Is there anything more luxurious than Charlotte Tilbury makeup? I mean her packaging, her products… they’re all incredibly swoonworthy. And I mean… they aren’t cheap either! So imagine my surprise when Katherine of the The Green Bows just handed me a Charlotte Tilbury Wonder Glow when we were having brunch one day! (She already had it and she knew of my love for the brand so she gave me a brand new tube she just happened to have.)

Charlotte Tilbury‘s Wonder Glow is an Instant Soft Focus Beauty Flash Primer.  And the claims are lengthy:

• The state of the art Fluorescent Core Light Diffuser absorbs UV particles from the sun & re-emits their energy as visible light, flooding the skin with powerful luminosity.
• Soft focus ceramic microspheres “roll” into wrinkles and over imperfect skin tone, scattering light to create an anti-age optical illusion. Wrinkles are disguised and skin tone is corrected.
• The anti-age hero, BioNymph Peptide Complex, multi-tasks in the skin to reduce the appearance of wrinkles, improve skin elasticity & generally smooth things over. This is combined with wrinkle-preventing matrikines that recharge the skin’s natural renewal rhythm.
• Sodium Hyaluronate forms a film of hyaluronic acid over the skin, sealing in moisture, whilst extracts of Wild Pansy promote the renewal of hyaluronic acid in the skin surface to retain and flood the skin with moisturize.
• Floral accents of rose hip oil and camellia oil regenerate, restructure and moisturize the skin.
• Paraben-free

The bottle is a sleek see-through tube with a spout that you squeeze the product through to dispense it. I love that the bottle is see-through because you can see how much is left in the bottle. The product also slides down the tube easily, so you’re not left banging it repeatedly against your hand to get the product out! The tube also indicates that it can be used under your foundation or in place of foundation.

The product itself is a warm-toned primer with a hint of gold sheen running throughout it in a heavy swatch. The sheen/sparkles don’t really show up on the face though – so I suppose they blend in nicely.

And here’s how it played out on my face under foundation.

Final Thoughts

This is hard, because I really do love Charlotte Tilbury… but I don’t find Wonder Glow does anything at all for me in terms of “glowing”. Sure, I have a faint sheen on my face in the shots above, but that’s primarily thanks to my highlighter! I also don’t notice it increasing the longevity of my foundation either (not that I needed it extended wear with my foundation though). I’ve worn it under foundation or alone many times now and neither seems to really visually do anything at all for me. It kind of seems like an expensive product for no good reason, which makes me sad since I’ve loved her eyeshadow quads, lipsticks and Filmstar Bronze + Glow. Very disappointed in this one. 🙁