Hourglass Femme Rouge Velvet Crème Lipstick in Icon

Hourglass Icon collection

I feel like all I'm doing is waxing lyrical about stuff of late, but I have a lot of great stuff to recommend.

One such (new purchase) is this lipstick from the Hourglass Icon collection (look here for more information); a collection I spotted in Liberty's, on a recent London trip.

Hourglass Femme Rouge Velvet Crème Lipstick in Icon

The collection features a red lipstick in three different finishes and a matching lip pencil.  The one I bought, the lipstick, is the Femme Rouge Velvet Crème Lipstick, a velvet-satin cream finish.  There's also a gloss (Extreme Sheen High Shine Lip Gloss) and a matte lip stain (Opaque Rouge Liquid Lipstick) - the latter is the one I'd wanted, but it was out of stock, likely I imagine as this is the one that was used in the campaign visuals on-counter.

swatched, although appearing a little lighter than it is in real life...

And wow is this stunning.  Hourglass touts this as a "universally flattering red".  Not sure whether or not that is true, but I can see how it could be.  This is a grown up red.  It's a luscious, very darkened pink-based red.  It's an Autumn red.  It's my transition-into-Autumn-red (for the record, this summer I've been wearing Make Up For Dolls Red, then NARS Mysterious Red was my late-summer red, and this one is my early-autumn-red, prior to my actual-autumn-red (review on its way!)  It's highly opaque, highly pigmented, highly moisturising on your lips.  Containing no parabens or sulfates or other nasties, and coming in a refillable cartridge (not really sure how this one goes, but how and ever), it cost me £22.  Hourglass is available in Harvey Nichols in Dublin, if anyone is tempted.  I am sorry (although my bank balance isn't) that I didn't get all of the formulas, or at the very least, the matte and the lipliner too.

on the lips...

I know that I've been wearing hardly any makeup all summer but I am categorically looking forward to a paler face and a slash of a darkened red lip in the Autumn.  Yum.