Cheek/lip hybrids: the battle

When I received my Edward Bess lip/cheek in Island Rose, I tested it ofcourse and the first thing that I thought was "Darn, my Kose Addiction is still the grand no. 1 compared to this one".

But to get things really precise I dug out all of my hybrid cheek/lip products, which turned out to be a lot, and tested them based on texture and hybridity. I only tested the products that directly marketed as being a hybrid lip/cheek: there are other products that work brilliantly for both and are still marketed as only blush or only lipstick, but I won't review those.

And even though I already gave out the outcome which is my fave no. 1 (Addiction), I still discuss them all for other no. 1s on other fields.
 

sorry for the NARS multiple looking so grubby: I cleaned it a lot but, it's reality: NARS stuff really gets a yucky packaging after a while

Ok, let the battle begin:

1. Julie Hewett Cheekie:

One of my first and still a good favourite of mine
Lip performance: it brings out a medium colour on the lips that spreads easily. It has a glowy texture, which is flattering. It feels a tiny bit waxy, but quite like a MAC lipstick so not really unusually un-lipstick
Cheek performance: A glowy colour with a medium coverage. It glides easily over imperfect skin (I have a tiny scar from a laser treatment that still has to heal) and doesn't sit in the pores. It last for approximately 5 hours before it diminishes in colour. The fading is natural and non-blodgy.

2. Etude House Angel Kiss Lip and Cheek

It's a light-pink colour and really the unusual one in my collection
Lip performance: For a light pink colour that normally wouldn't look good on my or would sit in the folds of my lip, it is quite dewy and glides over the lips and makes them appear smoother. The colour pay-off is medium to high cover. It feels somewhat waxy, but not too hindering. It lasts for approximately 2 hours.
Cheek performance: It dissapeared on my cheeks after a couple of minutes and I first thought that must be the colour, however, I saw it when I applied it at first. It is dewy enough to glide over that tiny scar I mentioned before.

3.  Etude House Sugar Pink Lip & Cheek

I like Etude House, obviously, and they have lots of hybrid performers
Lip performance: it felt grainy and waxy on my lips. The colour didn't spread equally and settled in the lines so it needed high grade of blending and a pre-lip product first: not something that you want from a easy-to-carry hybrid product.
Cheek performance: that part was a lot better! It spreads quite equally over cheeks and the colour payoff is light to medium. It lasted for about 3 hours before fading.

4. Lotree

My ultimate fave Korean brand for a while, and then it suddenly was really hard to get on gmarket, darn.
Lip performance: smooth and glowy on the lips with light to medium colour-payoff.
Cheek performance: one of my favourite blushes for a while and I was glad I reviewed it for this post because I will wear it again. I love it! It glides over the skin, last for 4 hours with equal fading and has the perfect neutral colour (oh, sorry, I wouldn't discuss colour over here but it's so lovely)

5. Edward Bess lip/cheek Island Rose

The newbie in my collection of last weekends haul!
Lip performance: Quite light! I saw it on Sabrina from beautylookbook who branded this item as her ultimate date saver but it might be that her lips are lighter because I don't see as much colour payoff as the others I reviewed. The scent is lovely, a fig-type and it feels really balmy and smooth. But it's more a lipbalm on me.
Cheek performance: Also quite light. I also found it settling in that scar after a while which made that darn thing more obvious. I think this one will go up for swap on makeupalley.

6. Bobbi Brown Lip/cheek in Cabo Coral

Probably the best known one! I bought it for the colour that is a coral/tan shade and perfect on (fake) tanned skin.
Lip performance: Probably discussed endlessly on other beautyblogs and reviews but it's quite light (to light medium) and dissapears after 1 hour. The plus side is that it is so lovely for smoothing out lips and it doesn't sink in any beginning lines around the mouth.
Cheek performance: Vivid and creamy. It needs good blending but if you do that it will look lovely on. It last for 4 hours and even through a dance workout!

7. Becca creme blush in Hyacint

I'm not even sure it markets as a hybrid but its quite lovely so I put it up.
Lip performance: light to medium. It looks like a glowy lipbalm/lipstick colour and last for 2 hours tops.
Cheek performance: Hyacint is one of the sheerer colours, compared to the imfamous Turkish Rose. It still needs some blending to get it natural but it will last about 4 hours. Not my favourite for cheek colour. Turkish Rose has a medium coverage and Hyacint light-to-medium.

8. Becca Beach Tint Lip and Cheek

In contrast to the Becca above, this one is really long-lasting for both lips and cheek. Then again, it markets itself as a hybrid beach products that would suit surfer babes and swimming queens so that makes sense.
Lip performance: It is a gel-texture and feels a bit dryer when applied. However, it turns into a matte to velvet stain (I have Watermelon) that really last in a water-setting for a while. The coverage is medium but still quite natural. It smells really nice like a candied watermelon.
Cheek performance: This gel-like product spreads on light but can stills settle in a pore or scar so blending is needed. After that, it stays rather put and has a light to medium coverage without any shimmer. It looks quite natural. It market as a Beach product and they made quite the reasonable product for it.

9. Vapour Organic cheek/lip in Courtisan

Another newbie I will review in detail soon. Shortly:
Lip performance: Medium to medium/high coverage. It feels like a dryer lipstick (eg MAC or NARS) but that makes it quite longlasting. I do find, just like the other dryer lipstick types, that I need a smoother under this lipstick to make it appear more equal.
Cheek performance: high coverage and needs good blending due to the dryer texture. It stays on for about 5 hours before fading.

10. Kose Addiction in Revenge

My most expensive, but my ULTIMATE lip/cheek hybrid!
Lip performance: BRILLIANT! It is one of those velvety mattes that actually look good on me. Chanel makes a velvety matte lipstick as well, the Allure Velvet, but this one is even better in smoothing out the un-plumpness of the lips. The colour payoff is excellent: it lasted a vigourous excercise class and my lips were as corally pink afterwards.
Cheek performance: Just as amazing! The velvet texture that smooths out lips works brilliantly on cheeks as well and even without all the priming/foundation I can wear it without setting into that scar. And that is often what I like when wearing cream-cheek products, when I don't have tons of makeup on! It wears for 5 to 6 hours.

11. NARS Multiple (Beverly Hills)

The limited edition one: it's not as vibrant in colour as the other multiples but doesn't have that pesky glitter/shimmer thing going on either. I will discuss the texture of the Orgasm Multiple as well for review's sake
Lip performance: Beverly Hills is really sheer and smells somewhat alcoholy and gel-like. It dissapears in 5 minutes? Orgasm (or Copacabana) stays for about an hour or 2, but as discussed in tons of blogs: it's not a real lip-product and feels somewhat dry and doesn't plump up lips.
Cheek performance: Beverly Hills is sheerer and more gel-like than the regular Multiples, but I love the sheerness on cheeks for giving that supernatural but still visible change in colour. Similar as the gel-like texture of Becca's Beachtint, although this one glides better over the skin. The beachtint, in contrast, last longer.

Conclusion:
I already told you that the Kose Addiction in my favourite and I wish they came in tons of colours and half the price cheaper.  However, in the end I like them all for different reasons. Sometimes colour plays a great role too but I haven't discussed it today. Women like hybrid products for times we don't want to carry a lot of products a round or sometimes we want to colour-coordinate our lips to our cheeks. I don't think a hybrid lip/cheek product should be a hassle or too-much-an-effort to apply because I prefer my creamy blushers on a tinted moisturizer face or at least not too primed and powdery, otherwise I would have picked a powder blusher. So it has to have some ingredient inside that makes it easy to apply, but still longlasting and looking equal on both face an lips. That is a lot of things to demand and that's why I believe Kose Addiction did an excellent job: it's so travel-handy too.

Lipstick Queen oxymoron matte gloss in Minor Crisis

Today I will look at a product I have been lusting to have since it had been launched: Lipstick queen Oxymoron Matte Gloss. I was not able to buy it sooner, as it is a product which is hard to get over here. It is distibuted in the UK at the SpaceNK beauty branches, and it is also for sale for the American crowd at the Lipstick Queen website.

Since I do not live in either of those beautiful countries I was not able to get my greedy hands on this product. Well, I actually love going on short holidays to the UK, and when I am there I always seem to be extremely interested in everything beauty related. I had also bought some Lipstick Queen items in the past: for example the Saint Red lipstick and Saint Nude lipstick.

Thanks to the generosity of a beautiful London-woman named Yasumi, or glowchaser, I was able to have this beauty in my possession.

First, I was mesmerized by the packaging, or the drawings on the packaging. I love the Art-Deco style and its style also is reflected upon the package.

The back of the package describes Poppy's philosophy behind the product. Why it is named Oxymoron, what can you expect from this product, and so on..

The word 'incongruous' would have been a lovely word to appear on my TOEFL test I did last saturday.

I like the idea of a multipurpose lipgloss that you can use on your cheeks as well. I haven't tried it like that so far. It could break me out, the ingredients, I mean. So lets take a look at the ingredient list.

Mmm, I see some good ingredients (Jojoba oil, Shea Butter, Meadowfoam Oil, Advocado Oil) and some questionable ingredients (Butylparaben and Propylparaben).

Anyway, I am not an expert on cosmetic ingredients, so I will go on to show the pictures I made of the Matte lipgloss.

Awww, I had to harm my beautiful, virgin lipgloss with a lipbrush...

It came with a different brush than pictured. The brush that came with it was not that impressive, it was a bit stiff for applying lipgloss.
The colour is a deep mauvy rose. The next pictures have been made in (rare) sunlight, so it might seem a smidge darker than it actually is.

It looks really opaque on my pulse. However, on my lips it became indeed more transparent and glossy. I think this is the contradiction-part of the Oxymoron gloss. I was a bit afraid for the dense colour, but on my lips it looked really natural.

The first picture is made in the shadow. Sorry for the tilted picture (it is not that I have such unsymmetric lips in real life, LOL)

My own lipcolour is a mauvy red and the lipgloss enhances this colour and makes it a bit deeper.

The feel of the lipgloss is like a light lipstick. I love the balmy feeling it gives my lips, which is probably caused by the wonderful ingredients (all the natural oils). I would qualify this product to be more of a lipstick than a lipgloss.

My verdict is that I love this product, both the colour and texture. I would love to obtain the Honest Politician as well (don't you just love that name?). It looks more purply than Minor Crisis.

Or the Free Ride...It looks more like a peachy nude
Anyway, there are always enough reason to revisit the UK shopping paradise...LOL.

Tis the season for...red lips: part 2

The first part of the 'tis the season for...red lips'-edition already looked into the symbolism of the red lip, and I showed you some high end lipsticks that I really enjoy every now and then.

The second part will look at the midend and cheaper options I have.

The Clinique ones I have are quite glossy, which I love for a more toned down look. The first one I will be showing is the Clinique Colour Surge Butter shine lipstick in Cranberry Cream. I consider Clinique to be more of a midend brand on a price-scale from cheap to expensive.

Clinique Colour Surge Butter shine lipstick in Cranberry Cream- I love the bamboo form of the lipstick

Clinique Moisture Sheer lipstick in 05 Ruby Kiss- (yes, it is a tester I got in a swap extra)

I swatched the two cliniques and I compared them. First I want to discuss the similarities. As you can see, both are of a glossy texture and the colours look similar.

1. Butter shine Cranberry cream 2. Moisture Sheer in 05 Ruby Kiss

1. Butter shine Cranberry cream 2. Moisture Sheer in 05 Ruby Kiss

The difference is more subtle: I think the Moisture sheer lipstick has more sheerness and more of a glossy texture. The Cranberry Cream is indeed more of a red cranberry while the Ruby Kiss is a tad more berry-ish.

I love both colour as they are flattering for a neutral-leaning-to-cool toned NW 25 skintone. They are a good introduction to the red lip, because you can control the intensity of the colour. The slightly blue tones in the lipstick is a optic whitener for teeth: in other words, teeth look more white when wearing a lipstick with blue undertones, so that is a perk as well.

The next round of lipsticks I will show are the so-called cheapies. If you read a lot of beauty blogs, you probably have seen your share of NYX lipsticks. The round lipsticks from NYX are really cheap with prices from $1 to $2 online (available at Cherryculture.com and nonpareilboutique.com. Both stores have 20% discount codes right now: Cherryculture over here and Nonpareil here)

The NYX-es, or the Cheapies, are quite pigmented. They are excellent value for both the red lipstick-shy as the aficionado, as you can adjust the level of pigment on the way you apply it.

For a stain: press your finger on the lipstick and blot the pigment into your lips...tap tap tap...and there is a bit of a stain. You can always add a bit of clear lipgloss over it for a even sheerer and glossier mouth, or dab some lipbalm over it.

For a true red mouth: prep your lips by removing the flakies (lipscrub or wet washcloth), blot some eyecream onto your lips, apply a thin layer of concealer of a bit of foundation, line your lips with lipliner and colour your whole mouth with the same colour, apply lipstick with a lippencil, blot with a tissue, keep the tissue on your mouth and dot some powder over the tissue onto your lips, reapply your lipstick with the brush, blot again with a tissue, additionally...add some gloss in a clear or tinted colour.

Okay, lets show some action...the swatches:

1 Electra 2. Eros 3. Snowwhite

1 Electra 2. Eros 3. Snowwhite

Electra is a colour that I would call a true red or a red that caters for warm and cool skintones. Eros has looks more like a pinky orange. Snowwhite is a deeper red with more of a cranberry stain.

The last two pictures will show all of the lipsticks from the previous post and this post. It will give a good overview and shows which lipsticks are pigmented, the sheer ones and the glossy ones from each other. I combined the lipstick from part 1 and part 2:

1. Julie Hewett (JH) Gem Noir 2. JH Coco Noir 3. JH Film Noir 4. Lipstickqueen Saint Red 5. Lancome PS Kiss 6. Clinique butter shine Cranberry cream 7. Clinique Moisture sheer Ruby Kiss 8. NYX Electra 9. NYX Eros 10. NYX Snowwhite


1. Julie Hewett (JH) Gem Noir 2. JH Coco Noir 3. JH Film Noir 4. Lipstickqueen Saint Red 5. Lancome PS Kiss 6. Clinique butter shine Cranberry cream 7. Clinique Moisture sheer Ruby Kiss 8. NYX Electra 9. NYX Eros 10. NYX Snowwhite

So, I hope I could show you that red is not simply red...there is a great range of reds and there is probably a suitable red for everyone.

As you have seen, I have a great range of reds. Does this collection keep me satisfied? Yes and no...

Yes, I love my collection and they suit my skintone well...and No, because colours keep me fascinated. For example, Lunasol launched a new line of reds this autumn, called Lunasol Full Glamour Lips S and they look simply gorgeous. I have already been lusting over the 03 Fresh Red, which I saw on Haruhhi's blog over here and Kathy's blog has some swatches as well over here...they look really lushious, but they will be high end for sure (think $36-ish).