Saturday, 21 July 2012

L'Oreal Color Infallibles USA Summer Edition Swatches

Recently, I ordered several L'Oreal Color Infallibles from Drugstore.com. There were six new shades released in the USA this summer, of which I purchased all except 800 Bottomless Java.

337 Endless Sea is a metallic turquoise that is more blue-toned than 031 Innocent Turquoise (from the Cannes collection released in Europe) but not as vibrant as Laura Mercier Turquoise Caviar Stick.

996 Liquid Diamond is a light silvery grey that is supposed to be a dupe for Flashback Silver, which I do not own. It lacks the purple taupe tint of 037 Metallic Lilac (from the Cannes collection).

L'Oreal often releases the same shade using different names and numbers in different countries, which is terribly sneaky of them and makes absolutely no sense as it just causes confusion and frustration for the customers. There were two dupes in the new shades released in the US. 335 Golden Emerald is virtually identical to 022 Emerald Lamé, which was released in Singapore last year. Emerald Lamé swatches more smoothly with a richer intensity than Golden Emerald.

556 Smoldering Plum is a ringer for 013 Burning Black, which is a tinge more intense. The new US shades are all made in the USA while the others in my collection are made in Italy. Packaging-wise, they are very similar, except that the plastic stopper in the US version is grey instead of black.


Below are comparison swatches done on bare skin without any primer. Most shades were 2-3 swipes each except for Emerald Lamé which required just a single swipe.




For this look, I used 337 Endless Sea from the upper lashline to the crease and 222 Infinite Sky in the crease and along the lower lashline, with MAC Fly-by-Blu Pearlglide Eyeliner. Both Endless Sea and Infinite Sky were easy to apply and blend with my fingertip. Even without using a primer, there was hardly any creasing. Endless Sea has a beautiful glowy effect and is pretty easy to wear as it's not too loud.


Thanks for reading!

6 comments:

Anonymous said...

I'm not sure if you have any, but are these really similar in quality to G Armani's Eyes to Kill Intense (which I have heard before from others)? I really want one of those LE ones from GA but $32 with tax is steep for me at this time. Since it's not fully a dry eyeshadow, I'm concerned about these drying up.

Haru said...

hi,
I find Armani's Eyes To Kill are usually more richly pigmented than the Color Infallibles. The formula is very similar (Armani is owned by L'Oreal after all) but Armani offers a number of more complex shades. I've owned a couple of Eyes To Kill and Color Infallibles for more than a year and have not noticed any of them drying up. As long as you keep them properly closed, I think they should be able to last a couple of years without problems.

. : * justine * : . said...

I just bought Smoldering Plum even though i was 99% sure it was just Burning Black... oh well! I find the Italian formulation of the Infallibles a lot smoother... all of my American shades have a tendency to stick to the stopper lid and lift out of the pot!

Haru said...

hey justine,
I was so bummed to find two dupes, especially Golden Emerald which had looked so lovely online. Yup, there is definitely a difference in the quality of the Italian-made ones versus the US-made ones. Some of my Italy-made ones also stuck to the stopper though. I found that nudging the stopper sideways against the pot usually makes the eyeshadow block fall back into the pot.

Bun Bun Makeup Tips said...

Absolutely agree with them being sneaky about the names part! Like Permanent Kaki is Golden Sage, Endless Chocolate is Continuous Cocoa, Hourglass Beige is Iced Latte. Annoying!

xxMxx said...

Don't know why L'Oreal just gets it over with and releases the exact same shades all over the world. Can't they see we love them? Having more options is a win-win situation.
By the way, Endless Chocolate USA equivalent is Bottomless Java, not Continuos Cocoa. The latter is an almost matte charcoal-brown.
They should also make available world wide the Chrome line. Do you know the line has an almost perfect dupe for Lancome's Erika F.? But it's not even available for the whole of Europe. Shame on you, L'Oreal