Welcome to Deep Reviews—your one-stop destination to discover the absolute best products and brands the beauty industry has to offer. The Who What Wear staffers you already know and trust will research, test, and review the market’s most sought-after and buzzed-about products to see which formulas (of the hundreds up for consideration) are truly worth your hard-earned money and attention. You can expect honest, completely uncensored feedback and no-BS recommendations our hard-to-please testers endorse without reservations.
The majority of our Deep Reviews will feature our editors’ honest, ultra-hot takes on entire product categories or multiple products from a particular beauty brand, but every so often, we’ll sprinkle in a special single-product format called Honestly, I Love It. As the name suggests, these reviews will hone in on one standout beauty formula our editors quite literally can’t shut up about. This time around, I’m highlighting the Ami Colé Lip Treatment Oil ($20).
If you’ve been tapped into the online beauty community in the last couple of years, you have likely heard a thing or two about Ami Colé. The fresh-on-the-scene Black-owned beauty brand is the brainchild of Diarrha N’Diaye, and it was created to address a lack of beauty products available that considered melanin-rich folks at the inception of products rather than as an afterthought. Now, a couple of years after its launch, Ami Colé has built a cult following with its famous Lip Treatment Oil at the center of its dramatic rise.
As an editor, I like to keep up with what’s trending and getting people excited. Among the never-ending internet chatter of the latest and greatest cool-girl products, the Lip Treatment Oil has consistently been on my mind. On top of that, I couldn’t help but notice the number of repeat purchasers on my feed. When the opportunity to take the lip oil for a whirl presented itself, I had to know what all the hype was about.
The product comes in four shades: Exellence, a glossy brown; Bliss, a light pink; Reflection, clear; and Smitten, a bright reddish pink. The lip oil arrived in a pretty bright-orange box, and the bottle seemed to have a fair amount of product. It looked pretty standard as far as lip glosses go. As I twisted the bottle open, I was immediately impressed at the size of the applicator. The brush tip was larger than I was used to seeing on my other lip glosses. This quality reduced my need to repeatedly coat the brush in the product to get ample coverage. One swoop of the product was enough to coat my full-sized lips.
As a lip-gloss girl through and through, the glossy sheen from one swipe of product was incredibly pleasing. The lip oil immediately made my lips look moisturized, luscious, and shiny.
As for the feel, I experienced little to no stickiness. I was totally surprised by this, especially because the product is a bit on the thicker, more viscous end as far as consistency goes. My lips felt properly moisturized and appeared ultra-hydrated as well. I used the product over a few weeks and felt that my lips sans product looked a little smoother than they had been previously. I learned that this is due to the Lip Treatment Oil’s three-in-one formula containing baobab oil, camellia-seed oil, and passion fruit–seed oil. These powerhouse ingredients promote moisturized lips, skin hydration, antioxidants, and moisture retention among other benefits.
I really do feel like this product lived up to the high expectations set by the internet beauty community. I was pretty pleased with my previous reliable lip gloss, but I’m officially shifting to the Lip Treatment Oil as my go-to product to keep my lips looking plump, moisturized, and juicy.
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