This months Play! by Sephora was my favorite one in a while. I am obsessed with the bag it came in this time (LOOK AT IT!!!):
It’s nylon, so it’d be great to travel with (hello, clear plastic TSA-approved bag) and is easy to clean if any product spills inside it. The bags are usually great, but this one is totally different than the drawstring cotton bags they normally include.
Loooooooove iiiiiiiit…..
Price: $10/month
Box Type: Beauty products, 5-6 deluxe samples
Why you’ll love it: High end brands (no drugstore products here), new and interesting products in deluxe sample sizes, plus a cute little bag each month! It’s a great mix of makeup and skincare.
How to Subscribe: Click here!
Alright, let’s see what came inside the awesome bag…
treStique Highlight & Perfect Multipurpose Stick ($34 for full size) – I am not a regular highlighter by any means (though Lauren is a highlighting master), but this one is SO PRETTY. It’s a shimmery champagne pink, and brings a nice glow to your face. I like highlighters that are in stick-form, the powdery ones end up falling out all over my face and making me look like a Twilight vampire. The stick formula is way easier for this novice to control. This is also a really huge sample, so I would expect this to last me a very, very long time.
Sunday Riley Ceramic Slip Clay Cleanser ($45 for full-size) – The samples this month are enormous. This one is roughly 25% of the full-sized version! Sunday Riley is a solid brand, I’ve loved several products that I’ve tried from their skincare lineup. This clay cleanser is meant to minimize pores and help control oil with Morrocan rhassoul clay, so it might be too drying for my skin but I love seeing expensive brands like this in sample boxes! (Lauren’s Note: I thought this stuff smelled AWFUL. To the point where I don’t think I will ever use it again! Which is a bummer because I totally love receiving a Sunday Riley product in my box but sadly, I just cannot deal with that smell!)
Christophe Robin Cleansing Purifying Srub with Sea Salt ($53 for full size) – Again, this is a ginormous sample. It’s also a really interesting product – a scalp scrub! More specifically, it’s a purifying, moisturizing, and soothing scrub that is meant to remove product buildup and rebalance sensitive/oily scalps. I have never heard of a scalp scrub before, so I’m intrigued.
NUDESTIX Magnetic Matte Lip Color in Boho ($24 for full-size) – You’re probably getting tired of hearing this, but this is one giant sample. Described as a multitasking, three-in-one, lip stain, lip color, and lip liner that glides on high performance, intense color, this lip color seems to have a lot of promise. The color is on the browner side, but it surprisingly looks really nice? I’m confused by how much I like the color, it’s not one I would normally go for at all. (Lauren’s Note: I’m so excited that Jill likes a dark color! This color did NOT work for me… but I am also saving it in case I get invited to a 90’s party. I wish it looked like a normal, vampy color on me, which was my hope since I love NUDESTIX. I can’t wait for Jill to start wearing deeper colors! Welcome to the dark side… literally.)
Grande Lips Hydrating Lip Plumper ($27 for full size) – The last time I was sent a lip plumper I thought it was a regular lip gloss and was mildly alarmed when my lips started burning and poofed up almost immediately. I am grateful for the packaging on this, because there’s no mistaking that it’s a lip plumper and not just a clear gloss. Thanks, Grande Lips. Infused with “Volulip” (whatever that is) and hyaluronic acid, this plumper boasts that it improved overall lip hydration, volume, softness, and firmness after using it twice daily for a month. Iiiiiiiinteresting.
Maison Margiela REPLICA eau de toilette in Beach Walk ($28-$126 in full size) – We’ve gotten other REPLICA scent samples in the past and while I’ve liked most of them, this one is nice for summer. It is weirdly beachy and summery, and has notes of Bergamot, Pink Pepper, Lemon, Ylang Ylang, Coconut Milk, Heliotrope, Musk, Cedarwood, Benzoin (I won’t even pretend to know what a couple of those mean). I find perfume descriptions pretty entertaining, so I have to include this one for your reading pleasure:
“Close your eyes and let the fragrance transport you to the memory of an afternoon stroll along the ocean. Your feet sink into the wet sand as waves brush against your skin. The sun sinks gently through the crystal sky, its warmth balanced by a soft breeze with the subtle tangy scent of water. Beach Walk evokes hints of ocean spray, and captures the carefree bliss of a summer day.”
Sure. If you say so. To me it just smells fresh and clean, but that’s because I don’t have the imagination and whimsy of a perfume description writer.
Final Rating: A+
I loved this box! So many new products to try, and the sample sizes were huge. Sephora was late to the beauty box game, but (surprising no one) they are totally killing it now.
Want to try Play! by Sephora? Click here!
xo,
Jill
I bought this box, all opinions are my own.
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Jill
A foodie, travel junkie, and reality TV aficionado who derives an unnerving amount of joy from dressing her giant dog in ridiculous costumes.