Review: Crown Brush
Before Ordering: I was back and forth on placing an order with Crown Brush for almost a year, in all honesty. The main factors in my hesitation were the $25 USD minimum order, and that I didn’t even know where to begin with their selection.
What I Ordered: a large duofiber face brush (C406), a Luna line blending fluff (BK13), the Syntho line deluxe crease (SS012) and deluxe eyeliner (SS008) brushes, the Studio line Taklon pointed liner (C250) and sable pointed liner (C250S) brushes, and a short-handled angle Taklon brush from the Backstage line (S160SH).
Shipping Time: I placed my order on January 20th. I received a shipping notice the same day, and my actual order on January 24th.
Packaging: My order arrived in a plain bubble mailer, with each individual brush in a plastic wrapper.
The Product:
Large duofiber face (C406): there were a few errant/kinked hairs in this brush upon receipt, but nothing too bad. I don’t think it was a matter of price = quality, as I’ve had the same problem with MAC brushes. I believe this type of brush is more suited to liquid or cream makeup, but I tried it with my powder foundation regardless and found that it didn’t work too well. I did have some mild shedding, 5-7 hairs came out during the first use and wash, even though I had already washed the brush prior to use. For reference, I do believe that the equivalent MAC brush is a bit more dense.
Luna blending fluff (BK13): this brush is a lot bigger than I expected! In fact, it’s too large, by my preferences, for its intended eye makeup use, and I wound up using it with blush. The brush head looked lopsided/cut crooked when I received it, but was fine after I washed it. There was some minor shedding pre-wash that only got worse with at least 10 hairs coming out during the first use!
Syntho deluxe crease (SS012): I purchased this as a blender substitute for my MAC 222 brush. The tip of the brush head feels soft, yet it has some firmness to it. It works great and has become my everyday crease blender brush. Note that the brush head is smaller than the 222.
Syntho deluxe eyeliner (SS008): I expected the tip of this to be more tapered, but it’s almost like a duofiber in that the fine hair ends are white so it was probably just hard to photograph. The brush head is fine and small, though, making it easy to control. This brush has become my everyday cream/gel eyeliner brush, especially for use on the bottom waterline.
Studio Taklon pointed liner (C250): great size on this one. It’s a little finer than the SS008, but the hairs are a little longer.
Studio sable pointed liner (C250S): the size on this one isn’t so great. The diameter is about the same as the SS008, but the hairs are almost twice as long. The head has a nice, precise taper when wet, but the length makes it harder for me to control.
Backstage short-handled angle Taklon (S160SH): Crown Brush’s website specifies this brush as 1/8 size, which I believe means the width of the brush head is 1/8″ thick. The taper on it is amazing, though, and honestly puts the MAC 208 to shame; I’ll pretty much be limiting mine to use as an eyebrow brush now. The head length is more like 3/16″ or 5mm. This brush is very nice and makes a great replacement for the goofy little angle brushes that tend to come packaged with cream/gel eyeliners, and is perfect if you tend to get as close to the mirror as possible when doing your eyeliner so that you can actually see what you’re doing.
The one thing you must keep in mind when ordering from Crown is that as the price goes down, the quality does as well. The quality on the higher-end lines, like Luna, is steps above the lower-end lines, like Basic. Personally, I tried to aim more for synthetic brushes, but I have heard lots of good about the badger lines.
Customer Service: I had no need to contact Crown Brush. I was surprised by how quick I received my order, as I expected a slightly longer wait. I did, however, not like that I didn’t get some sort of order confirmation email from them; I only received an email from PayPal for the total amount, as that was my payment method, and an automated email from UPS with the tracking number.
Final Thoughts:
- Was I happy with my purchase? For the most part, yes.
- Would I order from Crown Brush again? Yes.
- Rating? 4.5 out of 5 stars.
Be aware that Crown Brush is illegally using the PETA approved bunny logo. They are not a verified cruelty-free company as they state. I approached the company about product information and received faulty, fraudulent information about their cruelty-free status. I, therefore, will not order any products from them. I am not a PETA member but I have verified this all with them.
I too only purchase cruelty free products, but to correct you– The bunny logo does not belong to PETA, it belongs to the Leaping Bunny, which has no affiliations with PETA.
PETA’s Cruelty Free Bunny and Leaping Bunny are actually two different programs, though both have a similar purpose and campaign, with PETA’s Cruelty Free Bunny probably being the more recognized of the two in the US.
I actually happen to know that Crown makes the brushes for MAC. There is a difference in the quality of the brushes that they make for MAC, but it is small. If you are a budget conscious buyer I would recommend buying the higher quality-slightly higher priced Crown brushes in bulk over the MAC brushes in small numbers. They also make the brushes for several other companies but MAC is definitely the most well known.
I believe that Crown makes some of the brushes for MAC. MAC brushes are made in different countries and the ones I’ve had personally have been stamped with Japan, USA, and France. I remember reading that the Japanese manufacturer is a very high-end brush maker with some pricey stuff.