By Terry in Review: Light Expert and Touch Expert Advanced

Well, it certainly has been a long time since I posted on this blog. There are probably a few different reasons for my absence but none of them really warrant wasting space here.

I do have a post for you today about two well-tested products from By Terry. The first is the Light Expert in the shade 1 - Rosy Light and the second is the Touch Expert Advanced in the shade 1. These products both have a in built brush with a click-pen mechanism. The smaller product of the two, the Touch Expert is a concealer/highlighter hybrid and the Light Expert is a foundation.

By Terry Touch Expert Advanced and Light Expert.

The Touch Expert Advanced is a product in the same vein as the YSL Touche Eclat. In fact, apart from the shade selection and the colour of the packaging they may as well be the same product. This is unsurprising, however, as the creator of By Terry, Terry de Gunzburg, was involved in the development of the original YSL product. I have previously used the YSL Touche Eclat and liked it enough to repurchase it. I do think that I prefer the By Terry version because it seems to give slightly better coverage and I like the peachy pink tone better than the shade of the Touche Eclat I was using. It works very well as an under-eye concealer and a highlighter and I use it in conjunction with the Nars Radiant Touch Concealer in Chantilly as a blemish concealer.

The only real con with the Touch Expert Advanced is its price. The By Terry Touch Expert Advanced is 68AUD vs. 55AUD for the YSL version. All in all I would still recommend this product but if you are already using the YSL Touche Eclat and liking it I see no real reason to spend $13 more on the By Terry version.

The Light Expert foundation is a little more controversial. It seems that it is supposed to be similar to the Touch Expert Advanced as it is also a click-pen just in a foundation form. Firstly, I would be hesitant to call this a foundation, mostly because it is very sheer, sheerer than some BB creams or tinted moisturisers. The sheerness does however lend itself to its mode of application with its built-in brush which supposedly means you can just click, swipe it on, blend and go. It's a product that should deliver maximum results for minimum effort. But does it? Not exactly. The brush doesn't really apply the product evenly (see swatch below) and it's also pretty clumsy and useless for blending. A lot of the time I click some onto my hand and use another brush to apply and blend. When I'm in a rush I do sometimes blob it straight on to my face and blend out with my fingers.

L: Touch Expert Advanced (shade 1) R: Light Expert (shade 1)

The formula itself is very blendable and I love the shade match. It really does brighten the skin and blur imperfections without looking like you're wearing anything. I bought this when I was in New York for around 45USD and it was great whilst I was travelling because it was so compact and still relatively easy to apply. Despite its issues it's a lovely base product for people who don't like wearing base products.

Have you tried any of the By Terry base products? What do you think?
<3 Catherine

Foundation Dilemma! Chanel Vitalumiere Aqua in B30

L to R: Chanel Vitalumiere Aqua foundation,
 Poudre Universelle Compacte, Le Blanc de Chanel

The title of this post is probably a misdemeanour as I do really like all the products mentioned in this post, the difficulty that I have with foundation in general is that I can't find a decent colour match! It's always too dark, to orange or too yellow!

But here's how I got on with a mix of overall stellar Chanel products that have been forming my foundation routine over the last few months.

Firstly, I start off by taking a small blob of Le Blanc de Chanel Sheer Illuminating Base on the back of my hand ready to mix in with my foundation. This base is sort of like a primer in that you can blend it all over your face before you put foundation on. However, I wouldn't really call it a primer because in my experience, it does nothing for the longevity of the foundation although it does whiten and brighten the skin like it says on the bottle. It does tend to make my skin a little to greasy if I use it like a primer though so I stick with mixing it with my foundation. Another annoying thing about this is that it doesn't come with a pump just a screw top with a wide opening and spatula to scoop out the product (which I lost ages ago).

Then I take a blob of Chanel Vitalumiere Aqua in B30 on the back of my hand and mix the base and the foundation together. I do this essentially to lighten the foundation because as you can see from the swatch below (without Le Blanc base added), even blended out this foundation  is a bit dark/orange for me.

Chanel Vitalumiere Aqua in B30

This swatch is a little too damning though because obviously my face is a tad darker than my forearm. Also this foundation is a fairly easy to blend with a foundation brush I just have to work extra hard to make sure there no colour discrepancies, it's made easier with the addition of the base to the foundation which does lighten and sheer it out a tad. The only problem with adding the base is that you get a very sheer coverage which is really good when my skin is in great condition but not so good if it's a little red and blotchy.

Vitalumiere Aqua is known for being build-able but I can't really do that without compromising the colour match. Otherwise it's a really light foundation, you cannot feel it on the skin at all and it barely looks like you're wearing anything except flawless skin.

Lastly (after concealer) I use the Chanel Poudre Universelle Compacte in 20 Clair Translucent 1 which is a natural finish pressed power. I apply this with a soft powder brush all over the face to set my make up. This powder is very fine and you actually cannot see it on the skin at all so there is no cakey-ness, it keeps my make up on all day without compromising any desired dewy-ness.

But back to my dilemma, which is my colour problem I have been matched to this colour by more than one MUA even when I said I thought it was too dark. The reply was that the lighter foundation colours would be too yellow for me, which is probably true but B30 just makes me look tanned and I don't want to look tanned! I know I have cool-toned skin (pink undertones) but I can't find a foundation that does and I know that a lot of companies eg Chanel, YSL have Beige Rose colours but they are just not available here.

I'd love to know if anyone else has cool toned or pale skin and whether or not they have any recommendations. If I can't find anything else I'll probably just end up mixing shades from the VA range or something.

Thanks for reading my mammoth length post!

<3
Catherine