"Achieve the royal standard of glow with BECCA’s new and limited edition shade of Shimmering Skin Perfector Pressed Highlighter, embossed with a suitably opulent crown for every queen of cosmetics. In an irresistible shade of warm golden honey infused with pink pearl, this creamy powder luminiser is like 'crushed gemstones in a compact' – ultra-fine and virtually weightless, to blur imperfections and grant skin an enviable, lit-from-within glow. Use to highlight the high points of your face, or as a ‘setting’ powder – dusted lightly on top of foundation to fix things in place and grant your complexion a subtle, ‘your skin but better’ effect"Sold. Take my money.
I'd been interested in finally trying the famous Jaclyn Hill created shade Champagne Pop since Jaclyn has a similar skintone to me, so that must be a shade that'll work well for me. However BECCA's above product description for their new limited edition highlight shade made me completely forget about it and add Royal Glow to my shopping cart instead...
The two John Lewis stores [BECCA said that it was a product exclusive to them] that are the nearest to me turned out not to stock the brand, so I had to go back home and order it online without getting to see it in person and now that I've opened it I can't return it, otherwise I'd have sent it right back...
On me the shade gives the appearance of a gentle champagne glow, but there are no hints of pink and nowhere near as strong a glow as the official photos lead me to believe. Seriously - is it my eyes at fault here? Does everyone else see some pink tinge here?
I read up on Royal Glow before ordering it and bloggers who went to the launch party for it said that it is a universal shade that looks great on everyone, so I felt safe enough to order it without swatching it in real-life. Verdict? It's not quite a universal shade; it is almost too dark for my fair warmer-side-of-neutral skintone now, so in autumn/winter it's not going to be something that I can wear. I've seen photos of it on light, medium & deep skintones and it looks awesome, but us fairer girls have slid under the radar.
I think Royal Glow is pretty if I'm light-handed with it, so that the base doesn't leave behind a visible strip of colour on my fair skin. However I'm overall underwhelmed with it; where's the promised pink?! Plus; I won't be able to wear it for a huge chunk of the year, which is a huge waste considering the cost. At the end of the day there are more readily available companies in the UK like Sleek and Revolution, that do similar products that work better and cost much less.
I don't dislike the product formula in theory, as the highlight does wears well and lasts for the whole day. It doesn't irritate my skin and it doesn't highlight my pores too much. So if you have a light to deep skintone, like the shade you see on this page and want to treat yourself to a highlight higher than drugstore price, then Royal Glow could work nicely for you...