When Merit Beauty started shipping to Australia last September, there was a collectively sigh of relief from all Australian beauty lovers. A cult beauty brand founded in 2021, Merit is known for creating simple makeup products that are impossible to mess up.
For Black Friday this year, Merit is offering 20% off its entire range, plus an extra 30% of select shades and an extra 20% off select sets. Blessedly, they’ve given ELLE readers a two-day head start on the sale. Use code ‘EAELLEAU’ at checkout to shop the Merit Black Friday Sale, from 9am AEST 22 November.
Read: Inside Access: Unlock Merit’s Black Friday Sale 48 Hours Early With Our Exclusive Code
Many of the base products come in stick formats with a multipurpose promise that they will replace more than one item in your beauty bag. The Minimalist Perfecting Complexion Stick is a case in point for this. It retails for $61 and promises to be neither a foundation nor a concealer, but a product that can do both, and I’ve already been through two tubes (extremely high praise from a beauty editor).
The ELLE Edit Of The Best Merit Beauty Products:
- Merit The Minimalist Complexion Stick, $61
- Merit Flush Balm Cheek Colour, $48
- Merit Signature Lip Lightweight Lipstick, $42
- Merit Clean Lash Lengthening Mascara, $42
- Merit Solo Shadow Eye Colour, $42
- Merit Brow 1980 Volumizing Pomade, $38
This product captures the ethos of the brand beautifully. The stone-coloured packaging is effortlessly chic and travel-friendly, and the product itself has a skin-like finish that’s not designed to mask your natural skin texture, but rather, offer a touch of coverage just where you want it. This is also the case for the Flush Balm Cheek Colour ($48), which is a creamy and easily blendable cheek tint that comes in nine shades, and the Bronzer Balm Sheer Bronzer (also $48), which is a sheer-buildable product that adds a subtle warmth to the skin.
Merit’s goal is to bring an elevated touch to simple morning makeup routines. The range is a tight edit, with lip oils, a brow pomade, sheer lipstick, and a few skincare products designed to work well underneath makeup, plus a few essential makeup brushes.
This thoughtful approach is also evident in the formulations, which are pumped with skincare ingredients like antioxidants, vitamin B5, and squalane. Meanwhile, the packaging also has added benefits, with every first Merit order coming in a chic little bag that doubles as a makeup bag or clutch on a night out. Even the website is properly optimised for the online shopper, with all 20 shades of the Complexion Stick modelled on 20 different people, to try and take the guesswork out of virtual shade matching.
If you haven’t gathered yet, Merit is a brand people rave about — and you don’t need to take our word for it. Merit counts celebrities like Gossip Girl‘s Kelly Rutherford and Hilary Duff amongst its list of fans. It’s also earned industry awards for 13 formulations, including Allure Best of Beauty awards for the Flush Balm and Brush No. 1 Blending Brush ($51).
Ahead, we share our personal favourite products and explain why we love them so much. And don’t forget to take advantage of that early access sale!
This complexion stick is technically not a foundation or a concealer, but it’s also both. I love its sheer, buildable coverage that allows us to add extra product only where we need it. It also adds a beautiful, satin-finish glow to the skin, and has become a true staple in my makeup bag. In fact, I’m reaching the end of my second tube and plan to restock long before it runs out, so I never have to go one day without it.
Key features:
- Available in 30 shades
- Hydrating formulation
- Contains sea daffodil extract to help diminish pigmentation
We didn’t anticipate a matte cream eyeshadow to be a standout product from the range, but it truly is. It has a creamy formula that blends easily with a brush or finger, like the rest of Merit’s products, and it dries down beautifully. We’re big fans of the neutral colour range but are excited to try the darker shadows for a smokey eye and liner effect.
Key Features
- Easy to blend
- Available in 8 matte shades
- Buildable colour
The Merit lipsticks can be worn as a comfortable, sheer lip or as a bolder evening look (particularly in the case of the matte finish lipsticks). They’re formulated with hydrating skincare ingredients like squalane and sunflower seed oil, and last well throughout the day. We’re yet to find a lipstick that doesn’t need touching up but these do fade quite evenly, so are an easy product to top up as needed.
Key features:
- Two finishes: matte and satin
- Available in 15 shades
- Hydrating formula
Flush Balm Cheek Colour
$48 at Merit
The Flush Balm delivers exactly what it promises on the tube: a balmy flush to the skin. The product is unbelievably creamy and glides over the skin, plus, it’s easily blendable with your fingers and the packaging is so lightweight that it can easily slip into your handbag for on-the-go touch-ups. We’ve found that it does tend to fade quickly, but this has been somewhat overcome by applying a light layer of translucent powder over the top and then tapping on another layer of blush.
Key features:
- Lightweight, buildable pigment
- Available in 13 shades
- Formulated with soothing vitamin E
If you love the original solo shadow formula, then allow us to introduce you to one of the collection’s newest recruits. The ‘sheen’ shadows give a subtle iridescence to the eyelid thanks to microfine pearls, which means it avoids looking glittery or greasy. Plus, it’s just as crease-free as the original matte formulations. I love to wear this layered over one of the nude shadows for an everyday look, but you could also pop it on before leaving the office for a “day to night” transition.
Key Features
- Available in 6 sheen shades
- Formulated with microfine pearl
- Easy to blend
This mascara is a great everyday mascara for lovers of a lengthened and defined lash but not a full va-va-voom lash. It adds just enough volume to make your lashes look like they’re naturally perfect, rather than coated in a thick layer of mascara. Plus, the tubing formula makes it smudge-proof (really!).
Key features:
- Formulated with vitamin B5 to add shine
- Tubing mascara
- Contains conditioning fatty acids and olive oil esters
Brow 1980 Volumizing Pomade
$38 at Merit
If you love a fluffy brow that stays in place all day, then this product is for you. Available in four shades, the volumising pomade applies like a brow gel but has more of a fluffy wax texture, which means your brows are lent a thicker appearance without looking too heavy. As for the hold, we’d describe it as medium-flexible, so while it won’t move around through the day, you also won’t get that concrete-like hold or crunchy texture.
Key features:
- Available in 4 shades
- Includes conditioning panthenol
- Kaolin clay and mineral pigments
This lightweight and buildable formula provides a sheer tint, with a natural looking finish that blends effortlessly into the skin. With an SPF 45, this product provides broad spectrum UVA and UVB protection while also providing a subtle wash of colour to the skin. It’s also formulated without any oils or silicones, and is non-comedogenic, which means it won’t clog your pores throughout the day.
Key features:
- Available in 15 shades
- Broad spectrum UVA/UVB protection
- Non-comedogenic, oil-free, and made without silicones
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