The Balm Hot Mama

Now this is my favourite make-up brand from Sasa. I hope they keep bringing in new The Balm products because I am drawn to The Balm as a moth to a flame. I have a number of The Balm products in my stash which I keep making a mental note to review. For goodness sake, I tell myself, some of them have an expiry date and I’ve had them for a few years already. In fact, I accumulated a number of The Balm products when they were first available in Malaysia 3-4 years ago. It’s been that long!

What’s not to like about The Balm? Quirky and very memorable names for their products, cute images on their packaging such as this red bikini clad lady on the cover of The Balm Hot Mama, good quality products at reasonable prices. Like just about everyone else, I thought The Balm reminded me of Benefit but The Balm prices are a far cry from Benefit’s.

Like it or hate it, most of the products come in cardboard packaging. Hot Mama comes in an outer sleeve and for those who don’t think it’s durable enough, well I have had mine for more than 3 years and it’s still as good as new. The mirror inside is too small to be of much use to me but better to have one than none at all, I suppose.

The shade is a warm coral peach with subtle gold shimmer. That slight shimmer doesn’t accentuate my pores nor does it look too shimmery. In fact, there is more of a glow than a shimmer on my cheeks and I love it as it brightens up my complexion.

This is a versatile shade as it’s meant to be used as a shadow and blush. I do like the shade on my eyes as well as it’s soft and an alternative to a neutral brown. It gives my eyes a natural look without being flat and boring.

The powder is quite soft so it could get powdery if I use my fingers to pick up the colour. It’s so pigmented and colour pay-off is excellent. I just have to glide my brush gentle against the pan and it picks up enough product for application on both cheeks.

The palette contains 7.08g which is a LOT of product for RM65.