Fall 2009: IPSA Eye Color Duo 3 & Lip Gloss Duo 2

Yea, you´re reading this correctly: Fall 2009 =P I didn´t review these 2 items from IPSA earlier as I scored them on eBay just a couple of months ago (and then forgot to review). My review is probably not really useful anymore but might be you still find these goodies pop up on eBay from time to time =)


IPSA is a so-so brand for me. They make some excellent items (in particular their lipliners and lipsticks/glosses) but their eyeshadows are often a let-down.
I didn´t order anything from the fall collection last year as I found them too pricey but I scored both goodies on eBay for less than US$20 shipped so I couldn´t resist.

The Eye Color Duo is actually really tiny as you can imagine from the pic where I placed it beside the gloss!


Last year´s fall theme was "Urban Safari" (as I read here on my favorite blog Rouge Deluxe) and the case comes with a metallic pink and black zebra stripe design. The case itself feels a little flimsy and is made of plastic.
There is no mirror and only 1 sponge-tip applicator in the compact which is a bit weird for an expensive brand like IPSA. The overall quality of the compact (and shadows as I will write about below) reminds me more of a drugstore brand like say Shiseido Selfit. After all the retail price was around 3000 Yen which transfers to over US$30 for the 1.2g in the compact (I can get a pretty Kanebo Coffret D´or quad for just a few bucks more on Adambeauty!)


The color duo #3 Desert Walker (I know the box shows #2 as the seller accidentally put the compact in the wrong box..) is actually very pretty and I was lucky that the seller listed this along with the gloss as the other 3 colors didn´t appeal to me at all.
The color is a shimmery gray with colorful micro-glitters and a satin peach shade.
Unfortunately the texture of the duo totally sucks. The shadows are crumbly (creating a mess) and dry and have a very dull and uneven finish. Very weird in all honesty. Brands like Fasio, Kate and Integrate have much smoother and better textures and cost about half.


I am very glad I didn´t pay retail for this. In all honesty I didn´t need this duo at all =X
On the swatch you can see the strange uneven finish of the gray color. Both shades are on the sheer side, too.

The Lip Gloss Duo however somewhat makes up for the weak performance of the shadow duo. I had a sort of flashback when I saw the gloss! It´s the exact same thing as the PN glosses (check my MUA review here!) from like 5 years ago. This makes me realize once again that Shiseido owns IPSA!


PN was the predecessor of Maquillage and had really nice products (though Maquillage continues the quality well and improved many things like the eyeshadows!)
The texture is the same as the PN glosses (rather thick, sticky, long-lasting and glossy). The color is sheer but noticable.
There is a layer of more pigmented gloss on the bottom of the lipgloss bottle and a translucent gloss on top. When you pull out the clear flexible spatula applicator both glosses mix a little.


The gloss is really nice, I like it a lot! The color is #2 Twilight Beige which is a nice peachy beige shade.
This retailed for about 2700 Yen (a bit below US$30) and contains 8g.