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What's the most expensive cosmetic you've bought
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There's a new poll on the Beauty Brains about expensive cosmetics. If you haven't voted, go do that now. It's located on the right side column and The Beauty Brains.
Now, what is the most expensive cosmetic that you have personally bought? -
1. $32 for a Smashbox eyeliner set
2. I did however splurge on a porcelain flat iron $225 The BEST invetiment
Oh any of my Bare Escentuals -
That's hard to say. I paid $70 for a Lancome eye shadow palette once but it has 8 colors in it. I also paid $20 for a Shu Uemura eye shadow but that was just one color. If we're counting perfume, then that's the most expensive cosmetic I've ever purchased.
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I bet your perfume didn't cost $250,000! Assuming of course, that that answer isn't the fake one.
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No, I've never even come close to $250,000 for perfume but I do remember reading about what was supposed to be the most expensive perfume in the world. More than one fragrance makes that claim, by the way. Most of what you were paying for was the packaging -- diamonds on the bottle, stuff like that -- and of course the right to brag about owning the most most expensive perfume in the world. None of the articles mentioned what the notes of the perfume were or what it smelled like. None of the articles mentioned the perfumer that had created the scent or anything that would be important to someone who loved perfume, which struck me as funny. It was so obviously geared towards someone with nothing better to spend their money on.
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I admit to buying more than a few bottles of TNS Recovery Complex. The first bottle was $120, purchased through a dermatologist's office. After that, I found it online at beauty websites for less. If you don't know what it is, put this product's name in the Search box on the BB home page. Still LOVE the picture that goes with that answer!
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All I can think of is the urban legends about people being knocked out and waking up in a strange hotel room with their kidneys removed. How long before we're reading about men being picked up in bars by beautiful women, drugged and waking up only to discover that they've been, um, robbed? Quentin Tarantino could make a movie about it.
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Ya know, I was just thinking of urban legends today when I read this REAL story about people in India stealing kidneys. I couldn't believe it. Although, I suspect it was more like they were buying kidneys from poor people and not stealing them.
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I once got a bottle of Pheromone perfume as a gift. At the time it cost over $450 per ounce! I read somewhere that it was the world's most expensive perfume, but I find that hard to believe. (I like the smell, but it wasn't worth THAT much money!)
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Have you seen Dirty Pretty Things? It's about the illegal organ trade.
There are actually a lot of people who study illegal organ trade, especially in Anthropology. You're right, left brain, sometimes it's not exactly "stealing," but for some people it's hard to pass up some cash for an organ you're told you don't really need. Unfortunately, the operations are often shotty and a lot of people are left disfigured and/or debilitated and they don't get a whole lot of money. Organ stealing also exists, where you do literally get kidnapped, knocked out, and wake up without a kidney. Kidneys can be worth a lot of money. -
I have a really nice deep blood red nail polish. I got it on a sale but it normally cots 20 bucks or so. I however do not use allot on make up. I do however use allot of lotions and the like to make my nails stronger and put together all of that might cost a bit.
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Do you think that because a product is more expensive the consumer thinks that it is better quality?
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I think for the average expensive item that, yes, consumers think it's better. People buying La Mer really believe it's better. For the obscenely expensive stuff mentioned in the poll, no, it's all about snob appeal. Someone who spends $250,000 on a perfume doesn't care what it smells like. They want to be able to tell people that they own it.
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^Agree...
If toothbrush is considerd a cosmetic item, then my Sonicare toothbrush. I did get it on sale though. A set of 2 for $97 at Costco. =D
Otherwise I don't think my cosmetics cost a lot individually. But altogether, they do cost quite a lump sum of change. -
I used to keep a shopping diary on MUA. I was appalled when I realized how much money I spent on skincare and cosmetics so I stopped keeping it and went back to being blissfully ignorant of how much I spent.
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^ yea I stopped that too..
being extremely ignorant of my cosmetic spending habits keeps me out of depression.. and having a list like that where my hubby can easily see how much i spend will keep him from committing suicide (he's Mr. Frugal)..
and for the quiz.. I DON'T REMEMBER WHAT I CHOSE AS THE ANSWER!!! so I don't know whether I was right or wrong.. :( -
I never bought any cosmetic/skin care worth more than 60 bucks, the most expenisve thing I think was the bare escentuals getting started kit, but it has a lot of stuff in it
but I can buy a lot of cheap things that can add up, I think that's my problem, I fool myself thinking I do not spend that much money when in fact I do. -
Fitness Brain: Ooooooh yeah. I can nickel and dime my way through Target or Long's (local drugstore with good cosmetic selection) and feel so virtuous that i hadn't been to Sephora or Nordstrom's.
I can't quite remember how much I spent but I think after having a facial at a spa I bought some of their spa products which were, of course, overpriced. A serum for something like $70. -
I paid $85 for a trish mcevoy moisturizer that's nothing special and that I'm thinking of returning. I think my nude skincare eye cream was about that. [The latter worked on my dark circles after several weeks worth of samples given to me at Sephora, but I couldn't tell you why or whether there's any scientific basis.]
Oh, I forgot, I think my blow dryer (Solano) cost me about 95 or 100 a few years back, if that counts. But it's too bad because now I hardly blow dry. -
the nude eye cream contains only moisturizers and antioxidants (it's most certainly not worth 88 dollars) and absolutely nothing that has even anecdotal information related to dark circles. So what you experienced is likely the placebo effect (convincing yourself it MUST be working for that price, I convinced myself of that with creme de la mer).
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What's weird, though, is it worked when I got the free samples, that's WHY I bought it. I was all prepared for it not to work. Is there any chance there's some effect that's making the skin around my eyes less thin? I mean, the skin that covers that purplish muscle? But yes, I acknowledge placebo effect is possible. Okay, I'm a little defensive:)
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no that's ok to be defensive. trust me, when I first tried kerastase masquintense and loved it, i convinced myself they had some special technology and no amount of science could convince me otherwise. we're all human and I want to believe all the marketing too.
i only read the functional ingredients when i looked it up but it's possible the product contains some light reflective pigments to deflect attention from the eye area, but this is just a makeup effect. even if there was some amazing result the product could produce, you wouldn't notice it within a few days of using a sample, that would signal a real biochemical change and it would then be classified as a drug.
also keep in mind that many things can have an impact on dark circles that have nothing to do with cosmetics, your health, your allergies, how (not how long) you sleep etc etc etc
any of these could have also produced a change, if there in fact was one. -
I wondered about the light reflecting properties, but I only see the effect after several weeks of use (they gave me a very generous sample, about 6 weeks worth). Go figure. I will say I've never tried ordinary moisturizer under my eyes for as long as several weeks, so possibly that would have an effect, too (just protecting the skin there).
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Here's the thing. I used up the samples a while back--which took about 6 weeks--and I was quite impressed that the dark circles were gone--not like there weren't any discernible dark areas left, but they were the normal ones young, well-rested people have. But then there was a period where I wasn't using the product at all. I'd finished the samples and wasn't prepared to buy. Finally, I decided to splurge and buy the product (the dark circles now being back to their full darkness), and having used it again for several weeks, they're noticeably lighter again. But I couldn't tell anything much until several weeks had elapsed.
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ok, now you've piqued my interest:
Water- why it's water!
Sesamum Indicum (Sesame) Oil- emollient
Dicaprylyl Carbonate- emollient
Butyrospermum Parkii (Shea Butter)- moisturizing
Lactobacillus/Eriodictyon Californicum Ferment Extract- skin conditioning
Glycerin- humectant
Acacia Senegal Gum- thickener
Cetearyl Olivate- emulsifier
Sorbitan Olivate- emulsifier
Alcohol- well well well, this is nice and "gentle for the eye area"
Dipalmitoyl Hydroxyproline- amino acid, lubricant
Hydrolyzed Rhizobian Gum- thickener
Sodium Hyaluronate- humectant, very powerful
Ubiquinone- co-Q10, antioxidant
Pyrus Sorbus Bud Extract- this is the mountain ash they talk about as their cure for "circulation issues" ie dark circles, the only thing I found about this ingredient from googling it was 1 link to a company that sells the extract and touts it as a miracle for circulation (I remain doubtful) and dozens of links to websites that sell clarins products, a lot of which apparently contain this ingredient.
Whey Protein (Lactis Proteinum)- skin conditioning agent
Argania Spinosa Leaf Extract- skin conditioning agent
Milk Protein (Lactis Proteinum)- creates lubricity
Bifida Ferment Lysate- puffery
Fragrance- some fragrance to make your eyes smell pretty
Lactose- a sugar found in milk (you know like lactose intolerance) it would be humectant when applied to skin
Arginine- amino acid, lubricates
Sclerotium Gum- thickener
Galactaric Acid- antioxidant and chelator
Limonene- fragrance
Helianthus Annuus (Sunflower) Seed Oil- moisturizer
Rosmarinus Officinalis (Rosemary) Leaf Extract- used as an antioxidant
Ethylhexylglycerin- preservative, chance of irritancy to eyes (funny in an eye area product)
Phenoxyethanol- preservative
Sodium Dehydroacetate- preservative
Tocopheryl Acetate- vitamin e
Linalool- fragrance
so this mountain ash, pubmed says, and I quote: "No items found."
But I really want to see if this is just some new discovery that science hasn't gotten around to yet (gosh I hope it is, I wanna cure my dark circles too, I'm sure lot's of other women do!)
let's do somewhat of an experiment. I will go to work (I work at Sephora) and make myself a sample of the satin smooth body lotion and the spf 15 light lotion from the hydraquench line. One for day one for night. If my dark circles start disappearing I will personally buy the bulk stuff and add it into lotion I currently use. But I have a sneaking suspicion nothing will occur (aside from the eye area being moisturized!).
Ladies, anyone else wanna get in on the experiment and try some products that contain the extract? -
I didn't really believe the part about the mountain ash. But I wondered if something else in it helped to plump the skin so you couldn't see as much of the dark circles underneath. Another experiment I thought of doing myself was to apply the nude eye cream on one eye and not the other for 6 weeks and see if I can see a difference between the two eyes. Or you could put nude on one eye and regular old moisturizer on the other. But yeah, I'd bet on the side that mountain ash does nothing, just because it sounds like marketing fluff. Anyway, you've convinced me not to repurchase--though I can't promise not to moisturize my eye area or use antioxidants on it:) I'll be curious though if you do a controlled trial of the mountain ash.
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Got it. Oh well, it comes in a pretty package:) Does anything topical really have an impact on the type of dark circles I'm talking about (the wine colored ones, i.e., the muscle being visible)? I seem to remember reading that nothing topical really does much. Didn't stop me from buying the pretty purple nude package, though...
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Lela,
I had to find a way to locate a pub med article on mountain ash, just for the challenge. So I typed in "Rowan Berries" (synonym for mountain ash) and this is what I found. Tell me if I'm reading this right (and sorry for dominating this thread, whoops). Does this article suggest that the mountain ash plant contains antioxidants?
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/19844825
Not that this means it cures dark circles, but it might not be useless?
P.S. Please also see this one...too bad its in Russian. Man, I really know how to find those obscure articles on sorbus trees....http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/5608586
Also, this one....http://pubs.acs.org/doi/abs/10.1021/jf051697g?prevSearch=sorbus&searchHistoryKey= Although, in fairness, these references concern the content or sorbus berries, not sorbus "buds," assuming bud is meant literally...
P.P.S. I propose, once I get my dark circles looking their "nude" best, I will do my own experiement, using one eye as the control for the other. I will stop using the nude cream on one eye, and keep using it on the other eye. I wait several weeks, and with the cream thoroughly washed off of the face (to prevent any effect of reflective ingredients in the cream), I will ask several friends and family members (single-blind) to point out the eye with the darker under-eye area. I will also try to photograph them, but since they probably won't photograph well with the unsophisticated equipment I have (my cell phone), I will report the result of the poll.
Nude eyecream now has its own thread here: http://www.thebeautybrains.com/vanilla/comments.php?DiscussionID=1447 -
They gave me a couple of free samples of the shu uemura cleansing oil once (the green colored one) and it triggered my rosacea a bit. Thought I was imagining it (and I didn't want those pretty and free green vials to go to waste, so I tried again some months later--yup, my face started stinging). I must say I liked the idea of it. Did you like it?
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yes, the orange one aggravated my rosacea as well. i use the classic one: yellow and says on it 'premium', that one is gentle and is designed for sensitive skin no rubbing needed. i also noticed that my rosacea got aggravated by this oil only if i came home from a long day of work and took the tube home. tube air is very dry and hot, i always have problems with my sensitive eyes and my contacts drying out while on the tube and also my skin feels terrible.
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