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Ulta Beauty Weightless Water Lip Stains are sheer, buildable lip colors with a lightweight feel that come in four easy-to-wear shades. They have a super thin feel to them compared to something like a gloss or balm and they dry down to an almost matte finish. Upon first swipe, the color goes on lighter than what you see on the top of the packaging but you can build up the intensity with a few layers. They have a light fruity scent but have a somewhat bitter taste. The taste isn’t that strong and it goes away after blotting. These are $10 each and can be purchased from Ulta.
I’m not a huge lip product user in general and lip stains are not something I have a whole lot of experience with. The last ones I tried were from Fenty and before that I dabbled with Benetint a few times. But, I’ll try to give you whatever useful info I can. My preference in lip products are things that require little effort and upkeep and don’t look super bold.
I wear tested all of these and got better results with some than others. The way I wore them most of the time was blotted and with balm or gloss over top. Very Berry was the one that faded most obviously and in a somewhat uneven way, holding on longest to the parts of my lips that were driest and fading sooner on the inner parts and around the edges. Mango Dreams did something similar but it wasn’t as obvious being a bit lighter of a shade on me. Fading from both of these shades started showing by lunchtime. The other two shades lasted much better on me looking nearly the same late in the afternoon as they did early in the morning. I did not experience color transfer from any of them since it was the skin that was stained and the color did not leach into the balm or gloss so, even if I touched that, it still did not transfer.
For application and longevity, I realized some things after using these all week long. It helps to apply a lip balm way before I apply these – when I’m doing my foundation and eye makeup. If I let that hydrate my lips for a while, then wipe off the excess before applying the stain, I get a much more even application. Otherwise, the deeper red shades clung to areas of dryness and darkened on those areas as the stain dried down. Prepping the lips this way and then applying balm or gloss over top seemed to also improve longevity. I got less uneven fading throughout the day and my lips didn’t get dry or chapped even after many hours. Another thing is, these are way more customizable than I thought. You can apply the smallest amount and get a little hint of color if you want. The color you see on the packaging is more of what you get if you build it up.
Below, I show you photos of all the shades applied 4 different ways. The first photos are just the stain applied to bare lips (no balm underneath) and with some of the shades, I applied a couple of layers if the first didn’t go on evenly. Next, I blotted some of the stain off. And for the last two pictures I applied some clear lip balm and lip gloss over top of the blotted stain.
Very Berry
Very Berry went on the most unevenly out of all of them but I only tried using this on lips that were not well prepped. Will have to try again on another day.
Mango Dreams
Mango Dreams ended up looking way less bright, orange and intense compared to Very Berry. It went on more sheer at first and looked much more “natural” on my skin tone than I expected once I blotted and used some balm over it.
Pink Popsicle
Pink Popsicle was the shade I most dreaded using. I really don’t like bright bubblegum pink lip colors but it turns out that this is my favorite shade out of the four. This one is very sheer at first and is cooler toned than I expected. It even builds up nicely, looking more like a berry pink than a barbie pink at full intensity.
Cherry Pie
Cherry Pie is another I ended up like more than I thought I would because of how it looks when applied lightly. It is a warm red and when it is sheer, it looks pretty close to my natural lip color, but just a warmer version of that.