Hello there summer!
If you like summer, like me, and hate to sunbath and look patchy as hell, like me, then you probably do own a bronzer. I use bronzer all the time, I have several ones with different finishes and different tones so I can match my overall look every day. And I also think that it's one of the most transforming steps in my routine. It just gives the face a nice shape and a healthy color. I like that.
I haven't bought a new pressed bronzer in a while, and I was never too excited about bronzers in the drugstore, because the shade range was just off all the time. No matter what, I always felt like there was one "light" shade and one medium shade, both of them similar shade of orange, patchy texture...just nothing good to choose from. But we all know, that drugstore brands have been stepping up their game recently, and I was lucky enough to get myself another Maybelline product for testing. Just because I got this in exchange for reviews doesn't mean I won't be telling my true opinion on this product, so let's get to it. But still, thank you Maybelline for giving me the chance to test all these products, I am very grateful for that. Anyway, let's get to it.
So, there's quite a few products in this "City" line from Maybelline, some of them, as always, not available in my country, but hey, at least we've got something. I am legit confused when I try to find this product online. On the US website it says there are 3 shades with matte finish. On czech websites, I can see four shades, so let's go with the czech description.
There are two light shades and two medium shades. I don't really understand if they try to go with some average skin tone of middle Europe, but there's no way these are dark enough. Get inclusive yall! I feel that the deep shade would probably work for a lot of people, who tan easily. Anyway, there are quite a few unclarities in the information on all the websites. It says, that it's the City Bronzer, bronzer and contour powder. Than is says that it has a soft matte finish, and that it evens out your skin and leaves it looking sunkissed.
What doesn't fit? Well, first of all I don' really think there's a powder like this you can contour and bronze with without looking just odd. Let me explain, where is this coming from. When you contour, you pretend that there's shadow on your face, shadow is cool toned and goes under your bones to give the effect of lifting them up. Bronzing is at least a bit warmer and bronzer mostly goes on places where the sun hits the face the most. That kinda sounds like no shadows or bones are involved, huh? That's what I'm saying. By all means, you can contour with this however you want, people do it with blushes for editorial or everyday looks, I don't really care, I just feel like it may be a little confusing for some people, who are maybe starting with makeup and don't have a tester nearby to look at the product.
So, I got this off my chest, let's get to the product itself. I have the shade 200 medium cool, which is on the verge for me. I feel like if you're like me, or more pale, you can go for the light warm or light cool without much hesitation. The pigmentation is very nice but not too agressive to the point where you cannot blend the product. It feels very soft, smells sweet but not overpowering and has a sheen. This is not a matte bronzer, it has a very nice sheen to it, not glitter, just this healthy glow and sunkissed goodness. I really like bronzers with a nice sheen, in fact, most of my bronzers aren't matte at all.
The finish reminds me of my Butter Bronzer by Physician's Formula, which is one of my favourites. Here is also a swatch comparison, with this one and with other of my bronzers. I don't own many bronzers, at least not the well known ones, so I'm sorry if there's not much information in these swatches. However, if you have a similar skin tone to mine, you can tell if these could work for you, because I wear all of these.
The packaging is nice and sleek and simple. I don't mind it not having a mirror, not every product needs a mirror and it's good that you can see the pan through the lid. You can actually tell, how the color looks in the store and that's really handy.
The testers in drugstore I was were very deceiving. They were pretty damaged, when I swatched them, but the amount of glitter in these testers was a little worrying. I was almost scared to receive the bronzer. However, that was probably just caused by people digging in, in a weird way, or shedding another product on the tester, or I don't know, but the product I saw there was totally different. You know, don't always trust the tester.
The amount of product you get is 8g which is not terrible and I don't recall hitting a pan on any of my bronzers yet. However, in comparison with my other bronzers it's a fair amount. The only one which had more was the Physician's Formula Butter Bronzer, which is also higher in price. The prices differ from website to website, but in the DM drugstore it's 199 Crowns. That seems like a quite fair price, it really depends on your preferences. If you're fair, this bronzer's light version may be your best bet in the drugstore, and then it's not too much to pay for a good bronzer.
The application is very easy, if you go with the right shade it's going to be a piece of cake. As I said, mine is a bit on the verge of a little bit too dark, so I cannot just pack it on, like I usually do. But it blends very well and looks really nice and flattering. It doesn't patch, it doesn't pick up on any dryness or budge when getting oily. I am very happy with how it looks and also how it lasts. It's very important for me, that my base product stay put, because the face looks good way longer, when only one thing fails and the rest holds up. The only problem I had the first day was, that it had a lot of fallout and the pan is very shallow. So basicly, I ended up with bronzer everywhere, even when I didn't dip hard at all. It's a very soft texture, so maybe be a bit more careful. It is a pressed powder, but it's not one of those "pressed to a rock" powders. It's easy to blend though, so if you pick up too much, it shouldn't be too much of a problem to work with it. And also you can always tap the brush off and get rid of the excess.
The wear time is pretty much the same as with my other bronzers. It didn't fade or budge on any of the foundations I tried and it just looked put in place all day. However, that would probably depend not only on your foundation but also on your skin type. Sometimes when my skin gets too oily with a wrong foundation/powder combo, other base products can act weird. This bronzer in particular is not a very dry powder, which sounds weird, but you know what I mean. It's more like a silky finish than just dry powdery finish, which makes it melt into the other base products a little easier. For me, that means, that I don't need to set my cheeks with too much powder, because the bronzer glides over a thin layer of setting powder way better, than over a thick powdery base.
Final thoughts...
Would I recommend this product? Absolutely yes. If you struggle to find a good drugstore bronzer, this is probably your best bet these days. The shade range is not too great but if you're in the fair/medium category, you will probably find a good match. Overall, I can see myself reaching for it quite often this summer and I am happy it found its way into my collection.
Let me know if you've tried it and how you feel about it down below and as always, thanks for reading!
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