What product doesn't work for you that you keep trying to make work anyway?
There are certain fragrances that I have that I want to love, but I’m often so adverse to dominant floral scents that I have yet to come around.
— Christine
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Setting powder doesn’t work for me, and I’ve tried many especially setting under eye concealer. It makes me look a thousand years old.
I feel the same way about setting powder!
The only one I’ve found that works good for me is Too Faced primed and poreless. It’s pressed powder.
The baking thing doesn’t work for me maybe bc I’m 60.
ABH Modern Renaissance. I’ve used a couple of the shades in combination with other brands, but I’ve yet to put together a look that I like using only this palette. I find the shadows too difficult to work with and there aren’t enough truly neutral shades for me.
(I think Christine’s fragrance answer is interesting. I have a lot of different fragrances and I go through phases with them. Right now I’m over a perfume that has been one of my favorites for months, but I’m sure I’ll come back to it sometime in the future. And a perfume I had tested and disliked a few months ago is now one of my favorites and I just bought it.)
Liquid/cream highlighter! I’m a combo-oily gal. I love the wet look highlight. It’s just that I cannot maintain the *right* amount of glow without looking like I can fry an egg on my face.
With the exception of base products, I hate the cream/liquid format for any color cosmetics.
Liquid foundation. No color matches for me and most formulas separate by mid afternoon. But I still want the option to use one sometimes.
The Morphe flawless beauty sponge..it’s just too big and bulky but I wanna love an inexpensive sponge.
Regular stick lipsticks are on the list too. I don’t have as many now, but I have a few that I can’t let go and occasionally try to use. They’re just too messy and come off constantly and I end up with lipstick all around my mouth. I wanna like them cuz they’re hydrating but, I still haven’t fell in love.
Not a specific product, but I keep trying to find a HE foundations that are ‘all that’ but I’m still quite content, if not happier, with the ones from the DS.
Stick foundations- I have tried a couple and while once in a blue moon they look super good most other days they look terrible on me and I just don’t know why.
The BareMinerals Complexion Rescue Tinted Hydrating Gel Cream. I tried so hard to make this work, but it was so odd and just balled up on my skin. I tried different primers, and just wearing it by itself and it never looked good. I wanted to like it so much because I really love light coverage face products, but this was just BAD for me.
It might be it reacting to your skincare? I haven’t had this product do that to me but I’ve had other BB/CC creams ball on me …I found it later it was reacting to my eye serum/cream.
Perhaps? But I don’t typically do skincare in the morning when I do my make up, just at night.
This was my answer, too! I had such high hopes that it would work better than the IT CC+ for me, because I was trying to avoid using IT because of the shade range issues. However, the Complexion Rescue did not settle into my skin at all, it just sat on top and never blended in. I tried it on bare skin and my normal skin care, nothing worked.
I would love to be able to work with liquid highlighters, but no luck so far. I even decluttered my Benefit High Beam recently – I just can’t make it do what I want it to do.
I keep trying to make the Beauty Blender (or any other make-up sponge work for me). When I start a new foundation or concealer, I always try to see if it applies better with the Beauty Blender. I will use it for a couple of non-rushing days (but if I need to get my make-up done in 10 minutes, I’ll just use my fingers) and then give up again. It’s not that I don’t like the results (although I find it works better with creamier products, but not so good on more liquid ones), I even use it sometimes to set with powder… is that I don’t see a major improvement in application and wetting and washing the sponge becomes cumbersome… Me personally, if I don’t wash my Beauty Blender immediately after make-up application (and wash it well) I feel gross to use it next time.
Same about wanting to wash the Beauty Blender.
Concealer. I think it’s because I prefer a light-medium coverage base (tinted moisturizer, BB/CC cream, or cushion compact) and I can’t find a concealer that matches the texture of my base and it just looks off.
Colourpop concealers. No matter what powder I use no matter how many pats with the beauty blender they look so cakey. Just not cute.
Today I threw them in the trash before reading this!!
My very most fav is Catrice with MUR close behind. I like born this way too and want to try EL Double Wear.
Tarte Shape Tape – addicted to the coverage but the dryness, oh the horrible horrible dryness…
EYELINER. I love how it looks on other people, but whenever I try it myself it just looks awful. I keep trying and failing. My eyes are deep set and my lids are somewhat heavy and eyeliner just emphasizes the shadows and droopiness of my lids. If I was going for a dark and smoky look it might be okay but I’m not.
Bronzer-I look ridiculous no matter what I do.
Anything coral or tangerine. I love these colors, but they make me look critically ill. Also, matte things. Love matte, but my deeply dry skin shreds it off in a nanosecond.
Powder foundations have never worked for me. Many years ago I owned the wet/dry one from Lancôme but it only ever worked wet.
I have also never felt comfortable wearing fragrance.
Setting powder, but I keep trying as I have a whole jar of Laura Mercier’s that’s too expensive to let go to waste.
Also, cream eyeshadows (crease too easily on me) and liquid lipsticks (the couple I’ve tried have been too drying). Right on the verge of giving up on these two categories.
Definitely eye liner. I have tried liquid liners with felt tip brushes, traditional brushes, gel eye liners, slanted brushes, you name it and I can’t make them work. It isn’t really the liners fault but rather my hooded, baggy, crepey and uneven eyes. I love the look of a beautiful winged liner but I just can’t swing it on my eyes. I keep trying and have followed many tutorials for liner on hooded eyes but just doesn’t work.
NARS Orgasm powder blush. I’ve been messing with it for twenty years, with different hair color, etc., and it never looks good on me. I love the liquid, though.
I have a hard time using white brushes. I’ve gotten better and feel sort of forced to because of Wayne Goss’s new eye set, but I’ve had to add time to my morning routine to do a little spot brush cleaning because I don’t like brushes looking dirty.
For awhile there I was trying different types of brow gels and none of them seemed to last long or work well. I persevered for a time but gave up in the end and went back to using eye brow pencils.
Undereye concealer. I don’t need it often, but I keep trying to find “the one.” The cream and liquid ones all settle into my creases no matter what I do. E.l.f.’s HD in Brightening was the only one to work for me, and they discontinued it. 🙁
Fenty Stunna Lip Paint – I cannot get it on my face without giving myself the Joker smile! I love it so much though.
Actually most of the Fenty line is so pretty but I have a terrible time applying the products. Match Stix come to mind.
Liquid lipstick, especially matte. I think I have a weird shaped mouth because my bottom lip is wider than my top lip and liquid lipstick just seems to highlight it more. Long-wearing ones always dry out my lips and others wear off unevenly and you don’t reapply as easily so it’s just a pain. I always go back to balms and gloss.
Mascaras! They always transfer to my browbone now, no matter what – this was never a problem for like 20 years before so I guess I’m getting oily?
I’m stubborn though, so I’ll keep wearing mascara on special occasions and keep checking in the bathroom and wiping off the track marks when I can.