Cover FX Custom Enhancer Drops Are Versatile AF

For the past few years, Cover FX has been steadily creating killer products to enhance and customize the makeup and skin care you're already wearing. Cover FX Custom Cover Drops can turn your favorite moisturizer into a tinted foundation, and the serums can be used to juice up your skin care with even more of the benefits that your specific skin type needs. The brand even has a collection of primers depending on how you like to prep your face for makeup.

But what we really need to talk about are those Cover FX Custom Enhancer Drops. They were released last year, and Cover FX just added three new shades, set for official release on March 3, that are really worth getting excited about.

Highlighting is the cornerstone of my beauty routine — I have a drawer full of highlighters. A deep drawer. A good foundation and a strong brow are important, too, but believe me, it all centers around the highlight.

When I got my hands on the original shades last year, it was love at first...high...light? You get what I mean. I know a lot of the beauty girls have been raving about them, but no one is actually talking about how to use them, aside from just tapping them on your cheekbones. That's great, but they can create so much more, it seems like a waste to simply use them like you use all your other highlighters. Simply put, there are a few alternative ways you can incorporate them into your routine. Here's how I do it.

Custom Enhancer Drops + Moisturizer

Cover FX Enhancer Drops, $42, Sephora; Kiehls Super Multi-Corrective Cream, $73, Amazon

Spoiler alert: This might have been my favorite way to use the highlighting drops.

So here's a thing about me: I prefer matte skin. I know, I can hear you hissing from the other end of the screen. I have combination skin, so if I'm not careful, I'll get oily throughout the day and my skin will look shiny. Like, real shiny. If I'm barefaced, I use moisturizers that control shine, and if I'm wearing makeup, I'll use a matte foundation, then glow up my face with a highlighter. I don't like foundations and moisturizers that give me an all over glow. They're just not for me.

Which is why I didn't think I'd be down with the highlight drops mixed in with my moisturizer. Boy, was I wrong.

I added three drops of the new Custom Enhancer Drops in Blossom, a pink shade, to the normal amount of moisturizer I usually use. I chose the Kiehl's Super Multi-Corrective Cream because it's an awesome option when you're looking for a standard, rich moisturizer. I mixed it all up in my palms, then I took this vaguely nasty photo to show you.

Then I just slathered it all over my damn face.

POP. The thing about these is though you're basically freebasing your highlight, they mix really well with other products. It didn't look like I had covered my face in chrome — instead, it made my skin glow, but not in the way that a normal moisturizer would do. It was more.

The drops add a soft sheen to your skin that you just don't get from other products. You can really see it on top of your cheekbones, the bridge of your nose, and that scar above your (my) eyebrow. Everywhere you're already highlighting. It's really, really nice.

Custom Enhancer Drops + Primer

Yves Saint Laurent Primer, $52, Saks Fifth Avenue; Cover FX Enhancing Drops, $42, Sephora; Maybelline Dream Cushion, $10, Amazon

No matter what type of foundation you're using, an illuminating primer underneath will add a subtle bit of glow. Your face can have some gorgeous luminosity without looking like you ran face first into the highlighting palette (like I do, daily).

You can use this with almost any primer, but stay away from matte primers, which can kill the glow and defeat the purpose. You'll have the best bet with primers that aren't super thick. I found the drops mix best with primers that are slippery and blend into skin well. I used the YSL Touche Eclat Blur Primer for this. It's a good option because it already adds a bit of luminosity to your skin on its own, but its clear base puts the Cover FX Drops front and center.

Same method as before, I just used my hands to mix up three or four drops with two pumps of the primer and applied like I normally would. This is me primed, pre-makeup, looking spooked.

I wanted to use a foundation that had light to medium, buildable coverage, so I went for the new Maybelline Dream Cushion. Between you and me, I hate cushion foundations across the board, but I actually really liked this one! It is surprisingly pigmented for being as light as it is, so it actually covered what I wanted it to with one layer. It's not insanely glowy like most cushions are, either, between demi-matte and glowy, I'd say. It let my primer show through without my whole face looking like a shiny mess.

Wow I am, I mean, that those highlight drops are gorgeous. No, but really. The primer-drops combo really came through for me and lit me up even under the foundation.

Custom Enhancer Drops + Foundation

Cover FX Custom Enhancing Drops, $42, Sephora; Make Up Forever Ultra HD Foundation, $43, Sephora

This is not what you might expect.

Instead of an all over, slick or metallic looking glow, mixing the drops with your foundation completely changes the way your face reflects light, making it subtle, but ethereal, which also happens to be my spring look.

I mixed two pumps of my Make Up For Ever HD Foundation with four drops of the Custom FX Enhancer Drops in Halo, and iridescent highlight with a blue flex.

It doesn't go quite as hard as you'd expect, instead, it makes your foundation pop back light from all angles.

It's gorgeous, but it wasn't enough. You don't just hand me an iridescent highlighter and expect me to play nice.

I caved and used it as a highlight, applying it directly to my cheekbones, nose, brow bones, and Cupid's bow. You know the drill.

Now that's more like it. These drops are so good and so versatile, but when used as a highlight over the top of your foundation, they're absolutely breathtaking.

Now, applying these takes a light hand because there is no subtle way to apply it directly skin. It's gonna be a high beam highlight no matter how you slice it, which is just how I like it.

I found that it worked and looked the best when I tapped it on with my finger and then buffed it into the skin using the Sigma Concealer Blend Kabuki Brush, which spreads the highlight beautifully without brushing it away, and diffuses any hard lines. The product and the brush are a match made in heaven. The highlight is heavy, for sure, but the with right application, it can be totally wearable.

Sigma Concealer Blend Kabuki Brush, $23, Sigma Beauty

I wanted to amp up the glow just a little, tiny bit more.

You know, a soft daytime lewk.

"When he tells you he needs space."

See? You really can get whatever look you want out of them, from subtle to...not, you just have to know how to apply them! Do you love? I'd say that the Cover FX Enhancer drops are the only highlight you need, but my highlighter drawer would disagree. In any case, they're totally flexible for all sorts of looks — try testing them out for yourself as soon as they drop on March 3.