My Color IQ Experience!

Welcome back beauties! 

Now, it’s no secret I’m obsessed with makeup and my favourite makeup store just so happens to be Sephora. So fittingly for my birthday I mainly asked for Sephora gift cards. So the other day I went to my local Sephora but I went wanting to pick up something in specific. Seeing as I’m obsessed with makeup and beauty, of course I’m into the whole Youtube world and my favourite ‘beauty guru’ has to be Judy of itsjudytime. Recently she did a first impression review on the Sephora Collection Perfection Mist Airbrush Foundation and I was completely sold and was waiting to get my hands on it. I was so close to just ordering one from online but I really wanted to try it out and find the right shade in store. 

Then I thought, why not just try out the Sephora + Pantone Color IQ system while I'm there since I've always been meaning to. For those of you who don’t know what that is, basically it is a system to help find your perfect foundation match by using a small camera device to take an image of different parts of your face (like your forehead, cheek and chin), then based on whatever colour your skin is, you will be given a Color IQ number and that number pinpoints your foundation matches from all the formulas available. Now they do have an option to find your Color IQ number online but it doesn’t involve any images of your face. It simply asks you to choose a brand of foundation you wear (of course only brands that they sell) and the shade, and it gives you the Color IQ number associated with that shade of foundation and other similar shades from different brands. Of course, I think this option is quite flawed because if the whole point is to find a match to the true colour of your skin, why would you use a current foundation you're wearing to help you? What if the colour foundation you’re using is wrong and you just helped yourself find the same wrong shade in different brands - it makes no sense. So with that I do recommend if you would like to try this service out, please go in store.

The Colour IQ Device or "camera"

With all that being said, I found my experience to be a pretty great one. The employee who helped me out was so nice which made my whole experience even better. I sat on one of their stools and attached to their large makeup station on both sides is a small tablet in which the Color IQ system is programmed into. First, she asked me if I was wearing any makeup, which I wasn’t, but if you are you have to remove it (I purposely didn't wear makeup that day because I knew I was going to go in and test foundations and to do that I would of course have to remove my own makeup and ain't nobody got time for that!). She also asked if I was wearing a lotion with SPF in it because if you are, the sunscreen will cause the image they take of your skin to appear white. After she completely sanitized the camera and her hands, she took a picture of my forehead, cheek and chin. When it was done, she showed me the image of my skin on the little screen of the machine where it showed my Color IQ number to be 3Y11. Now of course I had no idea what that meant so she explained. 

The Color IQ Skin Tone Chart

On the tablet, she showed me where I was on the chart above and explained that there are 2 options to the colours based on the undertone of a person’s skin - red and yellow. So therefore the y in my 3Y11 IQ number meant I have yellow undertones skin. She also explained that within the chart, each row (from top to bottom is lightest to darkest) is a shade and within that row are different variations of that shade. So because my shade 3Y11 didn’t have too many options, she moved me up to 2Y11. Now I know what your thinking cause I thought the same thing at first too - it sounds like she moved me up a whole shade of colour right? Wrong. She explained that moving left or right within my row, means I am choosing a variation of the shade that neutralizes my skin colour (which is helpful for people like me who have hyperpigmentation problems). If I wanted to go a shade darker or lighter, well then I would have to move up or down the chart in columns. Makes sense right? And she also mentioned that in the end, even if after receiving a Color IQ, there have been some people who wanted a foundation that is lighter or darker than their actual skin tone and she can’t really stop them cause it’s the person’s choice, so in the end, it's your personal preference.  

Anywho, so after she punched in my final neutralized shade, she showed me all the foundations that appeared for my specific IQ number. 

My foundation matches for the Color IQ number 2Y11

From this list, she asked me which ones I wanted to try, and I really didn’t know. I said I wanted a light to medium coverage so she recommended the Urban Decay but instead of choosing another one from the list, I requested to try the Sephora Airbrush Foundation (since that was the reason I went in). The horrible thing about requesting the Sephora Airbrush Foundation was that when she put it on one side and the Urban Decay on the other, I couldn’t tell which one looked worse because the Sephora one looked SO pale on my skin and in contrast the Urban Decay looked darker. In the end I realized it was the Airbrush Foundation that didn’t work on me because they just didn’t have my shade. They only have 5 shades in total and of course the shade I thought I was (which was Tan) was too dark for me but at the same time the shade right before it (Medium) was too light (sigh). It was so frustrating not being able to find my proper shade in that foundation cause it’s what I came in for but I gave up and moved on. 

I then was curious and decided to ask where a foundation I almost bought was on the shade chart. Several months ago I went into Sephora looking for a foundation match but had an employee test try them on me instead.  I ended up with two that I liked, the Make Up Forever HD Foundation and the Estee Lauder Double Wear Light Foundation. Because I wanted to actually test try them in my everyday life, I got samples before buying them (each little sample gave me about 4-5 wears of foundation so they’re pretty decent sized samples). In the end, because it was summer and I didn’t want something too heavy, I chose the Estee Lauder while I reluctantly left the Makeup Forever behind. Another factor in my choice was that when I wore each foundation on either side of my face (yes I actually went out in public with one foundation on my left side and another on my right) I asked various people which side looked better and they said the Estee side because the MUF side looked a little orangey and off. So out of curiosity, I asked the employee to type in the number of that foundation and see if it was close to my Color IQ number - it was way off. The shade was number 173 Amber and it ended up being 1R10 on the Color IQ chart, meaning it was a foundation with a red undertone instead of a yellow which is why it looked orangey on my face. 

So I asked for something from the MUF HD Foundation collection because I remembered that aside from the colour being off when I tried the sample months before, I loved the coverage of the foundation, the fact that it held up all day and it didn’t stain or smudge when I touched my face (which is a must with foundations for me). The closest shade was 128 Almond with a Color IQ number of 2Y09 which is not far from my match 2Y11 but is 2 rows higher making it a lighter shade. So, I disappointingly removed the Sephora Airbrush and tried on the MUF (with the Urban Decay still on my left side for comparison). In the end, I absolutely LOVED the MUF and even though I was scared that the foundation would look off because it was lighter than my 2Y11 Color IQ number, it actually looked fine. So I chose the MUF and the employee evened out my face and applied some blush and bronzer. 

Since I was also in the market for a really nice oxblood coloured lipstick, she recommended an OCC Lip Tar (which I’ve always wanted to try also). Now although the shade was beautiful I do warn you IT IS NOT MOISTURIZING AT ALL. I had the lip tar on for about 5 hours and it was the worst experience ever. My lips were so dry after only 30 mins and the colour kept caking up on the inner rim of my lips. I finally gave up and slathered lip balm all over it. The only good thing about the lip tar was that the colour lasted (like it really lasted -after I removed my makeup my lips were still tinted a little pink the next day) and that’s about it. So luckily I was able to try it out before buying it and finding out how horrible it is later.

So in the end, I was very satisfied with the Color IQ system and ended up buying the MUF HD Foundation, along with some old favourites - the Stila Stay All Day Waterproof Liquid Eye Liner (by far the best liquid eyeliner I have ever tried in the last 2 years) and my best friend, the Urban Decay Revolution Lipstick in Anarchy introduced to me through my Ipsy Glam Bag and seen here, which also happens to be a radiant orchid shade - Pantone's colour of the year. Sadly however, I have yet to find my perfect oxblood shade and am still on the look.

These three items happen to be some of my all time makeup favourites

Have you tried the Color IQ system? How was your experience? 

Oh, and if anyone knows what the best oxblood coloured lipstick is, please put me out of my misery.

Don't forget to check our previous post: Oscar Red Carpet

Stay beautiful and stay fabulous! xoxo

*images courtesy of https://www.sephora.com