When professional makeup artist Rea Ann Silva, founder of Beautyblender, first introduced a hot pink egg-shaped sponge to the market in 2007, she changed the beauty game. Now, she’ll try to do it again with the launch of the brand’s first-ever makeup product: Beautyblender Bounce Liquid Whip Long-Wear Foundation.

The foundation is a full-coverage, vegan formula with a velvet matte finish and a 24-hour wear claim. When I swatched it on the back of my hand, I was pleasantly surprised to see a subtle dewiness that made my skin look glow-y. The formula definitely feels lightweight—no worry about it looking cakey on the face—but offers an insane amount of coverage. (A little goes a very long way.) I left the swatch on my hand for some time and it did not settle into fine lines, lose it’s velvet dewy-effect or move around. 

The packaging is excellent. The bottle – both the design and functionality – shows that innovation continues to be the brand’s biggest strength. With one pump, the product falls into a Beautyblender shaped indent, eliminating the need to put it on the back of your hand. The bottle feels luxurious, as it is larger than traditional foundation packaging and quite weighty. It has the convenience of a traditional pump, but the lock function makes it very travel friendly. 

At a launch party for the foundation in New York City, I tracked down Silva in a back room. She was with Girls Trip actress Regina Hall, who was comedically fanning her, as they tried to escape the heat of the influencer and celebrity-filled space. (Hall, whose skin looked flawless in the new foundation, was one of the first people to every try the product back when it was only a prototype.) “I am so excited,”  Silva told us of the launch. “There are a lot of amazing people here. I am so honoured; it’s a dream come true.” 

When images of the foundation first started to circulate on Instagram, the Internet had a lot to say about what appeared to be a very limited shade range. (Though 32 shades were launched, the concern was the lack of shades available within that number for medium, tan and deep/dark skin tones.) I asked Silva her thoughts on the backlash.  “You know what, I understand,” she told me. “But it is really hard when you judge it from a photo [Ed note: originally circulated by Instagram account @trendmood1] and no one has ever seen Bounce in person, not until tonight.”

The brand has eight additional foundation shades “ready to go,” Silva told us. “We just couldn’t fit them on our merchandising! They’re coming!” she says. 

 

Beautyblender Bounce Liquid Whip Long-Wear Foundation ($52) is available now at Sephora.com.

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