The Makeup Mole

Kicking off the New Year in lash-tastic style, this is my latest favourite mascara. I have to be honest and say mascara is the one product I am reeeeally disloyal to. I’m talking a total mascara ho – I generally have one that I’m using when I want to be sure that I don’t look like a stripper left in the rain (black raccoon eyes at work, not so much), and a whole slew of wannabes waiting in the wings that I’m testing. I like to test them for at least a month as some of those dudes outperform at the beginning and then turn dry and gunky, others may not dazzle the first time out of the tube but on the 2^nd and 3^rd try (once the formula has settled a bit), they can be fab. So, bottom line is, you never know, and the there’s always a mascara somewhere out in the world you haven’t tried.

So, explanation over and the newest addition to my mascara family (after an exorbitant TWO MONTH testing period), is Bobbi Brown’s Extreme Party mascara. I wasn’t expecting much to be honest because although Bobbi is known for lots of great makeup products, generally mascara isn’t one of them – but I was really pleasantly surprised. It reminds me a bit of DiorShow without the silly jumbo brush thing going on. I know lots of people love the oversized Dior brush, but if your eyes tend more to the baked bean size (ahem) than grapefruit, I find it’s a little unwieldy. The BB Extreme Party brush gets in and kind of feathers the lashes as the brush grips at the root, and doesn’t deposit too much product at the end, so your lashes look longer, thicker, blacker and …well, just really nice actually. And it’s pretty buildable – more coats looks nice and it doesn’t flake throughout the day.

So even if in the sad month of January you don’t have any Extreme Parties to go to (I know for me it’s more like Extreme Tracksuit at the moment), still this mascara will do your new year lashes a power of good.

In my ongoing quest to discover the ultimate waterproof mascara I did a raid on Walmart yesterday. It was a smash and grab affair of L’Oreal, Maybelline and Revlon, (and it has to be confessed, two li-los for the pool WITH cup dispensers, God Bless America!). But yesterday’s poolside experiment was less than successful.

Maybelline Lash Discovery has one of the ace-est brushes ever – it’s a shrunken wand that allows you to get to every single little lash, including the bottom lashes that can be fiddly with a regular brush (and if you can do that with the outsized monster brush of Diorshow mascara, more power to you because you’re more woman than I am!)

And for the bottom lashes it’s great to have waterproof mascara as this is where you tend to get smudging, from oils and eye blinking. However, if this is the mascara you’re wearing underwater you are in big trouble as it smudges. Not massively, but enough to look like an under-eye shadow that on me looks like a giant puffy eye bag, not dissimilar to a Krispy Kreme donut (something else I have been enjoying whilst in America. Mmm, donuts). However, not something I want on my face. So for me I’m going to keep the brush, but for the mascara it’s Bin It!

Cover Girl Volume Exact in Black

The fact that I’ve been kicking back and tanning, swimming in the pool and sipping frozen margaritas, you could be forgiven for thinking I’m on holidays. But I assure you that it’s a cover (a deep cover) for my real purpose, which is bringing you the best of American beauty – including finding the world’s best waterproof mascara.

I’ve been relentlessly testing, through sunscreen applications, evening cook-outs and trips to Austin’s Barton Springs in 45 degree heat, and this is the one that’s held up – Cover Girl’s Maximum Volume Waterproof Mascara.

It’s got a pliable rubber brush that gets to the base of every lash, and so far even with multiple coats it doesn’t create the dreaded Stick Lash.

And let’s be clear – this is no lightweight testing process. We’re talking underwater breastroke, twice-daily dips and margarita fuelled poolside frolics, and always, always I have smudge proof, splash-proof, sweet and fluffy lashes. Meaning I don’t have to look like an egg (my natural state without mascara), even though I’m poolside.

I’ll be continuing my stringent testing methods all this week and next, and there are a quite a few more things on my list, so I’ll keep you posted on what other little makeup gems I find. Sadly for my UK readers they will probably be mainly US products, since I plan to take full advantage of what’s on offer in the nirvana of the American drugstore. But if you do find something you really like, you can always buy it on www.drusgtore.com as they now ship overseas. Which is dangerous. Not as dangerous as my mascara testing, but someone’s gotta do it!

Oh how do I love thee, let me count the ways:

 1.    Your fat, squidgy brush snuggles against my lashline and oh so gently follows the curve of the lashes until, hark! All the lashes are evenly distributed with a dense, perfect pigment, and not in any way spiky, clumpy or Liza Minelli-esque. The brush itself is like Chanel Inimitable on steroids – it solves the problems of that brush by adding in an extra layer of bristles so you don’t get spiky prongs for lashes.

 2.    You don’t flake, smear or end up needing to be repaired halfway through a shoot (or a long day at work since I love you so much you are also in my personal makeup bag, which I might add is gradually improving since I shamed myself in a previous post with the sadness of my personal makeup collection).

 3.    You can be layered, for multiple coats that give full, glam lashes and not the crunchy ones that you can’t drag the wand through. (That is nasty!)

 4.    As well as brown and black you come in gorgeous colors with a hint of color, like Smoky Violine and my favourite, Smoky Marine which is amazing on blue eyes.  It’s not obvious that it’s a deep navy, it just makes blue eyes pop (fear not those who think this might be straying into Lady Di territory, it’s a deep, rich cobalt, not an electric Duran Duran turquoise).

 5.    Your packaging is exactly what we would expect in one of the greatest fashion brands ever – sleek, slick and iconic, and makes you feel like a rock star every time you pull it out.

 6.    Apparently it is an “intense volume and curl mascara”, which makes sense as thick, gorgeous lashes is what we’re all craving – it’s hard to bat your eyes seductively with a fringe that is stick straight and stumpy.

 7.    The ad, which can be viewed below is gorgeous enough to make me do pretty much anything this mascara asks. (Except maybe volunteer to talk to a clown at the circus, because I’m really scared of them).

 You really are Exceptionnel (Chanel that is)