My Love / Hate Relationship With Benefit They're Real Beyond Mascara

There are so many mascaras on the market these days, that it's almost impossible to choose which one to buy. There are so many different things to consider - Are your eyes sensitive? What colour do you want? Do you want length, or do you want curl or even volume? It's a tough choice, especially if you're a mascara whore like me, I love trying new mascaras and I very rarely show any brand or product loyalty.  I have a mascara drawer that's full to bursting point with new and unopened mascaras at all different price points and acquiring a new mascara always makes me happy.

Most of the mascaras in the drawer are one offs that have came in goodie bags, magazines, gifts with purchase or in beauty boxes, but suprisingly given my attitude to mascaras, I do have a few mascaras from one brand in particular - Benefit! As you know I love Benefit and in my collection I have a mini Roller Lash and a mini Bad Gal Lash, and I also have several full sized and mini They're Real Beyond Mascaras that I've received in beauty boxes, as pressies, in sets and that I've even bought myself.

Benefit They're Real Beyond Mascara was released in 2011, in a blaze of publicity and it's popularity has grown so much as of 2015 it's now the UK's No. 1 best selling mascara. I can see why and that's probably why it's something that I've repurchased, but I do have a bit of a love, hate relationship with it and today I'm going to tell you why x

Benefit They're Real Beyond Mascara is so named because it pretty much promises to give you that perfect false lash effect look in a tube and it also promises to do everything that you could ever want a mascara to do, It claims to lengthen, curl, volumise, lift and separate your lashes. It also claims to be long wearing and not to clump, smudge or dry out. Can a mascara really do everything for everyone? Well Benefits consumer tests certainly seem to suggest that this one can at least in part, in their research 94% saw dramatic length & volume, 94% saw a visible lift in their lashes and a massive 100% of participants saw long wearing results. Were my results the same? Let's see x

Unlike a lot of Benefit products, packaging wise They're Real seems to have a little less of the quirk factor. This mascara generally comes boxed and it comes in a pretty classy looking, gunmetal, plastic and metal tube.

Most mascaras these days are all about the wand and the spoolie and this one is no different. Long gone are the traditional bristles that you would find in Bad Gal, They're Real embraces the new generation of plastic and rubber spoolies, covered in row upon row of tiny vertical prongs, what makes this one special though is the tip of wand

It;s not easy to see it in this picture but the slightly domed tip is also also covered in tiny rubber bristles or prongs or whatever else you want to call them. This tip is specially designed to separate the lashes but you can also use it to flick out the corners of your lashes for that real fake lash look.

For me the formulation is good, it's not too wet and it's not dry or flaky. I've only tried the Black but it's a true rich matte black, some black mascaras can look ashy but not this one, it's a proper black mascara. which is designed for maximum impact.

At the risk of telling you something you already know, I'm assuming that you all know how to apply mascara, we all have our own ways of doing it, but Benefit provide you with some application instructions anyway, which actually do make the application a little bit easier. Holding the brush horizontally, they advise that you apply the mascara to your bottom lashes first and that you apply your mascara by wiggling the brush from side to side, rather than just brushing it on. Then if you've ever watched the amazing Benefit head make up artist, Lisa Potter Dixon on QVC UK you'll know that you need to twist the brush, and go VERTICAL, using the domed end of the brush to separate, curl and fan out your lashes. Then in theory you can then layer, and repeat till you achieve the look you want. The key words being in theory but more on that later. Here are a couple of before and afters so you can see the difference that just one coat makes.

Before

After

There is absolutely no doubt that just one coast of They're Real has made a significant difference to my lashes, they're thicker, they're definitely longer, they've got a definite curl to them and they're much darker! It also wears well, it doesn't flake, it doesn't feel drying on the lashes, and it doesn't irritate my eyes and it also doesn't come off until you take if off with a decent cleanser or eye make up remover. You could say that it does everything that Benefit says but for me the words, close but no cigar spring to mind.

I like this mascara but I do have a few issues with it, first of all the wand attracts way too much product and as a result you can end applying way too much at once, it just doesn't seem to have as good a wiper system as Roller Lash does.

Although  as you can see above one coat gives a dramatic enough result I do find that if you apply more than one coat in order to get a real full on false lash look, it has a real tendency to get a bit thick and clumpy, I know the whole point of the domed end of the wand it to lift and separate the lashes, but in my experience it's sometimes so clogged with mascara that you need to actually wipe it before you use it, and sometimes even then it just doesn't cut the mustard. It's not ideal and more often then not I still need to comb my lashes thoroughly with a lash comb to get that picture perfect false lash look. Okay it doesn't take any effort to pull out a lash comb but with a mascara and a wand that promised so much it is a bit frustrating

Thankfully for me, most of the time one coat is enough, and all I used to perfect the lashes you can see above was the mascara wand itself. There is no doubt in my experience that this mascara does achieve most of what it promises and I will probably repurchase it in the future but if you fancy giving it a go, take some tips from me - take care and time with your application to avoid blobs and clumps, and either have on hand a wipe to clean your wand or a lash comb to achieve that flawless lash look, oh and make sure you have a decent cleanser or eye make up remover at the ready, because this stuff stays on. Benefit They're Real Beyond Mascara in Black retails at around £19.50 for 8.5g of product and is available for various retailers including Debenhams, Boots, John Lewis, House Of Fraser and of course the Benefit Cosmetics UK website. Thanks for reading and don't forget to let me know if you have any questions about this review x