Skincare

Sephora Play! March 2017

It feels like I JUST wrote February’s Sephora Play post but here we are already with March! I clearly measure a year in terms of monthly beauty boxes, and this year is just flying by. To be honest I have a hunch that someone at Sephora HQ made a goof and shipped out this month’s boxes too early because I received it a full week earlier than I normally do, buuuuut I’m not gonna complain ¯\_()_/¯

box n bag

So here we have the March edition of my Sephora box. I’m sure most people reading know what this is by now, but Sephora Play is a beauty subscription box that costs $10 a month and features various products. I’ve been subscribed for nine months now and you can see some of my past reviews of boxes here!

products2

In the past few months I feel Sephora has really been working to make improvements in the box through variations and themes and imo it shows. There’s definitely a difference in quality since I’ve started getting this box to where it is now. I’ve had a few blunders (January’s box was a bit of a dud for me) but I am still pretty happy with the overall quality of the box and the products I get.

card

Speaking of themes, this month’s theme is “The Gleam Team”,  which I think is just an excuse to throw a bunch of sparkly products in one box, but I’m not too upset about it.

products

Anyway. Let’s jump right in to the products:

GLAMGLOW Glowstarter Mega Illuminating Moisturizer in “Nude Glow”
$6.92 Value

First up is this beautiful pink tube from GLAMGLOW! I’ve mentioned before that I really like Glamglow (I’m not typing their name in all caps anymore because it looks like I’m yelling) masks – they’re great, albeit overpriced. This is an “illuminating moisturizer” that claims to enhance your complexion. It’s a really nice formula that’s pretty sheer and glowy – the swatches of everything will be in a pic below. It also has a really nice…floral-y scent? I find it hard to believe many people will use this as a daily moisturizer because it is so glowy, but it’s a pretty color and would make a really nice highlight.

Living Proof Full Dry Volume Blast
$15 Value

We got ourselves a hair product! This is a volumizing spray meant to add texture to otherwise flat hair. I’ve gotten a hair mask from the brand Living Proof in the past and really loved it, so I’m glad to see something from them again. It smells great, and I like trying out things like this on my hair as it can get pretty flat sometimes. This is also a really big sample size which is always nice!

Josie Maran Surreal Skin Argan Finishing Balm
$7.20 Value

I wasn’t really sure what this was when I opened it and to be honest I’m still not really sure?? According to Sephora it’s meant to be a makeup primer AND finisher, so you can put it on before or dab it on top of your makeup after applying. It seems weird to me to put it on top of your makeup though. I guess this is also supposed to have a bit of a glow to it, but it shows up as nothing on my skin. The texture is super weird – it’s almost like a moussey shaving cream, and made a weird noise when I touched it haha. I was so disappointed in the amount of product in the jar though! It looked like someone already had touched it when I opened it (it had a sealed top, so I know they didn’t…but still). It’s definitely an interesting product like nothing I’ve used before, so I’ll see if I can get a few uses out of it.

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Bobbi Brown Long-Wear Cream Shadow Stick in “Golden Pink”
$12 Value

This is a cream eyeshadow stick that’s a really pretty rose gold color. I like this, but…it reminds me an awful lot of the Laura Mercier cream shadow stick I got in the November box:

They’re like…the same. I wouldn’t mind this item at all if I hadn’t also gotten the LM stick, because it’s really pretty and sparkly, but it just seems really lazy to do such a similar product! I swatched them both below and they’re slightly different colors, but I am a bit disappointed still.

watts up

Benefit Cosmetics Watt’s Up! Cream-to-Powder Highlighter
$7.27 Value

I’ve used this highlighter before and I actually really like it! It’s a cool consistency, like the name says – it kind of starts off as a creamy stick and blends into a powder. The color is a warm champagne-y golden glow that I think would look beautiful on almost anyone. I normally do cooler highlighters for myself because I have cool undertones, but it’s always fun to go outside my comfort zone and try something different every once in a while!

chloe

Chloé Fleur de Parfum
$3.09 Value

The perfume sample this month is by Chloé. As I’ve mentioned a million times, I’m horrible at describing scents, so I’ll leave it to Sephora:

“This unique floral composition plunges into an infusion of rose petals. Fresh notes of verbena softened by freesia unveil a tender rose heart enlightened by cherry blossoms and warmed with soft woods for a soft and feminine signature.”

Now doesn’t that sound so lovely and pleasant. It does smell pretty floral-y and what I think of as a typical “girly” scent. I think it’s a really good spring scent and I’ll definitely throw it into my rotation.

glow

The bag this month is really cute – they’ve been doing different bags for the past few months and went back to their roots a bit again with a white one this month. And you’re welcome for getting this song stuck in your head for the rest of this post.

Inside as always was also a card good for 50 extra beauty insider points, and an info card with tips and tricks for each product:

open book

book

You can click on that second one to see it bigger!

Swatches

Here’s the swatches from everything this month. I also swatched that Laura Mercier stick from November to see how it compared to the Bobbi Brown one from this month:

swatches

You can see they’re not EXACTLY the same, but they’re close enough that we really don’t need both.

Value & Verdict

The value of the past few boxes hasn’t been great, but I’m happy to say that it’s much higher this month at $51.48! That’s actually really great considering I only pay $10 for this box. I’m overall happy with this box – I think I’d give it a 7/10. I like the moisturizer, hair spray, highlighter and shadow stick, though I’m disappointed in how similar the shadow stick is to a previous product. I also am displeased in the small sample size of the Josie Maran balm though I’ll still use it. I’m indifferent to the perfume – I’ll need to use that one for a while to see how I feel!

That’s all for March’s Sephora Play! If you want to subscribe, see if you can get on the waitlist here and until then, check out some of my previous reviews. Hope you enjoyed this post and thanks for reading!

<3 Kaela

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