Gritty Pretty Tested Kim Kardashian West’s Contour Kits & Here’s What We Thought

When Kim Kardashian West launched KKW Beauty to the world, her range of cream contour kits sold out within 3 hours netting a whopping $14.4 million USD in the bank for the social media star.

Since then, KKW Beauty continues to sell out online, has recently been crowned 2017 Allure Best of Beauty Award for Best Contour and we’ve been asked by many of you our dear readers, “Are Kim Kardashian’s beauty products really any good?”

To answer that question, there was only one way to find out… I purchased the Crème Contour and Highlight Kit in Medium ($48 USD, which equates to $60 AUD) and put the cream bronzer, highlighter and brush/sponge to the test.

The conclusion was this:

Fact: Kim Kardashian West has had her makeup done far more times than us mere mortals. But, what makes her predisposed to being a beauty brand creator is the type of people she’s had the good fortune to learn industry tricks from. Pat McGrath and Mario Dedivanovic, anyone? Being touted as the Queen of Contour seems apt for the 36-year-old beauty so it’s no surprise that when launching her own cosmetics line – and following on from the success of younger sister, Kylie Jenner’s Kylie Cosmetics makeup range – it made sense that KKW Beauty launched with just three products (available in four shades – light, medium, dark and deep dark) simply to designed to do two things: contour and highlight.

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The contour stick has two deep shades: an ashy contour for creating shadows under the cheeks and for nose contour, and a warmer bronzer shade, which works beautifully on the forehead or if, like me, you prefer a more natural contour. When I first applied the contour stick it really made an impact – there’s a lot of pigment – but because the crème formula is very creamy, it blends out SO well. The brush also makes the blending easy and seamless – it’s pretty hard to stuff the blending up due to the contour sticks’ creaminess (which errs on the edge of oily). The bullets themselves are, well, small. It makes for easy application along the nose and cheek bones, however, it does feel as though you would finish this product within a month (give or take if you use it daily). After a few hours of wear in warm humidity, I noticed the product didn’t last (it looked a little blotchy in areas as if it had moved due to the intense creaminess of the contour). Beauty Editor’s Tip: Set your makeup with a setting powder to avoid it slipping.

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Now, for highlighter fans, this is what I was most excited about. This is what I’d heard positive reviews on; and the shimmering highlighter did not disappoint. Did I mention I have very high standards (BECCA Shimmering Skin Perfector, Victoria Beckham x Estée Lauder and M.A.C Mineralize Skinfinish in Soft & Gentle – am I right?). The shimmering highlighter applied really smoothly, and I used my fingers to dab these onto my cheek bones and brow bones (rather than the sponge). I liked the matte highlighter shade; I just wish it had a little more coverage to cover dark under eye circles by itself.

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A nice addition to the kit; the brush is excellent at blending and while the sponge is good, fingers or a beautyblender also do the job. The muted pink Yeezy vibe packaging also means you’d be proud to have these products in your handbag/cosmetics kit.

At $60 AUD ($48 USD) for the trio and $19 AUD ($15 USD) for international shipping, a rough $80 AUD for three pretty packaged and good beauty products isn’t too bad. It’s not too bad at all.

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