Tuesday, April 14, 2009

materialism: lunasol, primavista, cle de peau, guerlain, etc.

Lately it seems like shopping is on my brain.

Beware, below lies only ramblings on cosmetics.


After giving up for a while, I'm again seeking a good powder foundation. Over the winter I tried samples of Lunasol Skin Modelling Foundation and Primavista's winter foundation, but nothing stood out.

Color-wise Lunasol was quite nice, but in the end the coverage was only average and oil-control was only average. As a fall-back, it would be quite acceptable, but if I'm going to spend $40 or more on a foundation, I'd like something a little better.

Primavista's winter foundation was pretty poor on coverage and average on oil-control, so I forgot it immediately. The sample was a print on paper, so perhaps the sample formulation had issues to begin with.

However, I've heard good things about Coffret D'Or and Primavista's spring/summer foundations in terms of both coverage and oil-control so I'm looking forward to trying them.

I recently received a sample of Cle de Peau's powder foundation teint naturel poudre SPF 20 PA++ in ochre 20 (タンナチュレールプードルS オークル20), which has impressive coverage, although I've come to realize that ochre 20 is a tad dark for me. The finish is rather matte so far. I'll see how the shine control fares over the course of this week. The coverage is quite nice - it covers up redness and some large cystic pimples without looking powdery or unnatural. It doesn't sink into pores much at all. There's some itchiness, but this might be the Elizabeth Arden face lotion I am using.

I did like Guerlain's pearly white powder foundation, which brightens the face and covers redness nicely, but the Cle de Peau may have better coverage, as one would expect, considering their target audience. It makes me wonder how the regular Shiseido powder foundation is; if it is almost as good as Cle de Peau, it may be a nice compromise in terms of price and functionality.

If I'm lucky, Coffret D'Or or Primavista will be almost as effective, as they are the least expensive options I am considering.

A Touch of Blusher also has reviews of Coffret D'Or and Primavista's winter offerings.

As a side note, I found Fresh Minerals' mineral foundation rather itchy, but I like the loose powder quite a bit. Nice, functional packaging too.

2 comments:

B said...

I once tried using an Elizabeth Arden moisturizer with sunscreen and I got a rash everytime I used it. Haven't dared to try it since.

Hopefully Shiseido will have something similar to the Cle de Peu - I find often times the formulations are the same across lines under the same parent company - just different packaging and price points!

kuri said...

ah, i'd better watch out for the Arden moisturizer, as that's precisely what I'm using!

I'll check out the regular Shiseido line; I just can't cough up for Cle de Peau's prices :)