Product Review: Bobbi Brown Creamy Concealer Kit

I'm a big fan of the products and ethos of Bobbi Brown Cosmetics, and I have been looking for a good under eye concealer for YEARS. Like many darker skinned people (and PhD students...) dark circles are inevitable on me, and having tried many many different products I thought it was time to give the Bobbi Brown Creamy Concealer Kit a go. I didn't actually buy this, but signed up for a free make up session at the Bobbi Brown counter in John Lewis. I really love this system of theirs, and they do quite extensive make up consultations for free which I support because I hate buying products untested. 

Anyway, I sat there while the nice counter lady smoothed and patted this in for a while. It's an extensive four-step process; she started with an under eye hydrator, then applied the corrector to 'brighten and disguise discolouration'. This is followed by the concealer to 'lift and brighten' and then she set it with a little powder. It looked a bit heavy when she was done, but did a fairly good job of concealing dark circles. I decided to wait and see how it wore for the rest of the day before buying anything. 

Unfortunately it wore really really badly on me. After about an hour, the concealer had shifted and sunk very very obviously into lines under my eyes. Maybe it didn't set very well, but it was horribly unflattering and very obvious that I had a huge amount of make up on under my eyes. The worst part was I met up with my boyfriend afterwards and asked him how I looked - not fishing for a compliment, just testing the product ;) - and he said I looked quite tired and asked if I was ok which is about as bad a review one can get for an under eye concealer!  

I feel bad writing this product off as it's quite cult and gets rave reviews, but it just did not work for me at all. It was quite cool at the time, about 15 degrees, and my skin fairly dry. I might try it again and ask the counter SA to use a light hand, but I can't justify spending £24 on it. I think my quest for a good under eye concealer will have to continue, because this definitely wasn't it. Having heard such wonderful things I was really very disappointed.