I have a detailed picture-heavy review for you today. I did one of such thorough, long reviews during last holiday season on Kat Von D Mi Vida Loca palette.
I am talking about the new Custom Enhancer Drops from Cover FX Cosmetics! Let’s get started.
These are liquid highlighter/bronzer! They should actually go ahead and rename these as “Liquid Metal” Enhancer Drops! They literally mimic the look of liquefied metal! I love when brands experiment and creates ingenious; but if not done properly, an innovative idea can result in a gimmicky product rather than a novel, useful product. HOWEVER, THAT IS NOT THE CASE with these drops! These are extraordinary. Let’s be honest, today’s beauty market is filled with highlighters! Every brand from drugstore to high end has been releasing new highlighters every day, a lot of which are liquid highlighters! But in such a sea of highlighters, Cover FX still manages to be innovative and create an incredibly unique product with their distinct “Cover FX” characteristic.
You are getting 0.5 oz. of product at a price of $42. That is an awfully steep price! But at the same time, I have to say that I only need the tiniest drop per application. This will definitely last you a long time and that’s why I personally I think the price is still justifiable.
It comes in a small dropper type of bottle; exactly like their custom cover drops. It is a glass bottle and it is color coded to the highlighter shade inside. It looks beautiful – now I have to make room in my makeup desk just so I can show them off :-) I am not entirely sure though if they will be travel safely. I am not brave enough to experiment and travel with them yet. I will rather transfer some to a small bottle for when I am travelling!
Let’s talk about the formula – this is what drew my attention the most. It’s a very pigmented liquid and they literally feels like luxurious liquid metals (apart from the fact that liquid metal will be impossibly hot to touch #sciencenerd!) A tiny, tiny amount is enough to apply on both of the cheeks. I absolutely love the formula but it definitely needed a bit of trial and error for me to figure out the best way that works for me! I will share more in a bit. The wear time is incredible. It will be there until you wash/remove it off! Today I mixed a bit of foundation with sunlight and candlelight with my bronzer to wear on the outer area of my face. I wore my makeup around 5.30 in the morning, came home and did a bit of Zumba exercise and finally washed my face around 9 pm. Throughout the day, my face looked so bright and beautiful (:-)if I can say so myself!). Even though it was super-hot here today, it did not look greasy or oily at all! Also the formula is very consistent among shades; the ones I got behaved exactly the same!
There are 6 shades in this range, I initially picked up Candlelight but the
product is so lust-worthy that I had to get Sunlight to use as more
of a highlighter! Here are all the shades as described in Sephora website
Celestial: glistening
pearl
Moonlight: soft, silver
glow
Sunlight: soft, golden
glow
Candlelight: shimmering
golden bronze
Sunkissed: a light
sunkissed look
Sunset: a deeper sunkissed
look
These last two shades are bronzer
shades and do not have much shine as the other four. Here is a video swatch in different looks here. Do have a look :-)
Sunlight:
It is gorgeous gold shade. Very
pale, calm champagne gold! In fact under some light it appears very similar
shade as moonlight. Personally, I would have preferred it to be a bit more gold
as I think that flatters my skin tone a bit more but I am not at all complaining
:-). As far as gold-champagne shade
of cheek highlighters are concerned, Becca x Jaclyn Hill Champagne Pop (reviewed here)
will always have my heart but this is my new
favorite product to mix out with foundation for getting that brilliant glow
:-) I also mix candlelight with it to get the
perfect shade for my liking.
Candlelight:
This shade reminds me so much of the Becca Cosmetics Shimmering Skin Perfector
in Blushed Copper (reviewed here).
Completely different formula but shade-wise they look very similar. Candlelight
is a pale coppery-bronze shade and is the deepest shade for highlighter in
this line. It is a beautiful color and that’s why I bought it, however on my
medium tan skin tone this does not always work as highlighter. If I want to use
it as cheek highlighter I have to pre-plan my whole look. Especially, I have to
wear a darker shade of blush. But I still absolutely love it! I have added it
on my foundation to get that sunset glowy-bronzey look. That’s my ultimate
favorite way to wear it (and I have declared that 100 times already :-) ) I have also applied it on my
eyelids, in just sheer layer as well as glossy, wet layer to imitate those high
fashion runway looks! Even though I put on a thicker layer it did not slide or
crease away; I am in love.
You can buy this from Sephora,
Beautylish
and CoverFX
website. Currently most of the shades are out-of-stock. I am also not sure
if these are permanent products. But I have high hope that they will restock
them considering the heavy demand :-)
I know that I have included a TON
of photos but I really wanted to show many different ways of how I use these. I
know that all liquid highlighters claim that they can be used in many ways. However
the unique consistency of these drops makes all the difference! You can see
from the photos, these can easily be one of those highlighters that “can be detected from outer space” (I
love this “phrase” even though in reality that is not accurate :-)) But, you can also make it very
subtle! I have been really enjoying the “customizable” quality of these drops
and having a lot of fun playing “makeup-mixologist”. I have used it on top of liquid foundation
and bare skin, on top of powder foundation, and it does not create any texture/mismatch
issue for the product underneath.
Yes, I am very impressed and
happy about this purchase however I do have a few warning points-
- These dry up relatively quickly. If you think you can put a drop on the back of your hand, dot in on both of your cheeks and then blend out one after another, you are already too late and will have hard time blending it out perfectly. I do one cheek at a time. Much easier that way!
- When you want a strong look with this, and you have texture issue on those certain areas, this will highlight them, not in flattering way! I have similar textures on my skin so I have to be careful. But applying this makes me SO HAPPY that I could care less about the texture. Nonetheless, it is an important thing to keep in mind.
- My ultimate favorite way of wearing the drops is to mix with foundation and apply a sheer to medium coverage layer! The finished look is very luminous; it makes me look glow-y, happy and healthy! Also, I don’t typically cover up my blemishes or any acnes I might have, the glow from this mixture somewhat diverts the attention from those nasty parts of the face :-). When looked very closely you can see very, very minuscule sparkles all over the face. It sounds “cringe worthy” but it actually looks super-duper pretty! They are such pretty super fine speckles!
- This being a crazy pigmented product, one full drop is often a lot of product for me. I squeeze a lot of the product inside the tube itself and then on the back of my palm, squeeze out the very last, tiny drop that is left behind in the dropper. That way I can avoid taking out excessive amount of product. I use my brush to blend it on the hand first and then apply it on my cheeks. For me this is the easiest way to wear them without looking patchy!
- I love using my fingers with this type of product but unfortunately that’s not the best way for these. :-(
Alright, with all the points
mentioned above, I have to say that this is not a beginner friendly product.
There is definitely a learning curve to it. But hey, there is nothing you
cannot learn when you practice! Also for the same reasons, I don’t opt for
these as cheek highlighter whenever I am in a rush! On the other hand, it is
uber easy to wear it mixed with foundation when I have just a few minutes to
get and I still want to look a bit polished!
I had so much fun preparing for
this post! Makeup in general makes me happy but every once in a while there
comes a product that brings PURE JOY! Bottom line, I truly think my money was
well invested!!! Have you already tried
these? Are you planning to? :-)
Keep glowing!!!!!!
Love,
Arrru
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