urban decay

Vacations are synonymous with summer in many parts of the world, especially those parts that get downright chilly in winter, but I like to set aside some time for a quick trip or two each fall.

Temps are usually a little cooler, the crowds a little smaller, and, beauty weirdo that I am, I like being able to use the season as my rationale for wearing smokey eyes almost every day, and in all of my vacation pics. 🙂

LOL! I had a feeling you’d understand. Now let’s pinky shake for being makeup nerds 4eva!

Thanks to Urban Decay, I think I may have found a perfect palette to take on my next fall foray. It’s called Smoked, sells for $49, has smokey eyes written all over it, and arrives at Sephora and Ultra stores, Macy’s and the Urban Decay website later this week.

Comprised of mostly neutral colors with a few smouldering jewel-toned shades, lacking any electric hot pinks or teals, it seems almost subdued for Urban Decay, but not at all in a bad way.

These are colors a rock goddess might wear to a black-tie affair with fishnets beneath her formal gown and heels bristling with chains and spikes.

It’s as if a warlock took Urban Decay’s Naked and Naked2 palettes, dropped them into a boiling cauldron, added the Black and 15-Year Anniversary palettes, let that stew for a few hours, and then poured the mixture into the Midnight Emergency Kit’s packaging.

The sleek zippered case contains 10 Eyeshadows, five of them new and five repromoted, but all of them in Urban Decay’s new eyeshadow formula; one full-size 24/7 Glide-On Eye Pencil in Perversion (repromote), an inky black the color of a starless sky at midnight; a travel-sized Primer Potion (repromote), and a booklet called the Smoked Get The Look Book, with 12 step-by-step smokey eye tutorials (new).

Truth be told, I’d probably leave out the Primer Potion, as I have a tough time blending shadows on top of it (I don’t think it’s “slippery” enough for me), but I do know many gals who swear by it. If I were going on, say, on a 10-day trip to Italy this fall (hi, El Hub! Hint-hint!), that’s the one piece that come with the palette that I might just leave behind.

Ah… I can see it now — traipsing across the country on a quest to find the perfect pasta, and eating plate after plate of fettuccine, fusilli, spaghetti, ravioli and linguine with clams, perhaps while wearing a look like the smokey cat eyes I’m wearing here.

And I wouldn’t even have to worry about having to reapply after having that second cannoli because these easy-to-blend shadows, which exhibit very little fallout, stay put for at least 12 hours without fading or creasing.

My lower lash and water lines, however, might need a quick touch-up with Perversion pencil after 5-6 hours, but I can live with that.

If I happen to be in a more dramatic mood, because lawd knows that nothing goes with bread, wine and cheese like two smouldering smokey eyes (LOL!), I could even follow one of the tutorials in the Get The Look Book, or line my lash and water lines with Perversion, and then smudge one of the shimmery shadows along the lash lines.

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