le metier de beaute

Disclosure:  Both the Le Metier and Eyeko liners were supplied as PR samples.

Ladies and gentlemen, roll up roll up!  Today we're pitting two felt tip style eyeliners together: in the high end corner, Le Metier de Beaute's luxe Precision Liquid Eyeliner in Noir, weighing in at £20, and in the low end corner, Eyeko's Graffiti Eyeliner Pen in brown, weighing in at £5.  Let the battle commence!

Packaging


Here are two products whose packaging definitely reflects their price points.  The Le Metier offering is black, smooth, glossy, with simply the brand name stamped upon its sexy exterior.  Eyeko's eyeliner has a silver toned plastic barrel with graffiti like scribbles printed on it.  The Eyeko pen also has a useful coloured end to it, much like you'd get with an actual felt tip pen, which helps you identify the colour the product inside, while the Le Metier pen leaves you to guess (or draw on your hand).  Being a bit of a snob, I prefer the slick black of the Le Metier product, as I find the Eyeko packaging a little childish - but that's personal preference, others might feel the opposite way!

Application 


Functionally, both eyeliners have fine felt tips which taper to a similarly narrow point, allowing you to control the thickness of the line you wish to draw.  At a Le Metier event a while ago, I was told that the design of the eyeliner was aided by a Very High End pen manufacturer.  By the same standards, one might imagine Eyeko were assisted by Bic - as both eyeliners, much like both high end and low end pens, have tips that allow you to draw a decent, precise fine line.  There's no real difference between the two in terms of weight in the hand, balancing etc (these are EYELINERS, of course, not knives).  In short, no difference between them here.

Formula & Wear


The Le Metier eyeliner dispenses a thin, deeply black ink which dries down quickly and applies smoothly.  I've found that when I apply with a flick, I can get a bit of patchiness in the thickest parts of the flick, but nothing that can't be remedied with a further dab of product.  The Eyeko product drags a tiny bit on the eyelid, but I'm being really picky in saying so - it's marginally less smooth than the Le Metier product.  I didn't notice any patchiness in my flicks with the Eyeko product either, although I'd say that the ink was a little less pigmented and opaque than the Le Metier.   Wear wise, both products were still firmly stuck to my eyelids after a full 13 hour day.  Which is rather excellent indeed.

Shade Range


Eyeko make their Graffiti liner in four shades; brown (as shown here), black, navy blue, and purple.  Le Metier de Beaute make their Precision liner in three shades; noir (shown here), bleu, and aqua.  While Le Metier obviously win points for naming things in French, which immediately make them more desirable, Eyeko ultimately wins out with their slightly wider shade range.

Value for Money


Oooh, now we're talking.  Effectively, what we have here are two products which do the same thing in a pretty similar way.  It's very difficult to choose one over the other.  However, for the price of one single Le Metier liner, you could have all four Eyeko liners.  In my mind, the difference in price is entirely down to the brand positioning here - Eyeko are cheap and cheerful, aimed at the younger market, and Le Metier are high end and luxe, aimed at those who will pay for style.

And the winner is...


For the price and performance, it has to be the Eyeko Graffiti liner.  BUT.  I'm not saying that the Le Metier is an inferior product - it very definitely isn't.  In fact, it's one of the best felt tip liners I've ever tried.  Unfortunately, the Eyeko liner is also one of the best I've ever tried - and given the massive difference in price, the Graffiti liner wins.  If you want a high performance eyeliner, buy the Eyeko.  If you want a high performance eyeliner, with a bit of that high end tingle, and you've got some cash to flash, buy the Le Metier.  There's virtually nothing but price between them.

Eyeko Graffiti Liner can be bought from the Eyeko website for £5, and in selected branches of Superdrug.  Le Metier de Beaute Precision Liquid Eyeliner can be found exclusively at Liberty, where it will cost you £20.

Which one would you be more likely to try?

If you fancy a one-to-one session with Le Metier's makeup artist Ivan Castro, and you're in London this weekend, then your luck is in. Mr Castro, who has made up the faces of the stars, will be offering sessions to the general public between 3-5 June at the Le Metier counter, Liberty.

The event will tie in with Le Metier's new Endless Summer collection. Ivan will be introducing products from the range and creating a summer look for attendees.

Sessions are £20, which is redeemable against products. There's also an opportunity to snag a free blusher/bronzer duo worth £30 when spending £50 or more (not hard at this counter, trust us).

To book, call 0207 7341234 ext 2506.

We've managed to get an appointment too, so maybe see you down there!

Sarah and I recently attended a Le Metier De Beaute event at Liberty where we were introduced to a variety of the brand's very luxe products, in particular some of the new summer colours.  I, however, was distracted as always by the lip products.  Especially this beautifully sparkly, red lipgloss, which is a very similar hue to my hair.

I swatched it on my hand and was immediately impressed by the level of pigmentation - the Lip Creme Lipgloss is more of a liquid lipstick than a traditional sheer gloss.  The texture is smooth, creamy, velvety, very moist, and not at all sticky.  There's a lot of sparkle - in this particular shade, Framboise, it's a golden microglitter, which really shows up in direct light, but is more subtle under softer lighting conditions.

I decided to get my wallet out and buy myself one.  This is despite the PR lady offering to send me one in a few days if I emailed her - I was just so excited by the colour, the pigmentation and the texture that I just HAD to have one NOW.  Naturally, as soon as it was in my hands, I applied a full lipful and then went about the rest of my evening.

Now I've had a chance to wear the product for (several) full days, I'm even more in love with it than before.  It looks absolutely beautiful applied - it's the kind of red that isn't too in-your-face for work, but can be layered up a little or paired with a smoky eye for nighttime glam.  It leaves my lips feeling moisturised, it's incredibly light to wear, and it smells pretty, like almonds.

The best thing about this gloss, though, is the wear.  The wear is so impressive that some of my friends have commented on how well my lipstick has lasted during a day out.  Most days, I apply it just as I leave the house at 7.15 in the morning, and it only begins to look a little bit ragged at about 5pm.  That's a staggering amount of longevity for a gloss.  While it does lose some of the shine throughout the day, the pigment remains, softening down into a pretty stained flush on the lips.  It also wears completely evenly - I've not had any of the ring-of-death (Sarah's phrase) of pigment around the outside of my lips with a faded middle. 

I love this product.  I really, really love this product.  So much so that I suspect I will be popping into Liberty to buy all of the other colours.  Yes, at £22 it's expensive for a lipgloss, but it's worth it for the beautiful colour, the comfortable texture, and that extraordinarily good longevity.

If you'd like to try Le Metier de Beaute Lip Creme Lipgloss for yourself, you can buy it from Liberty for £22.  The website has a few colours, but sadly not this one, which is Framboise.