Hourglass Radiant Light Ambient Lighting Powder ($45.00 for 0.35 oz.) is described as a “golden beige powder.” It’s a subdued, light-medium peach-orange with golden shimmer. Because of the type of product it is, it sheers out considerably to mostly translucent powder that adds warmth and radiance. NARS Miss Liberty has a similar coloring but has larger shimmer/sparkle. Chanel Lucky Stripes is more pigmented and works as a bronzer/highlighter. See comparison swatches.
The texture is very soft and finely-milled; feels like silk and blends out smoothly, but it is a very soft powder so there is some excess powder that gets dislodged while brushing against the surface. Hourglass’ Ambient Lighting Powders are supposed to mimic different types of light, generally giving skin a softer, smoother look with subtle glow Radiant Light is supposed to “[enhance] the overall complexion with believable, subtle warmth.” That’s exactly what it does: it gives skin a gentle warmth while having a soft-focus effect that makes skin appear smoother than it actually is. Because this is a powder, for my normal-to-dry skin, it also sets my foundation and prolongs the wear of my foundation by an hour (like a setting powder), even though it’s not claimed to do so. I suspect on very fair skin that this may be like a soft bronzer.
Urban Decay Naked Skin Ultra Definition Pressed Finishing Powder ($34.00 for 0.26 oz.) is supposed to be a “silky, weightless finishing powder with a luminous, demi-matte Naked finish.” It’s designed to set your makeup and reduce shine, so it can be used after you’ve applied your foundation initially as well as later on during the day as a touch-up powder.
Urban Decay recommends Light for shades 0.5 through 3.0; Medium Light for shades 2.0 through 4.0; Medium for shades 4.5 through 6.5; Medium Dark for shades 6.0 through 8.0; and Dark for shades 8.0 through 12.0. I used Medium over 4.0 in the photos, for reference. I applied it using Urban Decay’s Good Karma Finishing Brush. The texture is soft, incredibly finely-milled, and feels like a silky powder as it goes onto the skin. Applied over Urban Decay’s Naked Liquid Foundation, it made the resulting finish more matte and definitely more “blurred.”
It boosted the wear of the liquid foundation by another hour, so I was able to get eight and a half hours of wear before my t-zone started to show some fading, which started to be noticeable after nine and a half hours of wear. If used to touch-up, then the foundation looks mostly intact even after eleven hours of wear. I liked how well it softened the look of my normal-to-dry skin without appearing powdery, but I did miss some of the subtle luminosity of the liquid foundation, so I might opt to use this more as a touch-up powder a few hours into wear (personally). The powder was supposed to have a luminous and demi-matte finish, but it read rather matte when I tested it.
Hourglass Mood Light Ambient Lighting Powder ($45.00 for 0.35 oz.) is described as a “soft, sheer lavender pink powder.” It’s a nearly-matte, pale pink with neutral undertones. The aim of this powder is to imitate the “softest, most forgiving light and [to brighten] the complexion.” Like the other Ambient Lighting Powders, the effect is subtle, natural, and it is the, “Did you change your skincare regimen?” kind of product. Mood Light has a softening, lightly luminous effect that’s hard to really pin down. I can see this particular shade working well on all skin types, because it’s subtle and won’t make oilier skin appear oilier.
The texture of the powder is very, very soft and silky, but it can be a little powdery–which does work well for minimizing or absorbing oil for those who have normal to oilier skin. Even though my skin can be dry, I didn’t notice this powder emphasizing dryness either. The powder is very soft, so a soft brush and light hand will be key to minimizing excess product getting dislodged from the pan. It’s designed to work as a finishing powder, but I’ve found it helps just as well to set and prolong my base makeup (by about two hours) as it does to finish it, so I usually use this as my setting and finishing powder.
Hourglass Luminous Light Ambient Lighting Powder ($45.00 for 0.35 oz.) is described as a “champagne pearl.” It’s a light peach with a white shimmer but really goes on mostly colorless on the skin. This shade is designed to “create a soft, incandescent candlelight glow.” It seemed just slightly brightening but added a fine sheen all-over the skin. When blended, I did not see any shimmer particles actually on the skin, though swatched heavily on the arm or hand will show some–but these seem to really blend and sheer out. The effect is, indeed, luminous. I would describe it as a step above glowy or a sheen, because I think the effect is a bit more obvious as a result of the sheen of the powder overall.
The texture of Hourglass’ Ambient Lighting Powders is incredibly finely-milled; so soft that there is a tendency for excess powder to kick up and around the product. I did not experience powderiness on the skin, but it was enough excess to see it disperse in the air and get all over the compact. Though, on the plus side, I think that powderiness will work well for those with oily skin types, as it will help to mattify a bit during application. Luminous Light seemed to yield a rather luminous sheen, not so over-the-top that it acts like a traditional highlighter but not quite as subtle as other finishing powders. It may be touted as a finishing powder, but it worked well to set my makeup, too, and helped prolong the wear of my foundation by an hour or so.
I actually found the two to look surprisingly different when swatched. The Loose version is a similar stark white, but it looks nearly matte with very, very fine shimmer sparsely found when blended out–but nowhere near the same sheen as the Pressed Powder. As a result, this mattified skin better and had a very subtle sheen–really barely-there. Like the Pressed Powder, the Loose version softens the skin’s appearance; texture and lines blur, while pores soften and smooth out. Can you really tell the difference between the two? At a glance, no, definitely not, but if I look at myself in the mirror, I like the way there’s a noticeable but natural sheen to the skin all-over that the Pressed seems to generate more so than the Loose powder. I think if you have oilier skin, you may prefer the Loose.
Since it is a loose powder, the texture feels different, as it is an extremely finely-milled powder that’s soft and blendable on. I found it was easier to apply, because you’ll have no trouble getting enough product on a brush or pouf with this. I recommend only opening a few of the holes in the powder, because it will be easier to contain the excess that you aren’t using. Of course, because the pot tends to expose more product than you need, it can be easy to over-apply the product. The Loose version is more like Hourglass Diffused Light, though Diffused Light has a warmer tone, so it is also a color corrector.
NARS Translucent Crystal Light Reflecting Pressed Setting Powder ($34.00 for 0.24 oz.) is described as a “weightless, translucent powder” with a “soft matte finish that looks luminous in any light.” It looks stark white in the pan, and there’s a definite sheen; a pearly finish that certainly reflects light. The texture of the powder is very unique; I don’t think I’ve ever felt anything like it. It almost feels like a cream and powder hybrid–not just a cream-to-powder product–but the texture has the smoothness of a cream but the thinness and dryness of a powder. Because of this texture, you really need to swirl and swish your brush across the surface (if you use a brush) to loosen the product.
I primarily used a powder brush to apply the product (I liked the results of MAC’s 134 best), and the powder, while it can swatch more heavily and look white and almost chalky, disappears and holds true to its translucency claim applied to the skin. There’s no powderiness in the pan or as seen on the skin. It absolutely softens and smooths out the skin’s texture and appearance. There is a faint reflective quality as an overall glowing sheen but doesn’t translate as visible sparkle or obvious particles. It extended the wear of my foundation by an hour or so–I have normal-to-dry skin.
Even though it’s titled a setting powder, it feels more like a finishing powder, though the category is, frankly, one that I always feels blends together/overlaps where the two are often more alike than not. In that vein, Guerlain Wulong has a similar sheen and coloring, but Wulong has a stronger shimmer-sheen finish, so it gives skin a more luminous (“glowy”) appearance. We are talking degrees, not canyons, of difference, though. It has more of a sheen to its finish than Hourglass Diffused Light, which I reviewed yesterday.
One thing I noticed about the Pressed version is that you have to be really good about the brush or tool you use to apply it, because the surface of the powder doesn’t seem to react well to anything liquid/moisture/cream. It was really imperative to wait for my foundation to dry before brushing this on, because any smidgen of foundation caught on the brush (which I only used for applying the setting powder) would slightly harden the surface of the pan. There’s a very thin sponge included with the powder, and it works for application, but I found it dirtied very quickly and resulted in far more foundation transfer into the pan than preferable.
I will be reviewing the Loose version shortly after this, and while I prefer the look of the Pressed over the Loose, I really don’t like how touchy the surface of the pressed powder is and find the Loose one is easier to apply and maintain. Also worth noting: the pan of this is on the smaller size at only 0.24 oz., though physically it seemed rather large (even the Loose version has 0.35 oz.).
