I don’t own an embarrassing truck load of blushes because on my cheeks, it’s either nothing, or pink, or coral. I’m boring like that when it comes to blushes. Due to non-existent cheekbones, I spend more time on my best features – my eyes – to draw attention away from my flat cheekbones to my played up eyes.
I thought I’d heard too much good stuff about the Too Faced Papa Don’t Peach Blush so it was only time that it promptly went into my basket when it waved at me. Yup, I don’t look at makeup, they just stand up and wave at me, shouting “HEY JULI! IT’S MY TURN TODAY!”. Hoho.
Retro Packaging
Too Faced, like Urban Decay and Benefit, likes to package their powder products in paper boxes, albeit very sturdy cardboard ones. Another popular cardboard-made palette is the customizable makeup Z-Palette. I think paper gives a lot more room for design elements, metal probably makes printing a little more challenging.
Paper is more environmentally friendly too! Normally I shun the Too Faced palette boxes because they are wayyyy too bulky, but this one is just right.
On the cover of Papa Don’t Peach is a Madonna look-alike pinup doll of the 50’s. Wavy hair, highly arched and waxed eyebrows, crazily thick eyelashes, red lipstick and of course, warm peachy cheeks. So very retro. The packaging makes me wanna play dress up in a polka dot dress and dance a-go-go.
It looks kinda like the Western version of the much loved olden Chinese face powder, which design has been adopted by Palladio for its Rice Face Powder and blotting sheets.
Get the Palladio Natural Rice Powder Tranlucent
Gorgeous Peach Color
In the packaging it looks a little brown, and I’m afraid of blushes turning a muddy brown on me. But when I swatched it, oh my oh my, it turned out to be such a gorgeous peachy color! It has just enough of a sheen to catch light cast on your cheeks with its subtle golden shimmers.
If shimmers and glitters were torchlights, I’d imagine the teeny specks from Papa Don’t Peach to be glowsticks – enough to give out light but not glaring to the eyes.
More importantly, it gives my skin a healthy glow and a natural-looking touch of color. In Sephora’s own words, it ‘adds a warm burst of fresh peach for a fresh-flushed face’.
This color is somewhat similar to NARS Orgasm - which is definitely an essential in my travel makeup bag -, but with much less gold shimmer and slants more towards peach (see comparison below). This is perfect for people who shun glitter and shimmer (because they tend to amplify fine lines and highlight pores in an unflattering way), but still want healthy, glowing cheeks.
Staying Power and Pigmentation
One of the things that stopped people from giving Papa Don’t Peach a full five stars rating on MakeupAlley is the staying power of this blush. The exact reasons as to why they said pigmentation is insufficient or that the color fades after a couple of hours, well, your guess is as good as mine. It could be that they didn’t use a proper blush brush or a face primer was not used before face makeup application.
To me, this looks great on my cheeks and lasts as long as all my other blushes! And it is definitely very pigmented too!
Here are swatches of NARS Orgasm and Papa Don’t Peach. Both were swatched without a primer underneath and they went on my hand easily and smoothly.
Left: Orgasm; Right: Papa Don't Peach
Papa Don’t Peach gives a warm glow without making it too obvious that you ‘faked’ it.
If the color doesn’t appear as easily on darker skin tones, just layer it on as it is definitely buildable without looking cakey.
Papa Don’t Peach is also included in the Too Faced Fun in the Dark Palette.
Get Too Faced Fun in the Dark Palette
Get Too Faced Papa Don’t Peach Blush
Bun Bun rates the Too Faced Papa Don’t Peach Blush:
What is your favorite peach blusher?
How do you think the Too Faced Papa Don't Peach Blush compares against the NARS Orgasm Blush?
