Hey everyone! Today I'd like to tell you about Darling Clandestine's lip balms! Before getting started, I want to let you know that I was first able to try this product when Evonne kindly included a bonus tin of La Malinche in one of my orders. I liked it so much, I purchased a tin of Cielito Frito during a recent sale. I've also purchased several as gifts for other people.
Let's start with the first thing you notice about these balms - the tin is huge! I have pretty big hands for a woman, and the long edge of the tin is as wide as my palm. I'd guess the short edge is about an inch and the long edge is about 2.5 inches. They're slim enough to fit nicely in your pocket, but deep enough that it takes some work to hit pan on the tin. The lid slides open to reveal the vast expanse of product within.
Here's what my La Malinche tin says about the ingredients:
"Contains shea butter, cocoa butter, beeswax, sweet almond oil, coconut oil, vitamin E, cinnamon essential oil, flavor oil blend"
With one exception, the scents of these lip balms are different from and much simpler than the shop's perfume offerings. Hellbender (a ginger/vanilla/bourbon/amber blend, and one of my favorites) is available as both a perfume and a lip balm, but otherwise the lip balms come in scents composed of only a couple of food-related notes. For example, La Malinche is meant to smell of chocolate, and Cielito Frito is meant to smell of churros. I may or may not have sniffed a few of the other scent options before giving them as gifts, and in general, I have to say they all smell excellent but they don't necessarily smell exactly like what you'd expect from the description. La Malinche smells like creamy cocoa butter to me, with perhaps a hint of chocolate. Cielito Frito smells like sweet and spicy cinnamon, but it comes across more Christmas-y than churros-y. In both cases, I'm not sure I would have guessed the scent inspiration if I hadn't read it before sniffing the products. I should also mention that the balms are only lightly scented (to respect their proximity to your nose) and are unflavored (to prevent you from licking your tasty lips and exacerbating dryness).
I've been using La Malinche as an overnight balm on my very dry lips to give it a trial by fire. If I put on a thin layer, it's gone within an hour or two and my lips are uncomfortably dry in the morning. However, if I pile it on, it lasts me the whole night and my lips feel good the next morning. It's not the most moisturizing balm I've ever tried, but it's pairing nicely with my daytime balms to keep my lips in good shape. The texture is neither too soft nor too waxy, so it stays put on my lips without dragging during application. In this photo, you can see it keeps its shape, but it's just starting to melt where it meets the warmth of my skin:
I only have one complaint about this balm, but it's a big one - tins are a notoriously unhygienic container for lip products. This means I don't feel comfortable tossing it in my purse and applying it during the day with potentially germy fingers. I tried working around the hygiene issue by applying the balm with clean synthetic makeup brushes, but it's so full of oils and waxes that the brushes took a couple rounds of deep cleaning to get it all out. Do not recommend. I've settled on applying it at night with clean fingers, but a washable plastic applicator would work just as well.
Despite the inconvenient packaging, I find the full size balms well worth the $8 price tag. If you want to take the formula or one of the scents for a test drive, Evonne also offers miniature spheres full of balm for just a couple of bucks. If you're concerned about sensitivity, the minis are a great way to see how your lips feel about the potentially irritating cinnamon and mint oils in the various flavors (but for what it's worth, I haven't had the slightest issue with my cinnamon scents). The full size is certainly pricier than most of the popular indie lip balms, but from eyeballing it, I wouldn't be surprised if it had 1.5 or 2x as much product as your standard balm tube. I'll probably get 4-6 months of heavy night applications out of one tin. It doesn't hurt that this formula is blissfully free of avocado oil, a common indie balm ingredient to which I am allergic. I will happily keep repurchasing and gifting these beautifully labeled tins, but I won't stop trying other balms in hopes of finding something even better.
Let's start with the first thing you notice about these balms - the tin is huge! I have pretty big hands for a woman, and the long edge of the tin is as wide as my palm. I'd guess the short edge is about an inch and the long edge is about 2.5 inches. They're slim enough to fit nicely in your pocket, but deep enough that it takes some work to hit pan on the tin. The lid slides open to reveal the vast expanse of product within.
Here's what my La Malinche tin says about the ingredients:
"Contains shea butter, cocoa butter, beeswax, sweet almond oil, coconut oil, vitamin E, cinnamon essential oil, flavor oil blend"
With one exception, the scents of these lip balms are different from and much simpler than the shop's perfume offerings. Hellbender (a ginger/vanilla/bourbon/amber blend, and one of my favorites) is available as both a perfume and a lip balm, but otherwise the lip balms come in scents composed of only a couple of food-related notes. For example, La Malinche is meant to smell of chocolate, and Cielito Frito is meant to smell of churros. I may or may not have sniffed a few of the other scent options before giving them as gifts, and in general, I have to say they all smell excellent but they don't necessarily smell exactly like what you'd expect from the description. La Malinche smells like creamy cocoa butter to me, with perhaps a hint of chocolate. Cielito Frito smells like sweet and spicy cinnamon, but it comes across more Christmas-y than churros-y. In both cases, I'm not sure I would have guessed the scent inspiration if I hadn't read it before sniffing the products. I should also mention that the balms are only lightly scented (to respect their proximity to your nose) and are unflavored (to prevent you from licking your tasty lips and exacerbating dryness).
I've been using La Malinche as an overnight balm on my very dry lips to give it a trial by fire. If I put on a thin layer, it's gone within an hour or two and my lips are uncomfortably dry in the morning. However, if I pile it on, it lasts me the whole night and my lips feel good the next morning. It's not the most moisturizing balm I've ever tried, but it's pairing nicely with my daytime balms to keep my lips in good shape. The texture is neither too soft nor too waxy, so it stays put on my lips without dragging during application. In this photo, you can see it keeps its shape, but it's just starting to melt where it meets the warmth of my skin:
I only have one complaint about this balm, but it's a big one - tins are a notoriously unhygienic container for lip products. This means I don't feel comfortable tossing it in my purse and applying it during the day with potentially germy fingers. I tried working around the hygiene issue by applying the balm with clean synthetic makeup brushes, but it's so full of oils and waxes that the brushes took a couple rounds of deep cleaning to get it all out. Do not recommend. I've settled on applying it at night with clean fingers, but a washable plastic applicator would work just as well.
Despite the inconvenient packaging, I find the full size balms well worth the $8 price tag. If you want to take the formula or one of the scents for a test drive, Evonne also offers miniature spheres full of balm for just a couple of bucks. If you're concerned about sensitivity, the minis are a great way to see how your lips feel about the potentially irritating cinnamon and mint oils in the various flavors (but for what it's worth, I haven't had the slightest issue with my cinnamon scents). The full size is certainly pricier than most of the popular indie lip balms, but from eyeballing it, I wouldn't be surprised if it had 1.5 or 2x as much product as your standard balm tube. I'll probably get 4-6 months of heavy night applications out of one tin. It doesn't hurt that this formula is blissfully free of avocado oil, a common indie balm ingredient to which I am allergic. I will happily keep repurchasing and gifting these beautifully labeled tins, but I won't stop trying other balms in hopes of finding something even better.
Have you tried Darling Clandestine's balms? If not, are you interested in them? I'd love to hear your thoughts!
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