Shiseido Aqualabel White Liquid Foundation Swatches

Shiseido Aqualabel is the drugstore version to its more upmarket parent brand, Shiseido, much like Majolica Majorca. However, while Majolica Majorca, ZA, and a bunch of other brands tend to focus on cosmetic products, Shiseido Aqualabel actually focuses more on skincare - in fact, it has very few makeup items, and the best-sellerss in the Aqualabel are the lotions and essences. Thanks to its association with Shiseido, Aqualabel has also been very popular here, as it is often considered to be similar to Shiseido in quality, but at a drugstore price.

Today I'm bringing you some quick swatches of one of the rare makeup items in Shiseido Aqualabel's line - the White Liquid Foundation SPF 23 PA ++ range. Wow, that's quite a mouthful for a foundation name, isn't it? But it's perfectly in keeping with Japanese product naming conventions - somehow, an eyeshadow just isn't an eyeshadow unless it's named "Girly Make Luminous Pearl Wet Eye Jelly" or something like that. You know, just like how Western brands like to sex up their product names (I'm looking at you, NARS), Asian brands lovingly give their products grandiosely long and uselessly descriptive names. (Just to clarify some comments I've seen on the post, this entire paragraph is meant to be taken with a sense of humour - because you know, the propensity of brands to give products ridiculous names to acheive sales targets happens in both Asian and Western brands. I just comment more on Asian brands because, well, I happen to live in Asia, so I see a lot more of this stuff here. Perhaps some of the humour may have gotten lost in translation when it went from my brain to the blog. It's not intended to offend.)

Anyway, the Shiseido Aqualabel White Liquid Foundation comes in a slim, blue tube with a nozzle at the end. To use the foundation, you have to gently squeeze the foundation out of the tube - I say gently, because squeeze too hard and you get a big squirt of foundation. But enough of my blather. Here are swatches:



L - R: BO10, OC10, PO10, OC20, OC30

Maybe at this point it might be good for me to briefly mention Asian foundation shade naming conventions. Generally, BO would stand for Beige, PO would stand for Pink, and OC would stand for Ochre - so you know, BO and OC would lean yellow, and PO would usually be a bunch of pink-based shades. And following the colour prefix (BO, OC, PO, etc), there will be a number (10, 20, 30 etc), and the higher the number, the darker the shade. When you know that, breaking down those confusing shade names makes a lot more sense!

BO10, as the name suggests, is a fair beige that leans a little yellow. It's the best match for me, and I'm about NC20 in MAC.

OC10 is a fair yellow beige as well. The difference between OC10 and BO10 is that one is more yellow than the other, although it's kinda hard to make out the difference, even though they're swatched thickly side by side on my arm. I think OC10 is a hair yellower, but I could be wrong.

PO10 is a very pink-toned beige. I can't even imagine why a shade like that is in the Asian market, because in my entire life I've never come across any Asian girl with this skintone. This is so pink it's really more of what I'd call a "Caucasian pink beige" kind of shade, as opposed to an "Asian pink beige".

OC20 is one step up from OC10 in terms of shade depth. I'm thinking this may be MAC's NC25 - NC30 in shade, but that's just pure guesstimation on my part.

OC30 is one step darker than OC20, and just as yellow-toned. I'm going to guesstimate that this may be rougly a MAC NC35, possibly a NC40?

The Aqualabel White Liquid Foundations have a very fluid, watery texture, making them a little harder to control. Pigmentation on these is pretty decent, giving you light-to-medium coverage. The White Liquid Foundation also doesn't have any shimmer or glitter in it. This would probably appeal to girls who are looking for a foundation with a light texture and pigmentation.