At the end of every year I find myself restocking on my favorite Merit mascara and sometimes lip product (both their Signature Lip and Shade Slick) during their end of year sale (my first review of Merit here). Well after last year’s Merit Beauty review some people had mentioned trying out their Minimalist Complexion Stick. Fast forward a year and I decided to give it a try too along with their recommended brush and the Bronze Balm. And I know this doesn’t need to be said but just as a reminder, all of our skin types and preferences vary so what works for me (or doesn’t work for me) might not be the same for you.

The Minimalist Perfecting Complexion Stick

This is my first time trying a foundation in stick form and I love the ease and convenience of it. I’m usually a liquid makeup gal (my tried and true is Bobbi Brown’s liquid foundation) so I love how not messy the stick foundation is. It glides on pretty smoothly and blends well. I would say the coverage is a tad on the heavy side (compared to liquid) but it’s not thick. It does leave a really beautiful finish on my skin. Foundation tends to degrade on my skin pretty fast (it’s probably because I don’t use a setting powder—but I don’t like how powder settles into my pores), so I use a primer. My current favorite primer is this one from Milk. With the primer, I find the makeup lasts quite well all day. My only gripe is that this foundation has no SPF so it requires finding the right sunscreen to layer underneath (I’m currently using one I got from Korea and it’s awesome but without it, I don’t know what I would use). As much as I like this foundation, because of the no SPF thing I’m not sure I would repurchase. Also if you’re prone to breakouts, I probably wouldn’t recommend this one since almost every time I use it, it looks like I get one small zit.

Brush No. 1

Since I didn’t have any foundation brushes (I’ve been a beauty blender sponge gal), I decided to get this with the foundation stick during the Merit sale. And I have to say I really love this brush. It works well with the foundation stick but also with the Dr. Jart+ Beauty Balm I bought last month. I’m very satisfied with this purchase.

Bronze Balm

I’m not big on bronzer but I do like to darken the hollows of my cheeks a bit to give my face a bit more dimension. For years I’ve been using an old tube of Dr. Jart+ face contouring liquid (no longer sold). But I finally decided to seek a replacement for it when the wand got stuck in the tube lol. So the impetus for this Merit purchase really was this bronze balm. And I love it. I was looking for something that wasn’t shiny and that was a liquid or cream bronzer since my foundation is liquid or cream. I use the No. 1 brush above to blend in the bronzer and it works really well. The bronzer is not super dark (I got the color Clay as recommended by the Merit site), and gives the subtlest of shadows. This Bronze balm is definitely one I will be repurchasing in the future.