Primark PS Love Beauty Haul & Review

Me and the lovely Kat over at +All Hail The Nails decided that it would be good fun if we both took £5 into Primark to see what make up we could get for our money. Everything is price for around £1-£3 each so I knew that I would be able to get a few bits for my money, and here is what I managed to find.

 L-R: Volumising Mascara, Cream Blush, Lipstick and Tinted Lip Balm

I wanted to try and get a good selection of products, so rather that just spending my fiver on lipsticks, I ventured out to mascara and blusher too so I could report back on how everything performs.

Volumising Mascara - Black: £1.00

I was very wary of buying this mascara as I've had cheap ones before and really haven't been impressed with them, however; I had heard good things about this one so thought that I would give it a try for a quid. I'm not overly keen on the brush on this, it's a bit on the spindly side but the mascara itself applies easily so I think that it comes down to personal preference. This is marketed as a 'Volumising Mascara' but I can assure you that it is not! It adds a little bit of length to the lashes but that it is. I think that this has been totally mis-sold. It shouldn't matter that it only costs £1, it doesn't do what it says it does at all. This would probably be an ideal for a teenager who is trying out make up for the first time.

Snap up or avoid? Snap up if you aren't bothered about the volumising aspect.

Cream Blush: £2.00

I'm totally obsessed with blushers at the minute, and especially cream ones so I was really excited to see that Primark had a couple of shades to choose from. I went for this pretty coral shade as it's nice and bright for the warmer months ahead. I literally couldn't wait to use this but man was I disappointed! This is the worst blusher that I have ever tried. I applied this with my buffing brush, like I do with all of my cream blushers, and this would not blend into my foundation at all. It sat on top and went patchy. I tried to add a bit more product thinking that it wasn't pigmented enough but that just made it worse. I ended up applying my trusty Collection Speedy Blush on top to try and salvage my make up.

Snap up or avoid? Avoid.

Tinted Lip Balm - Vintage Kiss: £1.00

I was really excited to see these tinted lip balms hanging up and was even more exited by the fact that Primark have actually given something a shade name! They had 3 shades to choose from in the Leeds store, and after a lot of deliberation I went for this lovely berry shade. I must admit that I was really looking forward to trying this out so I used it the day after I bought it. I loved the colour as soon as I applied it, it wasn't too bright but gave a nice pop of colour which is ideal for work. Within about 15 minutes of having this on, my lips started to feel really really dry and flaky which surprised me as this is being marketed as a lip balm which implies it should moisturise your lips. Another 15 minutes after that the colour had practically disappeared from my lips...all I had done was drive to work. By the time I got to work I had to reapply this, and again it had disappeared within the hour. This product is crap! Avoid it at all costs. It doesn't work as a lip balm and the colour certainly doesn't stay on your lips.

Snap up or avoid? Avoid.

Lipstick: 80p

I have tried Primark lipsticks before, but only the slightly more expensive matte ones so I was quite excited to see one available for 80p! The bargain hunter inside me was going a little bit crazy! There were a few shades on offer but some were quite shimmery so I opted for this fairly matte dusky nude shade. I really can't describe the shade of this, it's very unique and I certainly don't own anything like it in my collection. In fact, I would say that it isn't too far off Pantone Colour of the Year, Marsala. After all of the other disastrous Primark make up that I had tried, I wasn't holding out much hope for this either, so it was a total surprise to me that I loved it! The application is really smooth and silky, and the product is very pigmented so you don't need to do loads of sweeps across your lips. I wore this with my MUA Clear Lip Liner and it stayed on my lips for a remarkable amount of time. This survived a few hot drinks and even mostly survived me eating an apple. I love the apple test! It also didn't dry my lips out like a lot of cheaper lipsticks I have tried before.

Snap up or avoid? Snap up. Quickly.

Overall, I'm am massively disappointed with Primark PS Love make up. To sum it up, it's crap. The saving grace for me was the lipstick, and on reflection I wish I had spent my fiver just on them! I have tried other make up from Primark before, and found it to be better than this selection so perhaps I made the wrong decision on product choices, but I'm not convinced. I'll also make a point of stating that Primark PS Love nail polish in the big square bottles is fantastic. I own quite a few of the polishes and love them, so I can fully recommend them to you.

Make sure you pop over and follow Kat's blog so that you can see what she picked and if she had more luck with the products than me. You can find Kat's blog here.

Have you tried Primark PS Love make up before? Did you hate it as much as I did? Let me know in the comments.

Sam x

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