Rimmel Provocalips 16Hr Kissproof Lip Colour Review

Rimmel Provocalips is my new favourite lipstick. It may be the last lipstick I ever need (OK, that’s obviously a lie, but you get the idea – I’m obsessed).

I love lipstick, but I’m a low-maintenance girl. I’m pretty lazy, and checking my make-up in the mirror on a regular basis is too much for me to deal with. I can’t count the number of times I’ve gone to work with nice lipstick, then drunken a few cups of tea and eaten an apple, then when I make it to the bathroom three hours later I discover that my lipstick has slid off my lips and disappeared. Or made its way onto my teeth. Or the side of my mouth, and I look like the Joker.

It’s because of this that despite my love of bold lipstick, I only manage to muster up the motivation to wear it once or twice a month. I usually get lazy and end up at my old still-looks-good-after-food favourite, Revlon Kissable Balm Stains.

Enter Rimmel Provocalips. These come in double-ended doe foot applicators. One end has a liquid lipstick, while the other end has a moisturising, non-sticky gloss. The packaging colour is generally pretty close to what’s inside.

The concept is pretty similar to Revlon’s ColorStay Overtime Lip Color and Maybelline’s Superstay 24 Hour Lip Color, which have been around for a while, though the Rimmel ones are the first ones I’ve seen under $20. First, you apply 1 or 2 coats of the sticky liquid lipstick (it feels a bit like latex), wait til it starts looking matte, then you add the gloss on top to seal it in.

Rimmel Provocalips comes in 8 shades. I’m wearing 2 coats in these swatches, with the gloss on top:

Make Your Move – pink brown (more pink than the packaging)

I’ll Call You – medium pink

Little Minx – bright fuschia pink

Kiss Me You Fool – bold warm red

Play With Fire – deep cool red

Kiss Fatal – frosty plum

Skinny Dipping – nude brown

Dare to Pink – nude pink

While it’s usually hard to find a lipstick that suits me, most of these shades actually fit me really well. Naturally I love both Kiss Me You Fool and Play With Fire, but I was also pleasantly surprised by how pretty I’ll Call You and Little Minx looked on me. I’m also in love with Make Your Move as a natural understated lip colour. Kiss Fatal was promising, but the frost is a bit too heavy and looks quite dated, while the two nudes (Skinny Dipping and Dare to Pink) just look weird on me – they would probably work better on someone with lighter skin. I really couldn’t get Dare to Pink to work, as you can see from the swatches it just wouldn’t apply evenly.

The longevity of these is fabulous. They are indeed transfer-proof while kissing, but on top of that, they stay remarkably intact while eating and drinking. I road-tested 5 of the shades – each time, I put the lipstick on in the morning and didn’t reapply the base colour for the whole 16 hours (that’s from morning til bedtime). They all looked good from a distance, even after 2 meals, and sometimes a hardcore dance class or two as well – I was really impressed! As you might’ve guessed, the dark colours show patchiness more, and for some of them the missing flakes were obvious up close by the end of the day.

Here’s what they look like after a full day:

Of course, the flip side to longevity is that the lip colour is a pain to remove – I’ve found that letting oil or lip balm sit on them for a while before rubbing with a wipe is the best way to remove them, but it still takes a good 5 minutes and I never manage to get it all off. It also feels a bit clingy and stiff while it’s on, although the gloss makes it a lot more comfortable.

Overall, I’m in love with those 5 shades and the formula – they’re so good for absentminded lipstick lovers like me. If you also love bold lips but don’t want to worry too much about reapplication, you’ll love these!

Weirdly enough, after I tried these out, I realised that I’ve actually discovered these before. I bought a product called Lips2Last by a German brand called Manhattan when I was in Switzerland, that looks eerily similar to the new Provocalips range.

Even more bizarrely, Manhattan has just released a new range of lip products that look strangely familiar:

Yep, you guessed it – Manhattan is also owned by Coty, and it looks like they share some products too. They’re the Rimmel of Central Europe. The Manhattan shade I have was actually patchier than the Rimmel, and a bit weirdly frosty – I guess the newer product has an improved formula!

Rimmel Provocalips is available from Priceline and other Rimmel stockists for $17.95.

These products were provided for editorial consideration, which did not affect my opinion. For more information, see Disclosure Policy.