Essence Spring 2017 Review

This post is sponsored by essence and Her Campus Media. All opinions are my own. Thank you for supporting the brands that make Twinspiration possible!

New season, new makeup right? We don’t know about you but trying new makeup makes us so happy! We recently tried these new products from essence and were blown away by the quality! As many of you know Essence is very affordable and readily available at Target/Ulta, making it gold in the beauty world. Why spend a lot on makeup when you can get great products at an affordable price?! Saving money = happiness. Our favorite essence product is the essence Pure Nude Highlight. It gives the skin a beautiful subtle glow that’s perfect for Spring! ? Also, don’t forget to enter their #WatchMeSparkle campaign for a chance to win a trip to NYC! All you have to do is head to @essencemakeup Instagram every Monday and follow the weekly prompt! 

Now, let’s get into our mini reviews of each new essence product!

FACE PRODUCTS

Pure NUDE Highlighter / $4.49 – If you’ve been following our blog for the past year, you’ve definitely heard us talk about this highlighter. It is our absolute favorite affordable highlighter, we still can’t get over how good it is. The baked formula allows for a very natural glow that isn’t overly shimmery or glittery. You can layer it up to get a really high-shine look though if that’s what you prefer. Essence isn’t lying when they said the shade of this product is universal. It has a very neutral undertone which we think is what makes it so flattering on multiple skin tones. Why spend more on a highlighter when you can get perfection for under five dollars?!

Satin Touch Blush in Satin Coral / $2.99 – Normally, we never wear coral-hued blushes. We usually gravitate towards muted nudes, but I’m SO glad we got to try this blush. The color brightens up your face instantly when you apply it (great for days when you don’t get a lot of sleep). The formula itself is super soft and creamy with very little fallout. The blush has a satin, glowy finish which makes it perfect for the spring and summer. A little warning, though, it’s super pigmented so a little goes a long way, don’t use too much! We will definitely be picking up the other shade in this blush!

…All I Need Concealer Palette – We are very picky with concealers, mostly because our under eye area is very dark which makes it hard to cover. Sadly, this concealer palette didn’t offer enough coverage for us. We tried the medium concealer shade and will say that we loved the color match. Some concealers are too pink or too orange but these are very neutral. Because of the creamy consistency, these did crease under our eyes and definitely needed to be set (which we usually do with concealer). The pink color-correcting shade worked decently under foundation to color correct, although we wish it was more of a peach shade, less pink. For color correcting we usually apply the color, then foundation and top off with concealer so the pink color doesn’t show through.

Shape Your Face Contouring Palette – Face palettes are hard because it’s nearly impossible to like everything in them. We really like the size of this palette and that it would be really convenient to travel with. However, we didn’t love the highlight or blush in the palette. The highlight powder was a little too powdery and didn’t really brighten any of the areas we put it on. The blush was just way too dark for our skin tone, even when we used a light hand. It also didn’t blend as well as we would have liked. We really enjoyed the contour shade, though, it’s a great color and if you use a light hand it gives a great shadow effect.

EYE PRODUCTS

Smokey Eyes Set in Smokey Rose / $3.49 – First of all, we love the color combo in this eyeshadow set. We would normally never pair a bronze shade with purple but the colors really compliment one another. As far as the formula goes, these shadows are very powdery and creamy. They do have a ton of kickback when you run your brush through them. Normally, fall out doesn’t bother us too much as long as the shadows are good quality. The shadows blend very well but we do think they need a base to hold onto to get full pigment payoff.

The False Lashes Mascara Extreme Volume And Curl / $4.99 – This mascara is one of our new favorites!! If you know us, then you know mascara has always been our favorite product category. We’re so happy we love this mascara since it won’t break the bank! The formula is relatively thick and really defines your lashes when it goes on. It does a great job lengthening and volumizing as well. It also didn’t irritate our eyes which happens sometimes with mascara. Oh & bonus points for it being super easy to clean up if you mess up. It dries pretty fast and we found that if you get it on your face on accident it crumbles right off without leaving a black mark.

Contouring Eye Pencil in Caramel Meets Frosting / $3.49 – We’ve actually never heard of an eye contouring pencil so it’s pretty awesome essence is thinking outside of the box. Both sides of the pencil are super creamy and easy to blend. We love the highlight shade to highlight the inner corners of the eye with. The contour shade works well as a base for powder shadows or even as a face contour.

BROW PRODUCTS

Lash & Brow Gel Mascara – Ah we love us a good clear brow gel. Because our brows are so dark and semi-full, we usually opt for a clear brown gel over a tinted one. This brow gel is really great for the price! The formula is thick enough that it doesn’t over saturate your brows upon application. We find that when the gel is too thin, it gets everywhere and is hard to control. It dried completely clear but didn’t make our brows look shiny or wet. It held our hairs in place all day too! Our only qualm with this product would be the brush, it’s just a little too big for our liking.

Make Me Brow Duo Eyebrow Powder in Mix It Blonde / $3.49 – As boring as it is to say this brow product is our favorite from the collection, we’re going to go ahead and say it. I think with brow products, people truly just want a color match that compliments their hair and brows and the right (darker) side of this product is our perfect color match. The powder had some kick back when we first used it, which made us nervous there would be fall out on our faces once we applied, but there is NO fallout with this product. It’s also not overly pigmented, which is key for a brow product. We can’t say enough about this product, go out and get it!

LIP PRODUCTS

Matt Matt Matt Lipstick in 01 Natural Kiss & 06 Kiss Me If You Can / $3.99 – We were really excited to try these after one of our favorite YouTubers raved about them. Spoiler alert: we were not disappointed. These lipsticks are SO creamy and pigmented, they feel so nice on your lips. We wouldn’t say they’re super matte, more of a demi-matte finish. Because they’re so creamy, they aren’t extremely long-lasting but more lipsticks aren’t. They re-apply beautifully, though so it’s easy to touch up throughout the day. We will definitely be picking up other shades!

Volume On! Plumping Lip Gloss in 03 Perfectly Dressed / $2.99 – We’ve actually never tried a plumping gloss before this. We aren’t the biggest lip gloss fans, due to that gross sticky feeling that usually comes along with a lot of glosses. This gloss actually didn’t leave our lips feeling sticky at all, it has a thin consistency that felt almost like a balm (with more shine). It has a strong peppermint smell which we actually enjoyed, but we don’t think it plumped our lips. The shine and slight tint from the gloss did make our lip lines less noticeable, though!

Longlasting Lipliner in 06. A Girl’s Dream / $2.49 – We already have some essence lipliners in our makeup stash that we love & this shade is just as great. You can never have too many red lip liners, right?! This one is so creamy but just waxy enough that it keeps your lip color from feathering. These have always been one of our favorite essence products!

NAILS

The Gel Nail Polish in 82 My Hula Hoop / $1.99 – Fun fact you may not know about us, we LOVE nail polish. We always talk about makeup on the blog and our favorite nail polishes get overlooked. We’ve always painted our own nails so we have a pretty big makeup stash. We were actually surprised we had never tried this gel polish from essence before, it’s SO good for the price! First of all, the color is perfect for spring. The formula is pretty thick since it is a gel polish, we still had to apply 3 coats to get opaque coverage but we didn’t mind that since it looked so nice after all the coats were applied. The polish wears well and really looks like a gel manicure.

We hope you enjoyed our review of all the new essence products! Let us know what products you love from the brand & don’t forget to enter the #WathMeSparkle contest on Instagram!

xo Britta & Carli