Earlier this year, Clinique launched their Blend It Yourself (BIY) Pigment Drops – a pure pigment product that is intended to be mixed with your moisturizer to create varying levels of coverage.
Clinique indicates that “one drop of creates sheer cover[age]. Two or three, a flawless finish”. The more drops you use, the thicker your coverage will be! The BIY pigment will take on the finish of the moisturizer you use it with, so you can expect a more radiant coverage with a radiant moisturizer and/or one with a sunscreen base, or a more matte look with a mattifying moisturizer.
One thing most people don’t realize is just how small the bottle is! Because this product is strictly a pigment, it’s lacking in all of the other “stuff” that would usually fill out a foundation bottle to the normal one ounce/30 ml size. These bottles do contain 0.34 ounces of product, which is the third of a size of a regular size of foundation. So it’s not THAT tiny – it just LOOKS really tiny.
I have three of the shades starting from the lightest BIY 105 through BIY 115. The shot above is the product just after I’d tipped it out onto my arm (after shaking it vigorously to mix the pigment). You can see just how liquid the pigments are because they were dripping down the underside of my arm very quickly!
Smoothed out, you can see the colouring a lot better in the pigment.
I ended up mixing the pigment with Clinique‘s Moisture Surge moisturizer. More often than not, you need far less pigment from the bottle than you think you do. Every time I used it I was taken aback by just how much the pigment spreads throughout the moisturizer.
Shot above is with no makeup on for comparison.
And this shot is a split view using BIY 105 (which is slightly pale for me, I’ve since started using BIY 110) and the Moisture Surge Moisturizer.
- On the left side (as you’re viewing this) is a single drop mixed with moisturizer. You can see how it keeps the coverage of the BIY product very, very sheer.
- On the right is three drops mixed in with moisturizer. The coverage becomes a lot denser, and I’d argue to say almost too much since I’m looking a little ghostly.
Final Thoughts
I really like the blend it yourself aspect of this product as I think it’s a fun way to customize how much coverage you have. For me, however, I feel this is best used when you create a lightly tinted moisturizer instead of trying to build up the coverage to get a full coverage foundation. I found one drop mixed with the amount of moisturizer I would need to cover my whole face was the way I preferred to wear it. When I tried for full coverage I felt like it looked like the product sat on my face instead of sinking into it. (And really, if you’re going to be buying a product like this, I truly doubt you’re going for full coverage – you’re more likely to go buy a full coverage foundation!)
Best way to apply it? Use your hands! I plop a dollop of whatever moisturizer I’m using that day on the back of my hand, add a drop of BIY and then mix it together with my fingertips. I’d then smear it on my face as I would any regular morning moisturizer. When done this way, my makeup blends nicely on top and you get a really nice natural finish. It’s not a ton of coverage, granted, but that’s how I prefer to wear product on my face during the summer!
The Clinique Blend It Yourself Pigment Drops can be purchased on ulta.com for $33 USD (us Promo Code: MAGICLINKS350 for $3.50 off $15+ spend!) or on beautyboutique.ca for $44 CAD.
The products featured in this post were sent to me for consideration. Post may contain affiliate links.
