Review, Swatches & Recommendation: Limnit Lip Gloss

DISCLAIMER: I got these for free, but I was in no way obliged to post a public review & all opinions are mine. Trina did give a 10% off code I can share (WORKINGWITHMONOLIDS), but I do not make any money out of it. :)

Now with that out of the way.....

As you all know, I'm a diehard fan of Limnit and have recommended them before on this blog....as well as many, many, many times on Reddit. I love this brand. So when Trina, the owner, asked me if I'd like to be one of the first few people to try out her new lip glosses, obviously I said yes. 

These lip glosses only come in 3 colours at the time being, and here's the description from Limnit:

• Everyday Effervescence: true yellow-orange lip gloss packed with a mixture of copper, gold, and red shimmer  

• Fearless Firecracker: red orange lip gloss packed with a mixture of gold, red, and pink shimmer 

• Atomic Azalea: a slightly warm, watermelony lip gloss with cool pink, purple and red shimmer

So let's get on to the good part first...the swatches!

First of all, I'll put a disclaimer right here. I generally don't like glosses since I find them messy and my hair gets stuck in them, but at the same time, Limnit is my favourite brand, so it's hard not to be biased. With that being said, I'll be as fair as possible with my review!

Colour

Ok, my camera isn't doing them justice. They're really sparkly and in real life, I can see the duochrome highlight, especially in Atomic Azalea. These are sheer glosses, and while I normally don't like sheer glosses since my lips are often peeling and sheer glosses highlight this in an unflattering way, this is great for creating that blotted, messy lips look that's so popular in Korea right now.  Here's an example of that look using Fearless Firecracker & Stop And Smell The Roses (new shade!)

Wear

Like all glosses, these aren't really long lasting and I don't expect them to be. They also transfer easily, which again is common for glosses and why I hate glosses. The great thing is that these do NOT bleed and they're not sticky at all, which impressed me. I find that brands have a hard time striking the balance between non-sticky and non-bleedy, and Limnit got it right. So yeah, I'm impressed.

Comfort

10/10. They totally win for this. I mentioned they're non-sticky, but they're so comfortable on your lips too. They're not drying at all, but they don't feel greasy either. For my swatches, I messed up during the video and had to reapply everything all over again. Even then, my lips were ok. It just feels like you're using a lip balm so I'm a huge fan of it.

Ingredients

And comes a slightly boring part that I've decided to start doing in my reviews...ingredient analysis. Here are the ingredients:

Hydrogenated Polyisobutene (and) Ethylene/Propylene/Styrene Copolymer (and) Butylene/Ethylene/Styrene Copolymer, Ricinus Communis (Castor) Seed Oil, Caprylic/Capric/Stearic Glycerides, Tocopheryl Acetate (Vitamin E), Microcrystalline Wax, Euphorbia Cerifera (Candelilla) Wax, Simmondsia Chinensis (Jojoba) Oil, Butyrospermum Parkii (Shea) Butter, Ozokerite Wax, Fragrance, Theobroma Cacao (Cocoa) Seed Butter, Cetyl Alchol, Copernicia Cerifera (Carnauba) Wax, Cannabis Sativa (Hemp) Seed Oil, Ascorbyl Palmitate (Vitamin C); May Contain: Titanium Dioxide (CI 77891), Iron Oxides (CI 77491, CI 77492, CI 77499), Blue 1 Lake (CI 42090), Red 7 Lake (CI 15850), Red 28 Lake (CI 45410), Red 40 Lake (CI 16035), Yellow 5 Lake (CI 19140), Mica (77019), Tin Oxide (778161), Synthetic Fluorophylogopite (77019), Silica, Calcium Sodium Borosilicate

As you can see, these are vegan and as always, cruelty-free. Quick check with CosDNA shows that everything's safe & non-irritating, though some of the more acne prone may want to watch out for the cocoa seed butter. I'm acne-prone myself, but I've been using them for a week and haven't had any issues so it's not something I'd worry too much about.

These glosses are definitely rich in butters and oils, and I suspect that's why they're so comfortable to wear. So A+ for formula!

Would I repurchase? Yes.

So for those of you who prefer watching a video and want to see videos of face swatches, here's the video I posted on YouTube:

Oh and bonus swatch of a new Limnit lipstick shade, Stop And Smell The Roses:

Swatches & Recommendation: Swatches of 15 Limnit Shades!

On July 7, I got the most awesome surprise for me in the mail!

Trina from Limnit sent me 16 lipstick samples to swatch!

I accidentally got 2 Castle In the Sky though, so the swatches are for 15 colours only.

Limnit is a brand I've tried before, and you can find my previous review here. I love Limnit –not only do they have really gorgeous, bright colours, Trina is so awesome customer service-wise, and always responds so quickly to my questions. I usually get a respond within a day, and sometimes even within a few hours! 

Anyway, Trina had just reformulated her lipsticks, so I was really excited to try out her new formula. I actually wanted to publish this exactly 3 months since I received the package, but I have a business trip tomorrow so I'm publishing it a day early. 

Lipstick Formula Review

In my previous review, I mentioned the lipsticks hardening with time to the point where they were almost impossible to use. That's why I decided to delay this review by 3 months, just to make sure this new formula will survive the test of time. Guess what? It did! 3 months in, the lipsticks are just as creamy and smooth as they were before! I did the arm swatches on Oct 3, and they were still a dream to apply. And yes, they're very pigmented. 

The formula doesn't feather so you can use these without a lip liner. They're not drying on me and I found them really comfortable to use. They do fade around the middle of my lips after about 2-3h, but that's normal lipstick performance on me. 

Non-traditional lip colours like greens and blues are a true test of a lipstick's formula since any streakiness shows up pretty easily. Almost all of Limnit's colours passed this test with flying colours. The only colour I had an issue with was Between The Lines, which was very "oily" in texture so I had trouble getting an even application and building it up. Flower Maze has a similar issue, but to a much, much lesser extent. It's only one (or two, if you count Flower Maze) out of 17, so I think it's just a bad batch. 

I noticed Freestyle, Olive My Love, and The Other Side has a softer texture than the rest & melts more easily, but it didn't really make much of a difference to me application-wise. 

Overall, I'm extremely impressed with the formula and strongly recommend this brand!

Swatches

All done under natural light over bare skin:

Btw, I made a typo that I only caught now after I've copy & pasted the text on ALL the swatch pics. 

-__-

My phone's white balance went crazy with some colours for the lip close ups. I've tried to colour correct as much as I can:

Full face for more accurate white balance:

Oh, and I think Extraterrestial is going to be the IT colour for Fall. What do you guys think?

Pikachu Lips!

Ok guys, I'm so freaking excited! Trina from Limnit lipsticks sent me a bunch of Limnit samples to try out her new formula and I just have to try them out immediately! So screw crappy lighting, this had to happen.

Yup...crappy lighting = crappy photo T.T

Bouncy!

Bonus pic...the full face:

Review & Swatches: Limnit Lipsticks

I bought 2 Limnit mini-sized lipstick some time ago and got a free sample!

Customer Service Review

Here's the TAT:

• Ordered: June 27
• Shipped: July 07
• Arrived in NY: July 09

Customer service was great! I wasn't expecting the order to take so long to ship, so I had to contact Trina to ask her to ship to a different address since I ran out of time on my forwarding address.  I got a reply within the same day and she made sure my order was shipped to the right address. 

Lipsticks Review and Swatches

These come in tubs and as far as I know, there's no option to buy them in a lip balm/lipstick tube yet. There's also no option to buy samples, which is why I only have swatches of 3 colours.

The tubs come shrinkwrapped, so that's awesome:

I got the old formula, which apparently is prone to crystalizing and will be improved soon:

While I didn't have any problems with crystalization, I did find the consistency a bit hard and waxy, but I guess that's to be expected with matte lipsticks. They do get harder with time though. Here's a gif to illustrate how stiff it is:

It's a bit dark, so it's hard to see, but my brush didn't puncture a hole through the lipstick.

I don't know if I'm imagining it, but I swear it was softer when I first got it about 4 months ago. 

Here are the face swatches:

All under natural light..I wish I can go to work in these pretty colours! Oh, and for these face swatches, I cheated on the make up detox I'm supposed to be on and used 1 layer of Dior's Hyrdalife BB Cream. May my dermatologist forgive me.

As you can see from the photo above, the pigmentation is great. I struggled a bit with the formulas of Abracadabra & League of My Own though, since they kept going patchy. Abracadabra was worse than League of My Own, and as you can see from the lip close ups below, I couldn't get it smooth no matter how hard I tried. Luckily, it blends well with my lip colour, so it's not too obvious. 

Left: Under yellow-toned artificial light
Right: Under natural light

Ok, the reason I did 2 swatches is because I don't have a mirror in the spot where I get a good amount of natural light. That makes it really hard to focus, and I also found out I tend to make funny lip movements when I'm trying to take pics of my lips without a mirror.

UPDATE Jan 28, 2015: It's been an additional 2 months since this review, and the lipsticks hardened further to the point where I couldn't get the colour off. I contacted Trina and she responded so quickly. She suggested scouring the surface of the lipstick, and that definitely help make the lipstick more usable. I asked about melting the colour and mixing it with oils/lip balm to soften it, and she suggested against it since it dilutes the colour. I love the colours so much, I don't think I'll risk destroying them. Scouring works well enough for me!