Took me forever to decide on buying this due to the price. This brush is packed really firm and I suspect the reason for the price. There is a slight give from the tapering of hair towards the tip which makes it beautiful to blend. This is by no means filmsy. It looks like it has been shaped rather than cut to shape. Goat Sokoho is a very soft hair. In my novice opinion, it is not inferior to blue squirrel. It picks up good amount of product (better than pure blue squirrel) and deposits colour elegantly. I use this exclusively with Kevyn Aucoin's Ariana blush (it is a warm muted orange) and highlighter Candlelight which gives a healthy glow. Is this the only brush that will work well? No, but I do no regret buying this (I got this when there was a 20% discount to keep the cost down).

This brush is just ok (comparing it to the average quality of other Kumano made brushes). The handle is very nice and an upgrade from the previous version, but the quality of the brush head (the most important part) has gone way down. The older version was made out of squirrel, and new one is sokoho goat. This specific brush is very comparable to Hakuhodo J116 (also sokoho), which is literally half the price of this one. I understand the magnetic design and everything, but it doesn't justify such a big price increase, especially when you take into consideration that head quality went down. Please Rae, bring back the old heads and combine them with new handles!