Hello everyone!
Today I'm going to give a rare review on a new product that I've been trying-- Bourjois' 123 Perfect CC cream! I saw this in Metro and after seeing Lisa Eldridge use it in her videos, I was tempted to get it. So after many months of contemplation, I finally took the plunge when Metro had a sale. I got it during their 20+20% sale, so I got it for around SGD 16. I think this is rather affordable for makeup from a good high-street brand like Bourjois. I've been using this product on and off for around a month now, so I feel I've got a good grasp on its effectiveness on me to write a review on it.
About my skin: I've got oily, blemish-prone skin, and it doesn't help that the climate I live in is ridiculously hot and humid. Usually, if my skin's in the healing stage, there'll be dry patches. Also, I've got big pores that I wish will look less obvious and many blemish scars from years of picking at the pimples (yes I couldn't resist). My skin undertone is yellow and probably a MAC NC 20-25 for foundation.
About the CC cream:
Bourjois claims that the CC cream has 3 pigments for colour correction:
- Apricot- Anti-Fatigue
- Green- Anti-Redness
- White- Anti-Dark spots
It also claims to give a luminous complexion and smooth skin. It also boasts of 24 hr hydration and that it's oil free.Sounds pretty good so far right? However, it has SPF 15, which is not really impressive for a CC cream compared to CC creams by other brands like The Face Shop and Revlon, which have SPF 50.
Texture:
The CC cream is quite watery. It reminds me of the consistency of my Shiseido foundation and MAC's face and body. People has also commented on its similarity to Chanel's Vitalumiere Aqua foundation's texture. Due to the slightly watery texture, it gives a very natural coverage and your skin will feel like it has no makeup on. This makes it great for day wear.
Packaging:
The packaging is a plastic tube with 30ml of product. It is quite stable if you put it standing. I like that it is small and handy. It's packaging makes it easy to stuff in my pouch and bring it out if I want to. The packaging looks rather cheap looking but hey, it's the content that matters.
Coverage:
I got the colour shade 31 Ivory, which is the lightest in the range sold in Singapore. The shade is slightly too light for me even after letting it set, but it's not that obvious. The coverage is light but buildable. It still looks and feel natural with 2 layers on. I like to use my hands or my beauty blender dupe to blend it.
Firstly, it does make my skin look less tired by making my complexion look brighter and smoother. It also made my pores less obvious, which is a major thumbs up factor. This cream usually takes a while to set and adjust to my skintone, so I always look freakishly like a ghost at first. The CC cream does a decent job in covering up most of the redness in my skin and also the lighter blemishes. You will still need a concealer if you want to cover all the blemishes with this CC cream. For me, I usually don't go for the flawless complexion look because I'll feel that I look 'mask-like'. It's the same logic as people not covering up all their freckles for that natural look(to me).
Here's a look of my face before and after applying the CC cream:
You can see from the before and after pictures that my overall skintone looks brighter and better. It cancelled out most of the redness but there are still some blemish marks left that are not fully covered.
Camera Flashback:
There should not be a strong flashback because of the low spf
theoretically. However, the flashback effect is quite obvious despite it having just SPF 15! Or it could be that it was day time and my camera's flash is pretty strong. Or the CC cream had not fully set when I took a photo with flash. Anyway, due to different factors, I ended up with a scarily white face for the test first time round.
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| First test shot! EEK!GHOST! |
I tried it again the second time round: (Warning: not for the faint hearted)
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| I tried the flash test again.My face still looks whiter than my neck :/ |
So after trying the camera flash test 2 times, I decided to never ever take close up photos with flash when I use this. It looks good with natural light though.
Lasting power:
The CC cream lasted pretty well on my face throughout most of the day. It will still be on my face at the end of my school days with some coverage left, albeit some of it will have faded off due to my oily skin. I don't use a primer with this because I don't own one. I use my Vichy moisturiser which does a pretty good job at oil control. Usually, I set my face with the translucent loose powder from Essence(All about Matte). The CC cream stays on till the end of the day. However, some of it will fade away because of my oily skin. When I have this on me, my skin gets oily usually around 4 hours later, but not crazy oily unlike what Revlon's CC cream did to me (my face became an oil swamp 2 hours later). Nevertheless, my skin still looked pretty good at the end of the day(due to the mixture of oil and makeup, I had this overly dewy look). The downside is that some of the CC cream highlighted the dry patches of skin. Well look at the photos and judge for yourself!
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| This is me with makeup like concealer and powder added on top of the CC cream. For that day's pictures, I used the Majolica Majorca foundation powder to set the makeup. |
You can see in the picture above that at the end of the day the reddish bumps and blemishes in my skin were showing. I did not do touch ups at all that day(I only blotted my skin once) so all that's on my skin is the CC cream and remnants of powder used earlier.
Overall Rating: 3.8/5
I like the light texture of this product but I am not blown away by the coverage it gives. The coverage is pretty decent but not enough for people with many blemishes and redness. The color correcting abilities of this CC cream is slightly above average, but not will not fully correct the redness in the skin nor the blemish scars. I think this product is most suited for normal/combination skin, as the product will show the dry patches of skin. If you've got pretty smooth skin with no dry patches, then you should give this product a try if you like natural looking makeup. If you've got dry skin, make sure you exfoliate and moisturize properly before you use it. For oily skin girls,you got to use a good primer or setting spray to hold the product in place or do regular touch-ups.
However, I do wish it has a higher SPF because I like to do away with having to layer my sunblock beneath it. I haven't gotten any breakouts from using this yet so I'm happy. Overall, for the price, it is a product worth trying. However, I won't be repurchasing this anytime soon because there are lots of new products with similar textures available. But for girls searching for a great daytime base product to use, this might be worth a try!
Till next time
Love,
El xoxo
