Skintone Cremes from Revlon and L'Oreal

Yesterday was the Memorial Day holiday here, so I took advantage of the three-day weekend to go visit family in Illinois. For those of you who have been following my Mom's struggles, I'm happy to report that she's continuing to gain strength. She's going to senior day care two days a week and though she's not a fan of all the activities they have there she has made a new friend, so that's good.

Last week when I pulled out two of the shades from Revlon's Naked Tips for the Pacific Coast collection comparisons, I was reminded that I'd never gotten around to swatching those "naked" polishes in the first place, so I gathered them all up. Top row below: Porcelain, Cool Beige, Nude Beige, and Mocha. Bottom row: Natural Pink, Sandy Nude, Natural Tan, and Rose Beige.



I lacked the patience on this particular day to do eight full hand swatches of neutral cremes, but figured that Skittle swatches would at least give a flavor of what these colors look like on a pale rosy person like myself.

Left to right below: Revlon ColorStay Porcelain (3 coats), Cool Beige (3), Nude Beige (3), and Mocha (2). Porcelain surprised me by being so sheer since all of the other polishes in this Naked Tips group are opaque; it almost gives a French mani look. I think I'd be worried about anyone who's skin matched Cool Beige, as it's very cool-toned indeed and a bit greyish. Nude Beige, which we also looked at the other day, is a tiny bit too brown to match me, though I could see wearing this if I wanted a neutral look. Mocha, like Cool Beige, looks a bit ashen to me, like someone would look if the color drained out of their face, but it's a nice taupe creme on its own merits.





The second quartet is Revlon ColorStay Natural Pink, Sandy Nude, Natural Tan, and Rose Beige. Natural Pink is way too light to match my natural pinkness. Sandy Nude we discussed the other day; it's a tad orange for me. Natural Tan has enough pink in it to coordinate nicely with my rosy-ness; perhaps this is the color I'd turn if I weren't prone to sunburn and didn't care about skin cancer. Rose Beige is the pinkest of the collection, so pink that it's about three steps away from being something I'd call mauve.





The Naked Tips are limited edition colors (not sure why since they seem like basic shades to me). I have still seen the display around recently, though, so they're not yet impossible to get.

What I haven't seen in a while is the New York Nudes collection from L'Oreal, as that came out near the end of last summer, but since they were hanging out next to the Revlon colors in my boxes I grabbed them for the Skittle swatch treatment, too. Left to right below: Park Ave Luncheon, Broadway Boogie, Till The Sun Comes Up, Hudson Sunset, Downtown Chic, Brownie Points. (I will register my objection to the use of Till instead of Til only once before moving on.)



Because my four fingers didn't go evenly into the six L'Oreal colors, the first two got two fingers each. Park Ave Luncheon is the rightmost two, with Broadway Boogie filling out the hand. Both of these are three coats each. They're more yellow-toned than any of the Revlons and therefore less compatible with my pink-toned self though I can see them looking lovely on people who are less lobstery than I.





Left to right below: Till The Sun Comes Up (3 coats), Hudson Sunset (2), Downtown Chic (2), and Brownie Points (2). The first is the shade meant for me in this collection. The others will be mannequin hands on darker complected ladies; for me, they're a great start on a brown ombre mani.





Surely it will come as no surprise that I did some comparisons. Left to right below: L'Oreal Park Ave Lunch, Revlon Porcelain, L'Oreal Broadway Boogie, Revlon Nude Beige.



Left to right below: L'Oreal Till the Sun Comes Up (3 coats), Revlon Natural Tan, L'Oreal Till the Sun Comes Up (2 coats), Revlon Rose Beige.



Based on just these two collections, it looks like I'm more squarely in Revlon's target market than L'Oreal's but I'm more inclined to want to support L'Oreal because they seem to acknowledge that people come in a wider range of nude shades.