Can Clinique All About Eyes Rich Eye Cream Really Get Rid Of Dark Circles & Puffy Eyes? – Beautiful With Brains
Clinique All About Eyes Rich likes to boast. It claims it can do everything: it moisturises skin, fights wrinkles and makes dark circles go away. I admit I’m sceptical – and not just because, in my almost 20 years as a beauty blogger (yes, I’m one of the grandmothers of blogging), I have yet to come across an eye cream that can really get rid of dark circles. So, I put it to the test and, let’s say it didn’t exactly live up to the hype. Does that mean it’s a bad product or it only fulfils some of its claims? Read on to find out:
Key Ingredients In Clinique All About Eyes Rich: What Makes It Work?
SHEA BUTTER TO MOISTURISE SKIN
Clinique All About Eyes Rich is loaded with shea butter, one of the most moisturising ingredients on this planet. Shea butter works by creating a protective barrier on the skin that keeps moisture in, where it needs to be to hydrate skin and make it soft. Studies show that shea butter works better than mineral oil (what derms think of as the gold standard for moisturization). Its effects last for up to 8 hours!
Related: Why Shea Butter Is A Godsend For Dry Skin
SILICONES TO MINIMISE WRINKLES
Clinique All About Eyes Rich contains its fair share of silicones to minimise fine lines. It works like this: silicones fill in fine lines and wrinkles so they look smaller to the naked eye. Of course, the effect is only temporary. When you wash off your skin at night, the silicones end up down the drain and your wrinkles look as deep as before. Silicones go a step further: they also give slip to a product and allow it to spread smoothly on the skin.
They’re not even as suffocating as you think. It’s true that silicones create a protective barrier on this skin. But this barrier has holes all over the place. Due to their molecular structure, you’ll find little gaps in between each silicone molecule. That allows them to keep water in the skin and let it perspire at the same time.
Related: Do Silicones Prevent Active Ingredients From Penetrating Skin?
ANTIOXIDANTS TO PREVENT WRINKLES
Clinique All About Eyes Rich is loaded to the brim with antioxidants. Here are the highlights:
All together, these antioxidants help you fight free radicals and keep wrinkles at bay. The catch? Every time they’re exposed to light and air, they lose some of their effectiveness. Guess what? This eye cream comes in a jar. While you won’t make the antioxidants completely useless as soon as you open it, this packaging can compromise their effectiveness somewhat.
Related: Why I’m Not A Fan Of Jar Packaging
The Rest Of The Formula & Ingredients
NOTE: The colours indicate the effectiveness of an ingredient. It is ILLEGAL to put toxic and harmful ingredients in skincare products.
Green: It’s effective, proven to work, and helps the product do the best possible job for your skin.
Yellow: There’s not much proof it works (at least, yet).
Red: What is this doing here?!
Water\Aqua\Eau: It’s a solvent that helps dissolve other ingredients. And it’s hydrating, too.
Cetearyl Alcohol: A fatty alcohol that hydrates skin and makes it softer and smoother.
Butylene Glycol: A humectant that draws moisture from the air into your skin, so it stays hydrated for longer. It also enhances the penetration of skincare ingredients into your skin.
Hydrogenated Polyisobutene: An emollient that lubricates skin, leaving it softer and smoother.
Polyglyceryl-3 Beeswax: It stabilises formulations and imparts a smooth feel to your skin.
Polybutene: A binding and thickening agent.
Sucrose: A type of sugar with water-binding properties. It helps skin stay hydrated.
Cetyl Esters: It gives skincare products a smoother feel and a glossy look.
Polymethyl Methacrylate: It scatters the light, so that when it hits your dark circles, they look less visible. But it’s only an optical illusion.
Isostearyl Neopentanoate: It gives a smoother feel to skincare products, so they’re easier to spread onto your skin.
Glycerin: A humectant that deeply hydrates and plumps up skin.
Cetearyl Glucoside: An emulsifier that helps the water-based and oil-based ingredients in the formula blend together seamlessly.
Tocopheryl Acetate: A form of Vitamin E, it has antioxidant and hydrating properties.
Triticum Vulgare (Wheat) Germ Extract: Derived from the germ portion of the wheat plant, it makes skin softer and smoother.
Hordeum Vulgare (Barley) Extract\Extrait D’Orge: It hydrates skin. It also has antioxidant properties when ingested, but there’s no proof it does that for skin.
Sigesbeckia Orientalis (St. Paul’S Wort) Extract: There’s no research that it does anything for skin – and that’s the only reason why it gets a red rating.
Peg-100 Stearate: It allows the oil-based and water-based ingredients in a formula to blend together seamlessly, thus improving its texture.
Coleus Barbatus Extract: A skin-conditioning agent that makes your skin softer and smoother.
Betula Alba (Birch) Extract: An antioxidant with astringent properties.
Methyl Glucose Sesquistearate: An emollient that makes skin softer and smoother.
Camellia Sinensis (Green Tea) Leaf Extract: A powerful antioxidants that fights free radicals and reduces inflammation, including the one induced by UV rays.
Salvia Officinalis (Sage) Leaf: It has soothing properties, but its fragrant components can irritate skin.
Glyceryl Polymethacrylate: A film-forming agent that also enhances the texture and how a product feels on the skin.
Yeast Extract\Faex\Extrait De Levure: A soothing agent with mild antioxidant properties.
Gentiana Lutea (Gentian) Root Extract: It has anti-inflammatory properties that soothe skin.
Stearic Acid: A fatty acids that makes skin softer and smoother. It also helps water-based and oil-based ingredients blend together, thus improving the feel of the formula.
Whey Protein\Lactis Protein\Protéine Du Petit-Lait: Protein fragments that are said, according to the manufacturer, to boost the production of collagen and hyaluronic acid, two substances that make skin firmer and hydrated. It gets a yellow earring cos I’m waiting for independent studies to confirm these claims.
Palmitoyl Oligopeptide: It’s a peptide that hydrates skin. But there’s not much independent proof it works (most of the studies come from the manufacturer).
Squalane: It creates a protective barrier on the skin that deeply moisturises all skin types without clogging pores.
Magnesium Ascorbyl Phosphate: A derivative of Vitamin C. It fights free radicals, but not as well as the pure form.
Cholesterol: A natural component of the skin’s protective barrier, it keeps skin hydrated and protects it from environmental aggressors.
Caffeine: An antioxidant that fights premature wrinkles. It’s also said to improve circulation in the skin to reduce puffy eyes and dark circles caused by blood pooling under your skin, but it doesn’t do this too well.
Peg-8: It binds moisture to the skin, increasing its levels of hydration.
Phytosphingosine: Part of the skin’s natural moisturising factor, it repairs a broken skincare barrier, moisturises skin, and protects it from environmental aggressors.
Acrylates/C10-30 Alkyl Acrylate Crosspolymer: It enhances the texture of skincare products.
Aminomethyl Propanol: A pH adjuster.
Isomerized Linoleic Acid: It makes skin softer and smoother.
Linoleic Acid: Unsaturated omega-6 fatty acid with moisturising properties. It also soothes skin and acts as an antioxidant.
Sodium Hyaluronate: A humectant that draws water into your skin and binds it there. The extra moisture makes your skin softer and plumper.
1,2 Hexanediol: A synthetic preservative that also hydrates skin.
Decarboxy Carnosine Hcl: A synthetic peptide that mimics a peptide naturally found in the body. It has antioxidant properties, but there’s no proof it boosts collagen like the manufacturer says.
Potassium Sulfate: It thickens the texture of skincare products.
Caprylyl Glycol: A humectant that attracts and binds water from the air into your skin, keeping it hydrating.
Disodium Edta: A chelating agent that neutralises the metal ions in the water before they can spoil the formula.
Sodium Dehydroacetate: A preservative that extends the shelf life of skincare products.
Phenoxyethanol: A preservative that inhibits bacteria contamination, keeping your skincare products safe for longer.
Yellow 5 (Ci 19140): A colorant that gives skincare products a yellow tint.
Iron Oxides (Ci 77491, Ci 77492, Ci 77499): They add pigments to the product, helping to adjust its colour.
Mica: A fine powder that gives a light-reflecting quality to the texture, so that when the light hits your dark circles, they’re less visible to the naked eye.
Titanium Dioxide (Ci 77891): You probably know it as a sunscreen agent, but in these small amounts, it helps to adjust the colour of the texture.
Texture
A pale ivory in colour, Clinique All About Eyes Rich has a fairly thick, creamy consistency that isn’t greasy and absorbs quickly.
Fragrance
It’s fragrance-free. That’s good. Fragrance is irritating. You do NOT want it anywhere near your eyes.
How To Use It
Before moisturiser, apply a couple of small dots on your under-eye area. Pat the cream in with your ring finger (it’s the gentlest). Avoid rubbing as that causes wrinkles in the long term. Apply any leftover on your eyelids, too.
Packaging
Clinique All About Eyes Rich comes in a cute salmon jar with a silver lid. It’s practical, but not the most hygienic. Plus, it compromises the effectiveness of the antioxidants. These little molecules degrade in the presence of light and oxygen (guess what happens every time you unscrew the lid?)
Related: Is Jar Packaging A Waste Of Money?
Performance & Personal Opinion
Clinique All About Eyes Rich keeps good on one promise: it hydrates and soothes skin, leaving it soft and smooth. I was a bit worried the richer texture would give me milia seeds, but thankfully that didn’t happen. It also didn’t sting, burn nor irritate my eyes. I also noticed the fine lines around my eyes looked slightly smaller (thanks silicones!), but the effect only lasts for a few hours.
So far so good. So, where does this cream fail? Like I suspected, it can’t do anything for dark circles. I’ve used this cream for weeks and didn’t see the slightest difference. Ok, it has particles that reflect the light in a way that makes your dark circles look less visible, but that’s not the same as getting rid of dark circles. Once the optical illusion is gone, both the darkness and the puffiness is still there.
Related: How To Deal With Milia Seeds
How Does Clinique All About Eyes Rich Compare To The Other Clinique Eye Creams?
Clinique has several eye creams. Is Clinique All About Eyes Rich the best one? Mmmm. First off, unless your eye area is considerably drying than the rest of your face, you do NOT need an eye cream. And no, none of these creams can really reduce dark circles. No eye cream can do that, so do NOT believe the hype. But, if you still want to go ahead and use an eye cream, here’s a quick lowdown on Clinique eye creams to help you choose the best one for you:
Clinique All About Eyes™ Eye Cream with Vitamin C ($39.00): A lighter version of All About Eyes Rich. It contains the same derivative of Vitamin C in the same tiny amount, so if that’s why you’re getting this cream, you’ll be disappointed. It has some antioxidant properties, but it doesn’t work as well as a separate Vitamin C serum. It’s better suitable for oily skin. Available at Boots, Clinique, Look Fantastic, Nordstrom, Sephora, and Ulta.
Clinique Clinique for Men™ Anti-Age Eye Cream ($40.00): FYI, you don’t need a different eye cream just because you’re a man. This eye cream is similar to all the others on this list. A rich base to moisturise skin and antioxidants to prevent wrinkles. Available at Boots, Clinique, and Ulta.
Clinique Repairwear™ Anti-Gravity Eye Cream ($59.00): No eye cream can fight gravity or unsag skin. Period. All this cream does is plump up fine lines and wrinkles, moisturise skin, and fight free radicals. Same as all the other eye creams on this list. This is best suitable for combination to dry skin. Available at Boots, Brown Thomas, Clinique, Sephora, and Ulta.
Clinique Repairwear Laser Focus™ Wrinkle Correcting Eye Cream ($59.00): A silicone-based, lightweight cream for combination skin. It makes skin softer and smoother and it’s full of antioxidants that can prevent wrinkles (but not reduce those you already have). Available at Boots, Brown Thomas, Clinique, Look Fantastic, Sephora, and Ulta.
Clinique Smart Clinical Repair™ Wrinkle Correcting Eye Cream ($59.00): A rich cream enriched with every antioxidant under the sun to moisturise and prevent wrinkles. But it can’t correct them. There’s nothing in here that can do that. Available at Boots, Clinique, Look Fantastic, Sephora, and Ulta.
What I Like About Clinique All About Eyes Rich
Creamy, fast-absorbing texture
Fragrance-free
Hydrates skin and makes it softer and smoother
Brightens the eye area
Doesn’t cause milia seeds
What I DON’T Like About Clinique All About Eyes Rich
Can’t reduce dark circles and puffy eyes
Jar packaging
Who Should Use This?
Dry skin who needs the extra moisture. Truth is, you don’t need a separate cream for the eye area. Your face moisturise will do (unless it’s full of irritants, but in that case, you wouldn’t use it right?). The only reason to use eye cream is when your eye area is drying than the rest of your face and needs some extra moisture.
Related: Why You Do NOT Need An Eye Cream
Does Clinique All About Eyes Rich Live Up To Its Claims?
CLAIM
TRUE?
Moisture-rich eye cream instantly diminishes the look of under eye circles, darkness and fine lines.
It helps with fine lines, but NOT dark circles or darkness.
De-puffs, calms the look of skin with botanicals.
Didn’t for me.
Strengthens skin’s moisture barrier.
Yes, it has natural butters that can do this.
Price & Availability
$32.50/£27.50 at Boots, Clinique, Look Fantastic, and Sephora
The Verdict: Should You Buy It?
No. No one needs a separate eye cream. But if your under-eye area is drier than the rest of your face, this can help moisturize it.
Dupes & Alternatives
Mad Hippie Eye Cream ($25.99): This unassuming eye cream contains literally everything you eye area needs: shea butter and squalene deeply moisturise and plump up skin; antioxidants like Vitamins C and E to prevent wrinkles; chamomile and other skin soothing agents reduce irritations; caffeine helps with dark circles (but only if they’re caused by leaky blood vessels). Available at iHerb and Ulta
Paula’s Choice Resist Anti-Aging Eye Cream ($37.00/£32.00): Its rich texture is super moisturizing and makes even the driest of skin types soft and smooth again. Plus, it’s loaded with antioxidants and soothing ingredients that fight free radicals and reduce inflammation. Available at Dermstore, and Paula’s Choice
Water\Aqua\Eau , Butyrospermum Parkii (Shea Butter) , Cetearyl Alcohol , Butylene Glycol , Hydrogenated Polyisobutene , Phenyl Trimethicone , Polyglyceryl-3 Beeswax , Polybutene , Sucrose , Cetyl Esters , Polymethyl Methacrylate , Isostearyl Neopentanoate , Glycerin , Cetearyl Glucoside , Tocopheryl Acetate , Triticum Vulgare (Wheat) Germ Extract , Hordeum Vulgare (Barley) Extract\Extrait D’Orge , Sigesbeckia Orientalis (St. Paul’S Wort) Extract , Peg-100 Stearate , Coleus Barbatus Extract , Betula Alba (Birch) Extract , Polysilicone-11 , Methyl Glucose Sesquistearate , Camellia Sinensis (Green Tea) Leaf Extract , Salvia Officinalis (Sage) Leaf , Glyceryl Polymethacrylate , Yeast Extract\Faex\Extrait De Levure , Gentiana Lutea (Gentian) Root Extract , Stearic Acid , Whey Protein\Lactis Protein\Protéine Du Petit-Lait , Palmitoyl Oligopeptide , Squalane , Magnesium Ascorbyl Phosphate , Cholesterol , Caffeine , Peg-8 , Phytosphingosine , Acrylates/C10-30 Alkyl Acrylate Crosspolymer , Aminomethyl Propanol , Dimethicone , Isomerized Linoleic Acid , Linoleic Acid , Sodium Hyaluronate , 1,2 Hexanediol , Decarboxy Carnosine Hcl , Potassium Sulfate , Caprylyl Glycol , Disodium Edta , Sodium Dehydroacetate , Phenoxyethanol , Yellow 5 (Ci 19140) , Iron Oxides (Ci 77491, Ci 77492, Ci 77499) , Mica , Titanium Dioxide (Ci 77891)
About Gio
Hi, I’m Gio. I’m a no-nonsense, tell-it-like-it-is skin coach and writer on a mission to help you achieve your best skin day ever – every day. I bust skincare myths and debunk marketing jargon to help you figure out what’s worth the splurge and what’s best left on the shelf – using science, not hype. I also offer skincare consultations to help you create the best skincare routine for your unique needs.
