I know I said I was on a makeup ban, but what do you expect me to do when my Guerlain SA, Jean, texts me about a 30% off sale. “Resist like a responsible adult, Carina,” you might say. Unfortunately, I can’t hear you as I’m drowning in lipstuff happiness.

See, my friend Gracie, keeps asking me if I plan on buying any shades from Guerlain’s Rouge G L’Extrait line. And I’m just always so puzzled by the persistence. I mean, what’s so great about this lip gloss, really? What about it would make me want to drop $48 on one color? Pretty steep, if you ask me. That said, I don’t think I would ever buy it at original price, unless I had a more stable and higher-paying income.

For a 30% off sale, though, I think I can forgive myself.

So, the Rouge G L’Extrait by Guerlain is a line of “lip colour” that they released pretty recently, in August 2012. It’s a “lip colour” because it looks like a gloss—with a doe-foot applicator and a creamy consistency—but it acts more like a lipstick. A matte lipstick, to be more precise. “How can this be?” you ask. I don’t know, but it’s pretty amazing!

(I swatched four shades of Rouge G L’Extrait before settling on the first one I picked—at the rightmost—which is Orgueil.)

I know a lot of companies say they’d do stuff, but the three things that the Rouge L’Extrait boasts of being:

• a crème de rouge
• being a matte colour, and
• having exceptional hold

It’s easy to judge the first two, and I’ll tell you right now, they are truth-tellers in this case. But what about exceptional hold?

One of my posts drafted for this blog is called “Confessions of a Lip Licker.” Lipsticks do not tend to hold on me, even though they claim to be long-wear. It’s a sad fact that I’ve come to accept. For a $48 “lip colour,” though, I am bound to have high expectations.

I got the Rouge G L’Extrait in Orgueil (M69). Named after the seven deadly sins, each Rouge G L’Extrait shade represents one, Orgueil being French for pride. It’s described as a plum, but it’s a beautiful, bold color that comes across more ruby-berry-bluey red than plum. I didn’t expect myself getting since I tend to stick with safe shades for lipsticks, but I couldn’t let it go.

I know this is long enough for a long-review, but! I’ll save that for another time. This is for a special Face of the Day timeline to display just how long-wearing this liquid lipstick is.

I took this photo immediately after putting it on, around 3:30 in the afternoon. Love at first swipe!

I was exceptionally pleased with it—from the texture to the color—but if it lasts on my lips remains to be seen.

Face of the Day details:

• Face: Ahava Light Foundation, The Body Shop Tea Tree Oil Pore Minimiser
• Eyes: MAC Paint Pot (Rubenesque), bareMinerals A Vision in Velvet eyeshadow (Satin Peach, Velvet Espresso)
• Cheeks: NARS Powder Blush (Orgasm)
• Lips: Guerlain Rouge G L’Extrait (Orgueil M69)

After about 4 hours of wear, at 7:14 pm, with my high school lady loves, Pam and Tata. We had coffee (créme brulee coffee for me!), cake, and a session of merciless self-loathing (lol) and a few rounds of high school catch-up with each other and people who aren’t there (double lol). I missed them a lot!

At 7:47 pm, waiting to be seated at Mitsuyado Sei-Men, a new ramen place along Jupiter that Sarie and I wanted to try. Ah-maw-zing color still, at 4.5 hours. On another note, my NARS blush has faded.

At 8:23 pm, after a few bites of food and a giant lip-wiping. There is still a visible stain, post-curry drenching and wiping. Close to five hours of wear at this point, after coffee, cake and a dinner of ramen, chicken karaage, and gyoza.

8:45 pm—all gone! Look at the face of this tired self. I had wiped my lips a few times in between this picture and the last one and I think the wiping just about did it.

As for the rest of the product, it is, as always, extremely luxe. Here is what the packaging looks like, sans box:

Gorgeous! I mean, I’m pretty sure this is why you’re so expensive, Guerlain. So pretty, though. It’s quite big, but the heft is what you really notice first. I don’t know about you, but I’d rather my makeup’s packaging be heavy but exceptional than light but cheap.

The heft can probably be attributed to the mirror each tube of Rouge G L’Extrait comes with. For easy reapplication, though I don’t know why you would need to anyway, unless you have a really long day. I prefer to use doe-tip applicators on clean lips, though, so I don’t think I would reapply on-the-go, unless I really really really had no other choice, but that doesn’t seem to be a scenario that’s likely.

Germ central! Doe-foot applicators are the very thing that turned me off of glosses in my earlier years because the applicators felt so yucky, but I have since warmed up to the idea when I purchased a tube of Larger Than Life Lipgloss from the NARS x Andy Warhol collaboration. I have compromised and I think I can deal with this just as long as I put on the lipstick only on clean lips.

I love how the color is represented by a dot on the wand end. There’s a label on the underside of the tube, but I appreciate the colored dot for easy color selection.

The lid of the box has a cute diagram that tells you how to open the contraption. 🙂

VERDICT: Great, long-wear lip color with amazing, intense pigmentation. It applies smoothly and dries to a velvety matte finish.
Would I purchase this again? Heck yeah. It’s something worth saving up for, in my opinion.
How much? $48 or Php 2,500 for 0.20oz (Bought on sale for Php 1,700+)
Where to buy in Manila? Guerlain counters in Rustan’s department stores.