, that’s everything! I hope you’ve enjoyed the bonus bronzer posts this month!

Thanks for reading!

-Lili ❤

What’s New with Benefit Cosmetics? Review!

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For the last couple of years, Benefit has been mainly releasing sets containing already existing products. Surprisingly, in the first half of 2025, we already got reformulated Hoola bronzers, an additional bronzer formula, a new line of highlighters, an additional shade of the Wanderful World blushes, a shade extension for the Benetints, a new mascara, and the Porefessional Foundation.

I got swept up in the excitement and purchased three new products from the brand (not including the Badgal Bounce mascara I reviewed in March). Two are hits and one is a miss.

Benefit Hoola Wave Cream Bronzing Balm in Deep

I immediately spotted the gold shimmer particles in the pan, and was concerned that this formula might be like the Juvia’s Place Bronzed Cream Bronzer that looked ridiculous on my skin. I was very happy to see that the shimmer is not noticeable in swatches or on my face. It makes my skin look hydrated with a natural-finish type of glow.

This product sheers out fairly well, so I consider it a blendable formula that can build up in color intensity, but it’s not the slow building type. I get a lot of pigment right away. With my holy grail cream/liquid bronzer brush, the Patrick Ta Contour 1, I have to be careful not to overapply because it’s such a dense brush. However, I don’t get as smooth of a blend when I try to use looser packed brushes.

What works best for me is to tap the bristles into the pan once and then stamp it along the perimeter of my face in big enough gaps so I have room to blend and spread the bronzer out without having too much concentrated in one area.

The texture of this product is not one that I encounter that often. It’s emollient like a cream, but it’s slightly stiff and doesn’t melt as quickly into the skin like the Rare Beauty Warm Wishes Effortless Cream Bronzer Stick or Anastasia Beverly Hills Cream Bronzer. It blends well, but it just doesn’t spread in the same way as the others. It has “balm” in the name, but that makes it sound like it will be sticky, dewy, and/or waxy, which this product is not. The formula consists of silica, waxes, and oils, but it feels balanced in a way that doesn’t lean too much in either of those directions.
Essentially, the most comparable product to this one is the Rose Inc Cream Bronzer that I loved enough to consider one of my top five in the cream and liquid bronzer category, until it dried up unexpectedly quick.
Benefit and Rose Inc’s bronzers don’t have the same formula and this product isn’t as stiff as the one from Rose Inc, so I am hopeful that I will not run into the same issue six months from now. If it does, I will update this post with the details.

The Hoola Wave feels weightless on the face and sets on its own, so I don’t need to powder it, and it lasts all day. If I had to put it on my Bronzer Ranking List, it would be the new #26. That puts it below the Nars Laguna Cream Bronzer and Powder Bronzer, but still above the one from Rose Inc. I like it a lot, but there are many I like even more, including affordable ones. For instance, I think the Colourpop Supershock Bronzer is even better.

I also want to clarify that my ranking list is of all the bronzers I like, not all the bronzers in my collection. So, 26 is still high in the grand scheme of things.

Benefit Hoola Bronzing Powder in Deep

I owned and decluttered Hoola Caramel for being too light and Hoola Toasted for being too red and deep for me. I thought the bronzer quality was fantastic, but whenever my skin would get lighter, I couldn’t use it. Plus, it would get hard pan every time I needed to do comparison swatches. I gave up on it, but continued to wish for a shade between Caramel and Toasted.

So, when I heard about the reformulation and packaging design change, I still wasn’t excited until I saw the shade range. Deep looked, and actually turned out to be, less red than before. I think it’s also a hair lighter, but I don’t have Toasted anymore to be able to compare. As for “medium deep,” which I believe is supposed to be the same depth as the old Caramel, they made it cool toned instead. So, that was definitely not an option for me.
While I’m happy to have a better suited color in a formula that performs just like the old one, it means those that used the old Toasted might not like or be able to wear the new version of Deep.

As I mentioned, the performance is just how I remember. It’s pigmented, but buildble, and it’s easy to achieve an airbrushed look (though not quite as airbrushed as the Charlotte Tilbury powder bronzer). The blend is so smooth and never patchy. There is no added fragrance and I have no issues with longevity.

I’m still not pleased with the box packaging, though it’s at least slimmer and matches the size of the Wanderful World blushes. As to whether or not these new ones hardpan quickly, I can’t say because I refuse to put my finger in it, even for science. That’s why the swatches are in the Hoola Wave section and was applied with a brush to confirm Deep is the same shade in both formulas.

In the photo above, I applied it heavily so it would show up for review purposes. However, I can get a sheerer application if I use my airier brushes. In fact, it’s easier to apply a sheer layer of this powder than with Benefit’s cream bronzer.

If I needed to put this on the Bronzer Ranking List, it’s hard to say whether it tops #12 Dior Forever Natural Bronzer or #13 Vieve Modern Bronzer Duo, because I haven’t used those two in quite a while.

Benefit Glow-La-La Powder Highlighter in Lumi

I waited over five years for Benefit to make a highlighter darker than Tickle, so even though I am supposed to be on a highlighter no-buy, I made an exception for this release.

There are six highlighters in the line (which is more shades than the bronzer), and the one I bought is the second to last color. It makes me glad to see Benefit with an inclusive set of highlighters, especially considering how long they took to create.

This feels as wet and smooth as the Natasha Denona Hy Gen highlighters, and they also turn dry once contact is made with the skin. It’s thankfully also fragrance-free.

Based on how smoothly Lumi swatched, I thought for certain I would love this. However, when I use this with my holy grail highlighter brush, it looks terrible! It’s pretty from far away, but up close I can see all the individual shimmer particles. I was very unhappy with it in the beginning, so I switched to the Bisyodo B-ES-03, which has denser sections, but it’s thin enough to apply precisely. Using a denser brush to pack on more product helped to alleviate the scattered look effect. Then taking time blending the highlighter (more than any other highlighter I’ve owned) helped to disperse the highlighter more evenly and have the shimmer sparkles closer together so that the overall look is smoother.

I found a way to make this highlighter work, but I don’t foresee myself getting much use out of it if I can’t use it with my favorite brush. I also don’t want to have to put as much effort blending my highlighter as I do when I’m blending eyeshadows.

The brand succeeds in creating a “wet look,” which is a positive thing, but visible shimmer is a stronger negative in my book. I purchased the Prada highlighter a week or two after this one, and the differences were even more glaring. Quite a few of my friends on Instagram like this highlighter from Benefit, and it’s made in Italy, so the brand probably spent quite a bit of money in the formula. It’s still just too far from my preferences.

Also, I don’t think this should be priced over $30. Yes, this is coming from someone who spent a lot on a Prada highlighter refill.
I’ve been glad to see plastic packaging instead of cardboard from Benefit, but it feels so cheap in the hand! It’s still way bulkier than it needs to be.

I can recommend the bronzers, but not the highlighter. The blushes are still some of my favorites too, so I still recommend those!

That’s all I have for today! Thank you for reading.

-Lili ❤

Laura Mercier Bronze Color Infusion Review

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This is number 3 of 4 in the Summer Bronzer Series where I post a bonus review every week in the month of July! The links are in blue to Part 1 and Part 2.

Laura Mercier Bronze Color Infusion in 40 Riviera

There was a lot of buzz surrounding this product within the first few weeks of being released, but so many bronzers have launched since then that have maintained their hype for longer.

What appealed to me is the ability to use the sculpt side if I’m in the mood for something matte or the glow side if I want some luminosity. I go through phases of wanting both, so a product like this seemed brilliant. It can be a staple in someone’s collection, so long as the colors are a good match. For example, I cannot use the glow side by itself because the base color is light on me, in addition to the way light reflects off of it. I can still use it as a highlighter, plus mix both halves of the compact together to create a glowy bronzed look, but if I found no use for one of the two products, then it would be the same as using an individual bronzer anyway and lose its advantage over single bronzers. I hold this product in high regard, but neither half is impressive enough on their own to enter the top 30 of my ranking list, but the combination could.

There can be quite a bit of kickup, so I never swirl my brush in here. I use some of my smaller light-medium density brushes if I want to use each half separately, or the Sonia G Smooth Buffer to pick up product by tapping the brush into both sides.
In order to continue being able to use them separately or together, I try to reserve putting my brush into the top half of the pan for mixing, but sometimes I forget.

The matte side feels soft, is pigmented, and blends nicely (though I have some that are even more blendable). It becomes one with my foundation and can look quite natural.
The shimmer side is finely milled with very tiny shimmer specks that are subtle enough to remind me of my favorite set of Guerlain meteorites. Despite how refined it looks to my eye, when light shines on it, it emphasizes texture a little more than I prefer.
It’s like a subtler powder version of the Glossier Solar Paint, which I decluttered for the same reason. Both formulas have synthetic fluorphlogopite in common, which is an ingredient that can look stunning in products, but I think the brand used too much of it in here, especially coupled with mica too. Basically, the color is subtle, but the reflect can be intense.
Since my texture isn’t too bad on the top of my cheekbones, I still don’t mind using the glow side as highlighter. It’s just when I use both sides of Riviera as my bronzer that I feel it looks beautiful, but I also just try to ignore the fact that the bumps around my face are more pronounced.
The swatch section shows some of the shimmer particles in Riviera (Glow) compared to Fara Homidi’s Roma, which has a lumi-matte finish. Roma doesn’t draw the same kind of attention to texture on my face.

One other thing to note about the shimmer is that if one’s face is too dry, it has a harder time adhering. On minimal makeup days, when I’ve skipped foundation and my skincare was dry to the touch, the glow side that I used as highlighter would disappear in under two hours. So, I had to start either spraying my face to give it something to grip onto, or only using this product on days when I’m wearing foundation. Then I no longer had issues with longevity.
The matte side was long lasting in every situation.

Another customizable product released this year was the Givenchy Prisme Libre Bronzing and Sculpting Powder. In my review for it, I mentioned that time would tell whether I would embrace the customizing aspect or revert back to using my individual favorites. The reality is that I only used it about three more times after the review. That was a great product, and so is this, but I foresee myself also setting aside this bronzer in favor of my individual bronzer and highlighter holy grails.
I’ve come to realize that trios or other kinds of face palettes rarely get used by me for long. The only exception has been the Hourglass Ambient Lighting Edit palettes. Even my Sephora Collection Microsmooth Multi-Tasking Baked Face Palette that I used for a few years has taken a back seat to the Hourglass ones.
Since the Laura Mercier Color Infusion is a duo, there is still hope it won’t be wasted in my collection!

Before we end this, I do want to point out that I’m surprised this release hasn’t gotten more hype. Right now, people are still raving about the Fara Homidi bronzer in the shade Bois for being a fair skin person’s dream bronzer in terms of color. To me, this range from Laura Mercier doesn’t have standard colors. Riviera is listed as a neutral, but it’s a bit pink on me. The lighter shades, in order, are described as peachy bronze, rosy bronze, and caramel bronze. The darkest shade would be a blush on me because of how red it looks, but at least it’s something I haven’t seen before.

This bronzer is nice, but not a necessity for someone with a large bronzer collection already.

That’s all for today! Thanks for reading!

-Lili ❤

Fara Homidi Essential Bronzer Review

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This is number 2 of 4 in the Summer Bronzer Series where I post a bonus review every week in the month of July! Part 1 can be found HERE.

A few months ago, I was unfamiliar with Fara Homidi and her brand. However, their bronzers started to get incredibly popular due to the luxury makeup reviewers with fair and light skin raving so enthusiastically about the color Lumen and most especially the shade Bois.
I became more and more curious to see if anyone would go crazy over Roma and Ombra too. I waited for weeks and still couldn’t find a single review from someone with a tan or darker skin tone. So, I purchased the refill to try it for myself and see if the hype was justified.

Fara Homidi Essential Bronzer (refill) in Roma

Packaging/Refill

I was pleasantly surprised that this refill came in a thick plastic clamshell that mimics the real packaging in shape and color. The real compact is matte brown and made of “hand-polished lacquered metal,” but the refill packaging is shiny, as seen in the first photo of the post.

The outside of the refill is made of “42% cellulose-based plastic,” and underneath are the raised letters ‘FH’ that fits into the ‘FH’ on the bottom of the clamshell container. The bronzer is actually pressed inside a metal pan, but it has that brown colored plastic encasing it.
So, the compact and refill pans are magnetic, but the magnetic pull is not strong enough for the pan to adhere to a separate Z-palette on its own. I have heard that the Fara Homidi compacts are weighty, so I assume the strong magnet is what locks the pan in place while contributing to the packaging feeling heavy.

I am pleased enough with the plastic case to keep the refill in there, but for anyone intending to add a metal sticker to the bottom and put it in a standard empty magnetic palette, just know that the refill height is above the edge, as seen in the bottom right corner of the second photo above. My example is how it sits in a large Z-palette. I can still shut the lid, but I recommend that someone place it in a deeper type of custom palette specifically made to house large domed products to ensure the sides are high enough.

Choosing a Shade

Regarding the color, I thought Roma was unique in my collection until I compared it to the “glow” half of the Laura Mercier Color Infusion Bronzer in the shade Riviera. The base color is deeper and more red in Roma than Riviera, which is why I can actually use the shimmery side of Riviera as a highlighter, but I cannot do that with Roma. They look so similar in natural light, but at night under daylight lights that wash it out, the difference is far more obvious.

When I pick up the product without rubbing, it looks darker. Once it’s smoothed out, it looks lighter. I think that has to do with the ingredients used to make the Fara Homidi Bronzer look luminous (mica, boron nitride, or the combination of both), which also lightens the overall appearance. It’s why the bronzer looks different in the pan depending on how much light is shining on it. I cannot see any shimmer specks, but there is a beautiful sheen that is very much apparent when blended in.

I feel confident in my choice to pick Roma over Ombra, but I have to share the photos from the Niche-Beauty website to explain my point.

Photo Credit: Niche-Beauty

The scraped pictures shows the undertone of the bronzers the best, even though it will appear a little lighter on the skin. Ombra looks almost purple with how richly red it is. I’m sure it would look gorgeous on someone else, but when my skin burns it turns more like the color of Roma.
That being said, I’m still not sure if I’m in love with this color. It’s not the kind of red that I flat out dislike (such as the original Benefit Hoola Toasted bronzer), but my favorite bronzer colors are yellow/golden, golden-orange, or neutral-brown that appears deep pink rather than red. There was a time when I liked the sunburned look, so when that inevitably becomes favorable to me again, I think I will appreciate the tone of Roma a lot more. This is especially coming off the heels of disliking how red I became while in Florida three months ago.

I mentioned that at the time I made my purchase, there were no reviews of the darkest two shades. It takes me ages to test and complete my posts, so there are videos available on YouTube by now. I’ve seen people much lighter and much darker rocking Roma and being happy with their shade selection, so the limited range seems to stretch quite a bit at least. I’m still not completely satisfied, so if the brand extends the shade range and releases another deep option in a different undertone, I would be tempted to buy it.

Performance

The brand calls this bronzer a “soft suede,” which perfectly describes the softness level of the powder. It has a slightly clay-like feel from how smooth it is, but it’s far softer than even the Glowish Bronzer that comes first to my mind when I think about clay-like textured bronzers. The product picks up easily on my brush, and I get kickup, but I can apply such a thin even veil of color to my face. The healthy look that my skin has, after I’ve applied hydrating skincare that leaves me with a subtle glow that is fully dry to the touch, is the kind of lumi-matte finish that this bronzer bestows to my skin.

Even though the powder is so thin that it doesn’t look like I’m wearing any on my face, it’s still quite pigmented. Trying to find the right brush in the beginning was tricky because I knew that this bronzer should be capable of giving me an airbrush finish, but even my top five favorite bronzer brushes were too dense. I can blend this product out, but the bronzer looks more natural on my skin if I build it up instead. I went as far as to use this bronzer with my Hakuhodo 2025 Gradation Sakura Limited Edition Brush that is partly synthetic and most similar in shape that I have to the one sold by Fara Homidi, but I needed something even airier to make this particular shade look natural on me. The rephr kōyō brush turned out to be the winner! It makes this bronzer perform to its full potential! A good color match and the right brush is key. If these two conditions aren’t met, I don’t think this bronzer will be enjoyable to the purchaser.

Issues

This bronzer is long-wearing no matter if I put it on top of bare skin or a full face of makeup. One minor inconvenience is that it turns unnatural looking again if I use one of my glowy setting sprays on top of it because it intensifies the color, which draws attention back to the fact that it’s not the perfect undertone for me. Imagine my surprise when my bronzer looked blurred with a slight veil of reddish brown, only to turn into a higher saturated red after I sprayed my face!

This change in color happened with Charlotte Tilbury and Pat Mcgrath’s glowy sprays, plus MAC Fix+, but it only happened with the Huda Easy Bake Setting Spray when I held the bottle too close to my face. It’s a problem I can easily avoid by just not using a setting spray, but I do count this as a point against the bronzer. Some people will use sprays with this product, and perhaps it will be fine if the tone of red is flattering for them, but for others it could ruin the whole makeup look.
Also, when my face was a bit dewier, or when I put skincare and still-wet foundation on the back of my hand to test how it looks if I applied the bronzer on top of a wet base, the color didn’t change as much. So, it seems to be a problem with moisture hitting the top of it and not moisture from underneath, as if it removes the sheen to unveil the base color within.

This has a very creamy and moisturizing formula with the Squalane, Sodium Acetylated Hyaluronate, Snow Mushroom (Tremella Fuciformis Sporocarp Extract), Ethylhexylglycerin, and various oils. One thing that has me a bit confused is that Niche-Beauty also includes Kaolin Clay as a key ingredient, and there is a description about it in the “benefits” section. However, I don’t see kaolin clay or its various alternative names on the full ingredient list on my unicarton or the Niche-Beauty website, and kaolin is not mentioned on the Fara Homidi website. However, it’s there on the Sephora US website between the Helianthus Annuus (Sunflower) Seed Oil and Triethoxycaprylylsilane.

Since the official website states, “Occasionally ingredient lists will change due to the availability of raw materials and as we optimize our formulas,” it makes me wonder if kaolin is actually in here and someone forgot to list it on the unicartons and every website, or if an earlier version of this product had kaolin, but what’s on the market currently does not.

It’s not unheard of for a hydrating formula to still have kaolin clay, zea mays, or some other dry ingredient to help balance things out. It doesn’t effect me whether that ingredient is in here or not, but I’m including this information since it could be important to someone else.

Another thing to note is that this contains Parfum and Vanillin. It has what I associate as a “beachy” smell in the tropical sense. It smells a bit like coconut and vanilla. I think it’s a pleasant scent and it’s not very strong, so I don’t mind it being in here.

Final Thoughts

I have a small twinge of regret in not buying the full compact because I like weighty makeup packaging. However, what I might do is wait for the brand to release blushes or some other product and see if the packaging for that one is even prettier.

Overall, I think it’s a very beautiful product and I don’t regret buying it. I understand the hype. This has the makings of being a perfect product for a select group of people, but it’s not going to be universally loved. As unique as the texture is, the performance and results are able to be matched by other bronzers. It’s not going to be an effortless blend for those that don’t have the right tools, and even if this had the best formula in the world, it doesn’t matter if it’s not the right color for the user. Then, of course, is the setting spray issue. For these reasons, I don’t feel that it’s amazing enough to be worth a casual makeup wearer saving up their money to buy it (unless the shade match is stellar). However, I think luxury makeup lovers and enthusiasts may see value in a bronzer like this. For some people, the packaging alone makes it covetable.

I feel it is too soon to rank this bronzer among my collection because I can’t make up my mind on how much weight to give the pros and cons. I have tried to be as fair as possible in this review, but I want to see how I feel several more months from now. I love the texture, I like the performance, but I need to see if my uncertainty about the color will lower my opinion of it over time.

*UPDATE AUGUST 4th, 2025 – I reevaluated my bronzer ranking list and this bronzer is currently sitting at 7 out of 49.

That’s all for today! If you like this kind of content, be sure to click follow to be notified the next time I post! Thank you for visiting!

-Lili ❤

Anastasia Beverly Hills Smooth Blur Bronzer

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Welcome to 1 of 4 Summer Bronzer Bonus reviews!

I like to group multiple products in a single post if I feel they are relevant to each other in some way, but there are times when this caused me to delay on publishing.
For example, my Battle of the Milky Toners post was supposed to be about toners in general, featuring four milky toners and three “regular” ones. However, I kept hearing about other milky toners that were popular, so I would buy them, wait a month or more for it to arrive from YesStyle, then test it extensively before hearing about another hyped up toner, and repeat the cycle. This is how I ended up making a milky toner post specifically, with 11 compared, and it took over one year to complete!

It’s summer! Now is the perfect time to chat about bronzers. So, I thought it would be nice to have a bonus post each week in the month of July, guaranteeing that I won’t have to delay reviewing these any further because of a last minute addition, wanting to replace or add extra photos, etc.

So, here we go!

Anastasia Beverly Hills Smooth Blur Bronzer in Beach Bum Bronze

This packaging is beautiful! It’s weighty, has a mirror, and is a magnetic closure type. I love the rose gold details in the logo and around the pan. I first noticed ABH stepping up their packaging with their mascaras, and now this one.* The packaging upgrade has to factor into the price.

Although I don’t own a bronzer from their first line, I know that it has the same weight of 10 grams/0.35 oz and cost $28, versus this new one at $38.

*UPDATE: October 9, 2025 – I didn’t realize the brand’s Glow Seeker Highlighter is in similar packaging as the bronzer, but weighs slightly more!

Beach Bum Bronze

I have to address the color options because it is very important for anyone to know when buying these. This range of bronzers is not intended to be cool-toned, but they might still appear ashy.

In the photos above, the picture with the untouched surface is color accurate in looking a bit dusty, cool, and as though it should be too light for my skin. Once I rubbed it, the true color showed as darker and warmer. I don’t know what causes the surface to appear different in color; perhaps because of whatever blurring properties are in this. Sometimes when a product has too much mica (especially paired with silica) or other ingredients that create a luminous or pearly sheen, it can look ashy/gray on someone even if the base color is dark. For example, the last three shades of ABH’s bronzers look a bit dusty in swatches by Angela Denise, despite her having a similar skin tone to mine. My skin’s hue is more saturated than hers, which I can only guess is why they wear differently on the both of us. Regardless of the cause, this problem has contributed to a lot of disappointment and backlash online, such as this scathing review from Robert Welsh.
Examples of other products that had this problem are the original launch of Fenty Cheeks Suede Powder Blushes and the darkest shade of RMS Beauty ReDimension Hydra Bronzer.
This differs from when a brand puts too much white in the formula of their product, which goes unnoticed for those with lighter skin, but is super ashy on dark skin. An example of that is YSL’s initial launch of shades in the Make Me Blush Liquid Blushes line.

So many people were thrilled to see photos of bronzers looking so cool toned that they should be labeled contours. Others were appalled. I would have completely skipped this release if not for the brand’s founder stating in Trendmood1’s comment section that the range was actually warm and she faulted Sephora’s photography (even though these were the same photos used by other retailers and they look the same as what’s on the official Anastasia Beverly Hills website).


Anastasia was correct in saying the bronzers look ashy in the photos, but some of those photos appear to be correct in showing how the bronzers look in the pan. It’s more useful for customers to know how they look on real skin. Where they went wrong is that too many of the models look sculpted instead of bronzed, so it doesn’t seem to accurately portray the color it should be on the skin. Then again, there are some people who this bronzer will look that gray on.

My original guess was that the makeup artist for the models didn’t use the bronzer alone in the photo shoot, and paired them with the brand’s Smooth Blur Contour Sticks. Perhaps too much of the contour was used, or the photos could have just been manipulated in post.
This is the grey area where the brand’s photos can be interpreted as misleading.
I’m happy with how Beach Bum Bronze looks on me, but I can understand why some people would feel let down, while others will be pleasantly surprised by the amount of warmth.

The thought crossed my mind that maybe it’s just my shade that is warm, but hanbeauty101 on YouTube bought the two lightest colors (Sun-kissed Dreams and Warm Sand Vibes) and was disappointed to see that neither were cool toned. In a contrasting reaction, Angelica Nyqvist happily confirmed that the shade just before mine called Tropical Tan is neutral-learning warm and golden.

When it comes to choosing a shade, I like that this one functions the way it should, by being warmer than my natural skin tone and only a little darker. I have many bronzers that are deep enough to be brontours, so having a subtle color is more desirable for me at this time. Beach Bum Bronze looks neutral-leaning-warm compared to the amount of orange in the shade Terracotta, which is my best match among Anastasia’s cream bronzer line.

Because Beach Bum Bronze is so similar to the color of the darkest section of my Hermès bronzer in the color Sienne, I can’t help but compare them. The ABH bronzer is the tiniest bit deeper with a little more red. Even though the powder is incredibly silky to the touch, I could see how much smoother the Hermès bronzer was when swatching the shades, and how it distributed the color evenly without skipping. To clarify, the Hermès’ bronzer is very soft to the touch, but doesn’t feel the same as Anastasia’s. It’s just the colors that are similar. If I mix in the the lighter two shades within the Sienne trio, the color turns more golden-orange.

The way the texture of the Smooth Blur Bronzer looks when rubbed reminds me of the ELF Halo Glow Pressed Powder, which is less than half the price of the bronzer from ABH. So, this kind of smooth and silky texture is achievable for drugstore brands too. The ELF powder doesn’t use Zea Mays (corn starch) like ABH, but it does have Aluminum Starch Octenylsuccinate.

E.l.f. Halo Glow Pressed Powder

Even though this cannot beat the #1 bronzer in my collection, the Smooth Blur Bronzer has still impressed me immensely with the texture, the blurring capability, how easily it blends and builds, and the finish. However, this can stick in one place and be harder to blend when applied on top of a dewy base. The only time I had a problem blending this bronzer was on a day when I was testing out a new foundation and skincare combo (one that I won’t be repeating). So, this formula may not be suited for someone who likes to use dewy foundations or moisturizing/emollient skincare. Someone with oily skin might still be able to enjoy this bronzer if a layer of powder is applied to the bronzer areas first before adding this on top.

Another difference between this bronzer and my Hermès is that the Plein Air Healthy Glow Mineral Powder blends perfectly with every brush I’ve used. The ABH Smooth Blur looks good with most I’ve tried, but light to medium density ones give more of the airbrushed look. A denser brush combined with the level of pigment in this range can be a bit overkill, and even if I try to blend it out, the end result isn’t as clean as I would want. Essentially, this bronzer doesn’t look great if overblended. Trying to build it up is better.

I’ve had no longevity issues, but this is usually the case with me.

This is a shimmer-less product with many potentially drying ingredients in the formula such as corn starch and kaolin clay, but it still has a natural looking sheen from the mica and silica. Even though this sticks too much on a wet base, I have no issues blending cream blushes on top of it. Those dry ingredients are why I think people with oily skin could still like this. I was worried I might have a problem with it, as someone with a dry skin type, but it hasn’t felt drying on my face. I use hydrating skincare, but my face is still usually dry to the touch. This is why the dew problem isn’t a big one for me, I know which brushes will work well with this, and the color is quite good.

Under my usual conditions, this bronzer works so well for me that I would place is somewhere within my top 15. However, I’m still hesitant to recommend it because of the number of potential issues I’ve detailed in this review. No product performs the same universally, but this has a bit too many outliers. I recommend that anyone interested in getting this should see it in-store if possible.

I hope you’ve found this post to be helpful. Thank you for reading, and be sure to click follow if you’d like to be notified of my next review, including the next bonus post!

-Lili ❤

Surprising Makeup Hits and Misses ft Rare Beauty, Glossier, Dior, and More

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I visited the US in April and was reunited with the rest of my makeup collection, along with all the things I shipped there during 2024. Those products consisted of Japanese brushes that I didn’t want to pay extra customs fees for, reward point and gift card redemptions only applicable to US sites, products only sold within the US, etc. I had older makeup I still wanted to bring back to Germany, but I needed to decide which of the newer ones were worth coming along too. That’s how the idea for this post began! However, some of the makeup I brought back will be discussed in other posts, and I added some of my newer makeup purchases to this review instead.

Rare Beauty Soft Pinch Matte Bouncy Blush in Worth

It was difficult to photograph this color accurately because it looks darker in the pan than it actually is. I own the liquid version of Worth, and have reviewed it before, but I left it in the US. Since the liquid is sheer, I wasn’t surprised that I also needed to pack on a lot of this cream-to-powder version to get it to show up on camera.

I’ve been into subtle and/or nude blushes lately, so I expected to love this. I tried pairing it with so many different things expecting that perhaps my foundation shade mattered or that the undertone was clashing, that the color of my eyeshadow looks could be throwing it off, etc. I just wasn’t enjoying wearing it. The answer I settled on as to why that was the case is that it’s matte. I knew it would be from the name, but I’ve used shimmer-free creamy and bouncy type of blushes before that still had a natural emollient gleam to them from just being a cream product. Examples of this are the MAC Glow Play Blushes and Armani Neo Nude Color Melting Balms. Even within the Rare Beauty Soft Pinch Liquid Blush line that comes in dewy or matte finishes, the matte one still has some life to it. So, I wasn’t expecting this blush to have zero shine, especially from a product that has Synthetic Fluorphlogopite as the first ingredient.

The longevity is fine. The blush blends into and becomes one with the skin. For the best results, I use my densest synthetic brushes with it.

I borrowed the photo above from my Charlotte Tilbury x Genshin Impact post where I reviewed the Airbrush Flawless Setting Spray. By the time I started using that spray, I already knew that my issue with the Rare Beauty Blush was the fact that it’s matte. However, I was still taken aback when I saw with my own eyes how much of a difference some extra shine truly makes. I love how this blush looks when I use Charlotte’s spray over it. So this product changed from a miss to a hit for me!

Eadem Le Chouchou Exfoliating + Softening Peptide Lip Balm in Fig Sauce

I mentioned in my Project Pan that there are only 5 brands I’m purchasing from in the lip category this year. One exception was this balm because I would have bought it ages ago if it was sold in Europe. I could only find one website that would ship it to me, but then I would have had to pay at least double the price.
The tradeoff for having to wait a long time to get it from USA’s Sephora was that I could buy it on sale and with a gift card.

I have to talk about the metal applicator because it feels amazing applying this lip balm! I don’t like when products have a cooling ingredient that makes my lips feel cold for 30 minutes to 2 hours depending on the brand. Instead, I only get that wonderfully cold sensation during the application process and then I can go about my day. This really adds to the experience, so much so that I’ve even put other products on my lips and then used this applicator to spread it out! Perhaps one day I’ll buy some empty tubes off the websites I’ve found by typing, “metal applicator cosmetic tube” into Google and transfer some other glosses into them.

This is a very nourishing product and lives up to its reputation as a lip treatment. It fills the lines and smooths over the lips. It’s thick, but not goopy in a gel or oil way. It has more of a creamy-waxy feel. It adheres fairly well to the lips, which helps it to last longer before needing to be touched up or reapplied. I still consider this a little sticky, but it’s not to Ami Cole levels. It has decent color payoff, enough for me to understand someone wanting to buy multiple shades, but I wouldn’t want to buy more than one extra.

The results I get are similar to Ami Cole glosses, which is to say my lips feel softer and more hydrated the next day, but this does not completely remove all of my chapped skin. I can always spot a few areas on my lips that are still chapped the next day.
So, this hasn’t claimed a spot in my top five, but I still like it a lot.

Gxve Beauty Eye See in Color in Rich Girl

This was the only quad from the brand that I found appealing, but my immediate issue is that I don’t get enough depth from the darkest brown in this palette. While it theoretically shouldn’t be a problem to grab a dark eyeshadow from any other brand, I know I will subconsciously not reach for this palette since it is technically incomplete for me.

The completed look is pretty, but I couldn’t bring myself to choose this to pack in my suitcase over my many other options.

If the eyeshadow formula was superb, I would have considered taking this with me anyway. My issue is that the shimmers are a bit lackluster. There is still beauty in a lower impact shimmer if the intended eye look is supposed to be sophisticated or demure. I think the quality is fairly good, though it could have benefited from being a bit creamier. The mattes were fine. My brush picked up a lot of product, but with how soft they look on my eyes, I think someone would be surprised to know how much I tried to build up these eyeshadows. They are drier shadows that appear to be finely milled, but something about the formula just doesn’t feel modern.

This palette is long-lasting on me. It doesn’t take long to get a blended look. However, this isn’t for me. I do appreciate that the holder of the pans is easy to remove, so I could technically keep the compact or turn it into an empty magnetic palette if I inserted a magnetic sticker sheet. I could also technically add metal sticker pans to the bottom of the eyeshadow holder to pop it into a larger empty magnetic palette. Removeable packaging is always interesting to me.

In any case, this quad wasn’t a flop, but it also wasn’t good enough to keep around.

As a random side note, the Gxve Beauty website used to sell merch as well. I ordered one of the Signature Hoodies during a 50% off sale (just like I did with the palette). It has fleece lining on the inside, so I’m excited to wear it come winter. The website says products are now exclusively at Sephora and things are so frequently for 50% off that I really don’t know how the brand will continue to stay afloat.

I don’t know where these are being sold now. If they are discontinued, I’m glad I was able to snag one as a piece of makeup history.

Glossier Cloud Paint Bronzer in Coast

I liked the Glossier Solar Paints, but wished to have a version without shimmer. The Cloud Paint formula is one of my favorites for cream blushes, so to have a matte Cloud Paint in a bronze color seemed like it would be an instant win.

I picked Coast because it is the second darkest option and has a golden tone, which I wanted. The darkest color, Drift, looked like it would be too red for me despite being labeled by the brand as a deep neutral bronze. Coast is just too subtle for my skin tone right now. While I was in Florida, I didn’t do a good job of reapplying sunscreen. My skin had a slightly redder tone and was darker, so the bronzer really isn’t visible in photos as it was already so subtle in person. I have a photo below, but I apologize for the lighting being very off. I couldn’t get a clearer picture during the trip and my skin looks even redder in the photo than it was in real life (plus I was wearing the Beekman 1802 skin tint that’s red).

I don’t mind having a subtle bronzer, but my biggest issue wasn’t the color. I felt it just didn’t blend seamlessly enough into my skin. While it’s true that I didn’t bring my holy grail synthetic bronzer/contour brush with me, I came to realize that the watercolor kind of finish that’s beautiful and natural in a blush isn’t what I want in a bronzer. So, I left this behind. What a shame!

Tarte Tartelette Tubing Mascara vs Too Faced Ribbon Wrapped Lash Tubing Mascara

Back in 2014, during my short lived time making YouTube videos (all listed as private now), I kicked off my Mascara Showdown Series with a battle between Tarte’s Lights Camera Lashes and Too Faced Better Than Sex Mascaras.

I determined that Tarte was the winner because of the length, but the mascara I actually repurchased the most was from Too Faced. I don’t know if it’s because I ended up preferring the balance between length and volume or if I was just able to get the Too Faced mascara on sale more frequently. I eventually stopped buying the one from Too Faced because I started to get clumping and flaking issues that I never had before. I don’t know if the formula changed or there was a switch in manufacturers, but I moved on from that mascara.

The KVD Full Sleeve Long + Defined Tubing mascara made me interested in tubing mascaras again. I had a deluxe sample of the one from Tarte, so when Too Faced released theirs I thought why not…let’s do another showdown between these brands over a decade later!

I never curl my lashes, so sometimes the mascaras look better or worse depending on how my eyelashes are naturally shaped that day. I’ve used the Tarte mascara five times and I can say that even if it had amazing results, what puts me off from it is how long it takes to dry. If I try to layer up even more product, then it takes even longer. I can touch my lashes thirty minutes later and it still doesn’t feel fully set. This is a big problem when I’m trying to photograph multiple eye looks in a day and in the process of removing my eyeshadow with a Makeup Eraser cloth and Bioderma, my eyelashes clump together, the color smears, and the stickiness makes it difficult to remove the rest. Part of the benefits of tubing mascara is the ease in which one can remove it with warm water. I can remove them with micellar water as well, so I’m not surprised that some of the Tarte mascara comes off. The annoying part is the weird middle ground where some of it comes off and smudges while the rest still clings on with a tight grip. It makes it so that I am forced to fully remove it every time when I want to do a new eye look, whereas with other tubing mascaras and even regular mascaras, it’ll come partly off and I can easily reapply more mascara because they didn’t turn my lashes spidery and hard. This is a makeup reviewer problem, but having to wait so long for it to fully dry is an issue overall. One time I made the mistake of applying this mascara not far enough in advance of watching a heartfelt scene in a show. The side with the Tarta mascara was a mess and got in my eyes. The side with Too Faced did not.

I didn’t like the Too Faced Ribbon mascara when I first tried it, but every time after that (at least 15 times so far), I have enjoyed it. Just like the showdown from many years ago, I found that Tarte’s mascara was better at lengthening, whereas Too Faced’s mascara was better with building volume while still giving nice length. It can start to clump if I build this up a lot, so I have to be careful about finding the balance between satisfaction and knowing when to stop.

I like the one from Too Faced, but I think I still prefer my tubing mascara from KVD. It gives better length than Tarte and if I’m patient enough I can build up the volume to similar results as Too Faced, though it can also start to form clumps if I take things too far.

The Tarte mascara is a miss. The Too Faced mascara is a hit.

Dior Backstage Rosy Glow Blush in 077 Candy

I reviewed the cream blush stick version of Candy already, and updated the original post, but this still feels like a good place to talk about the powder blush since it’s a miss for me.

This new powder formula is definitely an improvement on the original formulation and first reformulation, in terms of being more pigmented and less hard-pressed. I also think this square packaging is cuter and easier to use with larger cheek brushes. The reason it’s a miss for me is purely due to the color. I loved the addition of shimmer in the Bronzed Glow shade from version 2 of these blushes, but the base color of Candy being so light means that it unfortunately does the same thing as Nars Orgasm on me. I can see the pink shade at one angle, but when it hits the light, the gold reflect is nearly all I can see. So, it appears as if I tried to use a highlighter as blush! This kind of shimmer is not that refined either, which makes it unsuitable for my preference as even a blushlighter or blush topper.

The saving grace for me is that I can add the Candy blush stick on top to help the shimmer become one with the skin, plus boost the appearance of the pink color.

I’m happy using the Candy shade of Glow Stick on its own, but going forward, I will never wear the powder version of Candy by itself. Based on my continued enjoyment of the previous powder blush reformulation, and acknowledgement that the new one has improvements, I still recommend the powder blush. I just can’t recommend Candy or Toffee to anyone close to my skin tone because of that highlighter effect. Bronzed Glow still gives me hope that Dior can nail a shimmery blush in this new formula in the future if the base color is darker.

That’s everything I have for this week. Thank you for visiting and reading!

-Lili ❤