Review: 17 Berry Crush Lipstain in Pinkini

Hey guys! :)

So some of you may have seen me Tweet about this earlier but for those of you who didn't, let me fill you in.

Basically, I bought the Berry Crush Lipstain by 17 in the shade 'Pinkini' (Boots, £4.99) a few days ago as a prize for the giveaway I'm currently running because I thought the colour looked gorgeous and seeing as there wasn't a tester available, I didn't know what the product looked like on or anything, I bought it solely for the fact that I loved the packaging colour!

Anyway, having the prizes sat there on my desk this whole time, all ready to be packed and sent, I was mega tempted to open it up and try it out for myself. (Definite no-no!) So instead, I grabbed the opportunity this morning, whilst in town, to pick up another one for myself in the exact same shade (it was the last one there as well!) from Boots. 

I picked this up for £4.99 which I think is a reasonable price to pay for such a product, but I've since discovered that some stores have it on sale at the moment for just £1 which is bloody fantastic if you ask me! So if that's your local store, I'd go snap it up now and if it's not, fear not, because most stores nationwide have 2for£6 on 17 products so you can still get it for a decent price along with say...another shade perhaps? (I shouldn't encourage beauty product shopping addictions, my own is bad enough!

So as you can see from the (awful quality - thanks for that one Blogger) photo, it's a double ended lipstain pen with a coloured, felt-tip type tip at one end and a clear, moisturising lipbalm at the other end. I personally think this nifty little feature is brilliant because it saves having to carry two separate products around which is great if you're short on bag space like I usually am!

The coloured tip comes with a double cap (you may be able to see it in the photo, the two caps got stuck together so I couldn't photograph them separately!) for that little bit of added protection to prevent it drying out which is another clever little feature that I love.

The stain is really easy to apply thanks to the pointed tip, which adds precision and the slightly chunkier body, which helps with filling out. It goes on really easily too so I would definitely recommend this product to people of all lip product application skill levels (I managed to do it and I'm pretty much a full on retard when it comes to neatly applying lipsticks / lipstains!) The stain also lasts quite a long time too and is really well pigmented as you can see in the photo below, (ignore my gross hands...) so you hardly use any at all to get a good finish and with the long lasting wear,  this product is a definite 'get your money's worth' item!

With any lipstain, I usually apply a moisturising lipbalm first and leave it on for a couple of minutes to make sure my lips are hydrated and not dry or cracked because lipstains will bleed into the cracks in dry lips which results in some areas being darker or more pigmented than others (noone wants stripy lips!). I then make sure to remove any traces of lipbalm before applying the stain to ensure I get the best possible staining and therefore the longest lasting colour possible.  This works because the stain is applied directly to the lip rather than on top of a layer of lipbalm which would repel the colour rather than letting it sink it. This can be used to your advantage though, especially if you're not confident in applying stains - make sure you lipbalm up the edges and corners of your lips before applying a stain so that if you do make a mistake, it can be removed really easily!

So I used the moisturising end first then removed it and used the coloured end, then finished with a layer of mositurising lipbalm to doubly ensure my lips don't dry out. And as mentioned before, because the stain was directly applied to the lips, the lipbalm on top doesn't affect the staying power of the stain, it just adds moisture so it's win-win! :)

                                                                                           

Overall, I'd say I'm really glad I caved and bought one of these for myself because the colour is fantastic, it's really easy to apply, long lasting and a super reasonable price too.

Hopefully whoever wins my giveaway will love it just as much as I do!