Review: Revlon Brushes

I'd been looking for the eyeshadow brushes featured here for a while now and I was kindly sent the whole range to use and review.

My initial thoughts:

• The handles smell "woody" and the hairs have no palpable scent
• Handles = perfect length apart from the eyliner brush..I've done some desi mechanics on it though.  For those of you who don't know what desi mechanics are, they're the sister of ghetto mechanics, i.e. making something work by doing some simple, at home tweaks.  My mechanics were to cut the handle shorter, file it down and paint it. 
• Each handle has the name of the brush (more helpful than you would think!)
• The handle width varies depending on which brush you use, for example, the handles on the foundation brush, the blush brush and the powder brush are very chunky which is conducive to how the product applies whereas the handles on the eyeshadow brushes are thinner
• The hairs on all the brushes are very soft. I've mentioned this here because you don't want to read the same thing 10 times over

Revlon Powder Brush RRP £10.99

The brush doesn't feel cumbersome which is something to be welcomed when it comes to makeup brushes.  I've used  it a fair bit but then I gave it to my mum because she uses powder more than I do.

She reports positively on its performance and I think it's pretty good too.  I use it for translucent powder and mi madre uses it for powder foundation and I feel that it distributes powder properly.  With my old brush, you could tell where I was wearing powder but application is pretty seamless with this one.

Revlon Blush Brush RRP £9.99

I feel this brush was made personally for me as it fits my cheek area perfectly (ooh er) and blending is a dream.  I tap the top part in my favourite blusher (currently this Korres one) and sweep the sides in the blush too. 

The brush is fairly chunky which makes application even easier.

Overall, I'm very happy with the brush.

Revlon All Over Shadow Brush RRP £6.99

I think the stiffness (har har) is spot on.  I use this to just add a shade all over my eyelid and blend it out.  The hairs are black which make it a bit hard to see how much colour you've loaded onto the brush but I think that's a minor point because who honestly doesn't dip back into their eyeshadow when they're blending?

You get all the control you want and I think the results from using this brush are far better than any other blender brush I've used.

Revlon Contour Shadow Brush RRP £7.99

This was the brush I was most looking forward to using.  I've been trying to improve my application skills for ages and I think that I have finally cracked it and it may be in part due to this brush   It picks up just the right amount of shadow (no need to tap it off or anything).  The handle really lets you get into the crease and blend it on out.

I'm quite happy with my skills now and this brush has worked it's way into my daily brush arsenal.

Here are some practice eyes I did with the two brushes:

I can clearly see a marked improvement comapred to what I usually come up with.  I used two shades of blue and a black shadow on the blue eyes so I'm chuffed at how well it blended.  The middle eye could have done with a bit more blending but I only learnt my final trick when I was doing the blue eye.  I originally did a "thick winged look" but then wanted to see if I could blend it up into a more rounded piece and I could!

Revlon Eyeliner Brush RRP £6.99

This was the last brush I used from the collection.  It's not because it's crap, it's because eyeliner is a fiddly thing and I don't have time to sit down and be all nicey nicey with makeup when I'm rushing off to work.  So, this is a pure weekend brush. 

I have one simliar to this by Ruby and Millie but I decided to use it with my all time favourite gel liner (there's a post about that coming up, very soon) and it was a bit of a fail.  I don't think these brushes are made for gel liner..does anyone know what type of liner they are made for? The packaging didn't say and I can't see you using liquid liner with it simply because of logistics.

I used my Smashbox powder liner and got better results..I'm a bit unsure about this one.

Revlon Foundation Brush RRP £10.99
I love the feeling of this brush. The hairs are pretty densely packed for a foundation brush but it is still fluffy enough to apply foundation properly.

Blending was flawless and it took me literally minutes to apply a full face of foundation. It used to take me ages before but this brush is a brilliant time saver.

I never used to wear foundation every day but since I've had this brush, it's become a daily occurence for me and I will be finishing my second (ever!) tube of foundation very soon. 

Revlon Concealer Brush RRP £5.99

I don't use concealer so I thought it a bit pointless if I reviewed a brush for that purpose because I wouldn't know what to look for.

I handed it over to my cousin who has been using concealer since the day she was born and she absolutely loves it.  She used it with liquid concealers and solid concealers (she used this and this).

She liked the fact that the brush was soft but still firm enough to apply concealer without making it look patchy.

I personally like the way the hairs are coloured in a similar way to the foundation brush so that you instantly know that this is the concealer brush.

I use it to apply a highlighter under the arch of my eyebrows and it places the product perfectly.

All in all, these brushes are pretty good for the price and I'd recommend them all.  The handle on the eyeliner brush needs to be smaller but I find that's a problem with all eyeliner brushes, not something unique to this one.