Etude House LUCIDDarling Fantastic Rouge lipstick in 04 Pixel Pink

Today is a fab day to review a new lipstick from Etude House. Etude House is a Korean brand that focuses on a young public and has a fairly low price range. But most of you readers will already know that. What you also might now is that Etude House lauches something new frequently. It is not as crazy as MAC, who seems to launch something in the limited edition sphere every week, or so, but it still launches something every month or so.

I often skip the skincare range of Etude House as I consider my skin to be too sensitive to experiment with, especially as EH does not shy away from fragance in their product. However, I often really like their affordable makeup items they launch. 

In March I saw that they had a new lipstick on the market, Real Led pixel Lipstick.

Well, if you say the words lipstick to me and the word new, my mind goes a bit blank and I can only think of 'try, try, try', especially when the colours in the chart look so natural and lip-enhancing.

Before I break out in a song called 'I'm not an addict' (from the delighted K's Choice...love them, and they are back after a decade of not making any music!) I want to let you know I made a first step in acknowledging my addiction. That is, indeed, acknowledging that I am an addict. Yes, send me to the lipstick-anonymous group and I will stand up and declare that I am addicted to the beautifying potion that decorates the mouths of women (and some men) around the globe.

On the other hand, is it really an addiction? I can afford it and it does not interfere with my social life. It is not that I wander the streets at night finding my perfect lipstick...ha, that would be odd,! Or am totally disfunctional if I do not carry around any lipstick in my purse. So, my addiction is very mild, if it even is an addiction.

Back to the review. I found out that the etude house site, the Korean part of it, has some pictures uploaded from users of their products giving some reviews. It is not easily to navigate on that site, but I found this girl having swatched all colours on her arm...These were quite helpful for me to pick out a colour, or they look better than the digital pictures above of the colours.

I had a craving for something bordering between peach and neutral, as I find them so lovely and Spring-like. That meant that I was drawn to colours 4, 8 and 9. I picked colour 4, Pixel Pink, as it looked like the perfect peachy pink.

The packaging of the tube itself is reminiscent of Kanebo Kate's packaging, which I find neither cheap looking nor expensive. 

The colour is a true pinky peach with tiny flecks of gold inside. Quite beautiful. (click on the picture for a better view of the micro-flecks)

I made a swatch of the lipstick on my arm. The first in in the warm light of the sun (yippi, SUN) and the one after is in the cooler light of the shadow. The colour is so sweet and girly in the swatch.

I consider the colour to be quite stunning, and the feel of the lipstick is really nice. BUT....

And now I have to end my rave about the lipstick.

It is something personal which might be an incredible plus for a lot of girls looking for a lipstick. However, it is too opaque...it tones down my natural lip-colour entirely and I do not find it sheer enough.

I did not include a lipswatch for my readers, as I am not happy about showing of my pucker these days. However, believe my word on it that it is a high dense colour that almost transforms the lips in the colour of the lipstick itself. It stays as lustrous as in the swatches, so it is not matte at all.

Somewhat, I did not think the youthful colour of pink/peach suited me when wearing it. I was aiming to channel a bit of Brigitte Bardot with the colour, and I turned out to look like 'aunty X in bright lipstick'...

However, I absolutely think this is a kind of lipstick that will leave lots of lipstick-likers excited, especially the ones that consider Japanese lipsticks to be too sheer and natural. In that case I think it is a fantastic choice to take.

I bought mine on ebay, for a change (here). These are also available on gmarket (here), but they do not have 04 anymore so I linked to colour 8.