Guerlain Blush 4 Couleurs Madame Rougit from Fall 2013 Violette de Madame Collection

Without doubt, star product of Guerlain's Fall 2013 Make-up Collection Violette de Madame Blush 4 Couleurs Madame Rougit. It is a four-colored blush with lace design embossed on the surface, matching to the black lace theme of the collection.

Guerlain Blush 4 Couleurs Madame Rougit

The dots on the surface are oversprayed with white sparkling color and goes away after sweeping a few times with a brush. Logo of Guerlain is embossed in the middle of the blush between the dots in an elegant way.

Guerlain Blush 4 Couleurs Madame Rougit

The compact has two decks, lower one hosts a nice and soft mini-brush, which is also pink and fits the rest of the design. Brush is perfect for touch-ups on the go.

Guerlain Blush 4 Couleurs Madame Rougit

The size of the brush is great for picking up all the colors at once but since it is flat, it can also be used to pick up more of a certain color to contour or use one color more intensely than the others. Company name written in pink letters on the brush, which makes everything matchingly feminine and so pretty.

Guerlain Blush 4 Couleurs Madame Rougit and included brush

Up to here, I am smitten by the design and how Guerlain thought of every little detail about this product. Then I want to swatch it. I take a deep breath and hope that the design won't get damaged by doing so. I sweep a finger across the right most tan shade, result is buttery and fine milled. The powder almost melts on my finger. I gasp. Then I bring my second finger to the coral shade, the largest one of the pan. This one is even more smooth, I sigh happily! Then I want to swatch the pale pink shade between the coral and fuchsia. Hmmm... This one is a little harder. But the stripe is so tiny, I come to the conclusion that I can't feel it. I decide to run my finger, this time on the left most fuchsia color. Suddenly I am alarmed. This one feels like plastic! Instead of the buttery texture of the right two shades, this one is hard as a rock and after several sweeps, I look at my finger to see almost no color. I then get a hard creme eye shadow brush and almost scratch the surface (which is not easy to scratch because of the hardness!) to get the following swatches.

Swatch under direct sun light: Guerlain Blush 4 Couleurs Madame Rougit

I take two photos, indoors and outdoors for you to get more idea of the colors. Shades are as follows (on the swatches from left to right):

• Fuchsia (left most corner): Very hard texture almost no color pay off
• Light pink (second from left): Hard to tell since it is hard to pick up alone but it is hard, maybe a little softer than fuchsia shade.
• Soft coral (second from right, the main shade): Buttery texture, very finely milled, almost melts on the skin, good color pay-off for a soft shade.
• Tan apricot (right most): Texture is as smooth and buttery as the coral part, very soft color but it is true to pan.

On the right most part of the swatches, you can see all the colors applied together with the brush that comes with the compact. As you see the resulting shade is rather coral than pink because the coral and apricot shades have good color pay-off while the other two don't.

Swatch with indirect light: Guerlain Blush 4 Couleurs Madame Rougit

The combination in Madame Rougit reminded me of Chanel's 2012 Spring Limited Edition Blush Horizon, which I found out later on that was already being discussed in many forums. I took a picture of them side by side for those of you who already own Chanel Horizon.

Chanel Blush Eclat Douceur Horizon vs. Guerlain Blush 4 Couleurs Madame Rougit

Once a brush used all over the blush, Chanel Horizon ends up much more pink toned than Guerlain which ends up mostly coral. I think the reason for it is the poor color pay-off of the pink tones in Guerlain Madame Rougit. Chanel Horizon is also more shimmery. Once the overspray is gone, Guerlain Madame Rougit is almost matte.

Chanel Blush Eclat Douceur Horizon vs. Guerlain Blush 4 Couleurs Madame Rougit

Final thoughts: Apply Madame Rougit on your cheeks, you are going to like the resulting soft and defining effect. Unless you want to swatch all the colors one by one, you might never notice this, but I find it very heart breaking that more than one third of the blush has poor quality. By poor quality I mean plastic finish and no color pay-off! I also can't come over the fact that quality is inconsistent throughout the product! At this price range (around 55€) everything should be perfect. I strongly recommend testing this product out yourself before ordering it, unless returns are accepted.

I am dying to know your experiences on this or previous Guerlain products. Please let me know.