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Rant & Rave: Pastel Lipsticks & Lipglosses

Share: Tell us what you love and hate about Pastel Lipsticks & Lipglosses!

my answer: Sometimes they can look really chalky or milky (in the case of gloss, typically) so they’ll settle into lip lines or the white base will be too stark against my skin tone. With enough brightness, they can be really fun to wear!

28 Comments

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sophia Avatar

I am obsessed with colorpop brille and the nyx pastel lippie in violet. I love my pastel purples! Fun and different but not quite as crazy as blue/green/yellow lips!

Rachel R. Avatar

I hate the really white-based pastels aka Jordan almond colors. They just aren’t flattering on me, and settle into lip lines.

A good pastel is bright, fresh and pretty for spring.

Nikki Avatar

On myself, I hate everything about pastel lips. The way they wash out my face, the yellow tones they bring out in my teeth, there is nothing good about how they look on me and I refuse to wear them. Cool, light skin, rosy lips for reference. I sometimes like how they look on other people though. Lol. The pastel brights like mint green are a fun idea.

Mariella Avatar

I just don’t find them especially flattering on anyone – they tend to look so chalky and unattractive. They also seem to have a propensity for forming that really icky, crusty looking lip gunk – the sort of caked on sludge around the inner edges of people’s lips. Sorry for the gross visual but it really does seem more common with those milky pastel shades.

Fran Avatar

Pastel lippies pretty universally make me look sick/dead/un-dead. When I was a young teen, in the late ’60s, “make-up” on teens basically meant pastel blue eye shadow, which doesn’t look very good on me, and frosted pastel pink lipstick, which looks really horrendous on me, so I didn’t really get into makeup, other than mascara and nail polishes (of which I would wear the crazy colors, like frosted dark blue — yes, they did have crazy polish colors even back then!). So I didn’t really wear much makeup until my mid 50s!

hashtagfablife Avatar

A blonde fair blue eyed friend of mine just posted a stunning pic of her in lilac lipstick! I think its all about skin tone. I wish I could wear the same lipstick but I’m afraid it would look clownish with my yellow undertones!

Eliz Avatar

I love them in theory, but have trouble making opaque, highly-whitened formulas look good. I’m very fair with a good bit of pink in my lips and MAC Angel is about as light and pastel as I can go without looking unwell. I envy those who can rock true pastels as I think they are so pretty and look doll-like in the best way. I can stare at a tube of Viva Glam Nicki 2 forever.

Emilie Avatar

Honestly, I have yet to discover a pastel lip product that I don’t hate. I don’t think I’ll ever go lighter than Creme Cup by Mac (that pushes it for me) because on my pale skin I just think pastels kind of fade into it and make me look rather ghostly :/ It’s like they erase the line between my lips and skin, if you know what I mean.

Natalie Avatar

These colours scare the heck out of me. I’m very pale, and I think they’ll make me look washed out, though I suspect I might look better in them when I find the right shade of pink. They’re definitely not a colour I look out for when browsing through lipsticks, though I reach for virtually everything else.

Elizabeth Avatar

I just can’t pull them off. I just don’t have a skin tone that allows me to wear them. I have tried a few different formulas, and find them to be extremely slippery and too milky/ashy looking. I think they are beautiful, just not for me.

Susan Dowman Nevling Avatar

I do like the lighter colors, the medium lights, I guess. I have a huge problem with chalkiness and hate it. I don’t know how to tell which colors will do that however. Any tips?

kellly Avatar

I don’t personally look good in them. Too white. Anything lighter than my skin tone looks so fakey and chalky, I can’t deal with it. I like a natural color lip, or sometimes something brighter but I can never pull off pastels.

Telesilla Avatar

Every one I’ve tried looks awful on me. I was trying to go outside my comfort zone with one of the light pink UD Revolution lipsticks (can’t remember which) and it was just ghastly. On me it looked chalky and it washed me out. On the other hand, my Mom loves it and it looks great on her. From now on, she can have the pastels.

Brittany Avatar

Pastels seem to be tricky to get the formula right. A lot of them seem to be really slippy to the point where it’s just not going to stay put on the lips without sliding around and looking like crap eventually. I wish more brands could come out with neat pastel colors that were more matte and not suckage like KVD Coven’s formula.

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