Skin-Nomad's Take — At a Glance

• Three-in-one gloss, oil and plumper for fuller lips
• High-gloss shine with a cooling plumping tingle
• Fine blue shimmer for a brighter-looking smile

The tingle is the fun part of a plumping gloss; tight, dry lips afterwards are not. The VENICEBEAUTY Lip Plumping Oil Gloss, made in Germany, keeps those two apart by carrying its chilli extract and cooling agent in an oil base of argan and aloe, so one swipe covers gloss, lip oil and plumper at once. It is a lip gloss for people who like to feel a product working.

Key Features

• A fine blue shimmer brightens more than your lips: The high-gloss shine carries a fine blue shimmer, and because blue sits opposite yellow on the colour wheel, that cool tone makes teeth read whiter by contrast. The shimmer is fine rather than glittery, so it reads as light across the lip instead of specks on it.
• What you feel is the plumping mechanism, not a side effect: Chilli extract and a cooling agent irritate the lip surface just enough to raise blood flow to it, and the mild swelling that follows is the fuller look. The tingle arrives within seconds, and the fullness lasts as long as the tingle does.
• Underneath the shine sit argan oil, aloe and a peptide: Argan oil and aloe soften the lip surface and hold water in it, with a peptide alongside them. That is the half of the formula still working once the tingle has gone.
• Wear it on bare lips or over a lipstick: On its own it reads as a wet-look nude with a glimmer running through it, and over a tinted balm or lipstick it works as a topper. The shimmer is light enough that the colour underneath still leads.

Note: The tingle is meant to be noticeable, so on lips that are already cracked or split it will sting rather than tingle.

Ideal For

• Skin types: All skin types, including drier lips that want an oil base under the shine.
• Pigmentation and finish: Clear apart from the blue shimmer, so there is next to no colour payoff, and the finish is high-gloss and genuinely wet-looking.
• Best used by: People who want a lip product to feel like it is doing something, and who enjoy the tingle rather than putting up with it.

FAQ

Q: How is this different from a standard lip gloss?
A: A conventional gloss gets its shine from wax, and wax is what makes gloss tacky on the lip. The VENICEBEAUTY Lip Plumping Oil Gloss shines from an oil base instead, which is lighter to wear, and it adds two things a plain gloss does not: a temporary plumping effect and enough conditioning oil to leave lips softer than it found them.

Q: Is the plumping permanent?
A: No, and no topical plumper is. The fullness comes from a mild, deliberate irritation that raises blood flow to the lip, and it recedes as the tingle fades. Nothing about it accumulates, so it is a per-wear effect rather than a course of anything.

Q: What if I do not like tingling lip products?
A: Then this is the wrong plumper for you, and it is better to know that now. The sensation here is deliberate and quite present, so it is central to the experience rather than incidental. A lip oil that plumps through hydration, with hyaluronic acid drawing water into the lip surface, gives a subtler fullness with no sensation at all.

This is a lip product you notice on the way on as much as in the mirror, which is a different sort of pleasure entirely.