ILIA Lip Sketch Hydrating Crayon Review & Swatches

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ILIA Lip Sketch Hydrating Crayon Review & Swatches

I love a lip crayon so I was really excited to test out the new ILIA Lip Sketch Hydrating Crayon. I have photos and swatches for you right here.

What is ILIA Lip Sketch Hydrating Crayon?

ILIA Lip Sketch Hydrating Crayon
ILIA Lip Sketch Hydrating Crayon
  • Weightless lip crayon
  • Comfort of a lipstick with the precision of a lip liner
  • Glides on to the lips smoothly
  • Delivers rich, long-lasting color
  • Soft-matte finish.
  • Enriched with hyaluronic acid and marine plant extracts
  • Clinically shown to hydrate, visibly plump, smooth, and strengthen the skin barrier
  • Available in 12 shades

Key Ingredients

Sea Succulent – boosts hydration & helps replenish the skin barrier over time

Hyaluronic Acid – to hydrate, smooth & plump for fuller-looking lips

Seaweed Extract – to visibly improve definition & volume

Rosehip Oil – to help to nourish & soften lips

ILIA Lip Sketch Hydrating Crayon Shades & Swatches

ILIA Lip Sketch Hydrating Crayon Shades
ILIA Lip Sketch Hydrating Crayon Shades

There are 12 shades in the collection to choose from:

  • Banquette – beige pink
  • Pampas – soft peach
  • Pink Door – soft pink
  • Earthen – terracotta brown
  • Genre – mauve brown
  • Rhyme – cool mauve
  • Gala – brick rose
  • Kiln – rich berry
  • Night Bloom – deep magenta
  • Blue Note – cool cherry red
  • Case Study – classic red
  • Piazza – poppy red

Lip Swatches

I have six of the shades to show you – Banquette, Genre, Rhyme, Kiln, Blue Note, Piazza.

ILIA Lip Sketch Crayon in Banquette
Banquette
ILIA Lip Sketch Crayon in Genre
Genre
ILIA Lip Sketch Crayon in Rhyme
Rhyme
ILIA Lip Sketch Crayon in Kiln
Kiln
ILIA Lip Sketch Crayon in Blue Note
Blue Note
ILIA Lip Sketch Crayon in Piazza
Piazza

How to Use It

These lip pencils are pretty easy to use. If you want a sharp line, it’s best to keep it quite sharpened. The brand suggest using the ILIA Large Sharpener* to get a precise point. You could have a play and see if any of your current sharpeners work, but these are larger than regular liners, so you may need the ILIA one.

You just need to line the lips first and then colour inside the lines for all over coverage.

My Review of ILIA Lip Sketch

ILIA Lip Sketch Crayon Review
ILIA Lip Sketch Crayon Review

I think these are really lovely lip pencils and all the shades I have are fantastic. I love how easily the colour glides onto my lips. It has a lovely emollient texture that doesn’t tug at the skin at all.

It feels like a pretty hydrating lipstick but in a pencil form. The colour payoff is really impressive, and it takes a matter of seconds to get a full lip look. The formula feels more hydrating than a typical lip crayon or lip liner and it is super comfortable.

It stays feeling emollient on the lips and didn’t dry them out at all, as promised. One of the claims is plumping, which I have to say I didn’t notice, but the formula does leave lips looking smooth and hydrated. I really like the soft matte finish too.

In terms of precision, you will need to keep the pencils sharpened if you want a very precise line. This will be more important with the deeper colours, as you will see with the Blue Note lip swatch, where I could have done a sharper job on the lip line.

One of the downsides is that you will most likely need the brand’s sharpener, the Large Sharpener*, which is a bit of a pain but it’s not too expensive. The other thing to note is to make sure you put the cap back on firmly. I was a bit slap dash and found that the lids slid off a couple. You just need to really push them on – better safe than sorry!!

The wear time of the ILIA Lip Sketch is good. They are not all day wear, but it’s definitely a good few hours before you need to reapply. They are also great under a gloss if you want a more moisturised and shiny look and feel.

I love the shade Piazza which is a beautiful, super vibrant red. Also Genre is my other favourite. It is the perfect 90s nude. Absolutely love it.

If you like a lip crayon, check out the NARS ones which are also fab – read: NARS Powermatte High-Intensity Lip Pencil Review & Swatches. The NARS ones have a slightly waxier, firmer texture than the ILIA Lip Crayons, and they are also slightly more affordable at £24.

Where to buy ILIA Lip Sketch Hydrating Crayon

The new lip pencils are available now for £26 / $26 via the following links:

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Maison Style Experience

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hihi everyone, I hope all is well. Today I am talking about my experience at Maison style. Lets begin

I decided to get a texture release( lets call it TR from now onwards) back in Dec 23 but because my hair wasn’t in good condition, I gave myself till April to it. I wanted to get it done at Maison Style specifically by Andree because I felt like she had the most knowledge on it from my research. I finally went on the 16th for it!

Pic from AllinLondon

Salon & My experience

Maison Style is based in Tulse Hill South London and led by Andree and her team. They are all about healthy hair care and work both on natural & relaxed hair. I had a 48hr email reminder which was good because I totally forgot I had to do a patch test lol. I called and went in for a patch test which was super quick, it went well so I could proceed with my TR.

I arrived a bit early for my app, and it was busy by the time I got there. There’s parking available on nearby roads but those parking prices man kmt lol. After a few mins wait I had a quick chat with Andree about my TR and she gave me some details about it too. She was able to take one look at my hair and say it was super fine and I don’t know why I found that amazing because sis didn’t even touch my hair lol and it was in 2 large flat twists loool. The chat was eye opening for me and because of this I am changing a few plans I had for my hair this year ( more on this in another post)

Texture Release

The service begun with a shampoo. She (not but Andree and I didnt get her name) clarified then used the TR shampoo. She explained that the TR shampoo needs to be left on for about 5 mins before its washed out. My hair was detangled I cant remember with what though. I asked about conditioning and she explained for TRs they don’t usually do conditioning unless the hair was really dry as the shampoo has a treatment in it( that’s why its left on for 5 mins) and since my hair felt very hydrated (yay me!) and was in good condition, she wouldn’t do this step. It makes sense that the shampoo has a treatment in it because in all the videos I watched on YT, none of them did any conditioning and I always wondered why. I also asked if she could tell me what my porosity was( I already know this) but she said that wasn’t something they really look at in the salon so she didn’t tell me- I thought it a bit strange because I mean if you’re washing my hair you can pretty much just tell me what it is. anywayss…..

After shampoo, the dilator was put on, then it was under the dryer for 15 mins with a cap then without a cap for another 15, then the releasing lotion is put on(on top of the dilator) then 30mins under the dryer. My hair was washed again before the final blow dry and finish

For the finish, I didn’t know the exact style I wanted so Andree advised to just have a simple finish instead of forcing myself to get a style/cut and regret later. So after a dusting( because my hair was in good condition and didn’t have a lot of split ends yay me), she lightly bumped the ends for volume and I was done! Because my hair is fine, she only did 2 to 3 passes of the straightener and hot comb on my roots in the front. I was happy with this and super happy when she told me to close my eyes when she was doing the front lol because God knows my heart was beating FAST and I felt that heat! She was generous with the heat protectant which made my heart SING

Thoughts

In total I was there for about 4.30 hours, I arrived at 1.40 and left at 6.20. Whilst the TR service has a lot of steps and waiting I think that the salon been so so busy when I went contributed to the long wait. I think if it wasn’t so busy, the whole TR service would be about 2-2.30hrs. The salon is smaller than expected and because she’s popular it was so busy on a Thursday afternoon at 2pm lol, I went in with no breakfast/lunch and less sleep so I was so exhausted afterwards sigh. Andree was really sweet though because she gave me a £5 discount because of the wait. I felt for them tho because there were 2 stylists on the day and they had back to back clients. damn

Do I recommend the salon? Absolutely Andree’s expertise is top notch, I’ve been following her on insta for a while and I love her Tuesday Q&As. I’ve also learnt a lot on TR from her YT videos. I love that her whole vibe is healthy hair practices. She answered all my questions I had on the day. She also sends a video on how to maintain the TR with product recommendations. In terms of how she handled my hair, she was quick but gentle and explained what she was going to do before doing it

Because its small I reckon it will be busy at most times so go prepared- snacks, sleep, parking charges(loool)

How do I feel about my texture release? I CAN RUN MY FINGERS THROUGH MY HAIR. I don’t remember the last time I did that without any resistance loool. I haven’t seen my hair straightened in SO LONG. Time will tell if I keep liking it, I definitely have some thoughts.. all good

I’m going to have to do another post on my TR and the chat I had with Andree that is making me tweak my hair plans for the year. I have so many thoughts…

I hope you guys have a blessed day

Check out my review on Elite hair lounge I’m trying to visit a few salons this year so keep your eyes peeled for more salon reviews

RAMOSU – Bifida Ferment Lysate 100 Review

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hihi everyone, today’s post will be a full review on the Ramosu 100 Bifida ampoules I got from Stylevana. If you want to see the other items I picked up, read that post here

I wanted to experiment with k beauty dupes for the Estee Lauder ANR serum. I absolutely LOVE the ANR serum, its pricey but its so worth it! I usually bulk buy it when they do their buy 1 get 1 free promotion but the problem is they haven’t done this in 2 years and my stash is down to the last 1, sigh. I worked it out that they run this promotion when they update the ingredient list so that they can quickly get rid of the old stock. the last update I feel was 2022 when they did the promotion.

Anyways the promotion hasn’t be run in the last 2 years so I decided to find some k beauty dupes I can use whilst waiting for the promotion to come back or a really good offer on. Estee Lauder do have some great offers from time to time so really its only a matter of time LOOL.

Criteria for Estee Lauder ANR dupes

This is the current full ingredient list for the ANR, what I am looking for in a dupe is something as close to this OR has the key ingredients I have put in bold, but the main ingredient I look for in dupes is the Bifida Ferment Lysate since its the 2nd ingredient in ANR therefore in high conc

Ingredients: WaterAquaEau, Bifida Ferment Lysate, Peg-8, Propanediol, Bis-Peg-18 Methyl Ether Dimethyl Silane, Methyl Gluceth-20, Glycereth-26, Peg-75, Butylene Glycol, Adansonia Digitata Seed Extract, Tripeptide-32, Sodium Hyaluronate, Yeast ExtractFaexExtrait De Levure, Lactobacillus Ferment, Cola Acuminata (Kola) Seed Extract, Anthemis Nobilis (Chamomile) Flower Extract, Hydrolyzed Algin, Pantethine, Caffeine, Lecithin, Sodium Rna, Bisabolol, Squalane, Glycerin, Oleth-3 Phosphate, Caprylyl Glycol, Oleth-3, Oleth-5, Choleth-24, Hydrogenated Lecithin, Jojoba Wax Peg-120 Esters, Ceteth-24, Tocopheryl Acetate, Carbomer, Triethanolamine, Tetrasodium Edta, Bht, Xanthan Gum, Potassium Sorbate, Disodium Edta, Phenoxyethanol, Red 4 (Ci 14700), Yellow 5 (Ci 19140) 

It is well known that k beauty have a lot of products with Bifida Ferment Lysate in them so I turned to the k beauty world for dupes. I picked up 3 for my 1st round of testing and I started with the RAMOSU – Bifida Ferment Lysate 100.

RAMOSU – Bifida Ferment Lysate 100 – this is a 100% pure bifida ferment ampoule with nothing else added to it. I had never heard of the brand Ramosu until browsing on Stylevana and I got it because it was on clearance. You get 5x10ml bottles, I have finished 3 so far out of 5. This ampoule promises a special skin feeling in 28 days

Experience

This was an easy addition to my skincare routine, it layers well with other products and pairs well with other actives. I have used it with high strength retinol, acids, peptides with no irritation. I started using this on the 20th of March after I had just finished a bottle of ANR. I finished a 3rd bottle of the Ramosu on the 2nd of May before taking a 1 week break to use ANR then back to Ramosu.

Is it similar to ANR? In terms of ingredients, this product only has the bifida ferment so its lacking the benefits of other ingredients in a well rounded serum. To combat this I just layered other products with some of the ingredients in ANR e.g peptides, glycerin etc. The serum itself is not hydrating.

Results: I think that the ampoule has helped maintain a healthy glowing complexion like ANR but I can see a difference. ANR makes my skin feel smooth, soft and radiant and the results are literally overnight. I just didn’t get that from this. In the pictures and ignore my spot treatments, I feel like there is a slight difference in terms radiance and feeling of my skin. My skin looks great but I can feel the difference

Verdict

Is it a dupe for ANR? Well it has the main ingredient which is the bifida however the lack of other ingredients means you are not getting full benefits so I would say its not a dupe.

Is it a great product? absolutely, if you are the type to layer on skincare then the lack of other ingredients wont bother you so much because you will be getting them elsewhere. The only time this was annoying was when I wanted a lazy pm routine, the lack of hydration from ramosu meant I couldn’t just use this plus a cream because it wont be enough

Do I recommend it: yes and no- yes because for the price you pay for 100% bifida its amazing, its well packaged and it actually leaves the skin great but no because there are no many other dupes that are well rounded in ingredients and may work better.

Bottomline: it doesnt hurt to try this, its £10 for 50ml but it is not a dupe for ANR. Get it to try as a product because you want to experiment with bifida but not as a dupe for ANR

I have 20ml left of this to use up then its onto the next dupe!

I hope this review is helpful! Catch you later