EcoTools Face and Body Sculpting Brush Review

A few weeks ago I went on iHerb and bought a few things from there. My purchases include organic green tea, lip balms and EcoTools Face and Body Sculpting Brush. I also purchased the E.L.F. Studio HD Powder which I will review in another post.

Today I will review the Face and Body Sculpting Brush. This brush cost me US$9.97 from iHerb. It's definitely a good price for a nice quality brush.

I purchased this because I thought it looked similar to the Rae Morris Radiance brush which is very expensive. However when the brush arrived it is actually bigger and thicker than the Rae Morris Radiance brush, so it's definitely not a dupe. However,  I still love this brush.

EcoTools is a great brand. It's a cruelty free brand. The brush bristles are made using cruelty-free synthetic taklon  bristles and the handle is made from bamboo. The bristles are so soft and feels so beautiful on the face.

I originally thought this brush is like the Radiance brush by Rae Morris which can be used for contouring the cheeks. However the bristles are quite dense and thick so it is too big to do precise contouring of the cheek. It may work if you squeeze the bristles to make it thinner but I think it's way too much work if I am in a hurry in the morning.

So how do I use this brush?

I really love using this brush to apply my foundation. Usually I have been using the Real Techniques face brush to apply my foundation but when I use this face and body sculpting brush, it applies foundation so fast and easily. It has cut my foundation application time by half. And because it is so dense it buffs in the foundation nicely into my skin. I use a sweeping motion side to side when I apply the foundation all over my face and on my nose I do a up down sweeping motion. And as it's a face and body sculpting brush, I can easily blend my foundation down to my neck and décolletage.

This blush is also great for applying powder all over the face. And lastly, although it may not be fully suitable for cheek contouring, this brush is great for applying bronzer all over the face. I also use this brush to contour around my jawline, my neck and my décolletage.

Overall I just really love this brush. I am amazed how versatile it is. It's definitely a great addition to my brush collection and at US$9.97, you can't go wrong with it!

IMATS 2012 haul - Brushes

So I know it's a bit late since IMATS Sydney 2012 was on 29th-30th September but I wanted to post my brushes haul on that weekend. I was actually happy that I didn't spend too much.

Most of my purchase were brushes. I bought a few brushes from Royal & Langnickel (R&L). I also got to meet the amazing Emmy Award winning makeup artist Kevin James Bennett (KJB) and I bought one of the R&L Revolution brushes that was created through his collaboration with R&L. I bought the BX-30 Kabuki blush brush for $18. I kinda regret I didn't buy anymore brushes from this line but I already had so much brushes.

The other brushes I bought was a small stippling brush ($6), a small crease brush ($4) and a finishing fan brush ($4).

R& L Revolution BX-30 Blush Brush

BX-30 Blush Brush (From side)

R&L SILK Pro Small Stippling C255

R&L SILK Pro Crease Brush C420

R&L Finishing Fan Brush BE05

Out of all these brushes my favourites would be the crease brush and the BX-30 brush. The crease brush is really good at picking up product and placing it on the crease and blending. It's not too big but yet not too small either. The BX-30 Blush brush is really good not only for blushes but also for contouring. It picks up a lot of products and blends it really well too. I love it! When I bought it, I asked KJB for a contouring brush and this was the one that he recommended. Although this brush is synthetic it amazingly picks up powdered products really well. And it's nice and soft too and not scratchy.  On the other side I did find the Fan brush a bit scratchy and not that soft. 

And even though I already did have tons of brushes I was so tempted and ended up buying one of Rae Morris's brush, the mini Kabuki brush.

The mini kabuki brush is very cute! It was $19.60 but I got a 10% discount at IMATS. I wanted to buy the deluxe kabuki but it was all sold out. This brush can be used to apply bronzer, blushes or highlighter. You can also use it for contouring as well. It's really nice and soft. I really want to buy a lot more of the Rae Morris brush collections but some of them are quite pricey!

So I think that was all the brushes that I bought! Let me know what you think of these brushes if you've tried them.

Sigma Mrs Bunny Travel Kit Brush Set

I was so happy and excited when my package from Sigma Beauty arrived because I finally purchased the Sigma brush set "Mrs Bunny" travel kit. I've been undecided for a while on which brush set I wanted to buy and finally decided on this travel kit. My main factors for purchasing this set is because it's vegan and it uses the Sigma Sigmax HD fibres. Also it's so cute, I love the blue handle and the pink ferule and it comes in a cute packaging that also transform into 2 separate brush holders.

I bought this off the Sigma website. The price was US$59 but I got a 10% discount so it was US$53.10. Shipping was quite pricey at US$15. So the total cost of this brush was AU$71.90 incl. shipping.

So to the product content. The brush set contains 7 brushes. Here are the description for each brushes (from Sigma Beauty website).

E30 - Pencil: Soften and smoke out lines. Soften pencil liners along the top and bottom lash lines, add shadow to line the eyes, or use to highlight inner corner of eyes.

E40 - Tapered Blending: Soft blended crease. Using just the tips to apply color, sweep back and forth through the crease for a diffused and blended finish.

E55 - Eye Shading: Even application of color. Place color across the whole lid for an even and strong application of product. 

E65 - Small Angle: Create precise lining. Moves fluidly and easily across the upper and lower lash lines. Use with gel, cream or powder liners.

F30 - Large Powder: Even powder application. Uniform blending of powder products onto the face and body.

F40 - Large Angled Contour: Subtle cheek application. Use the angle to softly contour the cheekbone. Can also be used to apply blush.

F60 - Foundation: Smooth foundation application. Apply liquid or cream products such as foundation and primer.

Here are some photos of the brushes:

Now to my review. These brushes are as good as I was expecting. I wasn't sure at first about these brushes since they were all synthetic fibres, but for vegan synthetic brushes they are so soft and fluffy. All of the brushes were nice and dense so it was really easy to apply the product.

I love the F30 brush to apply powder to set my foundation. I love how it applies the powder lightly but enough to set my foundation. It's quite dense so it does pick up the product. I also use this sometimes to apply liquid foundation. It's blends it into the skin nicely. And I also use this for blushes instead of the F40.

The F40 is a nice brush. This is my first angled contour  brush. Previously I used a rounded shape brush to apply blush. I now have started using the F40. I love how this brush picks up the colour of the blush lightly so it doesn't pack much colour which I like since I don't like my cheeks to be too red. I also use the F40 for contouring. It fits perfectly in the hollow of the cheeks so it's really good for contouring.

I have been using F60 brush a lot to apply my foundation. Prior to getting this brush set I didn't apply foundation much since I haven't found a good applicator for it. Since getting the F60 in the Mrs Bunny brush set, I have been using foundation almost everyday because the F60 applies the foundation nice and evenly. It's so soft and dense and it blends the foundation smoothly.

With the eye brushes I haven't used it as much as I have with the facCe brushes but I am definitely really happy with them with the exception of the small angle brush. The E55 brush is great for packing colour all over the lid. The E40 is really good in blending the colour especially on the crease.  The E40 is good for adding that definition in the outer "v" of your eye and also you can use it to blend some colour on the bottom lash line. Now the E65, I'm not that happy with this brush. Sigma says it's supposed to be good for precise lining but I have found it to thick and not fine enough to line your eyes. I've been using the MAC 266 brush and compared to this, the E65 is definitely thicker than the 266.

So in conclusion:

What I love/like:

• The packaging, it's so compact and handy and it turns into 2 brush holders.
• The brushes are so soft and dense
• They are really easy to clean
• The handles of the brushes are not too long and not too short either - they're the perfect length

What I don't like/need improvements:

• The E65 brush is not as nice as I thought and it's too thick for applying gel/liquid eyeliner.
• They're not available in Australia so shipping was quite expensive.

Overall I give them a 4.5 out of 5.