Product Review: Merit Beauty Flush Balm

Merit Beauty is a new line in the clean/Green beauty market that has recently come to Sephora and also besotted my attention. Co-founder of style blog, Who, What, Wear entrepreneur, skincare brand founder (of the brand Versed) and mom, beauty enthusiast and fashion expert Katherine Powers has created a makeup line that typifies the concepts of makeup minimalism with feelings of luxury and simplicity all while focusing on clean ingredients. In fact, she was inspired to create Merit while pregnant and not only wanted to know more about what was in her products , but also often felt sick because of the artificial tastes and flavors in her more standard lip products! But in reading this article-meets interview with Katherine, I realize it is more than just a focus on natural and clean ingredients that makes her brand compelling, it is a call to have a few, quality products that help us enhance and embrace the best of ourselves. One quote of hers that really stood out to me: "In 2020, we learned that we don’t need much. We got used to our natural hair textures, bare nails, and minimal makeup. The Merit launch assortment is everything you need to do your makeup in five minutes and nothing you don’t. It’s clean, comfortable, and long-lasting makeup you’ll actually want to wear—even if your only outings (for now) are on Zoom. At Merit, we believe that less is more."

Even though I love playing with all kinds of products and brands and styles of makeup, both the experiences of the last few years and just my own growth process has encouraged me to take a more holistic and, dare I say, less is more approach to my own makeup. And I can think of no other piece of makeup that so easily and beautifully enhances a natural makeup look than a dot of cream blush, making the Merit Beauty Flush Balm a new favorite of mine.

Flush Balm is a stick-style cream blush that I love to swipe on for its dewy, refreshing feel as well as the deposit of beautiful watercolor. I love how, that for a stick-style blush, the cream formula is not overly dry, stiff, or waxy like many blushes in this format can be, usually making the product deposit a lot of color at once and making it hard to move around and blend out. Not so with this! Yet, at the same time, the formula is not overly smeary or messy the way sometimes cream blushes, or using a lipstick for a cream blush, for example, can be. The Beauty Flush Balm marries the best of both worlds and is quite sheer to start out with, so it is EXTREMELY beginner-friendly either for first-time or minimal makeup wearers or those, like me, who love makeup but can be a bit intimidated when it comes to blush. Being very fair, although I like a bold shade of blush, blushes that start off applying pigmentation can often be too stark and dramatic and a little often goes an extremely long way. So I love this blush in that it lets me pace myself, choose to swipe on a little, or layer and layer to that wind-bitten flush if I feel like it. The formula is quite spreadable and easy to blend out. I always do my blending with my fingers for an extra painterly, diffuse watercolor effect, but other reviews I've read and seen say and show the product blending equally well with a brush or sponge.

Though a cream blush, the formula actually has a demi-matte finish that is not flat or truly matte but not something that is overtly glowy either. That said, the finish feels soft in terms of tactile feel , feel even through a full day's wear. As someone with dry skin, I don't mind this and in fact welcome it, but if you are someone with oily skin and don't like softer or less deeply setting products for that reason, I highly recommend powdering overtop or maybe opting for an ever more matte, denser cream blush like the Josie Maran Argan Colorsticks as one example of many, I have struggled with getting more matte liquid and cream blushes (less shiny ones) to move and blend properly, so I find the Flush Balm formula a welcome change, And I find though the formula is dewy in both look and feel that the color lasts about 4 to 6 hours without any fading, and that is as much or more full-color-that- I apply wear as I get from most any blush I've used and all I ever really want. It also removes quite easily with just a normal cleanser or oil cleanser without any stain let behind.

The Flush Balm currently comes in 5 gorgeous colors. Cheeky, the shade I have, is a cool pink that does not ready as candy but rather a soft crystalline rose petal. Raspberry Beret is another shade I have my eye on and is a light, chilled cool-toned purple berry. On the warmer side, there is Beverly Hills a soft peach that has hints of sheer orangey, pinky melon and Terracotta a neutral midtone brown that could work well as both a bronzer or a blush or even contour shade, depending on your skintone and undertones. Then finally rounding out the line is Moody, a beautiful rich brick-red crimson burgundy that seems to have both cool and warm undertones mixed within it. All of these shades seems to work and show up beautifully across an array of skintones, and you can see this in action on the photography on Merit's site as well as some on the Sephora listing. Also because of the dewy, sheer-starting, though somewhat buildable, and fairly fluid nature of the blush, I would suspect the formula would mix well with shades of itself and perhaps other products (especially those of also a cream or liquid design) to create more nuanced, custom shades,

Overall, this sweet stick of easy-to-apply, fresh-looking bloom of blush has been a wonderful addition to my makeup wardrobe and they seem very on par with the brand's aesthetic and vision. I cannot wait to try more from Merit, but if you find yourself interested in these, you can find them on Sephora.com in certain stores and on the Merit Beauty official website. for $28 USD each.