Product Review : L'oreal Eye Illuminator Mascara

Since L'oreal Beauty Tubes is my favourite mascara (red and white tube) I was really excited to try this new version. The Eye Illuminator, comes in four different shades and is supposed to bring out your eye color. It's a doubled ended mascara, with a black base coat on one end, and a highlighting topcoat on the other. Each formula has a different top coat specifically geared towards your eye colour.

• Black Copper for Blue Eyes
• Black Bronze for Green / Hazel Eyes
• Black Quartz for Brown Eyes
• Black Crystal for All Eye Colours

Black Bronze version

I bought the Black Bronze Version for my green eyes. It was on sale at Shoppers for around 9 dollars. I had high hopes for this mascara, as I think L'oreal makes some of the best drugstore brand mascaras. My hopes fell flat with this. I don't hate it, but I certainly don't love it. Here's my thoughts on it:
PROS:

• Black base coat went on fairly smooth. Lengthened the lashes well, with little clumping
• Formula is lightweight, no flaking throughout the day
• Bronze topcoat is subtle enough for day wear, adds subtle shimmer not tacky sparkles
• Easy to wash off

CONS:

• Did not add much volume or thickness to lashes. (I'm a volume kind of girl!)
• Bronze topcoat does not show up nearly as much as hoped.
• Topcoat has a bulb shaped brush which I found clumped lashes

A big key to getting the top coat to stick, is to apply it when the black base coat is still wet. So instead of doing the base coat on both eyes, only do one at a time. Black coat immediately followed by the top coat.  Repeat the same on the bottom lashes. I also found the brush on the topcoat end side is weird and ended up clumping my lashes.  So what I did was use the very tip of the brush, where the product is built up. I brushed that part on the tips of the lashes and it seemed to deposit the bronzy colour better.

So did it make my eyes look greener? Maybe. I felt that it did, but it might have been the gold & bronze eyeshadows I paired it with that day. Or it was in my head lol. I did like the hint of bronze shimmer, it showed up really well on my bottom lashes and I could really see it in the sunlight. I liked that it was subtle enough to wear to work without looking ridiculous. In the end my biggest complaint is that the formula just didn't thicken my lashes enough. Mine are naturally pretty long so I always gravitate towards volume mascaras. I think I'll try the top coat over my other mascaras and see how it goes!

If you like natural looking mascaras, you might really like this. The topcoat idea is pretty neat too....I'd be really interested in hearing some opinions on the other shades!

Peace, Love & Lashes,

The Genesis Girls