Collection's Illuminating Touch Range - A Superdrug Freebie

Collection's 'Illuminating Touch' Concealer has been around a fair while now. I can recall it being talked about - mainly due to its similarities in appearance to the YSL Touche Éclat - and used in tutorials many years ago, when I first discovered the online beauty community. I personally have only ever tried their infamous 'Lasting Perfection' one, that's more of a 'concealer' concealer and will forever be considered one of my favourite products. However, the 'Illuminating Touch' one has always intrigued me and I've lost count of the amount of times I've been in Boots or Superdrug and have come that close to picking one up to try out. And when I heard on the blogging grapevine how Collection were due to finally release an accompanying foundation and cream highlighter to expand the range, I was even more tempted to go and make a purchase. Then, I saw something on Instagram...

Superdrug's Insta was running a competition to win all of the products in the 'Illuminating Touch' range - a foundation in a shade of your choosing, the highlighter stick and concealer pen - all you had to do was 'like' the photo and they'd pick out 10 winners. Naturally, I did so and didn't think much more of it, as I'm not the type of person who often wins things and so wasn't expecting to hear anything more. However, a couple of days later a message pinged into my Instagram inbox, saying I was one of the lucky winners! I couldn't believe it and thought they'd made a mistake but it was infact true. It was all very strange how I was so close to making an order, only to go and win everything I was going to buy a few days later. I gave all the necessary details so Superdrug could kindly send my freebies over and a few days ago they arrived so I figured - why not share them with you lovely lot, eh?

 

When I opened up the parcel I was only expecting one of each item (as I'd specified which shade of the foundation I wanted), but in fact they very kindly sent a foundation, highlighter and three of the concealers - one in each shade! This was a very nice surprise indeed and of course enables me to try each colour out to see which one matches me best, but also gives a few other options depending on how highlighted I want to be and the two which may not be quite right now may just come in handy in the warmer months when I have slightly more colour to my face. So all in all I was sent the Illuminating Touch Foundation in '2 Ivory', the Illuminating Touch Concealer in '1 Naked', '2 Natural' and '3 Glow' and the Speedy Highlighter in '1 Pearl Sheen'. The Illuminating Touch Foundation (£5.99) claims to be a 'luxurious silky foundation that gives medium to full coverage for a flawless, radiant finish that lasts' and 'provides a radiance-boosting, hydrating base'. Having given this a few goes since receiving it, I can safely say I love it. As the name would correctly imply, it gives a really lovely radiant, glowy look to the skin, but with no visible shimmery or glittery particles in sight. The foundation itself is quite thin in texture, so applies very easily and doesn't feel heavy or cakey - and while it certainly isn't full coverage, it does provide a good base for other makeup to go on top of. It stays exactly how you apply it all day long and it's free of the funky smell that some foundations on the cheaper end of the price scale can often possess. All in all, for under £6.00 - it's very impressive indeed.

 

Moving onto the Illuminating Touch Concealer (£4.99), this claims to 'contain light diffusing particles to naturally illuminate under eye area and conceal dark circles'. After some swatching on the back of my hand, I decided to opt for '1 Natural' as being in the midst of Autumn right now, my skin has gone even paler than usual and so this shade seemed to match up to that fairly well, if not a little lighter (which of course is what you're typically after when using products to brighten and lift that under-eye area). While on the packaging, it suggests this can be used as an all-over concealer, I felt it wouldn't be best utilised that way (both due to its 'illuminating' properties and the fact these kind of products tend to be a little on the sheer side) so instead have been employing this solely for under my peepers and I have to say it's been working a treat. On the first day of trying this out I used it alone, before layering on my standard concealer on top as while it had brightened my bags, it hadn't so much covered them up. The next day I'd learnt my lesson and reversed the procedure - applying my standard concealer of choice and then applying some of the 'Illuminating Touch' on top in a classic 'V' shape under my eyes as a finishing step to give my face some light and dimension. I much preferred the effect of this method and so I'd recommend this is probably the best way to use something like this so you get the full effects of using the highlighting pen, but still the coverage you need at the same time.

 

Finally, comes the Speedy Highlighter (£3.99). This claims to 'add a healthy dewy radiance to the skin' with a 'easy-to-use, blendable formula' that's 'highly pigmented and buildable'. Now, this little beauty really was the revelation of the bunch. The other two I had quite high hopes for and could envisage myself enjoying them but this highlighter stick I wasn't so sure as two just how well I'd get along with it. Typically, I tend to find some cream products in stick-form can be a little dry for my liking and so become difficult to work with and can generally be a right pain to apply and blend out easily. However, this is completely the opposite. This does apply onto the skin in quite a 'dry' way and doesn't at first seem that creamy - and you'd be forgiven for thinking that there'd be no way it'd be moving anywhere - but in fact it blends in like an absolute dream. Simply dab your fingers over where you've applied it and in matter of seconds it's seamlessly meshed in with the rest of your base makeup. It's doesn't disrupt any other products you have on your face already - another problem I tend to find with cream products - and the colour is spot-on. Unlike the powder highlight in their Contour Kit that I recently tried out which although pretty, is a tad 'icy' in colouring, this highlighter stick manages to sit a little more on the 'golden' side of things and once on the skin almost gives a similar effect to the Mary-Lou Manizer which I LOVE (but in cream form, in a much more controlled way and at a cheaper price too). Need a new highlight to add to your collection, or struggling to find one that really does the job just like that? Look this way. In fact - scrap that - take a gander at everything mentioned in this post the next time you're near a Boots or Superdrug. It really is all kinds of awesome...