CodeBeautiful sent DailyEdge.ie products without any promise of a positive or negative review.
Also, please ignore the jaundice glow in the photos – I was testing a foundation that blatantly didn’t match.
CODE BEAUTIFUL IS a brand I’d never heard of, which seemed mad to me, given it’s popularity among beauty editors.
The cruelty-free beauty brand won an Image Beauty award for its Code SSL Soft Smooth lipliner (€16 – €22).
Besides being award-winning, the liner seemingly comes in a ‘universally flattering’ shade, meaning anyone can wear it and it will look nice. That’s a big claim, but fear not dear reader, as I was willing to put it to the test.
As well as the SSL lip liner, I also had a go at using:
- Code Beautiful Forget Fake Lashes pre-mascara (€20.25)
- Code Beautiful VLM mascara (€22.25)
- Code LIP lip intense plumper (€22.50)
Are they any use?
Starting with the lip liner, the universal shade of ‘Nude Blush has some other nifty knacks to it, namely that it’s self sharpening. Twist the base and voila!
The nip is quite sharply angled, but the product applies beautifully and softly on the lips themselves. The colour is quite a dark, cool-toned nude which, in my opinion, looks quite good on me. It’s a winner baby!
On to the lip plumper, which also only comes in one shade – while it looks quite jarring on the wand (bright neon glitter pink, hello), it only gives the tiniest bit of a sheer pink colour. I didn’t really like it over the liner in terms of how it changed the colour, so in future I’d be more inclined to wear it on its own.
If such thing as a tingle scale exists, I’d put it at 5.5. Despite the flavour being somewhat reminiscent of an After Eight milkshake,it doesn’t sting or make your lips inflate to cartoon proportions. As it’s marketed as being a gloss and conditioning treatment as well as plumper, the results are mild.
On to the pre-mascara and the mascara then: it comes with a warning that it’s a drier formula than you might be used to. The pre-mascara is colourless, applied with a skinny, well spaced wand.
The mascara is the same. There’s a knack to applying, Roots, Wiggle, Roll:
- Pop the brush on to your lashes as close to the roots as you can.
- Give the brush a good wriggle back and forth.
- Roll the brush from root to tip.
I can confidently say that I did not consciously apply the technique, but still got a result that I was extremely happy with – long, fluttery, well separated lashes.
Final verdict?
- The liner is extremely beautiful and versatile. I can definitely see it being a handbag staple for me, once I practice putting on and taking off the lid a few times.
- The plumper I could probably take or leave. It does work, but I’m not sure how much use I’d have for it every day or for special occasions.
- The formula will take some getting used to, and I’m not sure how highly I’d recommend it to someone with sensitive eyes, but I love the mascara. It really transformed how they look.
Code Beautiful is available from Harvey Nichols, Meagher’s Pharmacy, Beauty Bay and code-beautiful.com.
