Thanks to Sephora this year I have had a chance to try two different formulas of NARS Lip pencil. Cruella is a Velvet Matte and Rikugien (a garden in Tokyo) is a satin.
I received the two pencils as a ‘birthday gift’ from Sephora having made an order in September. to be clear, you had to make an order to receive your gift. Sephora dont just send it to you during your birthday month!!! At one point eight grams these are slightly smaller than full sized which are two grams so there has been plenty of product for me to play with. The pencils are sharpened with a jumbo sized sharpener so you can have the nib very sharp if you are going to use the product to line your lips and rounder if you are filling in the lips.
Rikugien
This is described by NARS as a rose pink but it is quite dusky pink on my pigmented lips. The texture is very smooth and glides across the skin. You will need to ensure that your lips are fully exfoliated as it will show every imperfection. This shade works as a nude on me if I apply it lightly and blot it. If I want a greater show of colour I will need a brown lip liner to make the shade wearable.
Cruella
The Velvelt Matte formula is my preference of the two. It retains the easy glide and easy wear of the Satin formula but, it is opaqe in one swipe. For me with two different colour lips that is perfect for a matte pencil especially in red as it means that I can wear this bright vibrant true red shade without a lipstick on top.
Long wearing and very easy to apply Cruella is beautiful and a great alternative to Ruby Woo from MAC if you find that formula too drying. This shade looks amazing on very pale and deep skintones – it is a gorgeous colour. I really wish that NARS would bring out a purple in this shade. A true purple. In fact, the lack of purplelispstick from this brand is both surprising and disturbing to me. How can a brand with such great pigmentation not have a true purple lipstick? but I digress.
If you are a gloss girl, and I am not hugely, the satin formula will be right up your street. If you are looking for an alternative to a matte liquid lipstick, this is a long lasting but much more wearable formula.