The Hourglass Ambient Lighting Powder and Guerlain Meteorites Compact Light Revealing Powder are both known to subtly give life and definition to your skin without you looking like you could grease a pan. But these two aren’t your identical twins – they are formulated differently to perform in one area over the other, and thus each fits different requirements, whatever yours may be.
Hourglass Ambient Lighting Powder Review in Diffused Light
Packaging
It comes in a slightly con-vexed square compact in front of which you press to release the clasp to reveal the product in a subtly raised, pyramid-like form – that I thought was a nice touch in addressing the hourglass geometry at the same time. The Hourglass Ambient Lighting Powder compact casing also comes with a mirror.
Shade & Consistency
From the photos above you can tell not only how fine the hourglass powder particles are but also how intense the pigments are. The finger swipe at first glance does not speak for the result on application; just so you know. This is probably due to the ultra fine powder quality that is soft enough for them to be ‘melted’ into the skin, enabling the powder to work from a level beneath. The video clip below features the Hourglass Ambient Lighting Edit Volume 3 (Holiday 2017) Palette of which the first shade I’d applied in the video was Diffused Light. Watch it to see what I mean.
I have chosen the shade ‘Diffused Light’ (among other shades – Luminous, Mood, Ethereal, Dim & Radiant Light) for its light diffusing properties and its claim for giving a warm glow and correcting redness. From the back of my hand, the warm glow bit is true as the product gives a beautiful muted golden sheen. Read further to know how this finishing powder performs in more areas.
Price & Where To Buy
SGD$76.00 at Singapore Sephora stores
Guerlain Meteorites Compact Light Revealing Powder Review in 3 Medium
Packaging
The Guerlain Meteorites Compact Light Revealing Powder comes off stronger in the color-correcting playing field; after all that colour-correcting palette-like look to it. It comes in a round mirrored compact case that you need to pry open to see this beautiful, almost mosaic-like collection of various colored pearl nuggets coming together in one pot. This one comes with a mirror in the casing as well.
Shade & Consistency
The Guerlain Meteorites Compact Light Revealing Powder comes in 2 Clair/Light, 3 Medium and 4 Dore/Golden. The one featured here is Medium. I picked up this shade because Clair/Light comes off too pale and cool-toned for my skin while Dore/Golden is a little too tanned.
This powder is surprisingly sheer when you swipe the product out with your fingers; even after you’d swirled on it a few times, more pigments just refuse to be picked up. Nonetheless the swatch on the back of my hand shows a beautiful, yet not over-the-top cool luminosity.
There’s no way to use this powder without ruining the boundaries of these individual coloured segments; you are bound to cause some spillovers and staining over the lighter colored pigments with the darker ones when you swirl your brush on it. So, get over it.
Price & Where To Buy
SGD$84.00 at Singapore Sephora outlets or at SGD$78.00 at Shilla Duty-Free shops at Changi Airport.
Hourglass Cosmetics vs Guerlain Meteorites Lighting Powders Review
For comparison purpose I’d applied the Hourglass Ambient Lighting Powder on the left side of my face and the Guerlain Meteorites Compact Light Revealing Powder on the right side. Take a look at the shots in which I’ve compared them on a few levels: their color correcting performance, glow intensity and pore diffusing ability.
The Color Correcting Test:
Hourglass Ambient Lighting Powder
Notice how the Hourglass Ambient Lighting Powder visibly brightened my skin but didn’t do much to correct the redness I have. However because it illuminates my skin as a whole, the redness in my skin seems that of radiance instead of just looking like pure blotchiness.
Guerlain Meteorites Compact Light Revealing Powder
Perhaps the Guerlain Meteorites Compact Light Revealing Powder in Medium is still a little too dark for me, you can see that the powder sort of dimmed out my skin tone. The plus side though is that it corrects my redness quite nicely and at the same time evens out my other discolorations to some extent.
The Glow Test
The Hourglass Ambient Lighting Powder gives a diffused glow as promised while the Guerlain Meteorites Compact Light Revealing Powder bounces off more shine. The Hourglass one also exudes a warmer luminescence compared to the Guerlain’s cooler light.
Notably, the Hourglass Ambient Lighting REFRACTS light while the Guerlain Light Revealing Powder REFLECTS light.
Pick one – poised for a candlelight dinner or out basking in the winter morning light.
The Pore Test
Now this one is pretty obvious. I have about equal amount of enlarged pores on both sides of the nose and clearly, the Hourglass Ambient Lighting Powder reduces the appearance of pores way better. I think this is due to the diffusing technology of the Hourglass Ambient Lighting powder that is able to distribute any imminent light more across the skin and the fact that the powder particles are more micro, they are able to fill up the pores and other imperfections better.
The Guerlain Meteorites Compact Light Revealing Powder on the other hand reflects in a less scattered way, so the powder throws light back more generously in more orderly paths without so much as taking in some first. This can make the pits of the pores appear even more visible due to the contrast.
Verdict
Best Highlighter Makeup In a Different League
Both the Hourglass Ambient Lighting Powder (Diffused Light) and the Guerlain Meteorites Compact Light Revealing Powder (3 Medium) livened up skin tones and cast a good amount of healthy glow, just in different ways. Depending on your skin texture and other conditions, they have different reasons to be picked up.
I would say the way both finishing powders comes off from the high points of the face is far more natural than many highlighting makeup in the market. At the very least, they don’t make you look like you’re having some party confetti or kids glitter glue on your face.
To be fair, I feel these two finishing powders aren’t to be mentioned in the same breath with the others. They are not exactly your contouring/highlighting counterparts because what they did was to go deeper into the technology of light creation and makes your skin ‘work’ for it. I feel these type of lighting powders are best suited for the strobing makeup technique. They merely gift you with something to harness what you already have. I believe this concept will be better appreciated under the circumstances of different lighting in which the skin is the only part that remains tops no matter which way your face is angled.
For me, I will give the Hourglass Ambient Lighting Powder my vote. The pore blurring properties and a glow that suits more to my warm skin tone are the winning points for me.
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