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Ingredients Explained
These ingredients are found in both products.
Ingredients higher up in an ingredient list are typically present in a larger amount.
CI 77163 is the color-index name for Bismuth Oxychloride, a lab-made white powder that acts as a pearl pigment.
It's what gives a lot of pressed powders, eyeshadows, highlighteres, and mineral foundations that soft pearly glow.
Due to its structure as flat, plate-like crystals that stack like tiles, it feels silky and sticks to skin well. This also makes it very chemically stable and insoluble under normal skin conditions (this just means it sits on top of skin rather than going into it).
It has an interesting quirk: it slowly goes gray in sunlight and the graying is partly reversible in the dark.
At this time, there's no legal cap on how much a brand can use. Both the FDA and the EU permit it without restriction so real-world concentration levels come down to formulation:
Allergy risk is low as well since it's insoluble and doesn't release free metal ions into skin. True allergic contact dermatitis to it is rare enough that there's very little published cases.
However, mineral makeup users do report itching or stinging. The leading explanation for this is irritation from those stiff platelet crystals rubbing on skin (also more likely with heavy, high-percentage loose mineral powders) rather than an immune reaction.
This ingredient shows up on a lot of "pore-clogging" lists but there's no real evidence behind that. It doesn't even have a comedogenic rating from an actual study; the numbers you'll find online come from blogs citing other blogs.
Some people still find it breaks them out. So if that's you, definitely trust your skin.
Learn more about CI 77163Ci 77491 is also hydrated iron III oxide. It's sole purpose is to give a red/pink hue to products.
Iron III oxides are classified as inorganic chemicals for coloring.
Synthetically created Ci 77491 is considered safer than those naturally found. This is because the synthetically created version may contain less impurities. Iron oxides are generally non-toxic and non-allergenic.
Learn more about CI 77491Mica is a naturally occurring mineral used to add shimmer and color in cosmetics. It can also help improve the texture of a product or give it an opaque, white/silver color.
Serecite is the name for very fine but ragged grains of mica.
This ingredient is often coated with metal oxides like titanium dioxide. Trace amounts of heavy metals may be found in mica, but these metals are not harmful in our personal products.
Mica has been used since prehistoric times throughout the world. Ancient Egyptian, Indian, Greek, Roman, Aztec, and Chinese civilizations have used mica.
Learn more about Mica