MUA were kind enough to send me three of their new Alexandra Burke Lip Booms to review.  If you haven’t heard of Alexandra Burke she was the winner of the British X Factor in 2008.

I’ve tried a few MUA products and have been very happy with them, so had high hopes for these Lip Booms.  These Lip Booms were created in collaboration with Alexandra Burke, and I believe she had quite a lot of input when it came to the colours etc.

Lip Booms have a matte lipstick on one end and a (very) glittery gloss on the other.

This is how MUA describe them on their website:

‘Lipstick and highlighting gloss that creates fuller curvaceous lips for a dramatic illusion of volume.

There are 4 amazing ways to transform your lips and give them some Boom!
1. Lipstick alone for a matte look.
2. Lipstick with highlighter applied just to the centre of your lips to create a full volume illusion.
3. Lipstick with highlighter all over for a super-glossy look.
4. Highlighter alone for a sheer pearl finish.’

The Lip Booms are available in eight shades and I received O.M.G., It’s A Situation and Doin Good.

Left to right: It’s A Situation, Doin Good, O.M.G.

O.M.G. is my favourite. It is an amazing light, pinky-orange colour – absolutely perfect for summer. It’s A Situation is a dark berry colour, which would be gorgeous for winter and Doin Good is a very ‘my lips but better’ kinda of colour, neutral and great for everyday.

The lip glosses on the other side are designed to compliment the lipsticks.

Here are swatches on the back of my hand (corresponding lipgloss on the left of the lipstick):

The lipsticks aren’t the most hydrating formula I’ve ever used with (sadly!) O.M.G. being the most dry. It’s actually quite difficult difficult to apply and takes a little warming up.  The two darker colours are easier to apply, Doin Good is the most creamy.  I think these are brilliant shades for a drugstore brand – these lipsticks retail at £3. Bargain!

However as much as I love the lipsticks (despite being a little drying – I’m really ok with slightly drier formulas which isn’t good I know) I can’t say I’m fond of the lipglosses on the other side. They smell like a sweet (candy) we have in the UK called Drumsticks and I absolutely love them so that’s a bonus, but they have really chunky bits of glitter in the formula. It bypasses sparkle or shimmer and goes straight to full on, what you used in primary school style glitter.  It would be great for the holiday season but not so hot for everyday use. Mind you, I will say that my friend wore It’s A Situation on a night out with the gloss and it actually looked really pretty on her, but she has gorgeous full lips anyway!

Another negative I have to point out about these Lip Booms is they don’t seem work in the way MUA suggest. If you try and apply a little gloss to the centre of your lips to make them fuller the glitter spreads out over the whole lip anyway. A nice concept but doesn’t work quite as well as you might expect.

That said, I do love these. At £3 they’re a brilliant bargain and the colour choices are great. The darker colours last longer than the lighter shades, my friend managed to eat dinner without It’s A Situation budging. I’m certainly going to keep using them (currently wearing O.M.G.!) just maybe without the gloss.

Pros

Great colour selection (fun, fashionable colours!)

Brilliant price

Wears well

Cons

Quite sweet smelling (a con unless you love Drumsticks!)

The gloss side isn’t great – chunky glitter

Drying formula

I’d definitely recommend checking these out for the price! Available in Superdrug and on the MUA online store.  They seem to be selling well in Glasgow at least, it took me ages to find one for the giveaway!

Speaking of the giveaway….! Facekitt has just reached 10,000 Twitter followers and it seemed a nice milestone for a giveaway. I also thought it would be nice to give readers who don’t have MUA the chance to win a few products!

The prize contains one MUA Lip Boom in O.M.G., a MUA blush in shade 5, a MUA nail polish in shade 18 and two MUA eyeshadows in shades 1 and 27.

To be in with a chance of winning you have to do the following:

1. Follow Facekitt on Twitter (@thefacekitt).

2. Like our Facebook page.

3. Leave a comment below telling us what posts you would like to see on Facekitt (this lets us know what you guys what to read!) Please leave your Twitter details in the comments so we can contact you should you win!

The competition will be open for a month (so it will close on the 19th June 2012 at midnight GMT) and is open internationally so anyone can enter! You can only enter once, so one comment per person equals entry. Winner will be chosen at random.

Good luck guys and I hope this has been interesting for you!

Gemma