Face of Australia Mineral Therapy Bronzing Pearls

You know how sometimes you get overwhelmed with products and end up shoving something away only to discover it about a year later? Yep, that is what happened with the Face of Australia Mineral Therapy Bronzing Pearls I was given.

Bronzer isn't really a product I tend to reach for regularly and I certainly feel more confident in applying blush and highlighter. I do however give it a shot every now and again and I think that when applied well it can look absolutely stunning and make the biggest difference!

This bronzer from Face of Australia comes in the form of 'bronzing pearls' certainly unlike the bronzers I am used to.

Formulated with natural minerals, bring a fresh glow of warmth to your skin with the Face of Australia Bronzing pearls. Oil free, fragrance free, talc free, no animal testing. 

For a start, I am not really a fan of the packaging. It is so very chunky and as always, the brush supplied is not particularly effective. I would much prefer a more compact product without the brush included (especially at a cheaper price, although this is hardly what I would call expensive).

The pearls themselves are incredibly sparkly. Very pretty looking things but they are as glittery and shimmery as they could possibly get, and to me that is quite a strange property for a bronzer. I really didn't know how to wear this because in my experience, matte bronzer is the way to go (especially for contouring) and even slightly shimmery bronzers can be applied tastefully but this was just so full on that I hadn't a clue where you would put it!

Despite this, I still attempted to use these as I would a normal bronzer, sweeping it gently across the places I felt could do with a bit of colour and brightening.

The results were okay, but I really felt a bit strange with the level of shimmer present. Everyone likes glowing skin but there is a fine line between glowing and garish and I think this product just crosses it. It was passable when the lighting I was in wasn't terribly bright but when it caught the sunlight I just looked stupid.

But I wasn't ready to give up yet. Surely I could use this product somehow. So I decided to use it as eyeshadow.

Everyone loves a shimmery brown/bronze eyeshadow shade! After having tried it as an eyeshadow I can safely say that is how I much prefer to use it and that though it may be a bit of a failure as a bronzer in my opinion, it kind of works as an eyeshadow.

There were two ways I discovered that this could be applied - with a brush as normal or directly rubbing the pearl onto the skin for a more intense shade. Both ways worked well however it was difficult to apply the shade neatly when holding the pearl and rubbing it on the skin (and it made a little bit of a mess too).

I found that on the eyes this wasn't too long lasting - certainly nothing like any of my other eyeshadows. My main problem, however, was that the glitter seemed to fall underneath the eyes (and there is nothing pretty about that!). I guess this is to be expected as this isn't designed to be an eyeshadow, but it's a little frustrating because it is just so useless as a bronzer.

All in all, this was a pretty disappointing product. I am especially saddened by it because I absolutely love Face of Australia as a brand and usually they can do no wrong! This costs $14.95.

Unfortunately I have to give this 3/10.