Makeup Review: "Bonne Mine"

Laura Mercier 

After work last Thursday I had a little time to kill before a girls dinner, so I wandered in to my happy place, Sephora. Having a Sephora store just two blocks away from my office is both a blessing and a curse. Read about the latest great lip color on a blog, it can be mine within a few hours. Have a nasty day at work, a little retail therapy is close at hand. It's less stressful than having to try on clothes (am I the only one that finds trying on clothes stressful?) and the items are small so it feels non-committal. Sephora also has a killer return policy, so if I buy something under duress and end up unsatisfied, it can easily be undone.

I get this feeling from time to time that I am missing out on the latest and greatest products, the key to early morning makeup perfection. I am always on the hunt for a holy grail bronzer (along with the perfect under eye concealer). In the interest of decompressing from the day, when a particularly friendly Sephora employee asked if there was anything I was looking for I started to say "just browsing" and then asked if he had a favorite bronzer. His excitement was palpable as he asked what I was currently using. I said "well, I rotate between Bobbi Brown, Nars, Benefit, Guerlain, Tarte, and maybe some others I am forgetting?" He laughed and said "you need to try a cream bronzer. Bonne Mine!" Say what?! A product I haven't tried?

Photo credit

He sat me down, gathered his supplies and started doing my makeup. As he was working away, other sale associates would come up and nod and say “are you using Bonne Mine??” or simply nod and slowly say “bonne meeeee.” It seemed like a pretty big deal, so of course I had to add it to my bronzer repertoire.  

The Laura Mercier Bonne Mine is a face palette containing five cream colors: “1 bronzer veil, 2 cheek veils & 2 glow veils.” I purchased the Sephora Collection Pro “Flawless Airbrush” #56 brush to apply. The colors are all very creamy and blendable and you sort of tap the brush in to the colors and then tap/ dot  the brush on to your face to apply, and then use the brush to blend. The Sephora man said you apply it like “stippling.” I’ve heard that stippling is a way of applying foundation, but I’ve never actually done it. Anyway, I have point. So far, I am very happy with the results. In the winter months when my skin is lighter (super pale), I have a harder time blending bronzer and it can look too harsh (or orange). This is a much more natural approach. One you master the correct tapping (or even while you’re just playing around, learning the technique) it’s easy to create a soft contour. The colors seem to last well throughout the day and are extremely lightweight on the skin (I don’t feel it at all). I have yet to master the trifecta of bronzer, blush & glow as well as the makeup artist, but I’m on my way. So far this week I have been using the bronzer to lightly draw reverse 3 along the sides of my face with a bit on my forehead and nose, then I put of the cheek veil (the peachy one) just on the apples of my cheeks, and the lighter glow veil to highlight my cheekbones. It even comes with a little instruction booklet.

If you are rushed for time in the morning (who isn’t?) and like the convenience of having your bronzer/ blush contained in one palette, I would highly recommend this product. I like that it’s light and natural for everyday, but I can also step it up, build more color and do a dramatic face contour for nights out. I like that it’s a unique product. It’s different than anything else I own, and I feel like it’s added something to my makeup collection. 

The best part is 100% of the profits from the sale of this product are donated to the Laura Mercier Ovarian Cancer Fund. Their “mission is to raise awareness and fund research and educational efforts that will help diagnose, treat and support women with ovarian cancer.” I loved Laura Mercier products before I knew of her efforts to raise funds for ovarian cancer, and you better believe I love her a whole lot more now. You can watch to learn more about her efforts here. 

It is a limited edition product, and of course after typing all of this out, I can’t find it listed on the Sephora website. It is available in stores (Sephora, Bloomingdales) and on Laura Mercier.com for $48.

What are your "holy grail" make up products? Do you have a recommendation for the perfect under eye concealer or bronzer?