Palettes

The Kevyn Aucoin Prismatic Highlighting Trio

February 28th, 2018 by Karen 5 Comments

Holla! Or rather, holographic. Or prismatic. Or prismagic.

WOW! These highlighters are chunky, but more on that in a sec… I was actually drawn in by the packaging at first. The Kevyn Aucoin Prismatic Highlighting Trio ($48) looks like Hollywood movie magic. It shifts colors at different angles, going from yellow to blue to orange to purple, and sometimes all of them at the same time, which is cool, but also CRAZY.

It’s also quite representative of what’s inside.

There are three glittery highlighters, and they don’t look like much in their pans. On skin, though, we’re talking unicorn-level glitter and shine, and the flecks of green, blue and orange glitter are BIG and flashy — so not at all what I’ve come to expect from Kevyn Aucoin.

I mean, the shadows feel fab. They’re almost creamy-caliber bouncy and soft, so they’re easy to pick up with a finger or a brush. They’re a lot like the awesome metallics Urban Decay did in the Heavy Metals Metallic Eyeshadow Palette from the Holiday 2017 collection, but with much larger bits of glitter.

kevyn aucoin prismatic — Wearing Illusion on my lids (see how it ended up in my lashes?)

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The Urban Decay Troublemaker Palette: This Fabulously Flexible Palette Is on Sale Now

February 26th, 2018 by Karen 14 Comments

I liked the Urban Decay Troublemaker Palette when it came out for $39 last fall, but it’s on sale for $19 now! Are you kidding me?! I love it at that price, which is how much it is now on sale (as we speak at Sephora and the UD website). I think it’s a great “going out” palette, and you get hella serious bang for your buck at that price.

When you open it up, it looks like there are nine shades, because there are nine pans, but there are actually 10, because two shades share Clash, the center pan. It’s split between black and white, and I don’t quite understand the rationale behind that because the black gets into the white, and the white gets into the black, but both of them are useful, so I can live with it, especially at $19.

The palette also comes with a miniature Troublemaker Mascara, which excels at thickening, but is just OK at lengthening and curl hold (I usually end up layering it underneath a separate lengthening waterproof mascara).

Now, the three warm-toned brown mattes in this palette are what bump this bad boy up to bad-@ss level. None of them are overly orange-y or reddish, which are big trends right now, and all three are eminently useful day/night colors. The lightest one actually reminds me of MAC Bamboo, while the mid-toned one looks like MAC Soft Brown, and the dark brown could almost pass for MAC Brown Down dupe.

They’re colors that I know I can wear in the daytime and at night. Even at 2 o’clock in the morning…not that I have much cause to wear eyeshadow at 2 in the morning (anymore).

There are also four metallic jewel tones that double as sparkly, shiny eyeliners. They feel a bit chunkier than the browns and exhibit a bit of fallout — more than the browns (which don’t have any fallout) — but at the sale price, I’m OK with that.

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The Urban Decay Petite Naked Heat Palette

February 23rd, 2018 by Karen 16 Comments

urban decay naked petite heat swatches — Just a little heat…

Hey, girl. 🙂 Yeah, what am I wearing on my lids? I’m wearing new Urban Decay Naked Petite Heat, which I keep wanting to call “Peh-TEE Heat.”

It’s just a little bit of heat… Get it? Petite? Like adding one or two drops of Tabasco or Sriracha, as opposed to submerging your burrito? LOL.

Urban Decay is famous for their O.G. Naked Eyeshadow Palette and the different incarnations of it, like Naked2, Naked Smoky, Naked Ultimate Basics…lots of nakedness, as you know. There’s also the one they launched last fall, Naked Heat, with its beautiful bevvy of warm orange and reddish browns, which are super trendy colors in eye makeup right now and for the past couple of years.

Chances are, if you’re a UD collector, or even if you aren’t, you may already have something like Petite Naked Heat in your stash now.

In fact, as I think about it…the Kristen Leanne Daydream Palette UD released in January has similar tones…

My point is just that orange-y browns are (still) having a moment, and you’ve very likely seen many of these colors in other palettes and pans before.

Just off the top of my head, Vibrate looks like MAC Soft Brown, Hot Spell like MAC Saddle, Wild Thing’s a little like MAC Texture, and Strike looks like MAC Swiss Chocolate.

The MAC Mischief Minx Palette and NARS Wanted aren’t exactly completely different either.

urban decay naked petite heat — Wearing Petite Heat on my lids with MAC Style Blush on my cheeks, and MAC Velvet Teddy and Fenty Gloss Bomb on my lips.

For $29 you get six new matte powder eyeshadow shades based in some form or fashion on the colors in the original Naked Heat palette, and the pans, by the way, are the same size as the pans in the larger Naked palettes.

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The Urban Decay X Kristen Leanne Collection Beauty Beam Palette

January 18th, 2018 by Karen 7 Comments

urban decay kristen leanne beauty beam — Stay gold

Every time I open the $34 UD X Kristen Leanne Beauty Beam Highlight Palette and see the words “STAY GOLD” there in the corner, I think back to a phase I went through in high school when I would sign all of my letters — this was back before email and text, when we actually had to write things down on paper like animals — with the phrase, “Stay gold, Ponyboy,” hearkening to the book, The Outsiders…

I’m sure a lot of other people also did that… Right? LOL!

From what I understand, one of Kristen’s catchphrases is “Stay Gold,” and now those words are here, immortalized forever in this trio of face highlighters from her new LE UD collection.

All three of these powder highlighters are different shades of shimmery gold. There’s a rose gold on the left, which looks a little like BECCA Rose Gold highlighter from the Chrissy Teigan palette — a palette which, to this day, makes me clutch my pearls. I still love it so much.

And then there’s the highlighter in the middle, a white golden pearl with a BECCA Opal vibe, and the one on the right, a warm golden pearl similar to Now’s the Time highlighter from the UD Jean-Michel Basquiat collection.

urban decay kristen leanne beauty beam swatches — Urban Decay X Kristen Leanne Collection Beauty Beam Palette

Assuming you like to wear gold (I do!), caution is still advised with these colors because they seem to apply, at least on my skin, much lighter than they look in the pans.

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The Urban Decay X Kristen Leanne Collection Daydream Palette

January 17th, 2018 by Karen 12 Comments

urban decay kristen leanne daydream 3 — I vote cake frosting.

So what do you think that is there on the front of the $26 Urban Decay X Kristen Leanne Daydream Palette?

Is it…

A. Cake frosting (*nods enthusiastically*)
B. Body lotion
C. Shaving cream

Because it looks like all three to me.

But if I can only choose one (Monday Poll flashbacks), I’ll go with cake frosting because — hi! — I’ve been watching The Great British Baking Show for five days straight.

Incidentally, that show is like chicken soup (with baked homemade crackers) for the soul. It’s almost a cure for the common cold, but I digress…

urban decay kristen leanne daydream — Got a Daydream on my lids and lash lines…

Isn’t this palette cute? When you open it up, there are five warm neutral powder eyeshadows inside.

Daydream is part of the new Urban Decay X Kristen Leanne collection, which is available now. It’s a collab between UD and spunky, cruelty-free makeup-loving YouTuber Kristen Leanne. In a nutshell, she has colorful hair, she loves rainbow looks, she’s got tattoos, and she owns a hair color company called Arctic Fox that’s all about mermaid and unicorn colors…so she’s all about color.

There are two eye palettes in the collection — a colorful one and a neutral one. The latter, of course, is the one I wanted to try first.

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The Tom Ford Winter Soleil Eye and Cheek Palette in 04 Violette Argente

December 21st, 2017 by Karen 5 Comments

tom ford soleil eye cheek palette violette argente 1 — Is the purple a shout-out to the new color of the year?

I love how Tom Ford drops a summery collection in winter, because, obvs, the private jet’s waiting to whisk us off to the Maldives ?? for the holidays. *hair flip*

Winter Soleil is his latest LE launch, and it has a blush duo, four roller ball lip oils (so intriguing, I know!), a gardenia-scented body oil spiked with cozy vanilla, a highlighter, a lipstick, and an eye and cheek palette with a peppery, potent purple/vivacious violet.

tom ford winter soleil collection — Tom Ford Winter Soleil

Hmm… Now that I think about it, the eyeshadows in the $155 Violet Argente Eye and Cheek Palette roll deep with pigment, especially the bronze and the rosy burgundy shades, but the purple sparkles. 🙂 It’s the only one with glitter (dainty glitter, though), and therefore it’s also the one voted Most Likely to Exhibit Fallout (although it doesn’t, and neither do the other shades), and Most Likely to Invite Prince’s Ghost ?? Over for Afternoon Tea and Chitchat.

tom ford violet argente — Violet Argente on my lids and cheeks

tom ford violet argente swatches — From the top: the blush, the highlighter and the four eyeshadows

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The Kevyn Aucoin Electropop Pro Eyeshadow Palette

December 1st, 2017 by Karen 11 Comments

Should you listen to electronic music or pop music when you’re playing around with the new $57 Kevyn Aucoin Electropop Palette? #deepmakeupthoughts

Every time I wear it, I end up listening to Pachelbel’s Canon in D at least three times, haha! We have a baby lullaby station set on Pandora, and I’m not kidding, every other song is some version of Pachebel’s Canon in D. I swear that song is holding the baby lullaby station hostage!

Electropop is a $57 limited edition eye palette with 12 electric hues and chromatic colors, and it’s all about the brights, dramatic pigment and mega metallic pearl. You’ve got color, shine and all the fun, flashy things, but they’re handled tastefully and executed with perfection.

At first, it was the brights that reeled me in, but the creamy, comfy, weightless formula sealed the deal. It’s like, dude, am I even wearing eyeshadow at all?

The Electropop shadows feel as light as a feather, much like the MAC In Extra Dimension Eyeshadows, and just like the In Extra Dimensions, they kindly stay the crap outta my fine lines. So thanks for that, Team Kevyn!

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NARS Wanted Eyeshadow Palette: A Cyber Monday Special

November 26th, 2017 by Karen 20 Comments

WANTED:

A new NARS eyeshadow palette
A piping hot gingerbread latte
A tuxedo-clad Nick Jonas to feed me chilled green grapes while I recline on a velvet fainting couch

Two days only!

If you love NARS and collect their palettes, don’t let NARS Wanted leave you wanting. It’s only going to be available for two days, first online only on Cyber Monday, November 27th, on the Sephora website, and then again two days later on November 29th on the NARS website and in person at NARS boutiques (here’s their store locator).

Ridin’ rose gold

It literally took me days to figure out that the image on the palette is a closed eye. Maybe I was too preoccupied by the rose gold action happening inside.

I love this mix of colors. The colors are flashy enough for fun but flexible enough to incorporate into responsible life looks. There are pinks, warm and neutral browns, coppers, cranberries, bronzes and a bit o’ beige for balance. Most of them are new colors, but I recognize some old faves, like matte beige Biarritz and dark brown Coconut Grove (oldie but goodie).

The BIG news: a new powder eyeshadow formula

Here’s the big thing, though: everything in the palette has a new reformulated powder formula. It’s supposed to be more pigmented than the current NARS shadow formula, but I’m not completely sold on how much more pigmented they are yet.

Granted, they are pretty pigmented, as NARS shadows usually are, but they seem maybe just a tad more pigmented than usual.

They do feel NARS soft and silky, though, and I easily get 12 hours of wear time with them.

Now, with a reformulation, you expect things to be better, and I expected there to be less fallout than usual with these, but the fallout is typical of the current formula, which isn’t all bad, because I don’t get a ton of fallout from NARS shadows anyway. I have to do a bit of cleanup underneath my eyes and on my cheeks when I use this palette, as I do with other NARS eyeshadows.

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