As i've said in my previous post on the matter, for absolutely years if you asked me what my favourite makeup brand was I would have said, without hesitation, Mac. And they do still hold this place in my heart that when i think of lovely, high quality makeup, Mac instantly comes to mind. However lately i've been wondering why that is. I've not tried all of their products of course, but the ones i have are actually very hit or miss.
Their lipsticks are probably still my favourites, the amplified creams especially are rich and creamy and highly pigmented and, though not moisturising are not drying either. I love the look of the matte shades but some dry my lips, and personally I find Ruby Woo (which was my first mac lipstick and still one of the most beautiful coloured reds i own) so incredibly dry that i can't actually get it on my lips properly! The other formulas I can take or leave as i hate sheer lips and I find that some shades are sheer and some pigmented so it depends entirely on the specific shade. Their lip liners and glosses are nice but no better (though also no worse) than Barry M, Nyx or various other cheap brands i've tried.
Mac don't make a foundation anywhere close to my skintone. While the NWs are meant to be for pink toned skin they still turn up far too yellow on me and the lightest shade is far too dark. I did however try their blot powder and hated it. It just did nothing for me except cake up my skin and exaggerate any tiny dry patch of skin. But for some reason when it broke i actually went back and bought another one. Their blushes are nice, but nothing special, personally i find Barry M, Illamasqua and Sleek blushes (2 of which are obviously a lot cheaper) much more pigmented and just nicer in general.
The eyeshadows are, for me, like the lipsticks. The Veluxe pearl and Velvet finishes are nice and buttery and go on beautiful but i really hate the matte shades (which is a shame because i love matte shadows) i just can't get any off the pan and onto my brush, and then either less ends up on my eye! The only Mineralize shadows i've tried are from the Style Black range and, while they do look gorgeous if foiled, are absolutely useless when used dry. I like their liqui-last liners and glitter liners but again i can find some drugstore brands that are either the same or even higher quality. And i've tried their eye pencils and, personally don't like them. I find that they smudge horribly and just 'melt' off my eyes quickly.
I've never tried their nail polishes but i've heard they are not good quality.
So yeah, basically I've had a very mixed bag in my of my Mac products. Now of course there are hits and misses with all makeup brands, however to be honest having read back on my list it seems that with Mac i really am finding more misses than hits. The only product i love are the lipsticks. Other than that i either actively dislike the products or find them fine but no better than a lot of high street brands.
Yet i keep being fooled, dragged in by the new collections, and keep crawling back to this old lover even though i know they're bad for me!
In my opinion the only great collections of the last 2 years have been the Style Black (though the lip products really sucked) and Dame Edna. With so many of their collections I have seen the concept photographs and got really excited, thinking there are going to be some great, exciting, new products and colours and then been so disappointed. It happened with spring forecast, where i thought there were going to be some very nice bright pinks and puples, but they all turned out to be pale, dusty and just rather dull. To The Beach was probably great to people who love nudes and tans, but to me there was absolutely nothing of interest. Liberty of London had gorgeous packaging and some beautiful lipsticks (Blooming Lovely and Petals and Peacocks were so lovely) but I found dupes for both of them which were actually made by Mac! Pret a Papier - more nudes and natural shades. Art supplies had some nice colours but i saw terrible reviews of the lip stains and, as i've said, i don't like their eye pencils. In the Groove just doesn't appeal to me. The purple lipstick looks nice but i've heard that it's just a slightly cooler, sheerer Violetta (which i have) and as i don't like sheer lips i don't see a point in getting it. Hang Loose blush looks pretty too but i would want the lilac to be proper lilac, instead it's just sheer and shiny and only really works when mixed with the pink colour (maybe i'm wrong?). I also liked Chillin' as i love a blue lip and really liked the idea of a pastel, creamsheen blue lip but of course it's super sheer :(
The only collection released this year that i was really interesting in was Riverting, which of course we did not get over here!
I then heard about some of the upcoming collections, Alice + Olivia and Venomous Villains. I was so excited when i heard that Alice + Olivia was going to feature a neon yellow lipgloss, and a glittery one at that. I saw the product images and was delighted by just how bright it looked. Then i saw swatches... Oh dear. So so sheer you can barely tell it's yellow at all! I understand that most women wouldn't want bright yellow lips, but i do! :(
Then there's Venomous Villains. Again so exciting when i heard about this collection. I adore Disney and all of the Villains chosen really appealed to me. And then i heard the details of what was coming in the collection and was really excited. Lots of gorgeous pigmented lipsticks, rich vampy colours, interesting, complex sounding eyeshadows and nail varnishes etc It all sounds lovely and the colours go perfectly with the characters attached to them. I even didn't mind that a lot of it is repromotes (as Mac loves to do with it's LE collections) because they go well with the villains. The only thing i thought is why the hell did they give the mirror to Dr Facilier when the Evil Queen is one of the villains???
But then i saw the photos and was so disappointed. There was so much they could have done with the packaging in this collection. Before i saw the pictures i was imagining what they could be like. I thought Cruella's line might well be whit with dalmation print, or black, white and red or something like that. With Dr Facilier i thought maybe they'd use the lovely voodoo doll things from the film. Maleficent i thought could be black with the neon green and purple colours of the magic in Sleeping Beauty, or maybe have something to do with the dragon. And, well i didn't know what it would be like with the Queen, maybe poison-apple red and metallic to represent the mirror. Or i really liked the sketch drawings of the villains that were released with the sneaky promo video thing so i thought maybe they would be included.
There were so many amazing possibilities. But we got this:
...Oh. Just the normal black Mac packaging with cheap looking stickers stuck on....
I probably will still buy quite a bit from the collection because i do love the sound of a lot of the products but i am so sad about the packaging. It just looks cheap, like something you'd get from Claire's Accessories. And it just shoes a lack of imagination i think. It's just the regular packaging with a sticker of the villain.
And some of the products don't even have the stickers! The nail varnishes and pigment jars are just exactly as normal! So disappointing.
So i think the glitter is finally lifting from my eyes. Mac will probably always hold a tiny part of my heart but I am now going to try my best not to get too excited about new collections or caught up in the hype that surrounds them. They have some great products to be sure but to me there just isn't anything special about them anymore. Mac used to be known for doing really unusual colours, especially for the lips but now personally i don't see any. The 'unusual' lip colours they've come out with recently, the purples, blues and blacks have all been so sheer and disappointing. The eye products are opaque and pretty but i find the quality changeable and you can now get good quality, bright, pigmented colours most places. Sleek, Barry M, Gosh are all cheap and cheerful but, in my opinion, just as good. My favourite brand, Illamasqua, has colours that range from 'safe' to incredibly daring and, with each collection, are coming up with brand new, innovative products. And then there's the countless Indie brands that are inexpensive, beautiful, higher pigmented and of equal or better quality and also have the added bonus of allowing you to support small businesses.
So yeah Mac, I'm sorry, it's not you it's me...
