LANEIGE Two Tone Matte Lip Bars

LANEIGE's popular Two Tone Lip Bars are now available in a matte formulation!

I'm a fan of both the original satin/creme formula, as well as the more balmy and glossy Tint formula, because both boast intensely vibrant colors in a fun format for creating ombre lips. But I'm obviously excited about the launch of a matte series since this is by far my favorite texture.

The Two Tone Matte Bars come in gorgeous pink matte-chrome tubes but the lipsticks themselves have the same slanted cut as the original Two Tone Lip Bars.

LANEIGE New Two Tone Shadow and Lip Bars

I have a bit of a strange fascination with LANEIGE's popular Two Tone Lip Bars (SG$34) - those strange rectangular tubes of crayola-like dual-colored lipsticks that allow you to create ombre lips in a couple of swipes.

Nevermind that I actually never wear them out as intended, as ombre lips. I do wear ombre lips quite often actually, but I like them subtle. Meaning the two shades are no more than a few tones apart, so there is dimension but it's not "obviously two colors" on my lips. LANEIGE's lip bars pair very deep/strong and pale shades together, and if you're not careful it can look a bit crazy.

My preferred way to wear LANEIGE's Two Tone Lip Bars is to hold the two sides horizontally side-ways - as a single combined shade.

Because they're all frikkin' nice mixed together. They definitely gave thought to how the two shades in each bar combine and blend together.

The release of 4 additional new shades in 2016 is no different.

I kinda took my time to post a review because I popped one of the shades right into my purse the very day after I received them and never got down to swatching.

No 11 - Coral and yellow mixed to a warm papaya
No 12 - Red and nude mixed to a soft warm cherry
No 13 - Tangerine and beige mixed to a soft orange
No 14 - Rose and beige mixed to a rich fuchsia

As with the original 10 shades, these have a gorgeously creamy and pigmented texture and go on like butta'.

I have a bit more of a mixed response to the Two Tone Shadow Bars.
They're equally fascinating to me - I just love the bars and they seem like they would be a great idea. Two in one cream shadow sticks. But somehow, after the initial excitement, I'm not entirely sure they're the greatest idea ever.

Unlike with lipsticks, it's not actually troublesome to blend two shades together on your eyes quickly. In fact, it's very, very easy. Ironically these Two Tone Shadow Bars - pretty as they are - ended up making it very, very hard.

Firstly, the flat rectangular tips make it extremely hard to apply across the lids. In fact they are downright uncomfy if you want to get a full swipe across your eye. Good luck trying to get both shades evenly across your eye in one or two swipes. Eyes are curved, and a straight edge is just not going to be able to get two colors on quickly.

Also if you like to apply lighter shades on the inner half of your lids and darker shades in the outer corners, you can't do that with these sticks. And never mind that the socket is curved away from the lash line in the center of the eye. These sticks will give you a stripe cutting straight across your eyeball and socket. 

This somewhat reminds me of those L'oreal One Sweep Shadows from a few years back. (Read: someone who obviously doesn't apply makeup thought those palettes would be a really clever idea.)

I somehow feel if they had split the two colors into a double-ended stick with one color on each end, it would work a bit better. Putting it together ombre style is a new and fun idea - but in the end, it's just feels like something created to ride on the coat-tails of the successful ombre lip bars, and not because it's actually a great idea for the eyes.

Unlike the Lip Bars, the pigmentation is not quite strong enough for the two tones to have enough contrast against each other and if you go back and forth to get a noticeable ombre effect on the much smealler lid area, and you mostly end up with what looks like a single shade.

The colors themselves are actually pretty darned nice, if a little lacking in options - there are 4 all-warm colors currently:

No 1 - coral and peachy champagne

No 2 - rose-gold and champagne

No 3 - orange and champagne

No 4 - chocolate and champagne

There are no cooler-toned or deeper options aside from No 4, which isn't all that deep once blended on the lids. Also the formula is not designed to be budge-proof, and you're kinda supposed to apply a thin layer of translucent powder over them to set, or use them as base for other shadows. Which kinda mutes the sparkle and defeats the purpose. If you have crease-prone lids, I would skip these.

It's not easy to apply these as an eye base compared to the typical cream shadow sticks or pots because of the awkward shape and the slightly less creamy texture. And on their own they aren't as pigmented and don't set and last as well as many other shadow sticks on the market. 

 I say all this - but I remain very fascinated and I keep using them despite the slight hassle of working with that oblong top and the slightly finnicky formula. Maybe I have an undiscovered fetish for crayons.

Laneige Two Tone Lip Bars: Swatches and Best Way To Apply Them

Ombre lips have been a big thing for a few years now, especially in Asia where the preferred style of "ombre" is more of the "stained" look, where there is a deeper or more intense color on the insides of the lips and a lighter, more muted shade around the outsides. 

This is not the same as the more dramatic style of ombre lips featured more commonly on social media among Western communities, where the top and bottom lips are different colors, and fade into each other in the center. 

Most of us bring two lip products out to achieve that effect, so a few brands have more recently come up with two-toned lipsticks to help reduce clutter in makeup bags. Laneige is the latest to create a series of Two Toned Lip Bars (SGD$34), that aim to to make ombre lips a one-step one-produce process.

The bars come with 2 shades stacked diagonally, and what you're supposed to do is to apply them vertically, with the deeper shade towards the center of your lips. (Or outside if you want your lips darker outside.)

Just remember to flip the bar upside-down when moving from top lip to bottom lip, cos otherwise you end up with a very strange striped effect instead of an ombre look.

The cons?

I'm not entirely sure you can get a seamless ombre effect in a single stroke without doing some other things to tidy up. Even when applied neatly and perfectly, the difference between the two shades can still look a bit harsh. The fact that they stacked the two shades together diagonally helps a bit, but doesn't blend the shades together enough without a little extra effort in my opinion.

And several of the shades in the range have a pale shade which is so muted and nude that when applied, it can make your lips very thin and mean, like in a press visual of Song Hye Kyo which actually looked a bit scary. But almost anyone can wear ombre lips, unless your lips are really extremely thin, or very mature and lined.

I'm using duo No 4 below to illustrate. 

This is a scarlet and white/clear duo, so the shades should blend together to give you a vibrant rose. But for most people, it can look harsh and geisha-like because of the huge contrast between the red and the white. In some cases, it looks like you simply applied lipstick in the center of your lips and forgot to blend.

So this is what I do to get the effect I want with ombre lips.

1. Apply the lip bar vertically on both lips (like shown above).
2. Flip the lip bar horizonally sideways and run it across the center of each lip just where the 2 colors meet. (When you hold it sideways, you get an automatic mix of both shades, and this allows you to blend out the pale and deep shade on your lips so they fade into each other more beautifully.)
3. Run a nude lipliner lightly along the borders of your lips to add some definition to the shape if your lips look very thin wearing ombre. The liner won't look obvious but it will help to make the edges of your lips more visible. 

Voila, no more harsh line between the white and the red. And I don't look like a geisha. 

If you prefer the more dramatic contrast between the two shades, just follow Step 1.

For me, to get the softest, most kissable, fullest-lip effect, the "mixed shade", the medium color you get when you mix two colors, should take up the most space on your lips. Only the outer edges and the very center where your lips meet should be very deep and very light. And you can only achieve this effect if you apply the lip bars vertically first, then horizontally to blend the colors. 

That said, I do actually like these lip bars a lot. They take the hassle out of bringing two colors out with me, and the textures and pigmentation are amazing. Every one of these is extremely intense and creamy, and I have 10 swatches below. Some of the shades are quite hard to remove from the lips actually. The colors do cling and stain a bit, but that also means they last.

Apologies for an error in the shade numbers; the print was too tiny; No 3 here is actually No 8.

(Apologies - just checked a press document and realized that I labeled No 3 and 8 wrong. The print on the bottom of the tubes is so tiny and the manufacturers like to stamp serial codes ON TOP of them. Couldn't see through that!)

As per above, shade marked No 8 is actually No 3!

What are my faves here? Just initially, I like No 2, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10.
Yeah I'm no help narrowing things down. It's fun experimenting with these!