Category Archives: Reviews
VIDEO: Suva Beauty Block Party Palette – Review, Swatches & 5 Looks
Revlon Galaxy Dream Holographic Highlighting Palette (Review & Swatches)
Get excited! Revlon has released a highlighter quad that isn’t varying shades of champagne, but rather (almost) all the colours of the rainbow! Say hello to the Galaxy Dream Holographic Highlighting Palette – potentially Revlon‘s most unique launch yet!
I’ve been raving on about unique highlighters for a few years now. I fell in love with the Kat Von D Alchemist Holographic palette, as well as the Anastasia Beverly Hills Moonchild palette long ago, and while a few drug store brands have launched singles of unique shades, there’s never been a palette (that I can think of). And now Revlon has finally done it! And frankly, while I love Revlon, they were NOT the brand I was expecting to put out a palette like this!
The Galaxy Dream palette is a four-pan pressed-powder compact containing 0.5 oz/14.4 grams of product (which is more than double what comes in the KVD palette by the way). The prices varies wildly – $19.99 CAD at Shoppers Drug Mart or $7.49 USD at ULTA. The conversion rate isn’t great between Canada and the US (come on guys, our dollar isn’t THAT bad – eesh!), but coming in at $20 for four large pans is actually a fairly decent price for the drugstore.
Of course, I must point out that while the Galaxy Dream palette is labelled “Holographic”, it really isn’t. These are fun, colourfully tinted highlighted but none of the shades reflect the entire rainbow spectrum and therefore cannot be called “holographic”.
Swatched out you can see that each shade provides a bit of iridescent sheen – with the silver shade clearly having the most pigment.
Revlon Galaxy Dream Holographic Highlighting Palette – Face Swatches
The pink imbued my cheeks with a pink-leaning-fuchsia hue that I hadn’t expected. I thought it would be a hair more peach given the swatch, so I was pleasantly shocked when I saw just how strong it went on my cheeks. I noticed right away that the texture of the powder is much different than other colourful highlighters I’ve used in the past. It’s more of a satin finish – almost as if I’m buffing a matte colourful highlighter on to my face. I was astonished with just how much I liked this kind of satin/matte but colourful highlighter aspect.
Sadly, I really struggled to photograph the green highlighter. In person the colour of the green is very obvious – I was continuously surprised at just how much I noticed it (in a good way!). But in the shots I got of it it comes across far more silvery-yellow which is sad because I promise you it’s REALLY green IRL.
And another beautiful shade! The purple shade was absolutely another stunner. Such a gorgeous surreal, sort of fairy-esque glow to it. It matched so well with my eyeshadow too!
The silver shade was the one I was the most nervous to wear and yet it turned out to be equally gorgeous! I had been nervous to put this on my cheekbones because the swatch looked like straight up silver eyeshadow and I did not want to be wearing that at all. Come to find out that the bulk of the silver pigment actually gets buffed away as you brush this on to your cheekbones, leaving behind a beautiful ethereal white-silver glow. This shade definitely surprised me the most – it’s freaking gorgeous!
Final Thoughts
I was truly surprised at how well the Revlon Galaxy Dreams palette played out on my cheeks. My only complaint is that the pink and the purple shade are a little too similar and I would’ve preferred a blue over one of those shades… but that’s it, because this palette is freaking fantastic! The colours are beautiful, the pigmentation is *really* good, and, what I found to be the most interesting… it’s a softer kind of highlighter. The other colourful highlighters I’ve used in the past somehow seem to have a bit of a shimmery quality to them, which I hadn’t really noticed until I started using this palette. This one is more of a softer hue. I don’t want to say dull, as the colours are certainly NOT dull, but it’s more of a “lit from within” colour than it is a loud, aggressive one (more specifically – the pink and purple are like this). I initially thought I wouldn’t like that after I applied the pink on day one, but I was so taken with how transformative the more satin-like quality of the powder was in comparison to ones I’d used in the past that it made me fall head over heels for this palette.
Revlon‘s Galaxy Dreams palette is really a winner. I love that it’s something fun and unique from a brand that usually sticks to the safe side of things. I *love* this palette!
The Revlon Galaxy Dreams Holographic Highlighting Palette can be purchased on shoppersdrugmart.com for $19.99 CAD or on ulta.com for $7.49 USD.
The product featured in this post was sent to me for consideration. Post contains affiliate links.
Mary Kay Precision Brow Liners (Review & Swatches)
Mary Kay continues to be one of those brands that people don’t think much about (especially if you’re under the age of 50), but I assure you they put out some quality products (for example, they make my absolute favourite nail polish formula. Hands down, that is the best stuff I have ever tried.) So when I was sent some brow products to try out, I was keen to give them a go.
Mary Kay has just launched their Precision Brow Liners in 5 shades, two of which fit into the blonde category (Blonde and Dark Blonde) which I’ve been trying out for the last two weeks. Each retractable pencil comes with 0.085 grams of products which is on par with the ABH Brow Wiz, and a little bit short (0.005 grams to be precise) in comparison to the NYX Micro Brow. The pencils retail for $16 CAD or $14 USD. (Interestingly, the American Mary Kay site seems to have only four shades available – they’re missing Black-Brown.)
The blonde shades are much less ashy than I was expecting. Traditional blonde eyebrow pencils tend to lean more cool than warm, although I’d say that these seem neutral with a touch of warmth.
As you can see, I don’t have much brow to begin with, so I have to fill in a lot of areas and create an entire tail out of nothing.
I found that the pencils were quite soft, which made for easy application, but it could sometimes mean you didn’t get the sharpest point you wanted. I also found that the nib is slightly larger than your average micro-brow pencils, so this wouldn’t be quite as precise for creating individual hair strokes. Personally, I don’t have the patience to create individual strokes as I’m really just trying to block out a brow as quickly as possible because I’ve got so much ground to cover and fill in. So the fact that I can’t create individual hair lines with this pencil is irrelevant to me.
Final Thoughts
If you’re looking for a softer eyebrow pencil, you may want to look into the Mary Kay Precision Brow Liners. I love my NYX Micro Brow, but it does feel a bit sharp and hard on my brows, so I completely understand if people are wanting something a little bit softer. The longevity of the product was excellent too – they last through full workdays without any issue.
I was also pleasantly surprised with the colours. I didn’t think they would work that well because they weren’t grey enough, but that turned out not to be the case. I used the Dark Blonde shade to fill in the bottom of my brow, and the Blonde shade for the top half. I feel the two shades worked well together, although I definitely preferred the Dark Blonde for filling in larger gaps of missing hair.
The only thing I feel the pencils are missing is a spoolie. Almost all brow pencils now provide a spoolie at the other end, so I feel like it’s a necessary component in a brow pencil now.
The Mary Kay Brow Precision Liners can be purchased on marykay.ca for $16 CAD each or on marykay.com for $14 USD each.
The products featured in this post were sent to me for consideration. Post contains affiliate links.