Experiences with Black Eyeliner

I’ve never been a fan of black eyeliner on me. I wear eyeliner every single day, but I never thought I could wear black. I always thought it looked too harsh, too stark, etc.

Then, for Halloween this year, I decided to go really dark with my eye makeup. I used a shimmery dark grey eyeshadow all over my lids, so the only liner that would look right would be black. I happened to have just received a sample of a black glitter eyeliner in my most recent Birchbox that I decided to keep, thinking I could smudge it down to look gray-ish, so I used that. I also had a black Ulta eyeliner on the other end of the Dark Brown double-sided pencil I have been using that I got free in a sample bag with purchase, and used that on my water line. Overall, I was pleasantly surprised with the look. In fact, I couldn’t take my eyes off my eyes that day! They almost looked to be a different color, just by changing up the makeup. The products themselves, well… I’ll get into that in a minute.

Since then, I’ve been playing around more with the sparkly black pencil eyeliner, and it’s been working out OK. I never really apply it too heavy and really smudge it out, so it almost looks like a dark sparkly gray.

Today, after a request from the kiddo for a black eyeliner look, I decided to take the plunge into liquid eyeliner. I recently had picked up the elf Waterproof Eyeliner Pen at Target. (I didn’t want to spend a huge amount on a black liquid liner not knowing if I would be using it more than once.) After priming my lids and applying my cream eyeshadow, I started in on the eyeliner. A few observations:

• Not sure if the winged look is for me. The skin on my eyelids if kind of crepe-y, and the wing itself was really hard to achieve. Once it was there and I had gotten used to it, especially once the look was finished, it looked pretty decent, but not sure if it’s worth the effort.
• I definitely need eyeliner on my lower lash line. Without it, I don’t look complete. I used the same Ulta pencil from Halloween, and brought it up until it met the wing. Also used it on my waterline.
• Right now, all of the black eyeliners I have SUCK! Today, the waterline was gone within just a few minutes. Within 2 hours, the lower pencil that met up with the wing was completely smudged down my cheek on my left eye. When I went to fix that, the wing came off. That meant the right eye had to go too, and it came off easily. The rest of the pencil under the eye is smudgy and I have to keep checking for raccoon eyes. The glitter pencil (Lord and Berry Sparkle Black Mini Liner) also smudges easily, also noted by my sister.

I will continue to wear the sparkly liner, because I can make that work when I need/want to. Otherwise, I’m going back to my pencils in pretty much every color but black, and passing along any black ones I get to my sister.

Any tips or trade secrets to share about liquid liner? What is your favorite eyeliner?