What are your top five must-have eye makeup brushes?

I had problems with my MAC 224 shedding, which was a real disappointment, so If you mean you are looking for a blending brush for the crease, I will say my Laura Mercier pony tail brush is great…actually all her and Paula Dorfs eye brushes are great and they are both in my rotation of favorites, but they are semi expensive, similar to MAC, although not so much as the TF brushes. To tell the truth, I’ve found myself reaching for a couple of the black series Lancome brushes just about every day anymore. I will confess that I didn’t expect to like the Lancome brushes so much, but had read more than a few reviews saying the black handled line was really good (I can’t speak for the dual ended lineup, I’m referring to the standard solid black brushes). I decided to buy some of them very cheaply on eBay since I wasn’t convinced enough to shell out retail prices on what I felt was a gamble after the Silver synthetic brushes they put out. I really like the Lancome # 11, although it is labeled as a large shadow brush, it’s not big at all, it’s a somewhat flat brush (like a miniature 217 and less fluffy), but it deposits color nicely and because of it’s more flat design, the edge can be used to work very well in the crease. It can be used for both transition color and darker crease work….the #12 is a smaller version of this same brush for the most part, but it’s great for more detailed work, like outer V or adding in some subtle shading. The Blending Tip #16 is like a pencil brush or crease brush and it’s great too, very versatile. The #17 blending brush is your basic blending brush, but I like that it’s not overly dense like Illamasqua’s blending brush for example ….I use all these brushes fairly regularly, but most often the #11 and #17. I paid under $12 for each of these Lancome brushes on eBay and have been genuinely surprised at how often I find myself reaching for them, especially considering I’m a verified Makeup brush junkie. I own A LOT of brushes ranging from inexpensive elf/Real Tech/Sigma lines to the pricier Tom Ford/Chikuhodo/Hakuhodo/Goss/etc lines. I think Lancome really damaged their reputation for having good brushes when they switched to those synthetic silver handled brushes a few years ago, but the black handled brushes are far more what you would expect from a high end cosmetic company. You might want to go take a look at them at your local Lancome counter. Also, the Stila Pro #9 is a pretty nice blending brush too 🙂