Review: Guerlain Orchidée Impériale Eye & Lip Treatment

Let me preempt this review by letting you know that I did NOT win the lottery. No, I did not purchase this $198 eye cream. I was lucky enough to receive 2 generous mini tube samples of the eye cream from a lovely employee at one of my favorite Shoppes Drug Marts. By all calculations, the samples were worth an astounding $50+ (holy cow!).

According to the good folks over at Guerlain, the Orchid has amazing regenerative and long-lasting capabilities, so they decided to spend a good decade researching this phenomenon. They narrowed 30,000 species of Orchids down to THREE rare species of Orchid that most exemplified this longevity best. 

Guerlain has dedicated an astounding amount of time and money into this venture, even building a dedicated "farm" in China where they grow these very rare Orchids. Additionally, they have a re-habitation program where they re-introduce some of these rare Orchids back into the wild where they are a rare and endangered species. 

So what does this all mean for your skin? Because of the Orchid's long life span, this cream is meant to bring youth back to your skin. While I don't understand the science of it all (the use of Orchid extract is pretty much exclusive to Guerlain), I do know this: this eye cream is amazing!!!

I have been using this cream for about 3 weeks now, every morning and night. The first thing I noticed was how incredibly light it was. It is thick in appearance and texture, but your skin will drink it up entirely in MINUTES! I reapplied a thin second coat almost every time, as I am a fan of thick and almost-greasy eye creams! :) 

My eye area looks taut and bright. My fine lines are non-existent! And best of all, my concealer does not crease, pile, rub off, or move in any way-shape-or-form! I didn't even have to use my beloved Smashbox Targeted Fine Line & Pore primer!


What am I going to do?!? How will I afford to buy this amazing eye cream?!? LOL! I shall find a way...this stuff is amazing! In the meantime I will see if I can find another sample of it to tide me over until I save up enough pennies to afford this baby. ;)

REVIEW: Neostrata Intense Eye Contour All-In-One Serum

I am in love!!!

I used to be scared of Retinol, and products containing Retinol, because nobody ever told me you have to start slowly with it. The first few times I used retinol-based products, I went full-steam ahead and applied it twice a day for 2 or 3 days until my face and eyes were so dry I thought I was going to die. Okay, not die. But you know what I mean....don't you?

The extremely sensitive may never be able to use Retinol, but truthfully, very few of us fall into that category. The extremely sensitive, if feeling adventurous, should probably use a FACIAL retinol product first to determine tolerance before moving onto an EYE AREA retinol product.

To me, that's just common sense... but in case you've misplaced yours, I thought I'd just let ya know. No offense. We're still buds, right?

Seeing that I now knew to start slowly, when I first got my little bottle of NeoStrata Intense Eye Contour All-in-One Serum, I started using it every other night for about 2 weeks. Then for the next week or 10 days I used it day and night, but still only every other day. Now I'm up to twice a day, every day. I still experience a little bit of dryness, but that's probably because I just started using it twice a day every day. At night, I apply straight Shea Butter overtop of the serum, and during the day I apply my Juice Beauty organic eye cream overtop, and sometimes Clinique's All About Eyes because it's so hydrating.

I've heard some people talk about how it's fine by itself, but I definitely recommend using a rich eye cream overtop. After all, having lots of moisture in your skin is the best way to slow down the aging process (oily skinned people age far slower than dry skinned folks).

I have to say, my eye area looks amazing! The dark circles seem to have faded a little bit and the tiny fine lines have disappeared ENTIRELY. No eye cream has ever been able to do this. I've had rich eye creams soften the lines...but no cream has ever ENTIRELY ELIMINATED MY LITTLE WRINKLES.

For someone who has more advanced aging around the eye area, NeoStrata's Intense Eye Contour All-in-One Serum will definitely help, but I don't know if it will remove ALL your lines. Either way, it is DEFINITELY worth a try because of the wonderful active ingredients in it.

The active ingredients in this light serum are 0.05% Retinol and 3% Matrixyl, a powerful pentapeptide that encourages collagen production. It also has an ingredient called "Eye Regener" at 2%, which reduces puffiness and increases firmness and tone. NeoStrata has also added a 7.5% blend of MDI complex, SabiWhite, and Cytobiol Lumin-Eye which all help to reduce dark circles.

I know I absolutely adore this product and have permanently added it to my twice-daily routine. Once this bottle runs out, I will DEFINITELY pick up a second!

A half-ounce air-tight pump is $45 and well worth it!

REVIEW: Vichy CxP Eye Cream

I. Love. This. Cream!!!

If you like rich and creamy eye creams... this one is for you! It's not greasy at all, it absorbs really well and is great for under make-up - if you wear eye make-up.

This is an anti-aging eye cream. The C in the CxP stands for Vitamin C. And the xP stands for 2 peptides. Vitamin C is an amazing ingredient that should be mandatory in all skincare IMHO.

A little skincare lesson:

Vitamin C brightens your skin. It evens out your skintone. It helps to fade and soften age spots, liver spots, or any type of discolouration. It won't bleach your skin, but it'll brighten it and it'll help fade dark spots. Vitamin C encourages collagen production and it firms up your skin's elastin. This keeps your skin gorgeous and firm. Vitamin C is also an incredibly potent anti-free-radical. It fights the things that age you: pollution, smoke, the sun, etc.

EVERYONE should have some skincare products that have Vitamin C in them.

Vitamin C is fairly unstable, which is why you should buy one in an airless pump. And the higher the concentration, the more brightening and anti-aging benefits you'll receive (NeoStrata makes the most potent Vitamin C product out there - their Intense Skin Brightener with 20% L-Ascorbic Acid...but that's a whole 'nother post!).

Ok...end of lesson.

The folks over at Vichy aren't using L-Ascorbic Acid, but instead a combination of "glucosylated and phorphorylated Vitamin C" (I have no idea what that means). I'm assuming this is gentler for the eye area. They don't mention what the percentage of Vitamin C is in the product. But the cream also has a bit of caffeine in it to help eliminate puffy eyes and the peptides encourage collagen production to ease away wrinkles.

I have to tell you... I'm on my second tube of this stuff. And with all the products, new and old, that I get to try on a very regular basis, I have to tell ya - this is good stuff!

I havent' noticed a reduction of dark circles (I'm beginning to think they're permanent) but I have to tell you, my fine lines have been very much softened.

At $39 per tube (that lasts for-bloody-ever) this is not an expensive eye cream at all. I highly recommend this stuff to anyone who likes a creamy eye cream and wants their eye cream to address wrinkles and puffiness.