RubyHue Lipstick Review: MAC Salon Rouge (LE)

Luckily, Salon Rouge is effing gorgeous in itself.  I've never personally owned anything quite this intensely berry-red, and am surprised at how it manages to be both striking and flattering at the same time.  Usually, you can have holy-shit or you can have perdy, but not both, which seems such an incredibly unreasonable and indeed perverse law of nature.  

It's decidedly cool and almost fuchsia-leaning, as if that hue was thickly condensed and taken to its natural extreme.  So- no warm, no orange and no dirty, just a very distilled, saturated, luminous deep beetroot or raspberry red that when slapped on thickly reads super-dramatic, especially on a dark mouth.  Check out the sheered-out swatch to really see what I mean.  Did I say saturated already?  Intensity is its middle name.

 Cool means kind to teeth, generally, and Salon Rouge is a definite yes for anyone with concerns in that direction.

I'll be the first to admit that I bought this stick for the sparkles as much as anything else.  If only MAC switched to this silvery livery for their permanent range instead of just the Heirloom Mix LE stuff; or er... maybe it's best that they don't, since it would probably bankrupt me.

You need quite a bit of mouth mojo to pull it off though, because it is a shit-tonne of look.  ABOVE LEFT  Salon Rouge sheered out/maxed out.  As I said, the more heavily you apply it, the closer you get to a conventional red since opacity tends to cancel out the berry/fuchsia.

BELOW L 2 R: MAC VG 1, Russian Red, MAC Red, Salon Rouge, Nars Mascate, Bite Cranberry  neutral indoor daylight.

While it applies almost as smoothly as a MAC Amplified thing, after ten minutes on my mouth Salon Rouge dries down to a pretty arid matte; it almost feels like a thick matte stain.  I personally prefer this finish in fuchsia-tinged shades since they tend to contain those annoyingly feral magenta dyes that love to bleed.  After a long cup of tea there is very little transfer and no feathering on my bare face which = very impressive. 

Another thing that might not be gobsmackingly obvious from the swatches is Salon Rouge's odd and quite compelling olde worlde glamour factor, especially when applied intensively.  I really can see it on someone in a tall wig and sack robe clasping a Redouté rose to their porcelain breast.  It's one of those shades that does the best of all possible things on a cool-toned face, and that's irrespective of pallor or darkness- MAC 10 or 55 - it's all good.  Bad news for warm/yellow-leaning girls though since this sort of fruit-red tends to look a bit cheap with a tan.  Oh well.  

I can't really give you any dupes; MAC Glam is in a similar direction, but quite a bit pinker.  MAC Diva is darker, slightly dirtier and more winy- not as luminous.  Some of the MAC Marilyn Monroe sticks (Deeply Adored?) look like they might be related, but I've never owned them.  If you crossed Nars Mascate with MAC Red, you'd be very close; Mascate offers the same sort of haute theatrical look and, being slightly warmer, is possibly more diversely wearable.

Salon Rouge is what I wanted Nars Dragon Girl to be (I'll be shitting all over that in the near future; stay tuned), so I'm especially pleased to have found this berry-flavoured dreamboat.  Just keep in mind there is a drama factor that probably isn't everyone's idea of awesome, but it gets three thumbs up from me.  Try it either cupid-bow neat or slightly smudged with just some matte powder and minimal mascara.  Trying... to... resist buying... back up...

L 2 R: MAC VG 1, Russian Red, MAC Red, Salon Rouge, Nars Mascate, Bite Cranberry
 warm direct daylight.  All these look a little deeper/redder on the lip.

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