NARS Audacious Collection (Review & Swatches)

NARS Audacious Collection for Fall

Coming soon to a counter and store near you: NARS‘ Audacious fall collection! New shades of lipstick, limited edition eyeliners and a brand new brow cream!

NARS Audacious Lipsticks in Stefania and Kate
NARS Audacious Lipsticks in Stefania and Kate

The NARS Audacious lipstick line ($39 CAD/$32 USD) hit the beauty world by storm a while back. But for me, I never managed to experience the amazingess of that launch. You know how it is… you get caught up in beauty launch after beauty launch and somehow you don’t get around to trying everything. So this was my first time interacting with a NARS Audacious lipstick.

I knew about the hype… but guys… I was not prepared

At first swipe (I was doing my swatches), I actually gasped. While the bullet felt solid, it also glided onto my arm like absolute butter. The swatches you see below are my very first time swiping the product AND it’s a single swipe.

NARS Audacious Lipsticks in Stefania and Kate - swatches
NARS Audacious Lipsticks in Stefania and Kate – swatches

These are hydrating, creamy, and completely luxurious. They have no scent and are opaque in a single swipe. For me, this has been an absolute jawdropping experience – I don’t think I’ve ever worn a more comfortable lipstick…. ever. This the kind of lipstick that makes me want to own the entire range (I can see my wallet staring at me in horror).

Wearing NARS Audacious Lipstick in Stefania
Wearing NARS Audacious Lipstick in Stefania

Stefania is a stunning fuchsia with a cool-toned edge. I managed to pair this with pink and purple eyeshadow and it didn’t look like pink overkill (which can be difficult!).

Wearing NARS Audacious Lipstick in Kate
Wearing NARS Audacious Lipstick in Kate

Kate is a gorgeous medium-deep purple with some pink in it. Scared of purple lipstick? This might be one to try since it seemed to look quite natural (in my opinion) and less fluorescent.

NARS Brow Defining Cream in Danakil
NARS Brow Defining Cream in Danakil

NARS is also releasing their Brow Defining Cream with this collection (although I’m looking on Sephora and I already see it in stock – $29 CAD/$22 USD). Danakil is their darkest brow colour so it’s not going to match me, but I wanted to play with it and get a sense for the texture.

NARS Brow Defining Cream in Danakil - swatch
NARS Brow Defining Cream in Danakil – swatch

As you can see, Danakil isn’t quite made for blondes! 😉 Regardless, the texture is creamy and yet is has a hint of grit to it. That sounds weird, but bear with me. It’s not as stiff as the NYX Tame & Frame (which I’m not a fan of) and it’s not as creamy as the Anastasia Dipbrown (which I do love). This feels like the perfect hybrid between those two products because it helped me carve out my eye brow (which I don’t have much of to being with!) and yet it wasn’t slopping all over the place.

Wearing NARS Brow Defining Cream in Danakil
Wearing NARS Brow Defining Cream in Danakil

I love the shape and texture I got with the Brow Defining Cream. I’m absolutely going to look into purchasing my correct shade (there are three other shades on top of this one) since I loved how well this applied to my brows. As you can see in the shot above, my eyelashes are quite blonde, even white in some areas (the tips are stained from mascara of course!), so I wasn’t going to show you a full face shot because it would have looked weird. But yeah, suffice to say, I’m impressed.

NARS Unrestricted Eyeliner Stylo - matte black
NARS Unrestricted Eyeliner Stylo – matte black

The limited edition Unrestricted Eyeliner Stylo comes in two shades: a matte black (pictured in this post) and a satin finish one. It’s a felt tip liner that is long enough to make me happy (yay!) and comes to a fine point.

NARS Unrestricted Eyeliner Stylo - matte black - swatches
NARS Unrestricted Eyeliner Stylo – matte black – swatches

At first swatch, I was a little bit unsure of this liner. However, a swatch doesn’t tell the full tale:

Wearing NARS Unrestricted Eyeliner Stylo (this shot was taken after a full work day!)
Wearing NARS Unrestricted Eyeliner Stylo (this shot was taken after a full work day!)

This NARS eyeliner is nuts you guys! I took this picture after a work day – so I applied my liner at 7:30 am and took the above shot at 5:15 pm when I got home. You can see some of my eyeshadow has transferred onto the liner, but the liner itself HAS NOT BUDGED. It’s not faded or less crisp than when I went to work in the morning. From the swatches, I had thought that maybe I’d be dealing with an eyeliner that spread (since you can see it spreading into my arm texture lines) but that was not the case on my eyelids. Really, really happy with this one.

Final Thoughts

This is one of those collections that really makes you fall in love with the brand. Between trying out their Audacious lipsticks for the first time, to discovering a new brow cream that applies beautifully, to finding an eyeliner that stands up against an entire work day… I’m really, really impressed. There really wasn’t a dud in everything I tried and it’s piqued my interest to perhaps jump on the bandwagon a bit quicker when NARS releases a new product.

Let me know if you’re going to be picking anything up from this collection! The NARS Audacious collection will be available at your usual NARS retailers (Sephora, The Bay, Holt Renfew, Nordstrom and Murale) on September 1, 2016.

The products featured in this post were sent to me for consideration.

2 thoughts on “NARS Audacious Collection (Review & Swatches)

    1. $39 is astronomical for a lipstick. But seriously… this was one of a formulation. I couldn’t believe just how comfortable they were to wear!

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