In Depth Into Chantecaille at Their NYC Headquarters

I stopped by Chantecaille‘s glossy Soho headquarters a few days ago to meet with Kristen Ott, who handles the brand’s public relations and Eddie Hernandez who is the brand’s in-house makeup pro. Until meeting with the two my knowledge about the brand was fairly limited. I’ve tried their SPF powder and mascara, both of which are great (their mascara is actually one of the best I’ve ever used – lasts all day but doesn’t stick to your lashes in a way that makes them shed when you’re taking it off – and it’s rose scented!), but I had no idea that rose was a brand signature. In fact all of their products have a rose water base (versus most products which use just a water base). More surprisingly still that strong rose scent you get with many of their products is completely natural (especially hard to believe for anyone who has used their anniversary rose cream…smells amazing!), so no worries about it irritating your skin (Artificial fragrance is the #1 skin irritant. That said some natural fragrances can cause irritation, but rose isn’t one of the common ones). The roses that go into their products all hail from Grasse where the brand has their own harvest (the roses they use only grow in May).

Sylvie Chantecaille, who worked at Prescriptives before launching her brand, launched with fragrance – another new thing I learned. Am I the only one who didn’t know the brand made perfumes? They’re gorgeous. They come in handmade glass bottles with a beautiful glass stopper and a dropper that disappears in the bottle. Also worth notice is their gel foundation, which is super light and oil free. When Hernandez applied the foundation and concealer it literally disappeared on my skin, covering all my unevenness without it looking like I was wearing any makeup. Better yet it didn’t clog my pores even though I wore it to hot yoga later in the day. All of this is in keeping with the lady-like, refined brand image. Nothing is about heavy, done-up makeup and their colors tend to be on the lighter side. I did also get to check out some holiday palettes however when I was there and they’re going to be launching some darker shades with huge color payoff later this month. Lastly, their Nano Gold Energizing Eye Serum is also worth singling out. If like me you don’t suffer from too much under-eye puffiness and therefore find most creams to be too heavy, this works great and the roller-ball has an instant cooling effect (especially if you keep it in your fridge!) to wake up tired eyes.