Eyeliner - reviews and routine

Some things (and brands) I am very loyal to.  Eyeliner products are not one of those things.  I am always on the lookout for a better, easier, more solid colored, less smudgy eyeliner.  There was a time when I tired of pencils looking kind of, well, pencil-ish - by which I mean unsaturated, jagged lines that fade and smudge and basically disappear by lunchtime.   I thought liquid eyeliner was the answer.  But while I realize there are some looks that cannot be achieved with anything else, and while I realize it looks amazing and glides easily onto some lids, I've had to embrace the fact that liquid liner is not for me.  I don't know if I just don't have a steady enough hand or if my eyes are too sensitive (flinchy), but even with short brushstrokes I couldn't get my eyes done in under 3-5 minutes which is way more than I care to spend on just lining.  I did loads of research and testing of various products and techniques.  I found the drugstore brand applicator tips just impossible.  You get what you pay for.  So I purchased the favorably reviewed Lancome Artliner and Smashbox Limitless Liquid pen and grabbed samples at every opportunity.  I ended up returning everything that wasn't a sample.  I'm not the type to hang on to a $30 eyeliner just to throw it away years later.  My favorites were the Stila Stay All Day pen and the Smashbox pen for pigment, "ease" of use, and long-wear/smudgeproofness.  So if you're into this stuff, that's what I'd recommend.

Upon giving up on liquid, I tried tightlining with gel.  Not great at first because I had the wrong brush.  I used Bobbi Brown's Ultra Fine Eyeliner Brush which is fine for over-lash lining with powder liner, but ridiculous for gel.  It just leaves a faint, too-thick, unevenly pigmented mess.  The holy grail for eyeliner brushes, particularly for gel liner that you're stamping under the lashes, is Laura Mercier's Flat Eye Liner brush. 

No joke, this thing changed my life, importantly, and probably forever.  So now, after applying a base cream shadow or tinted primer I do a pencil line above my lashes in dark brown or black.  My current pencils in both colors is  MUFE aqua eyes because I like how easily it glides on and the color choices are amazing.   But I'm not married to these pencils.  I think I'm going to try Dior next.  Then I do a tightline to my top lid in bobbi brown's gel liner in black with Laura Mercier's Magical Perfection Liner Brush (same one as above, I just renamed it).  The BB gel is the only one I've tried.  Because why mess with a good thing?  It's a long-wear formula, it goes on easy, has a super-pigmented inky black and as long as you just make a line and don't spread it on like margarine on toast it will not stamp down onto the lower lids.  I've tried the margarine approach and it does transfer a little, but very little.  It actually is a good technique if you want a very subtle smudge of color along the bottom water line. 

 

It only takes a minute for the whole procedure because both products are easy to apply.  And the effect is really dramatic...and yet natural.  It looks like your lashes go on forever and really defines the eyes without looking like an art project close up.  When I want to look super sexy I add a stripe of a Laura Mercier caviar stick basically right on top of my liner (because the stick is a little wider than eyeliner it extends above it a smidge making for a sultry ombre look.  I love these sticks.  I have one in Amethyst and one in Sugar Frost and would love to get them in Cocoa and one of the grays.  I have only ever used them to enhance the eyeline (and the inside corner with Sugar Frost - careful with this one it's kind of glittery) but they can be smudged into submission in the creases and corners too. 

 

As an aside, a lot of critiques of the MUFE aqua eyes line (and tons of pencils for that matter, high end or not) complain about staying power.  I think eye pencils, like a lot of types of makeup, are one of those categories that is "only makeup" so to speak.  Liquid foundation falls into this category too.  No matter how well intentioned the formula, the stuff will come off.  You can set pencils up to succeed by applying them on a primer- or base-covered eyelid rather than directly on oily or moisturized lids, but regardless, it is not a tatoo.  I hold gel and liquid to a slightly higher standard but in my experience, pencil is categorically failable.

Other favorite pencils:
Smashbox Limitless Eye Liner - great pigment, not as smooth as the 24/7 or aqua eyes. 
Clinique's Cream Shaper for eyes - great value, decent pigment, a little dry.  I have a hunch that they might be discontinuing this soon as it's no longer sold at Sephora and they have so many new liners on deck.   

Foundation brush challenge: day 4: Shiseido Perfect Foundation Brush review

As I mentioned earlier in the week, I like the compact design of this brush and was eager to try something so cutting edge.  But what it really is is a stippling brush.  The application is thus full-coverage, fully built, and while it does require less product than a sponge, it gives you a fully made up look.  It's hard to tell from the pictures online, including the one above, but if you're looking down at this brush from a bird's eye view the bristles are in a perfectly round formation, that is, it's a thick round collection of bristles razed off at a slight angle, like someone cut off a ponytail (I swear I will start posting videos soon, I'm realizing as I go that product reviews require either a lot more pictures or a video).  There are techniques for making the look a little more sheer that can be found on YouTube but I found these a little arduous and not very effective.  The technique requires you to move your wrist in a rotating motion as you glide the brush around.  The stroke is still pretty short and I can imagine getting carpal tunnel by the time I'm done with half my face.  The problem with this brush is not with the short strokes, it does a great job at that kind of stippling application, the problem is that you don't really have the option of doing longer strokes when you're working with the tips of the bristles rather than having some control over the angle you work at as you do with the typical flat and tapered foundation brushes.  The mandatory short strokes means not only a heavier look without the option of going more sheer but also that the whole process takes longer.  Even if I had been looking for a full-coverage look, I didn't like the lack of control.  The brush drags if you try to force the strokes and you feel a little trapped into short quick movements which, if you're covering your whole face, is tedious and time consuming. 

Pros:

• Soft, quality bristles, great resistance and concentration of bristles for stippling.
• Compact eye-catching design
• Doesn't absorb tons of product into the bristles so you don't waste product and it's easy to get the product out when you're cleaning.

Cons:

• Short stippling strokes are pretty much all you have the option of, even the rotating sheerer stroke technique doesn't give you the control you probably want for an every day foundation brush.
• Takes FOREVER to dry so if you're using liquid foundation and washing the brush every day this might not work for you.

Bottomline: Quality brush for what it does but not the every-day, all-over foundation brush I am looking for. 

Product Review: Me Smooth

I. Hate. Body. Hair.  Hate it.  Hate it on me.  Hate it on him (a little is ok, but seriously, not a requirement and I'm not offended by males who shave or trim body parts other than their faces).  I shave everything every other day without exception even in the winter except on the weekends when maybe I let it go two days.  All this ridiculousness is costing me precious morning minutes.  It's hard enough to get out the door as I have 100% of the childcare duties in the morning - I would love to get back the hour or so per week that I spend shaving.  Especially because minutes in the morning seem to be worth more than minutes at any other time of day for some reason.  I had considered professional laser hair removal before but the expense and formality of it scared me off.  After all, I don't have a hair problem.  I have light, wispy hair (darker on my legs), no facial hair problems, I don't even wax my eyebrows because tweezers once a week is more than enough.  But I am human and I do have hair.  And I want to be smooth at all times.  So when I saw the Me Smooth on Sephora and it's stellar ratings, I considered the benefits of an at-home treatment.  My initial thoughts - probably if you stick to it it will save you money over professional treatments.  Will it be permanent?  Judging from the manufacturer's inserts, probably not, but it will probably save you a lot shaving time.  Particularly if you're a "good candidate" - light skin with dark hair, from my cursory research, although the Me Smooth supposedly works on all skin types.  I won't be able to test that claim.  I'm as white as it gets.  It's also nice to be able to do something as private as hair removal in the privacy of your own home.  Not to mention the convenience of not having to make appointments and drive somewhere.  The system isn't cheap - I paid $399 plus tax and every cartridge refill is $50.  But I hey, I have a job and if this thing means I only have to shave once a month or less, It'll be more than worth it.  I went for it.

Like I said, the reviews on Sephora.com were good, but I noticed that a lot of them were written as soon as the purchaser took the thing out of the box.  The reviews were basically reviews of the purchaser's excitement rather than of how well the system works.  People liked the large window of the "laser zapper" wand and they didn't like the placement of the power button because it's easy to accidentally turn off mid-treatment (this turns out to be really annoying but not a deal breaker).  They also like that it says that it works on all skin types (but does it really?).  And it's painless and easy (but does it work?).  One or two people said it really did what it said and was worth the money.  So to settle all my questions I'm going to do my own review, I'll set out the first few and last few treatments in excruciating detail for those who are interested.  If you just want the bottom line, you can skip to the last paragraph.    

First treatment 7/8.

I assembled the wand and followed the instructions to power up the machine, which are ridiculously easy.  If you somehow lost the instructions you'd probably be fine.  I did a test on low as the instructions recommend.  No irritation. So I went forth and did a medium treatment.  I guided the wand up and down my legs, bikini area, and under arms slowly and methodically, making sure to get every inch.  I tried to go in a continuous motion as instructed but i was being so meticulous that I felt compelled to stop and let the flash happen before moving again.  The instructions aren't totally clear on this point anyway.  They say move the wand as you would a razor, you don't need to stamp...but should you pause?  I typically do.  The wand basically flashes and clicks simultaneously every second or so as you move across your skin.  The flashes are seriously bright.  The brightness is probably my number one complaint about the machine.  I wore sunglasses and tried to look away the whole time and I still got blinded quite a few times.  I'm not sure why it wouldn't be feasible to provide shields so the user doesn't get flashed in the face 2,000 times per treatment (disclaimer: I'm not actually sure what the average flashes per treatment are, I was too involved in the RH of OC to count, I'm sure there is a statistic out there on the interwebs).   Aside from my own annoyance at the flashes I was sure I was going to get a knock on my door from the neighbors wondering if there was some silent alarm going off inside my house, or a police car parked out front.  I was sitting next to a sliding glass door and I'm pretty sure you could see these flashes from space. 

The other complaint I have is how long the treatments take.  As advertized, it takes "just minutes!" to remove all your hair. Forever.  Or at least that's the implication.  In reality, it took forever to slide that thing all over my parts and then, re-reading the instructions, I realized I had to do the same thing 3-4 times!!  In one sitting?  This could take hours.  And it pretty much did.  About two hours.  This will definitely not save time over shaving in the short run.  And then you have to do that 7 weeks in a row.  And once a month after that.  So if you're contemplating this purchase, be sure you have the stamina to stick with it long term.  The price tag was sufficient motivation for me to use it. 

Second treatment 7/15. 

As an initial matter, my hair kept growing during the first week.  Part of me thinks it's thinner but that might be all in my head.  It's only been one treatment after all.  The idea is that different hair follicles grow on different cycles and so if you do a weekly zap session for several weeks, you're bound to get all of them at the right stage.  But just doing it once will make very very little difference. 

I started the treatment on my legs on medium this time.  Since it didn't hurt I tried it on high and it was fine for my legs but got a little "zappy" as I neared the inside of my knee and the bikini line.  But still tolerable.  I'm one of those people that wonders if things work when they're not hard/painful enough. As I was playing around with the low/med/high settings this time I noticed that the flashes came very fast on the low setting and gradually got slower (and more intense) as I changed to the high setting.  As I was bound and determined to keep the setting on high, the slower flashes made for a very, very long treatment.  It lasted over an hour to do my legs three times.  and that was just my legs.  It was getting to be so long that I decided from now on to stagger my legs treatments and my bikini/underarms treatments.  I would have been there all night if I had tried to do everything.  And probably would have burned out the mechanism.  It was really hot by the end of the session. 

Mid August

I have dutifully done Monday leg treatments and Wednesday underarm/bikini treatments for the full seven weeks.  I don't have to shave my legs between treatments.  My underarms are getting to that point and don't have that in-between stubble that seems to grow out 24 hrs after shaving.  That means shaving once a week with much smoother skin in previously hair prone areas.  It's pretty miraculous.  I am very smooth.  I am going to give it about two more weekly treatments and then do a review one month after that (apparently, after about 7-10 weekly treatments you can move to the more leisurely once-a-month frequency).  So mid-October (where is my life going?!).   Bottom line so far is that this thing delivers on smoothness and reducing shaving sessions.  Whether it has long-term effects as remarkable remains to be seen but I am hopefull.  On the price factor, it costs a lot.  Not just the $400 or so for the machine (i think you can get it cheaper on @maz0n, but also the $50 per cartridge.  I am going through about 1.5 cartridges per treatment.  I am very meticulous though, I'm not saying this is a necessary consumption but I want this thing to work, darnit.  Others might get great results with less time and fewer cartridges.  Stay tuned.