Shake it off, Sara. You’ve done this for years. It’s just a blog, it doesn’t bite.
It’s been a while! My last post was a bunch of rubbish from October, and on Sunday we’ll be leaving the hellscape of 2017. I have no excuse. Actually, I have lots! No one’s here to read them, though. You’re here because I was powerless to resist the allure of Fenty Beauty’s colourful lineup of matte lipsticks with their silly names and Alissa Ashley’s honestly award worthy video on them.
It’s what kicked me back into blogging gear. No one wanted to hear another person’s thoughts on their Anastasia Subculture palette (sitting in my drafts in bullet point form). A whole new lineup of lipstick, though? From someone who delights in the strangest of shades? Released internationally on the same day with a very limited PR run? That’s an arena I can stick my head into.
I’ve been working absurd hours, but I used the few hours of sleep I’d accumulated to limit myself to three shades. I was reasonably confident in the products – since my initial Fenty review, I’ve had great success with a split pan highlighter and multiple glosses (their universal gloss and a glittery christmas variation), and have become pretty confident in the brand. Nothing lures me in faster than a brightly coloured line of lipsticks, so this was the perfect launch for me. Almost all of the colours called to me – I had to put back a deep blue that didn’t seem quite opaque and a deep brown called PMS. I turned down a lipstick called PMS. After a lengthy decision making process, I ended up with colours from all over the spectrum.
The formula, overall, is stellar – with a caveat to expectations. If you’re expecting the longevity of a Mac retro matte or a liquid lipstick, with a name like Mattemoiselle, that’s not what this is. There’s a heavy emphasis on how these products make the lips look, and so there is no clinging to dry patches or skipping, there is a lot of creaminess. They are very honestly a creamy matte, more reminiscent of some newer Urban Decay comfort matte lipsticks or the creamier shades of Mac mattes rather than a retro matte or a Melt lipstick, for example. There is some inconsistency from shade to shade that I will touch on, and that I picked up with shades I didn’t purchase, but colours that are traditionally prone to skipping and tugging at the very least layer with ease. I was surprised at how plump and hydrated my lips looked in all of the shades, despite being anything but right now. Wear varies across shades, and the creamiest of shades have shorter longevity than the slightly waxier ones. The girls at Revelist were disappointed with the sacrifice of longevity to the traditional formula, but I think that the new age of all matte liquid all the time has skewed our expectations dramatically. This feels, to me, like how a good lipstick should feel. It looks nice and wears well, and you get the things from it that you lose in a liquid matte (comfort, wearing away without looking like the inside of your lip is crusting off).
The packaging is fine, I guess, but feels flimsy as anything with the metallic finish that shows any fingerprint you even think about making. They are also tiny, tiny, tiny things. It’s not that they contain a small amount of product – they’re 1.7g to a 3g Mac lipstick (obviously they are cruelty free, vs. Mac and their record in that respect), and AU$28 to the Mac’s AU$36, which isn’t the exact conversion, but it makes sense. It’s more that the actual lipstick borders on child sized. It’s nice for my little lips, but it would make for slow application on people with bigger lips. It’s also rounded, which can make it more difficult to get precision on the upper lip.
Ready yourself for my traditional terrible swatches.
s1ngle
Almost all of the near-nude lipsticks that I own are liquid formulas, and recently on my days off/bold eye days, I’ve been feeling a little lower maintenance. On people with deeper skin, this looks less peachy, but I found myself drawn to just how smoothly this applied. My new silver/purple hair is also giving me more range with peach tones and I own very few of them. This is possibly the best of the lipsticks in application, despite being the lightest.
One of the Boyz
I have purple hair now, so I wanted to try lilac lipstick again. This one went on, again, very smoothly. It felt almost like a cream lipstick, even as it sat on my lips. These colours are not the most flattering on me, but I don’t really care.
Midnight Wasabi
Now, I own a lot of green lipsticks. As soon as I saw the pictures of this, I knew it was a pretty unique shade. I’d call it a muted forest green? It’s the stiffest of the three to apply, but it also lasts really well. It does also require two layers for even application, because it does tend to disperse from the upper lip.
Bonus photo of Midnight Wasabi after five hours of night time wear – no eating, but plenty of drinking. Ignore the rest of the makeup, which had been holding on for more like 14 hours at this point.
I’m pretty pleased with that, for a creamy, comfortable lipstick.
Lipstick for Losers 