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The perfect mascara, the best mascara, the mascara that will provide you with the most fantastic lashes; it’s like finding the Holy Grail in the make-up world.

All we can hope to accomplish is finding the mascara that works best for us without being ripped off. And I think that I have found one that ticks all the boxes

The mascara I use is the Collection 2000 Multiplier. I always use eyelash curlers and then use Estee Launder’s Lash Primer and top off with Collection 2000 Multiplier mascara.

I have wondered about other mascaras in the range and so recently I bought the Colour Lash All Day Mascara by Collection 2000.( Oh Ok I will admit it, it was a bit of a mistake. I was looking for an alternative lash primer to the Estee Lauder version and bought this new mascara thinking it was a Collection 2000 primer.)

On trying the Colour Lash All Day Mascara, I have to say that this product was a bit of a let down. The only way that I could recover the situation was to use Maybelline Colossal Volume Express Mascara and add some of it to my lashes before they dried. I don’t really like this particular Maybelline mascara. They used to do a perfect formulation a few years back, but it appeared they changed the product range, yet again, and so that mascara was discarded from my make- up kit. So the Colossal Volume Express Mascara was just one I happened to have lying around.

I have to conclude that the perfect mascara is Collection 2000 All Day Multiplier. It performs well with and without lash primer. But for perfect results get the Estee lash primer. At the moment of writing the Estee lash primer is £18.00 but it is worth every penny in results when used with a great mascara. The collection 2000 Lash Multiplier is around the four pounds mark, but I think it is far better than many premium brands, so to me this is the perfect mascara.

Time and time again I hear – I don’t use cheap make up – it has to be MAC or Urban Decay or some other such brand of the moment. Wake up people – it’s marketing. Yes premium brand cosmetics may be very good quality, but a huge chunk of what you are paying for is the branding, the advertising and PR.

There are brands out there that don’t get the same exposure, PR or branding, but that does not mean to say that you compromise on quality by investing some of your money in a cheaper brand.

I have various brands in my make- up box. Taking a look I see:

Lancome

Clinic

Laura Geller

YBF

Natural Collection

Collection 2000

Max Factor

No 7

Body Shop

Revlon

Bare Minerals

Lord and Berry

Shu Uemura

Fran Wison

I can assure you there are more, but I am going to stop the list there. Some of the cosmetic brands you may recognise, some you may not as I am a big fan of QVC (and their return policy with make- up) and they often bring over American brands of make- up that cannot be found elsewhere in the UK.

Having said not to be a snob about make-up brands, I will also add a caveat. Be careful about some lesser known make up brands.

We should all be careful about unbranded or unrecognisable brands from China and the Far East. A lot of make products are made in China under license by EU and American companies. The USA and the EU have strict guidance about what ingredients can and cannot appear in make- up, and as long as the the companies making their products in China have very strict quality control policies, all should be fine.

However, it is very easy to obtain cosmetics which may not meet EU standards on sites like Global Sources. Here you can buy pallets full of cosmetics, and unless you have a chemist test the formulation, it is impossible to know what the cosmetic ingredients may contain. So beware about buying makeup on sites like ebay or on market stalls. If big companies like Fisher Price, (who had problems with lead paint in children’s toys a few years back) have quality control issues, then how on earth are we supposed to know what is in that highly pigmented make up, bought from a market stall.

So the message is beware, but don’t be a makeup snob. (Although, I was very guilty of it myself in my twenties. Nothing but Estee Launder!) But do try out other lesser known brands. You never know, they might just surprise you, and you will save yourself some money.

PS. If some well known make-up artist has produced a video demo using lots of expensive brands, remember that PR companies send out cosmetics FREE for them to use.

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Posts Tagged ‘makeovers’

Finding The Perfect Mascara

Make up Snobbery – it has no place in makeovers, or anywhere else!