A Tale of Two Sigma Brushes

Sunday, February 10, 2013

I've been curious about this brand's brushes for quite a while and I must say that I'm ~~a bit of a brush freak~~. I'm a total brush freak. At my high point I had around 80 but not only was that annoying as heck to wash, I no longer needed so many because I was not applying makeup to other people. I've since then eliminated my brush stash down to under 40 brushes and must admit that I have rather high standards for the ones that I buy these days.

There was however, two very specific brushes that I felt like I was missing in my collection. I wanted a small smudge brush and a tapered cheek brush. Luckily I had an Amazon gift card laying around so I decided to put it to good use and order a couple Sigma brushes.

I ordered two Sigma brushes, the F35 Tapered Highlighter and the E20 Short Shader. Sigma brushes have nice solid handles (I actually have no idea what it is made of, black lacquered wood or plastic? Morgan and I spent some time puzzling over it. I'm leaning towards plastic because of the engraving and the weight.) and double crimped ferrule. The brush number and the Sigma logo have a nice deep holographic which I'm quite certain will last longer than MAC's notoriously fast fading brush markings. Neither one of these brushes bled or shed any hairs while I washed them (I've washed them each about 4 times now), though I have read some blogs mentioning that some of their brushes bled.

First, the F35 Tapered Highlighter. Natural bristles, pretty soft and the cut is pretty nice. However, it is a bit smaller/not as dense as I would have hopped, not nearly as round as pictures of it on the website suggest. As a result, I feel like I lack control when applying either a highlighter or contour shade with this brush and the area of application is rather small, I don't really find that I reach for it. If it been a slightly larger and denser head, I think I would have loved it. Perhaps I should take a look at the much larger sister F25. The F35 Tapered Highlighter is $18.

The E20 Short Shader on the other hand, I grew to like quite a bit. Again, I feel like it could be denser and softer but it is a great addition to my brushes. It is very usefully for depositing color in my lower lash line and for small areas of my eye, like smudging color into my upper lash line. I think that in the future I might look into NARS #15 Smudge Brush, because I think it is a bit smaller and would be even better suited for my needs. However, the E20 is quite a bit cheaper at just $10.

To sum it up, I would recommend the E20. In fact, if I lost it I'd probably repurchase it. The F35 however, is just ok. I think this highlighter brush is nothing to write home about and probably won't be used very often at all. I think the quality of Sigma brushes (based on just the two that I bought) is good for the price, but then again you have to remember just how low the prices are. If you're looking for beginner brushes for makeup, these would work splendidly. But there are definitely better quality brushes out there and I think it is worthwhile to invest in those.

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