Could it be that I found another lavender blush? These seem to be rare yet popular, judging by the views on my purple/lavender blush list post, and as soon as I saw Henbane from Flower Knows I knew I had to check if it belonged there.
Flower Knows is a relatively young Chinese brand that is dedicated to making beautiful makeup items. The kind of products you’ll want to showcase, not just look at. But as with anything that highly values aesthetic, I was afraid that Flower Knows would be a form over function kind of brand, and I refrained from buying from them until I saw some positive reviews from beauty content creators. I did not found any review on the blush Henbane, however, so this was a total shot in the dark.
And as with most shots in the dark, I missed and almost hurt myself. You see, Henbane is a very, very, pale blush. My complexion is pretty pale (result of 14+ years of consistent SPF use, vitamin C serums, and a naturally pasty skin colour) and I had trouble getting this to show up on my cheeks. The swatch you see above is with about 5-6 layers of powder. This is so light that I only really see it working as a blush on extremely fair skin – the kind of skintone that will have trouble finding a foundation that matches because shade ranges usually won’t go that pale.
Another option would be to use this as a highlighter, but this is a very cool toned shade, and it almost has a grey undertone to it, so my yellow undertone skin just looks like it’s healing from a bruise if I use this on top of my cheekbones.
I thought a comparison swatch with my lilac/lavender blush collection was due, and I also compared it against the (former) whitest blush in my collection so you can see just how light Henbane is:
Illamasqua Katie is the lightest baby pink blush I own that does not darken on the skin, and you can see how much whiter Henbane is compared to it. With my Flower Knows order I also bought another blush, Pure Rhyme from the Strawberry Rococo collection, that leans lavender (review incoming) but it’s a lot pinker than Henbane. MAC’s Full of Joy still looks lilac compared to this but you can see by this comparison how extremely cool toned Henbane is. Clinique’s lilac blush, Pansy Pop, just looks pink here. And my very grey-mauve specimen, Mauve Sparkle from La Femme, looks like it has a lot more brown in it.
Shade aside, the blush is actually very finely milled and would not look powdery on the skin if I didn’t need so many layers. The finish is matte but it does not look flat on the skin. Longevity wise, this seemed to have lasted the whole day – but I honestly have trouble evaluating how and when this started to fade exactly, because I had trouble seeing it on my skin to begin with, and I had to use a lot more layers than you typically would with a normal blush.
I don’t think this lacks pigmentation, I think it’s just too light. Points for it not oxidising on the skin though. That’s rare on a blush this light.
Packaging wise, this is lovely. It looks like a Christmas ornament. It has a satin bow on top, it’s plastic but looks like ceramic and it’s hella bulky but that’s part of the charm. They’re the farthest thing from practical, as most things beautiful are. It contains 4 grams of product for 28€. Not the biggest blush, but when does a person go through an entire pan of blush anyway?
Definitely not the blush for me. But certainly a looker.
