Friday 11 March 2011

Lunasol Spring 2011

While transiting at Narita Airport last week, I picked up some pieces from the Lunasol spring collection, which has just been launched in Singapore as well. As usual, the highlight of the collection is the array of five eyeshadow quads. The Ocean Scene Eyes collection is dominated by shimmery shades of icy pastels and light neutrals.

The collection also includes five limited edition Shining Ocean Eyes. These are super glittery water-based eyeshadows. I picked up EX03 Shining Sheer Green (7.5g) which I figured would go well with the two Ocean Scene Eyes palettes that I got. While the Shining Ocean Eyes do add a nice sparkle, the glitter bits felt sharp and slightly gritty to touch when I was smoothing it out on my eyelids. Nevertheless, it did work well as an eyeshadow base.

The Illuminating Highlight #1 Sheer Lavender is a face highlighting powder that helps to enliven skin that is looking dull or sallow. It is subtle enough such that dusting it all over the face won't make one look like a shiny disco ball. I like using this for adding a more natural glow to a foundation that has a flat matte finish.

Coloring Cheeks #8 Medium Pink (10g) is not part of the spring collection. It is a very wearable natural-looking blush with just the right amount of color payoff. The micro-sparkles are not noticeable when applied. I purchased this and the Illuminating Highlight without the cases as I'll probably get the Compact Case (Select) N later which can fit four of these. The Shining Ocean Eyes, Illuminating Highlight (refill) and Coloring Cheeks (refill) were all 2125yen each at Narita Airport, versus the usual retail price of 2625yen.

Although I'm usually not a fan of beige shades, the greyish black and light beige combo of Ocean Scene Eyes #4 Smoky Ocean looked like a very wearable smoky eyes quad. I would usually avoid a palette with so many pale shades as they have a tendency to become indistinguishable from one another when applied. But the shades in Smoky Ocean looked very pretty when swatched so I decided to give it a try. The quad is 4250yen (S$66) at Narita Airport (versus the normal retail price of 5250yen in Japan and S$77 in Singapore).

With Shining Ocean Eyes EX03 as the base, I applied the whitish beige (bottom left) shade over the browbone area, the light beige (top left) in the crease, the greyish black along the upper lashline and the outer half of the lower lashline, and the silvery white shade at the inner corners and along the lower lashline.

The texture of the Ocean Scene Eyes feels more refined and smoother than Lunasol's earlier eyeshadow quads. When brushing the surface of the eyeshadow with the sponge or brush applicators, there were hardly any powder bits kicked up. I experienced only a tiny bit of fall out when applying the greyish black shade. There is no chunky glitter but all the shades are shimmery.

The lasting power was excellent with no noticeable fading and hardly any creasing, thanks to the Shining Ocean Eyes.


My first try with #3 Vivid Ocean was a bit of a disappointment because the blue tones were just not that visible when applied. I'll need to experiment with some other eyeshadow bases to see if I can get the shades to apply more like how they appear in the pan.

With Shining Ocean Eyes EX03 as the base, I applied the yellow shade over the browbone area, the light mint shade on the inner half of the upper lid and along the lower lashline, the sky blue shade on the outer half of the upper lid, and the dark blue shade along the upper lashline.

For both looks, I am wearing Illuminating Highlight #1 lightly dusted all over on top of my foundation, and the Coloring Cheeks #8.

If you have tried the Lunasol spring makeup collection, do let me know what you think of the products!

10 comments:

Anonymous said...

Hi Iris, do you know if Lunasol will be doing any roadshows for this collection? I remember they had it for the past few yrs at Takashimaya, there were japanese MAs doing the makeup for you if you buy something. :)
Rach

Anonymous said...

Haru, I really like your first FOTD with Smoky Ocean...you are very pretty :D
The tone of your skin is more luminous than usual and that's really great...can't wait to grab one and try it too :) thanks for the tips!

elainie said...

Hi Iris!
Great Haul!
I bought the 03 Vivid ocean from Adambeauty and I liked it very much!
I found that the palettes are more shimmery (than ever!) and very pigmented!
I had went down to Taka Counter to swatch the other colors and the shining eyes!
The warm, colorful & natural ocean eyes and the shining eyes in beige would be my buys!
As Kanebo is having a promotion from 18-24th March- direct 20% with $500 spend, will pick up the items then!

Haru said...

hi Rach,
I don't know if there will be a roadshow, best to check directly with the counter.

hi,
Thank you :-)

hi Elainie,
Thanks for the info! Though I don't think I'll be taking advantage of the offer as I have quite a lot of Lunasol to last me for a long, long time! The palettes are indeed quite shimmery and I liked the fact that they feel silkier than some previous collections.

Anonymous said...

I want to get excited about Japanese eyeshadows, but I just can't due to the constantly boring colors and the super sheer payoff. I got that purple spring Shiseido trio you posted about earlier and was so disappointed in how sheer it was. Beautiful colors, but it doesn't really matter when it blends to nothing. I think I'll stick to UD.

Haru said...

hi,
Japanese brands tend to focus on shades that are easy for ladies to use and wear, hence the proliferation of gradational palettes that do not require much thinking about how to combine the shades and where to apply each shade. Japanese ladies also tend to prefer shades that are more sheer, with a certain translucency. The Japanese aesthetic is very different from the Western aesthetic. Having said that, there are always exceptions to the rule and you can find Japanese brand eyeshadows that are very well pigmented.

Do try using a primer or coloured base (like a cream eyeshadow) under the Shiseido purple palette, as that helps to improve the intensity of the Shiseido shades.

Lynn.TrinketsLove said...

Hi Iris!
Thanks for the great ETOD and review of Smoky Ocean! That's the palette I like most from this new collection. I was considering whether to get it yesterday at Taka and I think I have made up my mind now :)

espenine said...

Hi Haru,

May I know how did you use the Colouring Cheeks #8? Sweep all at one go (light to dark or dark to light shade) or layer colors one by one?

Thanks in advance.

Haru said...

hi,
I usually apply the darkest pink shade (with the micro sparkles) first and then I dust the other two lighter shades on top to give it a more natural finish.

Kai said...

I've been following your blog recently (followed here from Lotus Palace XD) and I love it! A couple of days ago I also picked up a few Lunasol Spring collection stuff at the Kansai airport and so far i'm rather liking them!

I wasn't as imporessed with the blush, but to be fair not very many blushes can trump my R&R blush collection anyway. I got 01 Warm Ocean and 02 Natural Ocean, and liking both so far! Natural Ocean is definitely a warm natural that works well with asian skintone (i think i'm a little warmer than you, but we're about the same shade, NC20 or so but you might be a smidgen lighter), though I find it not neutral enough. Still lovely though.

Warm Ocean i actually don't find very warm, with really pretty purple! and the prettiest shimmer/sparkle! I did experience sparkle fallouts under my eyes and on my cheeks though, which I'm not a huge fan of, so i think next time I will just apply my base stuff after I do my eyes.

i didn't grab the cream eye base but now i sorta wish i did due to your review. and the highlighter too! i should've bought something that's lavender shade while i was in Japan. I forgot to buy a lot of things that I wanted, for that matter x___x

also grabbed a Full Glamour Gloss (i actually wanted Full Glamour LIquid Lip that Kathi reviewed, but got mixed up and got the gloss instead, since they didn't even have the liquid lips on display at kansai airport) and one of the lipstick S's. :D

for my first forray into Lunasol, it was a good experience!