Review: History of Whoo Hwanyu Eye Cream

This eye cream is from The History of Whoo's most expensive line, Hwanyu. I've seen it range from $320 on amazon to $400 on beclo.com for 25ml. The Hwanyu line has three products (that I know of/have samples available to buy): Hwanyu essence, cream, and eye cream. I bought the essence and cream as well but gave them to my mom since I think she will be a better judge of how effective those products are. I split the eye cream with her because my eyes look, unfortunately, older than my age. I've got dark circles that look like I pulled an all-nighter when I actually slept a full 8 hours, and fine lines under my eyes that will just never go away and crease when I put Skinfood Salmon Dark Circle Concealer Cream on.

My dark circles have improved with Skinfood Salmon Brightening Eye Cream and Sulwhasoo Essential Rejuvenating Eye Cream. The fine lines have improved with The Face Shop Smim Fermentation Concentrate Eye Cream (and a little bit from Sulwhasoo Essential Rejuvenating Eye Cream). But alas, it's not enough! After a long day I can see those fine lines returning and sometimes when I don't put enough or forget to put on The Face Shop Smim Fermentation Concentrate Eye Cream for a few days, the fine lines return like nothing ever happened. So I thought perhaps if I bought a super expensive cream like this, that it would actually fix and get rid of my fine lines? Forever? I mean why else would you pay for a $400 25ml eye cream?

Description (from lgcare.com):

• A blend of over 60 kinds of Oriental medicinal ingredients, including snow lotus, which blossoms only every seven years, 35-year-old wild ginseng harvested in the deep valleys of Gangwon Province, Siberian young antlers and dongchunghacho, regulates the skin’s metabolism and maintains its balance.
• Snow lotus, a rare plant, is considered a very valuable Oriental medicinal plant because it is found only in the Xinjiang Uighur region of Tibet and in the Himalayas and can be gathered only in July and August when the flowers have bloomed. It is blended with 60 different Oriental medicinal ingredients and featured as a key ingredient in the premium cream that restores health and youth to one’s skin.
• Only 35-year-old wild ginseng – known as an herb of eternal youth for Emperor Shi Huang of Qin of China - collected in the wild valleys of Gangwon Province will be used to enhance the skin’s defensive mechanism and improve a wilting appearance. Wild ginseng also repairs dry skin that lacks vitality and nourishes aged skin.
• Various Oriental medicinal ingredients such as dongchunghacho, reishi mushroom, pine mushroom and fleece flower root work together to improve the skin’s metabolism and create more radiant and firm-looking skin.

My impression:

According to LG's website (the makers of History of Whoo), only 10,000 products from this line are sold annually, targeting their premium VIP customers, including "famous figures desiring the finest quality premium cosmetics." Fortunately, they still make samples of this line for the not so VIP nor famous individuals. Don't get my wrong, this is the most expensive sample I've bought by a mile. But it's still a small fraction of the original price.

This cream, at first glance, doesn't look very well blended. It looks like the cream is so saturated with ingredients I can see little bits and pieces. But upon smoothing it onto my eye, it feels smooth and settles in quickly.

Each sample only contains 0.6ml. I read reviews that using a little bit goes a long way because it's so potent. But nothing happened when I tried that for the first 2 samples, so for the next 2 samples I was a lot more generous. I used this eye cream day and night and this was my sole eye cream.

This eye cream is indeed rich. It is the first eye cream to give me milia. Granted, I only got one, but I finished stopped using this eye cream 3 weeks ago and it still hasn't completely gone away. In other aspects, I'm afraid this eye cream didn't perform. I didn't feel any improvement in radiance, vitality, or firmness. Now, this could be because this eye cream is for more aged skin. Perhaps it doesn't help fine lines, but helps something more macro such as crow's feet. But I mean, if you're going to be effective for crow's feet, you should be effect for fine lines. It helped my fine lines a bit, but its effect was inferior to The Face Shop Smim Fermentation Concentrate Eye Cream. I didn't see much of an effect with my dark circles, but the eye cream was never for that purpose so I'll let that go.

I actually didn't even finish all my 5 samples; I only ended up using 4. At $3 per sample, I feel that I shouldn't waste another sample if I already knew this eye cream wasn't gonna work for me, so I gave my last sample to my mom.

Summary:

Did not perform for a $400 per 25ml eye cream
Mild improvement on fine lines, no change in dark circles
Got a milia that still isn't gone yet 3 weeks post-discontinuation :(
$30 for 10 samples of 0.6ml each, or $400 for 25ml

Grade: 3/5 because it helped with my fine lines a bit but gave me milia

Value: 1/5 because the $30 The Face Shop Smim Fermentation Concentrate Eye Cream was more effective in reducing the fine lines under my eyes.

Repurchase? No