Two things I learned while swatching: this product is fairly sheer and it dries quickly. I started applying EC-1 and quickly realized it was light enough that I would probably need dividing lines between the shades. I grabbed a black eyeliner and drew those, but when I went back to finish my EC-1 swatch, the product on my arm had dried to the point that I couldn’t continue adding more on top of it. I had to wash off and start over.

EC-1 is pale white-pink. EC-2 is yellow peach. EC-3 is peach-pink/beige-pink. EC-4 is terracotta rose. EC-5 is peach brown. I believe I could wear EC-1 and EC-2 with equal ease.

I think fingers are the best way to apply these. I applied EC-2 to my lids with a flat, domed synthetic brush and thought — by itself — it was a bit texture-y (though it looked fine once I put powder shadow on top of it). Application was much smoother with fingers alone (and it was easier to control the sheerness and get a nice, even layer).

Eye Canvas is a permanent addition to the line, and they are $26 each.

Last summer, Laura introduced a new (but limited edition) formula of lipstick called Gel Lip Colour. I confess, I missed these on their first release. Those 2011 shades were Clementine, Rosette, Dollface, Sweet Cherry, Hibiscus Bloom, and Berry Sorbet.

This year, the Gel Lip Colors are making a second appearance, and Clementine, Rosette, and Orchid are joined by newcomers Poppy and Orchid.

The Gel Lipsticks feel fantastic going on. They have a wonderful “gel”-ish, cushiony feel — very much like Chantecaille’s Lip Chics.

The coverage is sheer, almost stain-y looking, with a very soft shine. They don’t last long (a common criticism of sheer lipsticks), though they do leave some color behind even after the lipstick is gone. I’ve tried on Poppy, which has a vanilla scent. These lipsticks are $22 each, and are again limited edition.

Even though I may possess the world’s largest collection of sheer red-orange lipsticks, I lust after Clementine. It is sensational. Poppy is a red-violet pink. Dollface is the sheerest; a bubblegum pink. Rosette (my second-favorite) is a red-rose pink. Orchid is purplish pink with a very few pink/purple sparkles.

Poppy and Rosette are similar; Poppy is more violet/pink and Rosette is more red. Want to see them side-by-side? Okay.

The collection also includes five limited edition nail polishes ($18 each). My fingertips long for Sizzle, a warm red — a flaming hot orange-red. I also love Cabana. This salmon-coral-rose is exactly what I want on my toes right now. Oh La La is the sheerest, a baby-girl, cake-frosting, pastel pink. Flamingo is bright, cool, Barbie pink. Luscious is bougainvillea red-violet pink/magenta. All accounts I’ve heard say these polishes are tough and extremely chip-resistant.

These products are available at any major department store (Nordstrom, Neiman Marcus, Saks, etc. And Saks and Neiman Marcus are both in beauty week right now).

You can still buy Berry Sorbet, Hibiscus Bloom, and Sweet Cherry on Laura Mercier’s website (free shipping February 12 – 21st with code LMVFS12).

And Sephora is offering an extremely tempting gift set which includes an exclusive shade of Gel Lip Colour: Grapefruit.

• Oil-Free Foundation Primer
• Tinted Moisturizer in Nude
• Secret Camouflage in SC-4
• Translucent Loose Setting Powder
• Creme Cheek Colour in Oleander
• Eye Basics in Wheat
• From the eye and cheek palette, eyeshadows in African Violet, Rich Cocoa, and Buff Pearl
• Long Lash Mascara
• Sheer Lip Color in Kissed Lips
• Lip Shine in Naked Apricot

I talked it over with some of my favorite Laura Mercier sales associates, and we agonized over which product was where. (I wish I had an even bigger/higher resolution version of this image.)

We finally decided that it must be Rich Cocoa on the lid, blended with African Violet in the crease (because what else could create that shimmer). Tawny Apricot isn’t in the official product breakdown, but my artists said they would probably use it to blend and soften the edges of the African Violet — why not, if you have the palette. The brow highlight and the highlight at the inner corner of the eye are Buff Pearl. And the model has to be wearing eyeliner, even though they don’t include it in the breakdown. My artists said maybe Black Plum was used as the top liner, and softly smoked out on the bottom. That would account for the touch of purple on the lid and below the eye. (I’d probably tightline with a pencil liner in addition to the shadow.) And if you want to create that just-so sweep of shadow on the outer corner of the model’s eye, blend as normal, then clean up the edge with a q-tip.

The artists commented that SC-4 is an unusual choice for someone who wears Tinted Moisturizer in Nude… we wondered whether the Secret Camouflage might have been used to contour her cheek. And for a shorthand glow without a camera flash, they suggested Laura’s new Radiance Primer.

As LeVar Burton used to say: you don’t have to take my word for it. Anybody want to take a stab at recreating the look?

The collection includes one of Laura’s classic eye-and-cheek palettes (six shadows, two blushes — no lip products mixed in with the powders). The palette is $60, limited edition.

Buff Pearl is a beige-champagne-white satin. Tawny Apricot is a dusty rose satin. Rich Cocoa is a dark wood-/earth-brown matte. Pale Pink is a very whitened, very pale, ballet pink matte. African Violet is a shimmery violet-gold duochrome. Black Plum is a delightfully pigmented, dark, cool, dusty, muted, blackened blue-purple matte. Though these shades all feel really familiar, African Violet and Black Plum are the only two listed among Laura’s regular single eyeshadows.

Rose Desire and Fresh Peach are both new shades. Rose Desire is a blue (cool) rose pink; Fresh Peach is pinked peach with a few tiny sparkles (which give it a slight sheen).

The collection also features two Creme Cheek Colour blushes ($22). Oleander is actually a repromote from the permanent line. It’s a pigmented cool pink. Innocent Peach is a little more sheer. It’s a light peach-pink, and it’s limited edition.

There are three Sheer Lip Color lipsticks ($20). Baby Lips (repromote from the permanent line) is a warm rose. Kissed Lips (new, limited edition) is coral pink. Nude Lips (repromote from the permanent line) is a warm rose-beige-nude.

Naked Apricot and Tempting Coral are both “Lip Shines,” and I’m not exactly sure how to describe them. Potted glosses? Potted gloss-balms? They’re $22 each, both limited edition. Naked Apricot is very, very sheer peach. Tempting Coral is more pigmented, a red-berry-rose with gold sparkles.

The two cake eyeliners and two Eye Basics cream eyeshadow bases are repromotes (follow the links to revisit their original swatch posts).

Cake eyeliner is a dry “puck” of pressed powder, activated by water or a product like Laura’s Tightline Activator. You wet your brush, then muddle it on the cake until you achieve a paste the consistency of shoe polish. Apply your eyeliner and the cake will dry back to its regular state, ready for the next application. As you probably already know, a new cake eyeliner can be used with either water or Activator, but once you’ve used it with Activator, it won’t work with water again.

Mahogany Brown is dark brown.  Charcoal Grey (neither charcoal nor grey, really) is more like an industrial/nautical blue-grey. Cake eyeliners are $22 (and Tightline Activator is $20).

Eye Basics are $24 each. They are water-resistant, crease-proof, semi-matte eyeshadow bases containing vitamins and something called “Eyebright,” all meant to reduce inflammation. Flax is a manila-folder yellow-beige. Wheat is peach.

Makeup remover is, to some extent, a matter of preference. What are you used to, what format do you prefer, how much makeup do you wear? When I’m swatching, my goal is to get my arm completely clean of often-stubborn products (like heavy-duty foundation, bright lipsticks, and long-wear eyeliners) as quickly as possible, with a minimum of scrubbing, no residue, and without drying my skin. Hands-down, the most effective category is oil cleansers. I prefer them to foams, lotions, cold creams, other liquids, and soaps.

You apply oil cleanser to dry skin, massage it around, add water (to emulsify), massage again, and rinse clean.

Cleansing oil doesn’t leave your skin feeling oily, and it won’t clog your pores or cause acne (the molecules are too large to penetrate). I’m probably going to horrify some aestheticians by saying this, but I don’t use a second product after washing my face with oil cleanser. Once the makeup/sunscreen is off, I’m done.

Anyway, having tried a number of oil cleansers, I wanted to share with you my personal rank list, from best to worst.

1. Shiseido Ultimate Cleansing Oil ($25, 5 oz)
This is, unequivocally, the best cleanser on the market. Designed to remove Shiseido’s notoriously protective sunscreens, it’s the most effective, gentlest, least obtrusive, no-residue, non-drying, best-thing-I’ve-tried. It’s my #1 choice at home and “in the field.” I never need a second product to get my arm “all the way clean.”

Oil cleansers turn cloudy/white when you get them wet (somehow this makes me feel that they’re working), and Shiseido’s does this best.  If you plunge an oiled hand into a bowl of water, it makes a satisfying “poof” of white as the oil dissipates into the water.

2. Bobbi Brown Cleansing Oil ($39, 6.7 oz)
If Shiseido’s Cleansing Oil is, for some reason, unavailable, my second choice is Bobbi Brown’s. It gets almost everything off (though if I’m swatching something particularly tenacious, I might have to follow it with a chaser of Chanel Gentle Biphase Eye Makeup Remover).

With repeated use, I feel like it builds up a bit of residue. But you’re probably not going to feel that in a single face-washing.

3. Shu Uemura Cleansing Beauty Oil Premium A/O Advanced Formula ($75, 15 oz)
Shu Uemura Cleansing Oils come in several “flavors” — Pore Clarifying (pink) for oily/acne-prone skin, White Recovery Brightening (purple), Classic (yellow), Premium for dry/sensitive skin (this used to be called “Rich” and it was orange… they’ve reformulated and now the bottle is yellow).

Anyway, my favorite is “Green,” which is supposed to address aging concerns, yet still feels light. I think it has the best scent, and it seemed to me to be the most effective of Shu’s oils. (Green is also their #1 seller.)

Shu has a sterling reputation for cleanse off oils (and many people feel they basically invented the category), but in a head-to-head (or should I say arm-to-arm?) test, Shu would sometimes leave behind “ghosts” that another cleanser (Shiseido, Laura Mercier’s old Light formula) would remove completely.

Honestly, Bobbi Brown’s Cleanse Off Oil and Shu Uemura’s Premium A/O are probably a tie for me, but since Shu no longer has a physical presence in the U.S., it’s a little harder to get. (You have to order from their website. Though, on the plus side, free shipping and no tax.)

4. Laura Mercier Purifying Cleansing Oil ($40, 6.8 oz)
Laura Mercier used to make two formulas of cleansing oil (Light and Rich) — and Light formerly held my #2-favorite spot.

“Rich” oils, oils intended for dry or mature skin, often don’t rinse clean. They seem like leave-in conditioner for the skin… they feel sort of oily even after you’ve washed them away.

Maybe a year ago, Laura Mercier reformulated their oil cleanser, and the new edition feels like a combination of the old Light and Rich. I’m not a fan.

5. MAC Cleanse Off Oil ($26, 5 oz)
MAC’s Cleanse Off Oil just isn’t my favorite. It simply doesn’t seem as effective as the others when it comes to removing makeup.

6. Lumene Lift Touch Revitalizing Cleansing Oil ($10, 6.8 oz)
Lumene is just about the cheapest cleanse off oil you can buy, and a while ago I bought some for home use (both face and arm). It was even on sale at CVS when I bought it, so I only paid $5 a bottle.

Now this sounds absolutely crazy, but I stopped using Lumene on my face because it was drying my skin. How can a cleanse off oil (which even mentions dry/mature skin on the bottle) be drying? Well, the bottle also mentions “toning,” so maybe that ingredient is the culprit. Has anyone else had this experience? I did buy this about a year ago, so it’s possible the product has been reformulated since then.

What’s your favorite makeup remover, readers? Are you on the oil bandwagon? Do you have a favorite that I haven’t tried yet?

The collection includes three new eyeshadows — all limited edition. Pink Pearl is a slightly duochromey satin lilac (slight pink reflect). Crystal Beige is a high-shimmer warm rosy bronze. Deep Garnet is a satin/shimmer near-black red-purple-brown (with tiny red-purple shimmers). These are all Luster formula, each $22.

Orchid Shimmer is a new, limited edition cake liner (wet your brush with either water or Tightline Activator, then muddle the brush on the cake of powder. But once you’ve used Tightline Activator on the product, you cannot use it with water). It’s a nearly black purple, $22.

There are three holiday lipsticks and three holiday Lip Glaces. Evening Pink is new and limited edition, a bright, cool hibiscus-pink. Raspberry Sorbet is new but permanent, a deeper cool rose. Rose is a repromoted permanent shade, a light, warm pink.

The Lip Glaces are lipglosses with a doe’s foot wand and a sort of marshmellow scent. Rose is a repromoted permanent shade, a semi-sheer raspberry-pink (red-pink) with tiny sparkles. Bare Beam is a shimmery pink/brown. Nude Lilac is sheer lilac (purple-pink) with gold sparkles. Each of the six lipcolors is $22.

Of course, the piece of this collection that’s got everyone talking is the Rose Rendezvous highlighter. It’s a shimmery rose-gold beige, embossed with a gorgeous flower pattern. It was $42, limited edition (of course), and it sold out almost immediately. The good news is we have one for sale in the BeautyBloggers.org charity auction — and your winning bid goes straight to Doctors Without Borders.

And finally, there’s a new, limited edition nail polish in the collection. (It’s been a while since Laura put polish in a collection.) Twilight is a shimmery black-purple (red-purple), $18.

The Radiance primer isn’t specifically part of the holiday collection, but it is new. This addition to Laura’s primer lineup has a subtle, golden sheen. It’s $30 for 1.7 oz, the same price as all her other primers.

This set contains a 1 oz. foundation primer (1.7 oz. is full size), Full Blown Volume mascara, lipliner in Plumberry, eye trio (containing two exclusive shadows and an exclusive shade of cake liner), lip trio (not only new colors, but a new formula as well), and a handful of tools: a dual-ended ponytail/crease brush, dual-ended flat eyeliner (tightliner brush)/pointed eyeliner brush, a lip color brush, and a pencil sharpener.

Smoky Lilac is a shimmery, soft lilac. Smoky Plum is a matte/satin muted “rusty” plum (a reddish brown purple). Ground Espresso is a new shade of cake liner, a near-black, dark, cool, brown-black. I swatched it with the Tightline Activator solution.

You can use Laura’s new (reformulated) cake liners with water, but once you wet them with tightline activator, they won’t work with water.

The lip palette contains a new formula for Laura: Lip Glazes, which are supposed to be something like a cross between a Lip Glace and a Stickgloss (in pan form). I’d describe them as full-coverage, very glossy, potted lipglosses. Sugarplum is light, cool pink. Raspberry Tarte is a cool rose pink. Chambord is raspberry (violet-red). And of course, you can always mix the colors.

Plumberry lipliner is a mauvey, dusty rose-pink.

The model on the left is wearing Moisture Supreme Foundation in Warm Ivory, Secret Camouflage in SC-1, Secret Concealer #1, Translucent Loose Setting Powder, Second Skin Cheek Colour in Barely Pink, Caviar Stick in Sapphire, the Smoky Eye Palette, Lip Glace in Bare Naked, and Full Blown Volume Lash Building Mascara in Black.

The model on the right is wearing Moisture Supreme Foundation in Sunny Beige, Secret Camouflage in SC-4, Secret Concealer #2, Translucent Loose Setting Powder, Second Skin Cheek Colour in Rose Petal, Caviar Stick in Smoke, the Smoky Eye Palette, Lip Glace in Bare Baby, and Full Blown Volume Lash Building Mascara in Black.

This collection is a bit of a hodge-podge. First, the collection introduces a new kind of smudgy eyeshadow crayon, the Caviar Stick Eyeshadow. There’s a smoky eye palette (which includes a bunch of brushes). And then there’s a fantasia on the theme of nude lips (the go-to complement to a smoky eye) — in the form of a mini collection of Lip Glaces.

Connoisseurs of Laura Mercier eyeliner already know that she makes two “pan-form” liners: Cake eyeliner (which requires water or tightline activator, and makes a very precise line, like a pen) and Caviar eyeliner (which is smudgy like a crayon, and does not require water). Caviar Stick Eyeshadow is an extension of the “Caviar” idea. And though these twist-up crayons are super creamy and blendable when first applied, they seem to set pretty well after a moment or two.

We’ve seen a number of smudgy eye crayons recently (both new and familiar): MAC Shadesticks, MAC Greasepaint Sticks, Urban Decay 24/7 Shadow Pencils, Bare Escentuals Buxom Smoky Eye Sticks. These are eyeshadows, eyeshadow base — some of them (Urban Decay and Buxom, especially) can even be used as eyeliner. I think the Laura Mercier Caviar sticks are a bit too soft to function well as liner.

I swatched the Caviar shadows two ways. First pencil-to-arm to show you the full color.

Smoke is black with silver shimmer. Steel is cool, dark grey, gunmetal silver. Plum is a rich, shimmery royal grape (but it becomes more red-plum sheered out). Jungle is dark forest green with gold shimmer. Sapphire is aptly named, sapphire blue. Amethyst is actually more of a frosty pink bronze/rose quartz (almost copper-rose, sheered out). Khaki is cool brown (much more brown when it’s sheered out). Cocoa is warm chocolate brown.

For the second set of swatches, I colored the tip of my finger with the crayon, then smudged the shadow onto my arm.


Caviar shadows are $24 each (and permanent).

The Classic Smoky Eye Palette is $85 (and if that seems high, it’s the brushes that raise the price). It contains four shadows, a cake liner, and brushes: an eye colour brush, a dual ended crease + smudge brush, and a dual-ended pointed eyeliner + cake eyeliner (aka tightlining) brush. This palette is limited edition.

Sparkling Noir is black with silver sparkles. Granite is a grey taupe satin. Sable is a lighter, warmer, shimmery taupe with a touch of purple. Vanilla is a near-white matte.

Finally, there are six Lip Glaces ($22, pigmented gloss with a doe’s foot applicator). Bare Naked is milky, warm, pale pink. Bare Peach is limited edition, a light peach-pink. Bare Beige is a repromote, a dusty, warm, muted, browned-rose. Bare Baby is a cool, pale bubblegum/strawberry milk pink (maybe a little more pink than Bare Pink, which is slightly more white?). Bare Baby is limited edition. Bare Blush is muted mauve pink.