Mascara : Beauty and Fashion Tech

Long Lashes with L’Oreal Telescopic Mascara

L’Oreal Telescopic Mascara has just about everything I want in a mascara: A little brush that is long and thin, rubbery bristles, yet a wand that doesn’t bend, and a great formulation.

I got incredible length with this mascara, with no clumping when used carefully. However, do wipe that wand carefully and go slow, because the formula will clump a bit if not completely cautious. This is all about length and isn’t so much about volume, so if you want that, look for a different type of mascara with a thicker and fatter brush.

Overall it is a really nice mascara. Retail is around $9 at most drugstores and big box retailers.

Comparison Shop for L’Oreal Cosmetics

Popularity: 6% [?]

Today Only: Buy a Limited First Edition Lancome Oscillation Mascara

Lancome is releasing a vibrating mascara in December. But you can buy a limited first edition of it today only (July 31, 2008) at select stores. Visit the Lancome Website for details.

Supposedly this can also be ordered through Sephora, but when I checked a few minutes ago, it was not available and it was unclear whether the item was sold out or not placed up for sale yet. It could be ordered on the Lancome site though.

I also heard this morning on Sirius Satellite Cosmo Radio, that they would be giving some away throughout the morning.

Popularity: 9% [?]

Try Seven Mascaras With Sephora Lash Stash

Here is a great way to try out seven mascaras for the price of one.

Sephora Brand The Lash Stash is $50 worth of top selling mascara samples for $28. The kit includes:

0.14 oz Benefit A Little Bit BADgal Lash in Black, a 0.02 oz Blinc Kiss Me Mascara in Black, a 0.15 oz LORAC Publicity Stunt Lashes in Black, a 0.12 oz Smashbox Bionic Mascara in Black, a 0.24 oz Stila Multi-Effect Mascara in Black, a 1.0 oz Sephora Brand Lash Plumper in Black, and a 0.17 oz Too Faced Lash Injection in Black.

Could be a nice way to find the perfect mascara before paying full price!

Popularity: 15% [?]

New Tech Spinning Mascara: Spinlash

When I first heard of SpinLash Mascara I was a bit skeptical. How could a spinning brush possibly be easy to use and not create a mess? I kept envisioning little specks of mascara being flung onto the mirror, or worse, my face! I also have to say that if you browse the blogs on this one, you will see mixed reactions. Some people are not really keen on this product. But when I tried one, I loved the thing!

SpinLash is a battery operated rotating mascara brush. It comes with its own adequate mascara, but it really shines when used with your favorite brand. It doesn’t really “spin” in the sense of fast rotation. Instead, it very slowly rotates, so all those fears of flying mascara can be erased. The bristles of the brush are quite fine and rubbery, something that I think works particularly well. The result for me using SpinLash was very evenly applied mascara and lashes with great definition.

One downside is that SpinLash doesn’t appear to have a replaceable battery, so when it dies, a new purchase is required. But I suppose that unless religiously cleaned, it would be ready to be replaced by then anyway.

Spinlash retails at around $15 and can be found in various drugstores, big box retailers, and online.

Popularity: 13% [?]

Review: Lumene Blueberry Curl Mascara

I have been pretty fond of the Lumene products I have tried. Now they add a mascara to my favorites list.

Lumene Blueberry Curl Mascara contains blueberry seed oil to condition the lashes, while the brush has a flat side to help press the lashes into a curl form. The brush is on the smaller and thinner side (my preference) and it provides great definition to the lashes.

The mascara coats wonderfully and I have had no issues with clumping. Instead, I simply get long, nicely defined lashes with Lumene’s mascara. As for curling, I can get it to curl some, but honestly, I think that pre-curling with an eyelash curler is always the best option. I don’t love this mascara for its curing factor, I love it for the well defined, clump free lashes that it provides.

Bottom line: Lumene has another winner with their Blueberry Curl Mascara! Lumene products are available at CVS stores.

Popularity: 7% [?]

Review: New Sally Hansen Natural Beauty Cosmetics Inspired by Carmindy

Sally Hansen Natural Beauty has released a wonderful full line of cosmetics “inspired by” Carmindy from TLC’s show What Not to Wear. I am a big Carmindy fan and I liked her book, The Five Minute Face (Read Review). I also have been pretty impressed with Sally Hansen as of late. The new Sally Hansen Natural Beauty line focuses on natural ingredients and is paraben free.

When I saw the line at CVS, I bought a number of items to try. I was left highly impressed and am willing to bet that several items from this line will make my year end best of 2008 list (Read the 2007 list)!

The Sally Hansen Natural Beauty line includes foundation and powder, but I have so many unfinished items of those, I didn’t buy any. Instead, I got the primer, eye shadow base, an eye shadow trio, cream blush, lipstick, and a mascara. The look I created with the products and each item is covered below. All items are worn in the photo below. I am also wearing Laura Mercier Oil Free Foundation (Read Review), Laura Mercier translucent powder, and M.A.C. dual edged eye pencil in a blue/gray shade from the Heatherette collection.

The Natural Beauty Luminizing Face Primer is a really nice silicon based primer. It has a lighter feel than the cult classic Smashbox Photofinsh (Read Review), yet worked just as well. I found that it primed my skin quite well in preparation for foundation by leaving it smooth and silky. The luminizing properties are also a welcome addition. At around $10, this primer is an incredible value, and I am not aware of any other comparably priced primers of this quality. Revlon has a decent primer, but it does not provide the perfectly nice skin surface that the Sally Hansen product does.

Sally Hansen Natural Beauty Fast Fix Eyeshadow Base is another great value product. There are not a lot of drugstore shadow bases out there and this one is quite lovely. It has a light, easy to spread cream texture, that feels like it must have a touch of silicon in it. I found that it made my shadow look smooth and crease free all evening. This will become a staple product for me.

The cream blush is another great item in Salley Hansen’s new line. It is silky smooth, and Bloom, the shade that I purchased, has a nice rosy color. It is pretty well pigmented and builds pretty well, so those with darker skin can likely wear it just fine. At the same time, it also blends well, so I could wear it well with my pale skin as long as I applied with with a light and well blended touch.

Sally Hansen Natural Beauty Cosmetics Carmindy

The Natural Beauty Instant Definition Eye Shadow Palette comes in basic and fairly neutral color sets. I decided to go for the Ocean Eye Palette, a gray/navy combo, because I seem to have acquired way too much brown shadow. The shadow is decently pigmented, blended fine, and lasted well. I did not have any creasing issues. It seemed like a standard decent quality shadow to me with nothing really outstanding, but nothing wrong with it either.

The Natural Beauty Lift & Define Mascara was nothing special for me. The brush is small (I tend to like that), but has rather wide spaces between the bristles, which I think can make things clump easier. It went on OK, and looked OK. I don’t think it would be my first choice in mascara, but it wasn’t bad either.

Finally, I loved the Color Comfort Lip Color! Perfect Pink, Rose Parfait, turned out to be perhaps one of the best pink shades I have found in some time. For a full review of it, head on over to my post at Girl Gloss!

The bottom line: The Sally Hansen Natural Beauty Cosmetics line is a welcome addition to the available drugstore makeup choices. I particularly recommend the primer and shadow base. These items are comparable to, or perhaps even better than, other much more expensive products. The rest of the line is quite nice as well. Well done Sally Hansen!

Look for the new Sally Hansen Natural Beauty at drugstore and at ULTA Beauty.

Popularity: 73% [?]

Comparing the New Milani Mascaras and Finding Good Quality and Value.

Milani Cosmetics is one of the drugstore brands that I think people tend to overlook as they head straight for the big name displays such as Maybelline or Revlon. Well, next time you run by that Milani display, stop and take a look. They have some great items.

Milani recently sent me a number of products to try and of most interest to me were their four brand new mascara formulations. It isn’t often that I try several mascaras from one brand at once and seeing the differences back to back was rather interesting!

Power Lash-Thickening Mascara is a volume builder with a HUGE brush. It has Vitamin E, panthenol, and bamboo extract for conditioning. I normally am not a fan of larger brushes, but this one was fine. It is a nice thickening, yet light formula, that was basically clump free when I tried it. It reminds me a bit of Maybelline Great Lash, but without the running and clumping problems (sorry, I’m not a Great Lash fan).

Great Lengths-Lengthening Mascara, is a straightforward lengthening formula. Gimmick free–something that I find quite refreshing these days–the mascara has a standard brush and comes in a standard tube, and delivers good results. I got a nice amount of length and little clumping (be sure to carefully wipe the brush first on this one though). If you want a good value basic mascara, you can’t go wrong with one.

Distinct Lash- Separating and Lengthening Mascara was my favorite in the bunch. This one is much like what I wish Maybelline Define-A-Lash (read review) would have been. It has a small brush (my preference), with fairly delicate bristles (another plus for me), and it lengthens without too much thickening so that the lashes look more delicate and are clump free. Maybelline had that too, but it had fatal flaw that the Milani version takes care of–Milani made their brush wand stable. If you love Define-A-Lash but hate that wand bending, you should definitely give Milani Distinct Lash a try.

Build-A-Lash–Fortifying and Volumizing Mascara is a two parter that reminds me a lot of Maybelline Volume Plus Length (Read Review). Step one is a white primer that thickens and lengthens. After allowing it to dry, black mascara is applied for quite long and dramatically full lashes. Seriously do not skip the part about waiting one minute with this! I got impatient and made it clump to high heaven. But when I actually waited the full minute for the primer to dry, I got wonderful results. If you have the patience for two steps, this is a really geat mascara.

All of the Milani mascaras come in black. I am crossing my fingers for a brown, and a navy at some point. They retail at around the great price of $6.50 and can be found at most mass retailers and larger drugstore chains. I tend to buy Milani at CVS, which also tends to run some great cosmetic sales.

I tried some other Milani products as well, so watch for future reviews.

Popularity: 6% [?]