New brushes from eBay

I’m always on the hunt for new brushes. When I first started using makeup, I used my fingers. *Don’t judge me*

Eventually I decided to dabble in makeup brushes. I watch tons of beauty vlogs and all I want are Morphe brushes, Sigma brushes, Spectrum brushes being my latest brush crush, but I can’t afford those and they’re difficult to get hold of here in South Africa.

Reading blogs, watching vlogs, I still couldn’t understand why the heck beauty bloggers had 1 gazillion brushes. That is………until my brushes got dirty. I bought a few spares….and those got dirty….. Then you realise you need to actually wash your brushes, regularly…..

So a few months ago I saw this really pretty brush set on Pink Peonies’ blog and it was super affordable, Luzanne gave them a good review so I thought, hmmm….why not try and get a set.

I went onto eBay and found a set that looked similar and clicked ‘add to cart’. This seller offered free shipping so $15 seemed like a score for 18 brushes.

The bag is really pretty and I’ve wanted a makeup brush bag for a long time and they’re really pricey. So for that alone the price tag is worth it. I ordered on the 25th of May and I think they arrived here on the 25th of July, straight to my door! That really impressed me. I didn’t have any customs, so that was really great as well! The customs struggle is real here in South Africa.

Luzanne did warn that the pouch would possibly have a strong glue scent, but to just leave it open overnight and it would be odour free after that, and she was correct on both counts.

There are 18 brushes in the set and initially I wasn’t bothered to use any of them except the spoolie one (for my brows) and the big fan brush ( LOVE THAT BRUSH!), but as my usual brushes got dirtier, I realised I needed other options so I started using the eye shadow brushes and I must say they aren’t bad. 2 of them seem to be exactly the same. I didn’t get a dense blending brush and funny enough that is one brush I was looking forward to receiving, but it’s not a train smash. As I attempt to use gel liner as my latest bucket list item, I will be reaching for the liner brushes.

The brushes are pretty to look at and stand out from my usual black brushes and they feel sturdy. I’ve washed these brushes and initially I had a bit of shedding with the eye shadow brushes, but they’re fine now. The foundation brush I use to apply face masks (an awesome tip from a blogger I follow) as I just don’t use those flat foundation brushes for foundation anymore.

I don’t know that if you’re a brush snob you’d love these brushes, but as somebody starting out and to have a spare set of clean brushes, these are really great considering I paid around R225 for the set incl delivery to my door….that’s around R12,5o per brush! You are never going to buy a brush locally for R12,50 anywhere!

I’m waiting for a few Wet n Wild brushes to arrive that’s been at customs for a week now (pray with me people that they just send them through), so I’m excited to review those once I finally get my hands on them.

What are your favourite budget brush brands? Would you purchase these off eBay?

PS My pictures are HIDEOUS. I took these a while ago and obviously didn’t check them after I took them. The brushes are *shocker* dirty and all over the place now so I couldn’t retake the pictures. I also thought I took individual brush pictures. Oops. Apologies for that.