I placed an order recently with www.paintandpowderstore.com, primarily based on the suggestions of two of my favorite YouTube gurus (TalkinMakeup and GossMakeupArtist).
I wanted to try the Graftobian GlamourCreme foundation that they have been raving about, and so I placed my order about a week ago in the hope of finding a better option than my Revlon Colorstay,
which I have mixed reactions to.
So, before I go into my review of my experience with the website and the products, a bit of back-story...
I have been using Revlon Colorstay pretty religiously for over a year now. I am the rare pale with yellow undertones, and so my color is Buff (150), which is a relatively decent match. As I have combination skin with a lot of oil in my T-zone, I use the Oily/Combo formulation. Overall, I love the product. It has the coverage I need for my scarring and current breakouts (I suffer from cystic acne and although it has gotten a lot better since a recent purchase, I still have regular blemishes and a decent amount of dark scarring), it is relatively close to my skintone (although tends to be far too dark when set with powder), and unlike most makeup lines, it lasts all day on my skin with only medium oil breakthrough in a 10-14 hour day and does not oxidize ridiculously.
That said, I have SUCH trouble with it settling into my pores/fine lines, so I end up blotchy on my nose and my cheeks near my nose, as well as on my chin and in my smile lines. It also has a tendency to accent the fine lines beneath my eyes. I have tried primers (dimethicone works very well for beneath my eyes, but tends to make me get oily much faster in my T-zone, which is where my large pore issues are, and the extra oil makes me makeup slide, negating any use of the primer). Another downfall is that it is somewhat expensive. Because it does not match I take it all the way to my collarbone and around the sides of my neck in order to conceal the fact. Also, because I am covering so much, I use a lot. A bottle of this tends to last me about 3 weeks or so, and at $12 a pop, this can add up.
So, long story (not) short, I am always on the lookout for the next great thing and have tried a number of drugstore foundations with mostly failure. When I heard about this, it's coverage and concentration, etc., however, I had to try it.
So, back to my order. My experience with the website was pretty stellar. I live on the West Coast, so when I place my order around midnight it was just a few hours shy of opening time for their facility. They had my order processed and shipped by the end of that business day. That essentially meant that when I got home from classes that afternoon, I had an email saying it was shipped out. I believe that was Wednesday, and I got my package on Saturday, so shipping time was beyond what I could have hoped for.
As for selection on the site, I would label it as moderate. Graftobian is one of about 20-30 brands that they offer, and they seem to have all the common things. That said, there were a few things that I would have liked to have been able to purchase from other companies (mainly Kryolan Fixier Spray) that were unavailable. This was a bit disappointing, but they are a smaller, newer company and I cannot really expect them to have everything under the sun.
As for pricing, they were the lower end of the range (when I am buying something new I have never tried and that I can't take back, I want to "waste" as little as possible if I hate it, so I look around for the best deal). There was one website that had the products a bit cheaper, but their shipping was higher and their product range was MUCH more limited, so overall, paintandpowderstore seems to be the best value for your dollar.
Also, the neatest of all is that they had a comparison chart (http://paintandpowderstore.com/comparison_chart.pdf) to match your MAC, Revlon, Black Opal, Shu Uemura, etc. foundations with their GlamourCreme shades which was AMAZING. It is often very difficult to shop online for foundation as swatches on a screen never do a color justice. The shade I chose matches perfectly to my Revlon one, so I have been pretty happy with it, and I even think it matches my skin BETTER than the Revlon as it is just a touch lighter.
Now, on to the order. I bought a jar of the GlamourCreme in the color Ingenue based on their chart, a jar of the Muted Green Concealer (to cover the red scarring, acne, etc), and a stainless steel palette (I always pour out my foundation onto a surface before putting on, and so I wanted this palette to have a surface I could easily sanitize, that I could hold in my hand for mixing, warming, etc the foundation, etc.). The foundation was $11.50, the concealer was $6.75, and the palette was $5.49. I believe my shipping was about $6 or so.
So, my reaction to the website/company is nothing but positive.
Now, as for my reaction to the foundation...
I honestly hate it so far. The coverage is buildable, the foundation is smooth and creamy, and it blends and mixes easily. It is supposed to be perfume-free, although I swear I can smell it (it reminds me of that rosy, grandma smell if that makes any sense). I do not seem to be able to make it work for me no matter what I do.
The first time I used it, it was by itself, in clean dry skin, applied with a 187 brush and blended with a damp sponge. I set it with Ben Nye Neutral Set powder and proceeded to continue with my makeup. I did notice that when I tried to dust away the extra powder the makeup was disturbed by both the kabuki brush and a fluffy powder brush. It also started to fade within a few hours, although I did not apply a particularly heavy amount, so perhaps this is why.
The second day I used it I mixed it with my ColorStay. As ColorStay is a silicone-based (well, technically dimethicone, but that is considered a silicone), I thought they might work well together, but this is DEFINITELY not the case. Within about 5 hours the makeup had gone completely splotchy. From it's appearance I would hazard that the ColorStay and Graftobian had completely separated.
I will continue to try different things in the hope that I will be able to use this, but so far I have to say that it was a very disappointing result. I will be getting an airbrushing system soon, and Graftobian does make a line of water and alcohol-based airbrush makeup with identical colors to the creams, so if nothing else perhaps they will work if I cannot get the GlamourCreme to work.
If anyone has any suggestions on how to make this work better, please let me know - I want so badly to love this product. The coverage is great, it feels great on the skin, it blends like a dream (which is definitely a nice change from the ColorStay), but if it won't stay and it doesn't look good when applied, then it is clearly not a good product for my needs.
No comments:
Post a Comment