Hard Candy has been on the ball with some great new product releases, such as their new eyeshadow palettes and their first brow product EVER (!!) but they've also expanded some of their permanent ranges, and the All Glossed Up Hydrating Balm Stains are one of those lines. I LOVE chubby lip pencils, okay. I own a ton, from almost every brand. I've tried the regular All Glossed Up pencils before and they're okay. They weren't horrible, they weren't the best. They were just...middle of the road. When I saw they had some new shades, at first I was going to completely pass, because these are a "metallic" finish, and normally I'm not into that. However, I'm a sucker.
According to Hard Candy's website:
Get glossy with ALL GLOSSED UP lip crayon! An amazingly shiny, cushiony lip gloss infused with the long lasting stay power of stain. Pigments and stain are bathed in a silky-smooth, non-drying silicone base that leave lips feeling soft and supple all day."
First off, these chubby lip pencils will run you about $5 at Walmart. I'm going to be talking specifically about the metallic finish pencils, not the regular line ones, which have been out for a while. I picked up two out of the four new shades.
These feel nice on the lips and when they dry down a bit, they don't leave your lips feeling drier than before, which I have experienced with lip balms many times (EOS I'm looking at YOU). I found that the lighter shades, whether in the original lineup, or in this new metallic collections, do not really stain. It's not going to be like, say, Benefit's Benetint. The color will eventually wear away.
I don't notice a scent with these, which is actually nice because the original pencils smell like melted plastic and mint. There's that definite mint underlying everything, but the overwhelmingly noticeable scent was always a super plastic-y smell that just was not appealing. So while I might wish they smelled like mint or vanilla, maybe no smell is better!
These aren't thick or waxy on the lips and they have a lightness and glossiness to them, which makes it so that they're actually not the most long lasting product out there, even though they claim to be a stain. I did notice some slight color transfer with the red one I picked up, although it stained a light, barely noticeable pink shade on me. I get about three hours of glossiness out of these, after that I feel the need the reapply.
Just like the originals, the pigmentation is a bit more sheer and light than I would expect. Both shades seem to pull a bit pink on me, which is something I've noticed happens with the non-metallic shades as well. They're probably average pigmentation for me, but a little more color accuracy would be stellar. The lilac shade in "Mystic" looks a lot more pink on my lips than it does in the tube!
By "metallic", Hard Candy means "frosty and/or glittery". If you don't like obvious glitter in your lip products, you will want to run the other way. Both shades I picked up have glitter in them, although the lighter one is more frosty than just glittery. I will be 65 and still wearing glitter, but I can see how that look is not for everyone. As far as the texture, the feel of the balm part is the same in both, but in the red "Pulse" shade, the glitter is actually gritty on the lips.
Overall, I think these are pretty much the same as the originals for me. Not horrible. Not amazing. I like the sparkly look of "Pulse" but that won't be everyone's cup of tea. If you like glittery lips, it wouldn't hurt to check these out! I will be doing single color reviews on my Tumblr and I will link in this post when I get those up!
From L-R: "Pulse" and "Mystic".
"Pulse".
"Mystic".
