Claims: To correct sallow olive or yellow skin to a neutral bright tone, "blue + pink equals to lavender", "make-up to slim times clear equals beautiful skin".
Ingredients (Good): 3 forms of Vitamin C (Magnesium Ascorbyl Phosphate, VCIP-known as Ascorbyl Tetraisopalmitate and Trisodium Ascorbyl Palmitate Phosphate), Arbutin (reduces melanin production), Hyaluronic Acid, Jobs Tears extract (soothes inflammation), Raffinose (a great skin barrier strengthening ingredient that increases lipid synthesis and regulates keratin production, helping to prevent symptoms of psoriasis, dermatitis and rosacea), Licorice Root extract (helps lighten pigmentation and soothe inflammation), Chamomile (anti-oxidant and anti-inflammatory), Hydrolysed Collagen, Placental Protein and Vitamin E.
Ingredients (Bad): Lavender Oil (which can be irritating to some people) and contains Alcohol.
Ratings: SPF 50+ PA++++
Cost/Value: $25-30 (2.8 oz) on Ebay / Good Deal.
It is a Combination Sunscreen. Its active ingredients are Octinoxate, Tinosorb S, Uvinul A Plus and Titanium Dioxide.
It did NOT sting my eyes.
It DOES smell. It has a light fruity or floral fragrance.
It did NOT gather in my under eye wrinkles.
It DOES leave a white cast in your skin, depending on how you use it. This is a light grayish purple colour sunscreen. Depending on how much you use, it will stay opaquely that shade. If you wear quite a bit of it all by itself, you will have a slight grayish purple cast to your skin. If you don’t apply it evenly, you could get a streaky grayish purple cast to your skin.
It DOES dry down in 20 minutes or less. It sets into a transfer resistant finish. It sheers out somewhat but not much. If there are purple streaks when you initially apply this to your face, there will be purple streaks on your face when it dries. You really have to get this even and thick upon initial application, which can be time consuming and has a learning curve.
This is one of those textures that for some reason sucks up foundation. Wearing this as a base, required the use of perhaps double the amount of application I would otherwise ordinary use. This sunscreen didn’t seem to affect the longevity of my makeup and it's thick enough and stiff enough that it really holds its own during make up application. I felt very comfortable applying liquid foundation on top of this. I felt very confident that an even sunscreen film had been maintained.
In terms of its lavender shade making you lighter and brighter, it definitely works. I personally don’t have yellow or olive skin, I have very red skin. I tried this under both a serum foundation and tinted moisturizer that are both too dark and too yellow for me to see if it would lighten up the shade and neutralize that golden undertone. It definitely did lighten them by a shade or so and also neutralized yellow undertones. And that effect was further emphasized once the foundations were powdered. Although I only used translucent powder, the combination of sunscreen and foundation looked even lighter, even rosier and slightly blurred once powdered. I really did get a porcelain finish wearing this sunscreen underneath foundation and powder.
For testing purposes, I wanted to try it under a sheer serum foundation and tinted moisturiser to see if the purple would show through at all. And yes, it will work under tinted moisturiser but only if the initial application is absolutely even. Otherwise, an inconsistent application of this sunscreen, will show through the tinted moisturiser or super light coverage foundation.
For that reason, I wouldn't try to colour correct with this. It's already a lavender sunscreen; it's not a great idea to try throw peach, green and other colours on top of this, plus foundation and concealer on top of that, and expect it to look even and good.
It works best under light to medium coverage foundation. A totally full coverage foundation will negate any effect this might have on your skin tone. With light to medium foundation, you get all the neutralizing and brightening benefits without having to worry about perfect initial application, as you must if you wear it under a sheer foundation or tinted moisturiser.
This is a solid sunscreen that stays put all day long.
This is NOT good for dry skin. It looks fine at first but alcohol is too high on the ingredients list. The finish is too dry and matte for me to recommend it to somebody with dry skin.
Texture and consistency: After the initial application, I spread it out as even as I can. It shows, it has lavender cast to it. After 20 minutes, it is completely matte. It is transfer resistant proof. It still has soft lavender cast. I think, it really depends on what is your complexion is like to start with. I am pale enough, for me wearing this alone would really truly make me look like a zombie ghost. But perhaps, if you are sharing out with the complexion that's a little bit darker, a little bit more olive; you could wear this all by itself as long as you applied this evenly.
I would recommend this sunscreen. It's a reasonable price, it has lots of skin care ingredients and it will lighten your complexion, not permanently but cosmetically in the same way that any white casts sunscreen featuring titanium dioxide would. Except, I think the lavender tint of this makes it more appealing and easy to work with under make up.
