When these first arrived I thought they were a rather cumbersome, overly-pigmented attempt at liquid highlighters, and I put them to one side, planning to only try them out when it would be okay for me to leave the house looking like the original Tin Man:
However, I stand corrected, as these Sleek Barekissed Illuminators are actually really rather lovely. To be honest, I haven’t found too much of a use for Cuba as it’s a bit too deep and warm for me – maybe when I find the time to start fake-tanning again, this shade will come into its own? – but Monaco has barely been put down since I started using it.
There is no getting away from the fact that these are extremely pigmented, plus they come in a pump-dispenser that limits how much you can control what you dispense, meaning you end up with a large pump of extremely sparkly liquid. However, if you tread carefully you can limit how much comes out, and my absolute favourite way to use this is under foundation.
So sorry for the terrible swatches! Both my photography skills and my camera have a sparkle aversion, it seems…I apply this in all the usual ‘strobe’ areas, such as cheekbones, bridge of nose, centre of chin and forehead, then I apply my foundation over the top. The finish is the infamous ‘lit from within’ glow that people always bang on about – I’ve finally managed to achieve that and that’s mostly down to this product. It can also be used as a more traditional highlighter, but use it sparingly and get your blend on. I’m also guessing this would work well to add a bit of a life to overly matte foundation formulas, but don’t quote me as I haven’t tried it. There are four shades in the Barekissed Illuminator collection – the above cool pink of Monaco and corally orange of Cuba, plus there’s also the deeper pink of Casablanca and the bronzey Pompeii. As a rough guess, I’d say Monaco is best for the pale girls, Cuba and Casablanca for mid to olive tones, and Pompeii for darker skins, but obviously there are no rules and you should go for whichever colour takes your fancy. These are very well priced at £8.99 a pop, and they will last you FOREVER. Here they are – link.
*PR Samples
These actually look very pretty! Knowing me I’d probably end up looking too sparkly with these but I like the idea of putting it under foundation.
Hannah xx
Interestingly they’re not actually that sparkly, they instead offer more of a metallic finish – it’s very flattering as long as you don’t overdo it, but they blend out so well that any mistakes should be quite easy to correct xx
LOL’ing at the tin man picture! I thought exactly the same and have found a little goes a longggg way with these. The Monaco is defo my favourite and I have the really pinky one, which I think actually works well as a weird kind of blush. x
ha ha 😀 It does actually look as though he’s overdone the liquid highlighter doesn’t it? It’s a lesson for us all…
Ah I quite fancy the pink one so I’m probably going to pick it up xx
Monaco looks amazing! it reminds me of a liquid form of copacabana from Nars. Sleek always manages to surprise me in how fantastic of a product they can put together
http://www.beautyandtheboy.com
Funnily enough, Monaco actually reminds me of Benefit High Beam – it’s quite a dupe isn’t it? I am loving Sleek at the moment – they keep releasing knockout products!