There aren’t many good make-up brushes to be found at drugstores. They’re okay for fiddling around at home but they aren’t the kind of tools professionals would use. The best brushes are inevitably from reputable and famous cosmetic brands and even so, you’d have to purchase their full-sized brushes and not those from seasonal brush sets.

Urban Beauty United has a range of make-up tools, sponges, applicators, brushes, etc. available exclusively at Watsons. While browsing at the accessories display at Watsons, it’s hard to miss the colourful sponges and brushes.

All the brushes are hygienically packed in sealed bags so there’s no testing which makes it a bit of “hit-and-miss” with these tools. Since they were on discount, I picked up the Kabuki Crush brush and Shady Lady eyeshadow brush. I was quite taken by the vibrant bristles, fuchsia pink for the Kabuki and other face brushes and purple for the eyeshadow brush (only one available). The product description of these brushes don’t say whether they are made of animal hair or synthetic materials but I have a feeling it’s the latter.

This is my first Kabuki brush, I’ve always wanted to get one just to see what the fuss is all about. The bristles on Kabuki Crush are dense all right, just what they should be like on any typical Kabuki brush but the bristles are not soft. The bristles feel quite hard and pokey on my face. I use it just to apply bronzer/blusher as I don’t want my whole face to be poked by this brush.

Nevertheless, its redeeming factor is that it applies the blusher evenly and there are no visible demarcations on my cheeks. I wonder if it will get softer with time or is that too much to hope for? It’s a nice looking brush but I probably would not have bought it if I’d had an opportunity to test it out beforehand.

For the look below, I used the 2 make-up brushes to apply eyeshadows from The Balm’s Shady Lady Vol. 3 and Pop Beauty Sun Bronzer.

The Shady Lady eyeshadow brush is firm and tapered to apply eyeshadow easily on the eyelid. It picked up The Balm’s Shady Lady eyeshadows very well and I like it because it deposited the eyeshadows in the angles of my eyelids quite efficiently.

This brush doesn’t feel pokey and I can certainly see myself using it everyday. However, it’s just good to pick up powder eyeshadows. I tried using it with pigments but it doesn’t seem to pick up pigments well, much less use it to apply pigments on my eyelids.

These are some of the makeup tools from Urban Beauty United which are available at Watsons, prices in brackets are the discounted prices (I don’t have the prices of items (5) to (8):-

(1) Shady Lady Eyeshadow Brush RM14.90 (RM12.65)

(2) Kabuki Crush Kabuki Brush RM37.90 (32.20)

(3) Screen Preen Powder Brush RM25.90 (RM22)

(4) Picture Perfect Stippling Brush RM35.90 (RM30.90)

(5) Berry Blush Angled Blusher Brush

(6) Fancee Me Fan Brush

(7) Bronze Bombshell Bronzer & Shimmer Brush RM22.90 (RM19,45)

(8) Foundation Sponge Duo Sponge Cakes RM18.90 (RM16.05).

So far, I have only seen these products at Watsons MidValley, KLCC and Sunway Pyramid but they should also be available at bigger Watsons outlets such as Sungai Wang Plaza, Pavilion and 1Utama.