Organic Skin Care Blog – Product Reviews & Healthy Skin

The Marc Jacobs Shameless Youthful-Look 24H Foundation SPF 25 has just hit our shores, and it comes in a whopping 29 (!!!) shades! Obviously, I absolutely just had to swatch it - you guys know that I do love swatching things, so I just couldn't resist!

The Marc Jacobs Shameless Foundation claims to be oil-free, and offers medium coverage, alongside a natural finish. I have to say though, when I swatched it, I felt like it did perform better coverage-wise than your average medium-coverage foundation. The Shameless Foundation shade range also boasts a pretty easy-to-navigate shade naming system. Basically, pink-toned shades start with R, and yellow-toned shades start with Y. And the higher the number, the darker shade. So for example, R440 would be a fairly deep shade with red undertones, but Y130 would be a light shade with yellow undertones.


Alright, so without further ado, here are the swatches! I have to say, I am also so proud of myself for taking such photos in a club (yes, literally in a disco-loud-music-dancing-strobe lights-type club), and I think patience and searching out for good lighting helped!
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Tarte's Shape Tape Concealer has finally launched to much fanfare and - perhaps not too surprisingly in this day and age - controversy. I'm sure you'll have seen it if you weren't living under a rock. The Shape Tape Foundation - which was released in two forms, matte and hydrating - was very, very eagerly anticipated as the makeup launch of 2018, owing to the massive popularity of the Shape Tape Concealer. The main controversy with the Shape Tape Foundation was the lack of shades for darker skin, which was problematic for a brand that had previously claimed to champion diversity. I won't say too much more because that's not the focus of today's blog post, but should you be interested, you can google it; there are some very articulate and thoughtful summaries of the issue and why it is problematic.


What today's blogpost will focus on is another issue with the Shape Tape Foundation, specifically the Shape Tape Hydrating Foundation. What's the source of the controversy with the Shape Tape Hydrating Foundation? Basically that Tarte was already re-releasing an existing formulation as a new product. The existing product in question? Tarte's Hybrid Gel Foundation, which has already been on the market for awhile. So, if this is indeed true, it means that all Tarte did was essentially repackage their existing product into a different container, and then tried to sell it as a different product. And that, of course, would be awful.


So, in today's post, let's see how this little kerfuffle started, and take a look and see how similar the two products are, and whether they are really dupes or not!
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Su:m37 has finally come to Singapore, with a new outlet in Tangs Orchard, much to the joy of all kbeauty fanatics here! For those who aren't aware, Su:m37 is a luxe Korean beauty brand, with prices that are comparable to other luxe brands, such as SK-II, and the brand's selling point is that their skincare includes lots of natural ingredients, in particular fermented ingredients. The brand has quite the cult following for its skincare items, but I also found that their makeup items also aren't bad.


One of the makeup products the brand has brought into Singapore is the Water-full CC Cushion Perfect Finish, which is supposed to be a hydrating cushion foundation that provides a finish that's more on the dewy side. They have 2 shades, both of which I've swatched, alongside my first thoughts.
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Maybelline's Super BB Cushion Fresh Matte SPF25 has just launched this year - making it one of the earliest 2017 launches in the drugstore! I thought there was no better way to start off the year than looking at a new and shiny product, and the Fresh Matte BB Cushion caught my eye - after all, you can never have too many BB cushions, right?


The Maybelline Fresh Matte BB Cushion is a matte cushion, and it claims to be a lightweight foundation with a "natural matte finish that keeps excess sebum under control & is up to 12H long lasting!" All of these properties are super useful in our hot, tropical weather, and for people with oily skins. It's also the matte counterpart to Maybelline's Super BB Cushion that was launched in May 2016 - so if you liked that cushion but wanted a matte version, it has now arrived.


Maybelline Super BB Cushion Fresh Matte SPF25: A matte counterpart to the dewier Super BB Cushion
So, let's check out the mattifying properties of the Maybelline Super BB Cushion Fresh Matte - starting with the ingredients list!
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The Body Shop Fresh Nude Foundation was launched earlier this year, and The Body Shop claims that this foundation "mimics the look of fresh-faced natural skin with a nude glow" to "make every day a good skin day". It also claims provide "up to 24h moisturization", and doesn't that sound great?


I was half-expecting this to be a lightweight, watery foundation from the description, but it turned out to actually be more of a creamy foundation instead. And I'll admit that I've basically been procrastinating on this review because there were so many foundation/BB cushion/base product launches in the start of the year, that I just never quite got around to blogging about it! But now that it's already past the first half of the year, I figure I should get a move on this review, finally. So here you are!


The Body Shop Fresh Nude Foundation: Launched at the start of the year, this foundation claims to hydrate skin for 24 hours
So without further ado, let's start the review! And as with all reviews, let's begin at my favourite place - the ingredients list!
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Estee Lauder's cushion compact is finally here, in the form of its Double Wear Cushion BB SPF50 PA+++! Obviously BB cushions have been pretty popular this season, and more than one brand has come out with their own cushion foundation, but the Estee Lauder one seems to be pretty popular because of the Double Wear name.


If you've been a beauty addict for awhile, then you'll probably know that the Double Wear Foundation is one of Estee Lauder's iconic products, so that's why the product comes with high hopes. Even when I was a newbie beauty addict many years back, it was already being recommended as one of THE foundations to try for super high coverage. I remember someone on some of the makeup sites I hung out online even went to ask one of those ladies who swims underwater with dolphins what foundation she was using (theory being that if it works for them it should work for anyone), and it turns out she was using Double Wear Foundation. So yes it is a pretty famous foundation!


Estee Lauder Double Wear Cushion BB: I've gotten a lot of interest in this, so it's really time for a review!
when I posted photos of the Double Wear Cushion BB on Instagram, I had quite a bit of interest in it, so I figured I should get around to reviewing it! Unfortunately, I've never actually tried the Double Wear Foundation, so I can't compare the two directly, and this will be a standalone review for the Cushion BB. And, as always, we'll start at the ingredients list!
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One of the trending things in the beauty scene now, particularly the Asian beauty scene, is Bounce Up Pacts, as they are called by Asian brands, or Pore Putty as they are called by Western brands. For those who may not have heard, this is basically a base makeup, akin to foundation, and functions quite similarly, in that it comes in a variety of skin-like shades, and is meant to provide coverage and a smooth finish to the skin.


What's different and new about these Bounce Up Pacts/Pore Putties, though, is the texture. These have a hybrid texture that's sort of similar to a dough, or Play-Doh, which you can roll up, ball around, squish, and so on. You can depress your finger into the pact, and like Play-Doh, your finger will leave a print on the surface, but you can smooth it out. So these are sort of like, not as liquid as traditional cream foundation, but not as dry as a powder, and the "Putty" or "Bounce Up" name is a reference to how malleable the products are. On Youtube, you can find all sorts of videos demonstrating the more interesting properties of this product, as you can see below.


Interestingly though, this new generation of products aren't actually the first to use the phrase "pore putty". Back in the early-to-mid-2000s, Japanse brand Sana came out with a range of products called "Pore Putty", although none of them had a malleable, dough-like texture. Rather, the range's name was indicative of the supposed claims of the products - to hide your pores - and came in a range of liquids, powders, and creams, with BB creams, mineral powders, makeup bases, concealers and so on.

I guess this Bounce Up Pact/Pore Putty thing must be pretty huge right now, because I received two real-life queries from friends about this class of product, as well as one online request via Twitter. So I figured, why not? Most of the questions I got were centred around 1) whether the Bounce Up Pacts/Pore Putties were really novel, new or groundbreaking, as well as 2) what are the ingredients that give the product its interesting texture? So we'll attempt to look at these two questions in this post!

hello, @musicalhouses :) would you like to do ingredients analysis to Ver. 88 Bounce-Up Pact? It has been hot item these days.

— a (@justletterA) December 14, 2015

The best way to get blogpost ideas: Reader suggestions! Thank you for the idea!
If you know my blog, you know what I'm going to say next - we're going to look at ingredients lists! It was quite hard to find the ingredients lists for some of the Asian brand Bounce Up Pacts, but after searching the internets and asking other bloggers, I managed to get the ingredients lists for 4 products: the Chosungah22 Bounce Up Pact Master, Ver 88 Bounce Up Pact SPF 50/PA+++, Stila Perfectly Poreless Putty Perfector, and the Peter Thomas Roth Pore Putty. With two "Western" Pore Putties, and two "Asian" Bounce Up Pacts, this should give us plenty of material to work with! So let's get started!
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Givenchy Teint Couture Balm (aka Givenchy Teint Couture Blurring Foundation Balm) SPF15 is the latest base product for skin to come from Givenchy. Givenchy has some really gorgeous face makeup - their Prisme Libre loose powders, as well as their little squares of pressed finishing/brightening powders are some of my favourites (and I recently hauled yet more of their stuff, as this IG photo shows), and make up some of the brands best known products. So I had high expectations for the Teint Couture Balm.


The Teint Couture Balm is advertised as being a "an invisible, ultralightweight, skin-fusion foundation for a flawless, bare-skin effect, and it's a lighter foundation/base product addition to Givenchy's range. I'm pretty late to the party - these were launched a couple of months ago, but I'm only reviewing them now, but on the bright side, a thorough review is always good, right? And I'm glad to say, the Teint Couture Balm performs very nicely!


Givenchy Teint Couture Balm SPF15: Also known as Teint Couture Blurring Foundation Balm in some countries
And by thorough, I do mean thorough - I've got swatches, ingredients analysis, and a photo of the Teint Couture Balm on my face! Of course, we'll start with my favourite part - the ingredients analysis of the product.
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MAC's Studio Waterweight Foundation SPF30 is the latest foundation from MAC, and it has been getting tons of raves online for its lightweight, water-like texture. However, the foundation really made its way onto my radar because I was asked by my colleague at work whether I was going to review it or not. After sheepishly admitting that I probably wasn't (not because I don't want to, but because I'm already backlogged on my reviews), she told me that she had heard that it was a dupe of a Smashbox foundation, the Smashbox's Camera Ready BB Water SPF30. So I just had to check it out!


Of course, the ingredients nerd in me was piqued by this. Certainly this wouldn't be the first time a product has had a dupe, and is hardly surprising to me. In my 5 years of blogging, I've encountered beauty dupes for everything from brush-washing tools to colour-changing lipbalm to face creams, so nothing fazes me. But it is interesting to see a product being duped so early into its release.


Turns out, as you might guess, the MAC Waterweight Foundation SPF30 and Smashbox Camera Ready BB Water SPF30 are indeed extremely close, if not identical. But I wanted to find out more - what if there were other similar products out there? So began my journey into ingredient nerdiness.
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Too Faced's Born This Way Foundation is one of the newer base products from Too Faced, and judging by the reception on my Instagram feed and Twitter, it seems to be getting a lot of love. So naturally, I was super curious about it!


Too Faced claims on their website that the foundation is a "medium-to-full undetectable coverage", making you look like you were, of course, Born This Way. Now undetectable foundation is quite a tall order, because in my years of beauty blogging, I've found that nothing looks exactly like skin except skin, although of course a good foundation should be a good colour match and walk the fine tightrope between having great coverage and yet as realistic a finish as possible, and also hold up to whatever activities or weather you face. Still, achieving the perfect base is always worth a shot right?


Too Faced Born This Way Foundation: Touted as a high-coverage foundation with a natural finish, like you were "born this way"
I had high expectations for the Born This Way Foundation - I mean, in addition to all the raves I had been hearing, the foundation's box also has the results of some consumer study survey conducted by the company, that basically said that the foundation was awesome at blurring imperfections, making skin look perfect, and giving natural coverage. So we're going to put these claims to the test. And, we're also going to look at the formula of the Born This Way Foundation, to see how the magic works!
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I'm always discovering new ways to buy more makeup and beauty products from, and recently I was introduced to BonjourHK's onlince website! I'm actually somewhat familiar with Bonjour, as it is a chain of stores across Hong Kong selling beauty products at accessible prices, much like Ulta (if you're in the US), Watsons, Guardian or Sasa (if you're in Asia). When I visited Hong Kong 3 years back, I stepped into quite a few Bonjour shops, although I didn't buy anything (I ended up with the smallest haul ever - sigh!). But the thing I liked about Bonjour is the eclectic mix of brands and products - there's everything from mainstream brands to niche Asian beauty brands I've never heard of before.


I actually never realized that Bonjour had an online website, but they do! And the website has pretty cheap shipping (which is free if you buy above a certain dollar amount threshold), and they ship internationally, too. And of course, the range of brands and types of products are just as varied as ever - there's everything from skincare to makeup to skin devices, and the brands range from fairly mainstream Asian brands (like DHC and Hada Labo) to more niche ones (like Choosy and Yu Mei). I was super excited when the package arrived, right on time within the 7-21 days window stated on the website.


My BonjourHK Haul: Includes brands both fairly well-known, as well as some undiscovered gems
The mass of products above, as well as the fact that I actually want to do a mini-review for each product rather than just run through the haul, means that this post is going to be pretty long (and photo heavy). So if you're going to read onwards, don't forget to buckle up before you go! And if you're all ready, let's just head straight into my product-by-product quick review!
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The Body Shop's latest compact foundation and part of its MoistureWhite range, is the MoistureWhite Bright Compact Foundation SPF25 PA+++. I guess that's a pretty self-explanatory product name: it's a powder foundtion, it's in a compact form, it has brightening properties, and there is sun protection in the product. With such a comprehensive product name, what more is there to say? The Body Shop essentially succintly summarized what the product does in less than 10 words! Let's end the review here and you guys can just scroll down and look at photos! Yay!


Just kidding. (Aside: I don't know if that joke was funny or not. At least I tried!) I still do have lots more to say, because that's just the kind of verbose makeup geek I am. The MoistureWhite Bright Compact Foundation actually has two different colours in the compact. The main colour, which takes up most of the space in the compact, is the foundation colour. But there is also a little pink, shimmering strip inside, that is meant to act as a highlighter of sorts to brighten your complexion. The Body Shop claims on their website that the product is "infused with light-diffusing fine mica pearls" and that "the illuminating part of the compact is designed to bring multi-dimensional light...so your complexion looks radiant from every angle". Whitening, brightening, and illuminating properties in base makeup (primers, foundations, BB creams and so on) are always popular in Asia, so this is definitely the kind of marketing that people would be curious about.



Right, you say. So the MoistureWhite Bright Compact Foundation has brightening properties. But how does it work? Which ingredients give it these awesome illuminating properties? And speaking of brightening, does this product actually contain anything that will brighten my skin over the long term, like a skincare product? (See, this is why I have more to say!) And to answer such questions, we'll start off at the ingredients list of the products, and take a look there.
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