Category Archives: Reviews

Too Faced Unicorn Highlight Sticks (Review & Swatches)

February 28, 2018Makeup, Reviews, SwatchesToo FacedChelle

Too Faced Unicorn Highlighting Sticks

While it was hard to narrow down exactly which items piqued my interest the most in the Too Faced Life’s A Festival collection, it had to be said that the Unicorn Highlighting Sticks were definitely near the top of that list!

The Unicorn Highlighting Sticks come in two shades – Unicorn Dreams (golden rose) and Unicorn Tears (opalescent blue) and both are touted as having a pearlescent gloss finish. (I would say yes to the pearlescent and no to the gloss – which is a good thing! I don’t want these to be glossy on my cheeks!) They also come with 7 grams/0.24 ounces of product, which is a substantial amount.

Too Faced Unicorn Highlighting Sticks - with unicorn horn bullets! — Too Faced Unicorn Highlighting Sticks – with unicorn horn bullets!

The most fun aspect of these is that the bullets are shaped like unicorn horns! I love that knotted/rope-type twist to them – it’s really cute! It’s also not awkward or detrimental towards application, which makes it a unique twist on an otherwise standard cream highlighting stick.

Too Faced Unicorn Highlighting Stick Swatches

Too Faced Unicorn Highlighting Sticks - swatched — Too Faced Unicorn Highlighting Sticks – swatched

Swatched out, you can see their pigment and colouring is strong, but not over the top – which is perfect for a highlighter. I was expecting Unicorn Tears to appear more like their lipstick of the same name, but it’s really more of a blue tinted highlighter without the additional purple that the lipstick has. Unicorn Dreams is gorgeous – a deep pink with a golden glow. While both highlighters have a shimmer/sheen to them, neither of them have any particles of glitter.

On the cheeks, Unicorn Dreams is easily my favourite. It was creamy and easy to apply (I swiped it on to my cheeks straight from the bullet and blended it out with my fingertips). The colour is BEAUTIFUL! It’s not a shade I would normally reach for, but I found myself completely enamoured with its highlighting prowess on my cheek!

Oddly enough, Unicorn Tears didn’t wow me as much as Unicorn Dreams did. While I like the colour, I did find it was a bit more subtle than I was expecting, especially given how intense the original arm swatch appeared. I felt like the texture on Unicorn Tears was a bit stiffer and harder to blend out. It’s beautiful, but it just wasn’t as impressive as Unicorn Dreams.

Final Thoughts

Unicorn Dreams is the clear winner between these two for me. I love the golden pink hue that it adds to my cheeks, and I feel like the highlighting capabilities are stronger as well. Unicorn Tears might be best suited to someone who wants to try out “off colour” highlighters, but doesn’t want anything too bold. For me though… I’ll definitely be sticking with Unicorn Dreams!

The Too Faced Unicorn Highlighting Sticks can be purchased at sephora.ca for $39.00 USD each or on sephora.com for $28 USD.

If you want to see the bulk of the Too Faced Life’s A Festival collection in action, look no further than this video!

The products featured in this post were sent to me for consideration. Post contains affiliate links.

VIDEO: Too Faced Life’s A Festival Collection Try On

February 27, 2018Reviews, Tutorials, YouTubeToo FacedChelle

Bite Beauty Prismatic Pearl Multisticks (Review & Swatches)

February 23, 2018Makeup, Reviews, SwatchesBite BeautyChelle

Bite Beauty Prismatic Pearl Multisticks

A few months back, Bite Beauty launched their Prismatic Pearl Multisticks and I was super intrigued – I mean just look at the boxes! They’re rose-gold and holographic, who isn’t in to that??

While I was not pulled into the original release of Bite‘s Multisticks, I have to say that this range definitely appealed to me a great deal more. While the original lineup was all cream and matte formulas, this new launch is chockful of shimmering shades with definite duochrome edges to them. The Multisticks are intended for use basically everywhere – your lips, your cheeks, even your eyelids!

The shade range is fairly interesting too – while there are the usual pinks and roses, there’s a gorgeous blue-brown colour (Peacock Pearl) and a really neat white/clear base with pink shimmer (Blush Pearl) that really took my breath away.

Bite Beauty Prismatic Pearl Multisticks Swatches

Bite Beauty Prismatic Pearl Multisticks - swatched — Bite Beauty Prismatic Pearl Multisticks – swatched

Swatched out you can see there’s a lot of texture and reflection to the shades. They are definitely all super saturated with colour and have a lot of pearlized particles.

Pink Pearl is a soft pearlized shade that’s one of the most wearable on the lips in this collection.

Pink Pearl also makes an absolutely beautiful soft highlight.

Peacock Pearl is really neat looking on the lips, but a little bit patchy overall.

But uh… don’t wear this on your cheeks if you’re my skin tone.

Also… don’t wear this on your eyes. This is creasing within 2 minutes of application, and it’s on top of double-primed eyelids and powder shadow that, as you can see, is not creased on the other side of my lid!

Blush Pearl is ghastly on me. It’s chunky, patchy and just a mess.

Not bad as a cheek highlight though!

Oyster Pearl is easily my favourite. This is such a neat sheer gun-metal colour!

Bit less reflect on the cheeks, but still pretty.

Rose Pearl is a weird shade and I feel the colour doesn’t really come off very well on the lips because it moves around a lot.

I was expecting more of a blush out of this one, and there is some colour tint to it.

My Thoughts

Ugh.

I absolutely despise these. I tried to keep my commentary kind of succinct and neutral above to describe the product, but I have to tell you these are absolute garbage in my eyes.

On the lips they are a gritty, chunky, patchy mess. They never feel comfortable since they’re always moving around (you can literally feel the bits moving if you squish your lips together AND it leaves horrible clusters on the inner corners of your lips). They almost dry down… but not quite…. leaving you with dehydrated lips and a chunky mess. It just FEELS wretched.

On the cheeks… I’ll admit that the overall sheen in some of the photos I posted above is quite beautiful, but they just don’t dry down. I cannot handle having a sticky cheek for an entire day, so that makes it completely unwearable as a highlighter to me.

On the eyes… another no. VIOLENTLY NO! Since they’re chunky and don’t dry down, you’re going to end up with severe creasing in a matter of minutes. And to make matters even worse, it’s STICKY. So your eyelid ends up sticking to itself in the most unflattering way. Chunky, creased and sticky? I seriously cannot think of a worse eye look.

In short, the only way these Multisticks are wearable is by using them as a lip topper on top of another lipstick. On their own these things are completely unwearable on every facet of my face that these are claimed to be made for. They’re uncomfortable (seriously, that grittiness on the lips is just awful) and awkward to wear.

Overall, I find this launch to be so incredibly disappointing for Bite Beauty. I *love* the brand and wear their lipsticks all the time! But this useless product was so bad that I really couldn’t recommend these to anyone unless you’re doing something editorial and won’t be wearing it for the whole day. Blech.

The Bite Beauty Prismatic Pearl Multisticks can be purchased on sephora.ca for $28 CAD each or on sephora.com for $24 USD.

The products featured in this post were sent to me for consideration. This post contains affiliate links.

Wet n Wild MegaGlo Hello Halo Liquid Highlighters (Review & Swatches)

February 21, 2018Makeup, Reviews, SwatchesWet n WildChelle

Wet n Wild MegaGlo Hello Halo Liquid Highlighters

Although the revamped Wet n Wild eyeshadows got all of the hype from their recent launch, there’s another set of products that crept in that definitely didn’t get enough attention! Say hello to the MegaGlow Hello Halo Liquid Highlighters!

The seven shades of the Hello Halo liquid highlighters come encased in a glass bottle (yes, you read that right!), an absolutely massive doe-foot wand (not dissimilar in size proportionally to the wand in tarte’s Shape Tape concealer) and houses a whopping 15 ml/0.5 ounces of product (which is half the size of typical bottle of foundation!).

The applicator is a huge doefoot wand. — The applicator is a huge doefoot wand

Wet n Wild indicates that these highlighters have a “hydrating formula [that] is infused with powerhouses like Murumuru Seed Butter, Grapeseed Oil, and Vitamin E to help smooth out the skin’s texture”. They also note that they have a shimmering texture, but honestly that makes me think glittery – which these are not. They have more of a sheen than they do a true shimmer.

Wet n Wild MegaGlo Hello Halo Highlighter Swatches

Swatched out side by side you can see that there is a huge array of colour variety amongst the shades. Ranging from rosy and pale to deeper and more golden tones – I am hopeful in saying that I feel like the shades represented in this range will cover a wide variety of skintones (and I’m mostly looking at the deeper skin tones here – I’m really happy to see some intensely rich colours!).

I found these worked best when I dabbed two dots along my cheekbone and then patted the product out with my fingers. Oddly, the colour doesn’t actually come through as much as it does in swatches. The product ends up being low on pigmentation but high on sheen (for the most part).

Halo Gorgeous really surprised me. There is a bit of a pink sheen to it, but I was expecting to have a lot more of the pinky-rosyness coming through.

Halographic is a pearl-white with a pink reflect – this one is definitely a duochrome!

Halo, Goodbye is the first one I ever tried and the very first one I fell in love with! Beautiful, easy to wear sheen.

Rosy and Ready, surprisingly, has a lot more colour payoff than Halo Gorgeous.

Guilded Glow is an easy to wear beige-peach on me.

Go With The Glow is definitely not my shade for a highlighter, but I could potentially get some use out of it as a bronzer if I really wanted. Really though – this is for far deeper skintones and I’m happy to see that!

Goddess Glow is has more of a golden glow which works… but is perhaps a few shades deeper than I’d necessarily gravitate towards.

Final Thoughts

Although Wet n Wild offers a huge colour range in their Hello Halo highlighters, I don’t feel like you fundamentally need all of them. While the breadth of undertones is there and that’s wonderful, I think you could be fairly happy with picking up one or two shades that appeal to you and sticking with those.

Ones that really stood out to me are Halo, Goodbye – it’s just a really easy to wear every day for my skin tone – and Halographic because it’s a bit more unique with it’s pearly-white to pink duochrome.

I’m super impressed with the low price point and the glass bottles – it feels like luxe packaging, but it’s wrapped up in a tiny price tag!

The Wet n Wild Hello Halo Liquid Highlighters are available for $5.99 USD on ulta.com.

The products featured in this post were sent to me for consideration. Post contains affiliate links.

Kat Von D Studded Kiss Crème Lipstick in OG Lolita (Review & Swatches)

February 14, 2018Makeup, Reviews, SwatchesKat Von DChelle

Kat Von D Star Studded Kiss Crème Lipstick

In early January 2018, Kat Von D relaunched her Star Studded Kiss Crème Lipsticks. Longtime users of these lipsticks may notice not much physical difference between the relaunch and the old ones, and this is primarily down to the fact that this is a re-formulation of the line.

I was sent the shade OG Lolita from the Kat Von D Star Studded Kiss Crème Lipstick range from Influenster.

Influenster, for those unaware, is a web site where anyone can sign up to receive free product to try out. You can sign up here if you’re interested.

The lipstick packaging reminds me soooo much of the belts I used to wear back in the early 00s. (And honestly, it’s making me a little bit nostalgic for them!) The packaging is solid, but not overly weighty. It has a nice snap shut with an inner mechanism that ensures the studs on the outside of the packaging always line up when the lipstick is snapped closed. It’s a small touch, but a very neat one nonetheless.

The lipstick bullet has the KVD logo embossed on it and the lipstick itself has a faintly sweet smell – a little bit like vanilla, and a little like caramel.

The entire range of lipstick is vegan and cruelty free – which is always a huge point for KVD – she likes to ensure her products are harm-free for animals. The lipstick range also promises to be a high-pigment matte finish with long-wearability. (Although I can’t find the length of wear stated anywhere.)

Kat Von D Star Studded Kiss Crème Lipstick in OG Lolita - swatched — Kat Von D Star Studded Kiss Crème Lipstick in OG Lolita – swatched

OG Lolita is described as a chestnut-rose shade and I’d say that’s the perfect description for the shade. It’s opaque in one swatch, but I did find the application was a little bit stiff as the bullet is quite firm.

Kat Von D Star Studded Kiss Crème Lipstick in OG Lolita - swatched on lips — Kat Von D Star Studded Kiss Crème Lipstick in OG Lolita – swatched on lips

On the lips it does feel pillow-y and soft, but also kind of thick to a certain degree. The colour is gorgeous though and it was very easy to apply. It wore well for six hours without needing to be touched up.

Final Thoughts

Although I can’t truly find much to fault with this lipstick, I just never really fell in love with it! I can only attribute that to the fact that it felt rather thick upon application which just made me feel a little bit uncomfortable with the lipstick. That being said… the shade is beautiful. The pigmentation was excellent and it did wear for a really long time. I even found that the thickness of the product died down after about two hours, which is really good… but for whatever reason… I’m just not in love with this formula. I know I won’t be reaching for this lipstick after I’m done reviewing it, so I guess you could say this one just wasn’t for me.

That being said… if my descriptions of the product are something you’re interested in, I would definitely go check out the product in stores at Sephora!

The Kat Von D Star Studded Kiss Crème Lipsticks are available in a wide array of shades at sephora.ca for $23 CAD each or on sephora.com for $19 USD each.

The product featured in this post was sent to me by Influenster for review. Post may contain affiliate links. #StuddedKiss