beautybarbaby matte attack in scandal and fuzzy sweater

Fuzzy Sweater and Scandal in their tubes!

Please note the photos in this post have been adjusted for lighting tint using photoshop to make the colors of the product appear to true life. However, the product has not been enhanced, saturated or otherwise improved in any way.

Iiiiiiiiiiii may have spent a good hour at least browsing the #liquidlipstick tag on instagram searching for the perfect liquid lipstick to throw my cash at. I wasn't quite sure what I wanted, I was mostly concerned with finding a color that spoke to me somehow. Most places had great colors that were out of stock or they only had one color I loved, and to order that by itself would've made shipping terribly unreasonable.

Then, purely by chance, I stumbled across BeautyBarBaby's swatches and was drawn in by Scandal. I also picked up Fuzzy Sweater, their "Cashmere" dupe, mostly because who doesn't need more greige, am I right?

I own so many doefoot applicators...deer must be afraid of me.

First off, let's get packaging out of the way. It's a standard tube style but not totally round, the bottom has more of a hexagon type shape with ridges, which I like because that makes these differ from my other tubes. When I'm searching in my purse or pocket for a lipstick I'm a feeler, not a looker. They're also not too fat, they easily fit in a jean pocket if needed. The labels though are...well honestly, they're atrocious. I'm not a big fan of the look of them at all, but for most indie cosmetics I kinda ignore the outer packaging or labels, because I usually expect to be paying more for the product than the packaging or branding when it comes to an indie. At the very least the paper is fairly thick and durable feeling, so it should be able to take some wear and tear bouncing around in the no man's land at the bottom of my purse. Also each tube has a sticker with a shade name on the cap, so you can tell which is which when you grab them.

The only real thing some people might take issue with is that the tube labels do not list the ingredients. They did come with a list, each tube was individually packaged in a small zip bag with a sticker on the outside listing the ingredients, so it's not a matter of neglect of some sort on the owner's part. It's just the tube labels themselves don't list the ingredients, but rather offer some directions/tips for getting a good application. Personally it doesn't bother me, as once I've chucked a MAC box I have no idea what the ingredients are either, but I know some people prefer to have them accessible, so that may be a small turn-off.

Fuzzy Sweater and Scandal swatched on bare skin in natural light.

I'm quite happy with the colors. They're very true to the swatches on the etsy page, though somehow the etsy ones appeared a bit weirdly shiny, I'm unsure why. I can't actually say if Fuzzy Sweater is a real "dupe" or not, because I do not own Cashmere, but it's very much in the pinky brown "greige" family of colors that are very on-trend right now. Scandal is a deep reddish brown with a slight bit of plum. On me it pulls a little more plum than red, but it's overall just gorgeous. I especially think it'll be perfect for fall, but I'm going to wear it all summer long anyways, because it's too pretty to just shelve it. Summer trends never appeal to me anyway, I'm not really a brights girl at heart to begin with!

Naked lips, a slight bit stained from wearing Scandal earlier today at school.
This is just to give you an idea of what we're working with here.

Lip swatch of Fuzzy Sweater in natural light.

Lip swatch of Scandal in natural light.
(Also I apologize for the seeming lighting difference between this and Fuzzy Sweater, these were taken from two different angles and the sun was being finnicky.)

As you can see thanks to my bff macro lens, these are very very dry and very very super extra matte. There is not a lick of shine about these. The formula is a soft cream texture, much like Nyx's matte lipcreams. It's also quite silky and silicone-y, it feels very smooth as it glides on. It takes a solid minute or two to dry down, but it's worth it because it's not sticky at all. However, due to the matteness and dryness, it does feel a bit crumbly at times. It doesn't actually flake off, but it feels much less flexible than other formulas can. 

It's also very dry, around probably six or so hours of wear it starts to feel like a little much. It's also not very lightweight, it's so matte it definitely has a bit of weight on the lips. It's also one you very much want to start out with a good balm and moisturized lips under. BeautyBarBaby has a recommendation for exfoliation on the label as well, which I think is a good idea if you tend to have the occasional flake, because these will stick to them and show them like crazy.

Wear-wise, it wears like a champ. Not a gold medal champ maybe, it's not gonna last forever, but probably a solid silver. Naturally it fades easiest in the center of the lips, but it'll still go through a light lunch or two or three cups of coffee and not look like a hot mess.

As a demo of this, here is what Scandal looks like after I coated it in oil to remove it, then blotted (not rubbed) it off.

Scandal after one coat of oil blotted off.

So like most lipsticks these don't hold up to oil that well (oil is makeup's kryptonite, after all) but this was enough oil to be the equivalent of a really greasy burger or salad drenched in vinaigrette. So it holds up this decently against cleansing oil, which overall I find pretty solid.

Aside from that though these aren't a huge pain to remove, a little rubbing with oil or oil-based makeup remover will do the job. I also like to keep an oily (like a highly coconut-oil based) lip balm in my bag so if I need to reapply on the go I can easily coat my lips liberally with balm, wipe the old lipstick shambles off and reapply to freshly a moisturized pout.

BeautyBarBaby Matte Attack in Scandal vs Fyrinnae Liquid Matte in Sinister.

Also just for thoroughness sake, here's a comparison of Scandal to Fyrinnae's Sinister.  Both of these companies have "Cashmere" dupes (Fuzzy Sweater from BeautyBarBaby and Kitten from Fyrinnae) so I thought a comparison might be good so people can weigh them and decide which formula might better suit their needs. 

Formula-wise they're totally apples and oranges. Fyrinnae's is more of a watery consistency, like ink, and BeautyBarBaby's is thicker, more like paint. Sinister also transfers much easier, (just touching it caused me green-stained fingers) whereas I can rub and rub the swatch of Scandal and have absolutely nothing budge. I find Fyrinnae's much more comfortable to wear, but it's not as pigmented and sometimes takes two coats. BeautyBarBaby's is more pigmented and wears much longer and stronger. Sinister also came off easily with soap and water, but Scandal and Fuzzy Sweater actually require me to break out the cleansing oil and work a little.

I don't dislike Fyrinnae's formula at all, I think if you're choosing between these it'd be a matter of what you prefer. Both have strengths and weaknesses. Some people like a matte look but can't tolerate a lot of dryness, or prefer more flexibility, so Fyrinnae would be suitable for them. Others who want the ultra-matte look and need something that lasts would be better with BeautyBarBaby.

Luv dat Fuzzy Sweater.

Overall, I'm really really pleased with these!  If you're looking for a good, ultra-matte liquid lipstick, these are worth considering. They also recently released more colors, including a red and a nude, and they also stock an incredibly deep dark purple. They also shipped very promptly to me, I think TAT was only 1-2 days. They're also reasonably priced, on the lower end of liquid lipsticks at $13.95 USD. I'm happy to say they totally delivered on being everything I expected them to be!

Also now, like usual, it is time for full face pics ganked from my insta, so you can get an idea of how this looks full-face and how it tends to photograph and appear generally:

Scandal in the classroom, yo.

Wearing Fuzzy Sweater on my lips and a fuzzy sweater I stole from my girlfriend on my torso.

Where to buy: BeautyBarBaby's etsy, $13.95 USD.