I've always been a fan of cute packaging, especially in cosmetics. My favourite brand for a while has been Paul & Joe, with their insanely cute designs, & decent quality products. Recently I discovered a few Korean brands, which also are super cute, with good quality products. They are Etude House, & Tony Moly. I'm sure some of you have heard of them before, as I am certainly not the first person to blog about them. Anyway, I picked up all these things over the past few months, & thought I'd share them with you all!
First up, Paul & Joe! Pictured is the limited edition pressed powder, which has a sweet cardboard pot, with a pretty puff. The actual powder is lovely, with soft swirls of shimmery colour. I haven't done a very good job in getting a picture of it though, sorry! I won't review these fully, as there's loads on other blog, & not being an expert I'll leave it to those that are!
There's also got their face colour refill in Secret D'or, & the compact to put it in, which I use as a highlighter, and the pretty Bon Bon primer, which has really cute multicoloured bead things that crush up & become a slightly sparkly face primer. I don't mind sparkle, but all these things are shimmery/sparkly, so if you don't, then probably best to steer clear!
♥ ♥ ♥ ♥ ♥
The rest of the things I'll be talking about are the Tony Moly/Etude House items. I will try to review these better, as they are Korean brands, it's quite hard to find many reviews of them, so I hope these might help some of you!
I got these all off eBay, via 2 sellers, Zinopark & f2plus1. Zinopark sent out the wrong item in my first order, but did send the right item out to me in the end. I then decided to try f2plus1, also because they had some different items, like the perfume bars, & had no problems with that seller. Items took around 2 weeks to arrive, in all 3 cases, so not too bad! Another member who sells them is Bello-Girl, but I haven't tried buying from her, so can't comment on service.
These adorable bunnies are by Tony Moly, & are two solid perfumes (Pom Pom Green & Coco Floral), & Pocket Bunny Facial Mist, in "Moist". The perfumes to be honest smell more like bath products than perfumes, but the packages are so adorable I don't even mind!
The facial mist is just as cute, & actually very cooling for your face. it does spray out rather harshly though, rather than a fine mist, so you have to hold it quite far away from your face. I haven't tried it to set my makeup yet, but I imagine I will be using this a fair amount in summer, just to help cool me down, haha!
These are also by Tony Moly, & are the Petite Bunny Gloss Bars, & a Fruit Princess Lip Gloss. The two bunnies are more like tinted lipbalms, they smell amazing! I chose Juicy Orange & juicy Peach, purely for the colour/faces of the bunnies, haha, but they are very nice to wear. They aren't very pigmented, but provide a subtle tint.
The Fruit Princess Gloss is a true lipgloss, with doe foot. It's a dinky little pot, there are 7 available, & I chose Apricot Princess. It's a light peachy colour, that doesn't really add much colour to my rather pigmented lips, but just a nice shine. All of these products aren't at all sticky/gritty, which is good! Just before Christmas I picked up some Liberty x Hello Kitty lip tints & they were so insanely sticky & basically unwearable, that I'm pleased to say you don't sacrifice quality for cuteness here!
Pandas! The pot of handcream is by Etude House, & the Panda's Dream makeup "eraser" is by Tony Moly. The handcream is nice, & not at all greasy, & the cute pot makes it a winner! I picked up the eraser on a whim, hoping it would live up to it's promise of erasing makeup mistakes.
I tried it out for you, on the left is my liquid eyeliner after rubbing the eraser over it. The directions say to run with the eraser (it's a bit like a lipbalm in texture), & then swab with a cotton bud to remove it, which I did & is pictured on the right. This removes all trace of product, & although you could just wet a cotton swab with makeup remover & do the same thing, I still think this will come in handy.
Next up are my Etude House Dear My Blooming lipsticks, in shades RD303 & PK003. I wish they had nicer names, but they are really lovely, so I don't mind! I picked up the orangey red (it's more red in real life!) shade first, & was so impressed I ordered the pink shortly after. I'm quite picky about lipsticks, well I just think that you tend to get what you pay for, & as these were much cheaper than my Macs I wasn't expecting much. The last cheap lipstick I bought was around the same price (£6) & is nowhere as nice/pigmented as these.
The pink is not quite as creamy/glossy as the coral shade, but still feels really nice on the lips & is lovely to wear. It does seem to settle in fine lines a bit more than the red too. The red formula is pretty much perfect, super pigmented & really creamy & comfortable to wear.
I'd definitely put these on a par with my Macs, if the red not even a little nicer. The shade choices are quite extensive too, I think there are 24 in this collection. The shade chart is pretty accurate too, so do take a look at it before you buy. I have quite dark reddy pink lips & lighter lipsticks especially don't like covering them very well, so it's nice to find a brand that does it well!
Lastly, but certainly not least, with probably the prettiest item of the bunch, another item by Etude House. It's their Princess Entoinette Heart Highlighter, which comes in a pretty pink pot, with heart shaped shimmery highlighter pieces, in slightly different shades, complete with fluffy puff. To be honest, the fluffy puff is a bit useless for highlighter application, had I got the blush it would be useable for the task, but agains, cuteness wins over, so I don't even care :P I've only swatched it on the back of my hand so far, but it's a subtle shimmery highlighter & is very pretty. Even if I never use it again, this looks so lovely just sitting there with all my other pieces!
What do you think, do you like cute makeup, or do you stick to more basic packaging with more "grown up" brands? For me, I usually buy so little makeup (the last few months have been an exception, haha!), that when I do, I like it to be a real event, & pay a little more, to get really pretty things, but still things I will use.
♥ Georgina
P.S. Thank you all so much for all the lovely birthday wishes! I really appreciate them all x
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