Eye Kohl cream vs powder

This post is a long time coming. I'll be honest and say the reason it took so long to get it up was a mix of being busy/doing research, but most of all it took forever because I had to buy a L'oreal Eye Kohl from eBay since it's not available in stores anymore and the seller took their sweet time shipping.

Anyway, the good news is I have a review now and here it is!

I bought an eye kohl stick from Sephora, in black to review it against the above mentioned L'oreal Hip eye kohl.

Sephore Eye Kohl

L'oreal Hip Eye Kohl

Left: Sephora Right: L'oreal

After washing/rubbing off.  Left: Sephora Right: L'oreal

Sephora Eye Kohl

L'oreal Eye Kohl

 So, after seeing pictures here are the basics. The Sephora kohl was a stick kohl and was a very creamy formula. It applied easily but very patchy and was not as dark as the L'oreal Kohl. It didn't seem as dramatic but was very easy to build (building was definitely in order) and use, no watery eye mess. However, it wouldn't transfer from my bottom water line to the top, I had to line the top separately, that was giant pain.

The L'oreal kohl was in powder form. When I applied it I got powder in my eye, so unfortunately, I didn't really enjoy that. All kinds of not okay. It didn't get all over my face though, I think I may have just done it at the wrong angle. After that initial shock and strategic angling the powder applied darker and more evenly to my waterline than the Sephora stick. It also transfered better from my bottom to my top lash line, which meant I didn't have to line more than once. One swipe got a dramatic effect and it transfered from top to bottom easily.

One thing about kohl is that it doesn't particularly last very long, it smudges and runs throughout the day. In order to see which one would last the longest I showered with it, while they both ran and smudged horribly the Sephora ran less. However, it was gone by the end of my shower. Once I got out the L'oreal eye kohl was just as dark on my water line as before my shower, it was just a runny mess. So, food for thought!

As for other uses for eye kohl it seems like people can use it as mascara. You'd need to use powder kohl and you can dip a spoolie in water then into the powder to darken your lashes, kohl wont do much but add color. However, like I mentioned above, it's not very run-proof so you'd probably just get raccoon eyes after an hour, so I wouldn't recommend it.

In the end my recommendation would be a powder version. I know that L'oreal doesn't sell theirs anymore, but if you can find one it'd the best option in my book. Once I learned how not to get powder in my eye it turned out to be the better option!