May 2019 Birchbox

That's more diversity than the contents of any of my boxes has ever seen. -_-

Birchbox is a $15 monthly subscription that provides subscribers with 5-6 beauty samples and the occasional full-sized product. Birchbox is great for people who favor skin care or hair care over makeup items. Earlier this year Birchbox started various offerings including picking one of the items in your box, a choice of curated boxes, swapping out that month’s box for a select full sized item, swapping out that month’s box for store credit, or leaving it all up to fate and letting the algorithm surprise you. I find myself opting for curated boxes lately; even if not every item is a perfect fit, I’ve generally given up on trusting the algorithm to select even a fraction of my items. May’s theme was “Get Insipired.”

I forgot all about the included sticker, oops.

·         Benefit Cosmetics High Beam Liquid Face Highlighter – $10.40

·         Smith & Cult nailed Lacquer in Doe My Dear – $18.00, Full Sized

·         GrandeLIPS HydraPlump Plumping Liquid Lipstick in Vintage Rose – $9.26 (estimate)

·         Moroccanoil Treatment Light – $6.80

·         Beautyblender Beauty.Blusher Cheeky – $16.00, Full Sized

·         Real Chemistry Environmental Rescue Daily Serum – $8.00

Benefit Cosmetics High Beam Liquid Face Highlighter

I want so desperately to love this highlighter but I just can’t. The pearlescent pink is too light and frosty for my skin tone making me look like an ashy alien. If I was Alyssa Ashley’s complexion then sure, this may work for me. Another option is to just have box lights and ring lights focused on me at any given time. I also dislike the brush applicator; it just makes application far too difficult for me. I find myself overapplying highlighter and spending more time trying to blend it out than it’s worth. Often times my base makeup has been lifted off trying to correct my unintentional slathering of High Beam.

Smith & Cult nailed Lacquer in Doe My Dear

Let’s be real, this is almost 100% of the reason why I selected this curated box. I absolutely adore the packaging (it’s the one Smith & Cult item that I actually think is cute) and the dusty gray-taupe shade tugged at my heartstrings at first glance! I received this polish just after I fell in love with a manicurist who painted my nails with OPI’s Taupeless Beach. She’s married and I’m not into bigamy so we could not elope, much is the shame. The too-large-to-handle top comes off to reveal a too-teeny-to-handle black twist cap. As cute as the packaging is, the brand could not figure out a happily functional medium. Still absolutely worth it. The formula is nice too. It’s easily a two-coat polish and leaves a high shine finish that lasts for about a week. If I had to choose one color to wear for the rest of my life, this would easily be it. Ballet slipper pink would be a close second.

GrandeLIPS HydraPlump Plumping Liquid Lipstick in Vintage Rose

I picked this curated box knowing damn well this lipstick would taunt my melanin. Truly, nothing pigmented with the word “rose” in it would ever work for my skin tone. GrandeLIPS did not disappoint the cynic in me. It’s just too pink, too much. I like the plumping sensation, even though it’s pretty mild, and the soft, powdery texture, but as a liquid lipstick, it’s just too difficult for me to work with to try to make it wearable. More importantly, I don’t want to ruin one of my brown liquid lipsticks trying to make this sample worth it. I may play around with pencil lip liners but no promises. I’m just not a fan of the Barbie Mauve lip look on my skin tone (or really, pinks in general); it just looks so wildly 80s/90s a la Lisa Turtle.

Wearing GrandeLIPS liquid lip

Moroccanoil Treatment Light

Thanks? Most recently reviewed here. It works on the kids, not much more to add to this that I haven’t said numerous times before.

Beautyblender Beauty.Blusher Cheeky

This was a treat. I actually get more use out of it than I anticipated. It’s fairly large considering it’s purpose is to blend out blush. I’ve learned to use my Beautyblender Micro.Mini for blush. Don’t worry, guys. I didn’t actually find a use for the Micro.Mini until my Glossier haul. It works great for blending out any blusher job gone awry without concern of turning my primary blending sponge red and thus, contaminating any future makeup look. This item was just a (highly appreciated) bonus in my May box.

Dry Beauty Blender

Wet Beauty Blender

Real Chemistry Environmental Rescue Daily Serum

I’m trying to think of one product that I truly loved from Real Chemistry but so far I’m drawing a blank. The cleanser maybe? Whatever the case may be, this product certainly was not it. It’s not a bad product, it just left my face feeling sticky and I really did not notice any benefit from using it. I didn’t feel any increased moisture or hydration and the sample packaging was pretty gnarly. I had to cut the tip off with scissors making me feel like I was getting ready to glue a model aircraft carrier together.

Left to right: Benefit High Beam, High Beam blended out, GrandeLIPS liquid lipstick.

I am not going to complain about Birchbox not offering enough options for people of color only because I chose this particular curated box in May. I absolutely love the value in the box though. I got so much use out of the Beauty Blender and the nail polish can last me for years before it begins to separate. The color is near perfection and even after it’s exceeded its use, the pack rat in me wants to keep it around because the bottle is just so cute! This might be the most valuable Birchbox I've ever received at $68.46. I'm completely satisfied just based off of the value of the Smith & Cult nail polish and Beautyblender alone and how much use I've gotten out of both of those items. The box was worth $10.00 (I pre-paid for the year so my price per box was locked in prior to the price hike) for those two items alone. Everything else was pretty much a wash. Would I pay $15 for those two items? Not a chance in hell. I'd say Birchbox got lucky this month.