Safe, Cruelty-Free Makeup At Sephora - Brands to buy, and what NOT to buy
Sephora. The holy land for makeup lovers. Land of $45 dollar pressed powders and $65 eye shadow palettes... which I bought once when I was broke as a joke and too embarassed to tell the cashier it was out of my price range (and don’t even try to tell me you’ve never done something like that). This post definitely doesn’t cover every brand of cruelty-free makeup at Sephora, but it does tackle some of the most popular ones, and I invite you to let me know if I’m missing any. To determine what to include I went to the PETA website and a few others to look at which brands are cruelty-free. From there, I checked some of the most popular brands that were on the list with the EWG's Skin Deep website. After that I went and applied for my pension and played some bingo because it took so freaking long that I was like WHAT YEAR IS IT!? But anyway.
A couple important notes before we get started: the EWG rates products on a 1-10 scale. 1-2 being low hazard, 3-6 being moderate, and 7-10 being high hazard. I looked at which brands have most of their makeup products in the low to moderate range (so I ignored the scores for things like nail polish and hair products).
Safe, Cruelty-Free Brands to Buy
Tarte. This brand is top of the list... sort-of. Most products fall between 1-4/5, with a few venturing up to 6. And even those products that get up to the 4/5/6 range aren't always that high because of cancer-causing agents or developmental & reproductive toxicity, they're often there because the products contain ingredients that could cause reactions for some people's skin. So in general this brand is a pretty safe bet!
Urban Decay. Around half of the products fall in the 1-2 range, and rest stay between 3-6.
Too Faced. Most products are in the 1-4 range, and almost all fall into the 1-6 range. The only products that are consistently above that are the Glamour Glosses.
Smashbox. I have never used this brand or even paid it much attention, but I know lots of friends who love it, so I looked it up and was pleasantly surprised. Most products fall between 1-4, with some going up to 5/6.
Stuff to Not Buy
One thing I've noticed in researching this post and the drug-store makeup post is that long-wear lip glosses, self-tanners and anti-aging products seemed to be the main culprits when I was looking through even the safest brands. Most of the safe brands would have pretty great products overall, but then when it came to the long-wear lip gloss, anti-aging cremes and self-tanners, the scores seemed to suddenly get a lot higher. I don't know why this is, but it’s a pattern I’ve noticed for years now.
SoI hope you all found this post helpful, I know I'm learning a lot by doing all of this research. If you have a favourite makeup brand that's safe and cruelty-free, share it in the comments so I can look it up and let other people know about it! Also, if you have any ideas for future posts or a request for a review, leave a comment and I'll try my best to look into it soon! Have a fabulous day!!
