little white truths

It's been a while since I did a mascara review, and I opened this one back at the beginning of January so it's definitely time to review it before I need to turf it by the end of March.

I'm sure you'll have heard that you're meant to throw out mascaras after three months and I do normally do this, although I tend to go by what the mascara tells me as opposed to marking down dates. For example, one of my eyes is more sensitive than the other so when it starts to sting a little when I apply mascara (this normally happens around the three-month mark), that's when it's time to toss it.

I also toss them when the formula starts getting too thick and clumpy, which has been happening with this one for a while. When that does start to happen and I love the mascara, I may well add some saline to it in order to get more uses from a brilliant product - but I'm not going to do that with this because it's not brilliant. More on that below.

Rimmel claims/product details:

  

Verdict

This mascara is ok but it's not without issues so I wouldn't buy it and I don't recommend it.

The first comment I usually make on mascaras relates to the brush: in my opinion, the brush maketh the mascrara. This one's too fat for my hooded eyes, which means I struggle to get it close to the lashline (you can see that in the photos above). I do like that it's tapered, but that doesn't help me much and I still get mascara goo on my upper eye area if I bring the brush in too close.

The other issue with the brush is the spacing between the bristles. As you can see in the photo of the wand, there's quite a wide space between each line of bristles. What this means in practice is that it clumps particular sections of the lashes together so they come out in little pyramid shapes. I personally don't want that so I always need to use a lash comb with this product, which I find annoying.

And of course, given the large spacing between the bristles, it's no surprise that the wand always comes out covered in far too much product that's become trapped in the spaces, so I need to scrape the wand on the rim of the tube each time I use it. Also annoying.

Something else worth noting is that the formula has dried out reasonably quickly, and not in a good way. Some formulas get better as they dry, but this one doesn't: it's become clumpier over time and for the last month I've been combing out clumps as well as the aforementioned pyramids. Not ideal.

As for what it actually does for my lashes, the answer is not much. You can see in the photos above that it thickens them a little but it doesn't do much for length, and since length is what I need more than anything else, I'm not happy with that situation.

The good news is that this doesn't smudge or flake on me throughout the day, so that's a plus. Having said this, it doesn't do much for lifting my lashes so that's another thing that isn't in its favour. I personally don't use an eyelash curler because I prefer to have a mascara that lifts and holds my lashes for me, and this one doesn't do a great job of that: another reason to avoid it.

Overall this is an ok mascara but I personally wouldn't recommend it and I think you can do a lot better. My personal budget favourite is Maybelline's Lash Sensational Mascara (reviewed here), and I would choose that one over this one any day.

Ok but not for me.