L'Oreal Renewal Lash Serum, Week One

Note: This is an old entry reposted from my old blog called Boudoir Angel on Tumblr. I'm reposting all of these old entries because I plan to delete my old blog and consolidate everything to this one. Some posts may have its text updated and/or reformatted slightly according to the platform change.

Introducing a new experimental product (and by that I mean something I may or may not keep using), L'Oreal's Renewal Lash Serum.

I am a huge fan of anything that will make my lashes look more dramatic, regardless of whether it will look natural or not, so when this product came out, I was very excited.

The claim:

L'Oreal Renewal Lash Serum is an intensive formula enriched with arginine (an amino acid) and centella (which is apparently an herb, therefore an herb extract) to help give lashes a boost of nourishment to reivie and renew them, as well as prevent excessive lash fall out.

I found a video that appears to be in Chinese on YouTube of the actual advertisement and a review from a girl in the UK who describes an article in a local newspaper that said it's meant for three months use. Unlike her experience, however, my tube of serum came with a box that had the instructions on it though not much else in terms of what the product ingredients do. I only found the descriptions I put above via Google.

I first heard about L'Oreal Renewal Lash Serum via the February issue of Cosmopolitan Philippines and immediately, I went hunting for it. I'd used lash conditioners before but all they really did was provide a good base for my mascara to cling to, giving me the effect of wearing false eyelashes. This product claimed to do more than that--boost thickness and growth--so I wanted to try it out for myself to see if it would do what it claimed.

These were taken on three successive days, all after I'd applied the serum.

On the first day, right off the bat I noticed that it made my lashes appear darker with a slight gloss that disappeared when the product dried.

Application was very easy. The product comes in a tube with a curved felt-tipped wand applicator. I used the round tip to apply the serum on my lash line and then the curved side to apply the serum to the underside of my lashes, sweeping from base to tip just like putting on mascara.

The product can clump the lashes a little bit but a clean spoolie can take care of separating the lashes before the product dries to avoid little spiderweb threads between lashes.

I swear that I had completely removed my mascara before application, just in case people think I might be making all this up. In images 4 and 6 in particular, I just didn't realise there were still bits of mascara left on my skin after I'd washed my face. I cleaned up the serum applicator immediately after.

The most noticeable difference is actually with the lashes in the inner corner of my eye--they appeared longer and thicker compared to the first set and though I did not apply the serum to my bottom lashes, it seems some transfer occurred anyway as they also began to appear longer and thicker.

Since I do naturally have a long, thick fringe on the outer corner of my eye, the change isn't too noticeable when they're bare, but after mascara application, they were more obviously dramatically thicker and longer.

By the end of the week, I found a very satisfactory, dramatic difference between Day One and Day Seven.

My inner corner lashes grew thicker and longer, and everything just seemed to begin to lengthen and thicken for both my upper and lower lashes.

Some people have reported that they found no changes at all to their lashes, growth or otherwise, but this has worked better for me than any other product and trick I've tried in the past. In fact, to my chagrin, I found out this morning ("this" being my second week of daily product use) that my lashes now push against the lenses of my sunnies.

It is entirely possible that the product is not for everyone but I personally give it an A+ for its effectivity.

I wanted to keep tracking the changes, if any, up to the end of the third month of use but this was eventually dropped after a) work concerns pushed aside any thoughts of posting further images and b) after a month of use, the product started getting a strange smell. The latter may have been my fault; I might not have properly cleaned the wand, tainting the product with whatever impurity there might have been on my skin or even just in the air.

I haven't bought the product again since. This is partly due to the fact that I don't really need it and partly from my conscious attempt to reduce and eventually eliminate my use of products that are being tested on animals. I may or may not go as far as avoiding products with ingredients that are tested on animals but baby steps.

Originally posted as Boudoir Angel on Tumblr, 5 May 2010