I’ve written before about my love for Sunday Riley skincare and cosmetics; these products are high-priced, but they’re also high-quality, so I find them worth the investment. I wrote a review of the line’s Modern Lip Color lipstick in Duchess a while ago, and now I have a few thoughts to share about another shade, Marie Antoinette.

Of course, Marie Antoinette is named after the beauty-obsessed (and ill-fated) Queen of France. It’s a creamy, blue-based rose shade, deeper and brighter than the petal-pink Duchess. It would probably be most flattering on cool skin tones, from pale to dark.

Like all the colors in the Modern Lip Color range, Marie Antoinette has an unusual “feel”—to the touch, it’s a bit dry, but once it’s applied to the lips, it feels moisturizing, thanks to a mix of natural ingredients (like castor oil, beeswax, and candelilla wax) and safe synthetics. The texture falls somewhere between creme and matte, and it wears very well.

I’ve done a very amateurish “swatch” on my arm, so that you can see Marie Antoinette in relation to my skin. This was one stroke, so the color is still somewhat sheer. If I were to build it up with repeated strokes, which it does easily, the result would be more opaque and a little more dramatic.

All in all, Marie Antoinette is one of my current favorites in my little lipstick basket. It’s one of my more vivid lipsticks (since I’m not too daring in my color choices), but when my mood and the occasion are right, it’s perfect. And for workdays or other situations where I need to tone things down, Duchess is always waiting for me.

Sunday Riley Modern Lip Color sells for $32 (I think the price has gone up!) at Barneys, Bergdorf Goodman, Dermstore, and Sephora (online only).

Disclaimer: I purchased this lipstick at Bergdorf Goodman.

Images: photos by Tinsel Creation; portrait of Marie Antoinette by Elisabeth Vigée-LeBrun (1783) via Wikimedia Commons.