Category Archives: Swatches

Mary Kay Summer 2016 (Review, Swatches & Look)

May 23, 2016Makeup, Reviews, Swatches, TutorialsMary KayChelle

Mary Kay Summer 2016

Mary Kay‘s got a bunch of new products out for Summer 2016, so I grabbed some of them and put together a look alongside some quick reviews. Let’s get into it:

Mary Kay Mineral Eye Colour Bundle ($76 with compact)

The most eyecatching item was easily the Rose Gold Compact Mini ($22 if bought unfilled).

Mary Kay Mineral Eye Colour Bundle - Sweet Cream, Spun Silk, Moonstone, Rosegold, Driftwood & Espresso — Mary Kay Mineral Eye Colour Bundle – Sweet Cream, Spun Silk, Moonstone, Rosegold, Driftwood & Espresso

If you purchase the full compact with shadows, you’re looking at $76 CAD ($54 CAD without the compact). It comes with six shadows in your standard neutral shades. This is the kind of compact absolutely anyone can grab and create an easy day-to-day/work look.

Mary Kay Mineral Eye Colour Bundle - Sweet Cream, Spun Silk, Moonstone, Rosegold, Driftwood & Espresso - swatches — Mary Kay Mineral Eye Colour Bundle – Sweet Cream, Spun Silk, Moonstone, Rosegold, Driftwood & Espresso – swatches

The colours swatched well, and are quite pretty (if not fairly standard fare), but they were really, REALLY powdery in the pan. They applied well, but the kickup in the pan is INTENSE, so be sure to bang your brush off hard before you apply this to you lids!

Mary Kay Beauty That Counts - Hearts Together Lipstick — Mary Kay Beauty That Counts – Hearts Together Lipstick ($18 CAD)

Also out is a limited edition Beauty That Counts “Hearts Together” lipstick. From May 16, 2016 onwards, $1 of the sale of each lipstick will support the Mary Kay Ash Charitable Foundation in its efforts to support women living with cancer and to help end violence against women by providing grants to women’s shelters and community outreach programs.

Mary Kay Beauty That Counts - Hearts Together Lipstick - swatch — Mary Kay Beauty That Counts – Hearts Together Lipstick – swatch

Hearts Together is a labelled as a “soft pink creme lipstick”, but I’d say it veers more towards a sheer-shine lipstick with a glossy cool pink hue.

Mary Kay Perfecting Concealer ($17.50 CAD)

Okay guys… deep breath. DEEP BREATH. I loathe reviewing concealers because I just don’t use them. Why, you ask? Because every freaking concealer creases on me. Or looks crepey under my eyes. Basically, they all look like absolute garbage, so I can’t be bothered to use them.

….UNTIL NOW. I don’t know what the heck is in this thing except for magic. PURE FREAKING MAGIC. I put this on my undereyes and it not only brightened the area, but it also didn’t budge. It didn’t crease. It didn’t look crepe-y. I am totally and completely floored.

Mary Kay Perfecting Concealer in Light Ivory & Deep Ivory - swatches — Mary Kay Perfecting Concealer in Light Ivory & Deep Ivory – swatches

The shades featured above are the ones that are most likely to match my skintone so they’re the ones I’ve swatched. As it turns out, I used Deep Ivory under my eyes and it was slightly lighter than my skintone, so it helped to brighten up the area.

Mary Kay Summer 2016 Look

In these shots I’m wearing the eyeshadow palette on my eyes, the Lash Intensity mascara (which I forgot to photograph – I am so sorry!), the Perfecting Concealer in Deep Ivory under my eyes and the Hearts Together lipstick.

Mary Kay Summer 2016 Look - Eye Closeup — Mary Kay Summer 2016 Look – Eye Closeup

Rosegold on the lid.
Espresso on the outer corner and on the outer lower lash line.
Driftwood through the crease.
Sweet Cream on my brow bone.
Moonstone on the inner corner.

Final Thoughts

I wasn’t totally blown away by this collection as there are a few misses in the lot. (Overall, I found the Spring launch a lot more up my alley.) Of the products I used here, I think the eyeshadow palette is a miss for me. The eyeshadows, while lovely on the lids, are intensely powdery and I think the price point is unreasonable when other brands are putting out more shadows for a cheaper price point. (And it’s odd too, because the rest of the Mary Kay line is not unreasonably priced, so I have no idea why these shadows are so expensive. I also feel they’re inferior quality to the ones I tried last quarter from the spring line.)

The lipstick was perfectly adequate, and completely comfortable to wear. My only reservation is that it’s just not a shade I’d wear with any kind of regularity. If you love it though, get it – it’s comfortable and easy to wear!

All that to say… the complete and absolute winner out of this whole lot were the Perfecting Concealers. I can’t even begin to explain my excitement for this product! AT LONG LAST, I can finally wear undereye concealer without having to WORRY about it. I’d long since given up thinking I could wear undereye concealer just because no other brand has ever worked for me. I am so excited that the Mary Kay ones took me by complete surprise because I absolutely love them!

The products featured in this post were sent to me for consideration.

Swatch Sunday: QUO – Romance Novel

May 22, 2016Makeup, SwatchesQUOChelle

QUO Romance Novel palette

QUO recently released some new products for 2016 and amongst them was this palette called Romance Novel. The pans are ENORMOUS, so you’re getting a huge bang for your buck!

If you see the palette in stores though… just look for the one that apparently have no logo on the front cover. So weird…

If you’d like to see these shadows in action, head on over to my YouTube channel to see a look I did using QUO products from their new release. On with the swatches!

QUO Romance Novel Swatches

Quo - Romance Novel - Shade 1 — Quo – Romance Novel – Shade 1

Quo - Romance Novel - Shade 2 — Quo – Romance Novel – Shade 2

Quo - Romance Novel - Shade 3 — Quo – Romance Novel – Shade 3

Quo - Romance Novel - Shade 4 — Quo – Romance Novel – Shade 4

Quo - Romance Novel - Shade 5 — Quo – Romance Novel – Shade 5

Quo - Romance Novel - Shade 6 — Quo – Romance Novel – Shade 6

The product featured in this post was sent to me for consideration.

Kat Von D Shade + Light Quad in Rust (Review, Swatches & Look)

May 18, 2016Makeup, Reviews, SwatchesKat Von DChelle

Kat Von D Shade + Light Quad in Rust

I see the launch of the Kat Von D Shade + Light Eye Contour Quads as a colourful extension to her Shade + Light Eye Palette. You know… kind of like colourful addons that you can use to help flesh out the neutral look of the original palette.

Except… I was drawn to the shade range that is probably MOST like the original eyeshadow palette!

The brand new Kat Von D Shade + Light Eye Contour Quads come in four different colours that speak to different tonal shades. There’s Rust (matte brownish reds – which is the one featured in this post), Sage (matte greens), Plum (matte purples) and Smoke (matte cool grays). They’re also ALL matte shades.

So the Rust quad is… well… it’s pretty freaking gorgeous. As the name suggests, it features very warm and rusty shades. The largest pan is a bit more peach, the two middle shades are varying tones of orangey-red (be still my heart) and the final shade is a perfect brow bone highlight colour for me.

Kat Von D Shade + Light Quad in Rust - Swatches — Kat Von D Shade + Light Quad in Rust – Swatches

Swatched out on my skin you can see that they are really saturated with pigment. They do verge on slightly powdery (as does the original palette), but I’ll take that over a hardpacked shadow any day. I don’t tend to struggle with powdery shadows because I feel like you’ve got even more pigment to blend with.

KVD Rust versus KVD Shade + Light Palette - swatches — KVD Rust versus KVD Shade + Light Palette – swatches

I know a lot of people are going to compare the Rust quad to the warm toned section of the original KVD palette, so I thought I’d swatch both out for you to compare yourselves. They are definitely *similar*, but not quite the same. I prefer the tones in the Rust quad personally, but if you’re looking for more colour dimension to add to your collection, the other quads (Plum, Sage) may suit you better. You cannot go wrong with the formula though – so pick whichever quad suits your fancy!

Here’s how it played out on my face. I’m wearing only the Rust quad on my eyelids, and, since I know I’ll be asked, on my lips is Maybelline’s Vibrant Mandarin and on my cheeks is Hard Candy’s Skinny Dipping.

The Contour shade (the orange) was easily the most pigmented, so I’d say start small when you apply it to your lids and then keep building it up. I ended up whacking a whole ton on when I first applied it and the colour just kept blossoming over my lid as I was blending. (Not a bad thing, just worth mentioning!)

Final Thoughts

The Kat Von D Shade + Light Eye Contour Quad in Rust is a thing of beauty. The texture of the eyeshadows is soft and powdery (which I’ll leave up to you to decide if that’s a texture you enjoy – for me, that’s a thumbs up!) which make them very easy to blend. The colours are gorgeous and work incredibly well together – you can wear this quad without needing to pull in any other shadows for a cohesive eye look. I do find the packaging is a bit bulky, but it does fit with the KVD aesthetic so I understand the reasoning for it. I also love that she stuck to matte shadows with this launch. Overall product definitely gets two thumbs up from me!

The Kat Von D Shade +Light Eye Contour Quads can be purchased on sephora.ca for $34 CAD or on sephora.com for $26 USD.

The product featured in this post was sent to me for review.

Swatch Sunday: Wet n Wild – I Dream of Greenie

May 15, 2016Makeup, SwatchesWet n WildChelle

I’ve got a LOT of Wet n Wild palettes up my sleeve, so be prepared for those over the next little while! This week’s beauty is the I Dream of Greenie trio.

A word to the wise, however. While this palette is gorgeous, it is also INCREDIBLY fragile. You can see how a lot of the powder has worn away above and I would say 50% of that is just from closing the lid and having the powder crack at that minute impact. It’s so sensitive to impact, that I actually had to throw it after I swatched it for this post. Granted, I had had the compact for several years, but it’s still worth mentioning. Beautiful colours, but incredibly fragile!

Wet n Wild I Dream of Greenie Swatches

Wet n Wild I Dream of Greenie - Browbone — Wet n Wild I Dream of Greenie – Browbone

Wet n Wild I Dream of Greenie - Crease — Wet n Wild I Dream of Greenie – Crease

Wet n Wild I Dream of Greenie - Eyelid — Wet n Wild I Dream of Greenie – Eyelid

So alll the way back in 2014 I created this look with these shadows:

Full details are in this blog post!

Physicians Formula Butter Bronzer (Review & Swatches)

May 13, 2016Makeup, Reviews, SwatchesPhysicians FormulaChelle

Physicians Formula Butter Bronzer

Bronzer has become one of my most loved products in the makeup world over the last few years. One of the very first bronzers I ever tried that actually worked on me was a Physicians Formula bronzer in the heart shaped pressed powder thingamajig. I loved that thing so much that I actually used up the entire compact rather swiftly. But as with any beauty obsessor, I started to amass more and more bronzers by different brands because I wanted to try them ALL! So Physicians Formula kind of fell by the wayside as I tried any and every brand out there.

And yet here I am, right back to them. Physicians Formula suddenly released their Butter Bronzer about a month or two back and everyone went nuts. It has a beautiful gradient packaging. It has an embossed print on the powder. It smells like old timey sun tan lotion (or bleach, as I so nicely described in my recent favourites video…). I mean, we all knew we were going to be suckers for this compact, weren’t we?

The Butter Bronzer comes in two shades – Light Bronze and Bronze. The one pictured in this post is the darker of the two (Bronze), although the paler (Light Bronze) shade is maybe a HAIR paler.

As with most Physicians Formula compacts, the mirror is actually in the base of the product, alongside a… brush… type… thing. Well… usually it’s a brush. This time it’s some weird mushy sponge applicator that will do NO ONE any favours for application.

Unless you wanted tiger stripes.
This can definitely give you tiger stripes.

Anyway, the brush/sponge/thing is irrelevant to me as I threw it out immediately.

Comes with this weird... sponge... thing... — Comes with this weird… sponge… thing…

Like honestly. How are you going to blend bronzer with THAT *THING*?

Physicians Formula Butter Bronzer - swatch — Physicians Formula Butter Bronzer – swatch

The heavy swatch above shows you that there’s a tiny bit of a sheen to the product, but overall it’s a slightly warm bronzer that blends well.

Physicians Formula Butter Bronzer - on my face — Physicians Formula Butter Bronzer – on my face

On my skintone, it’s fairly subtle. I love how it blends out without much work AND it doesn’t look like I overdid it at all. In both the shot above and below, I’m wearing the bronzer on the back of my cheekbones, around my temples, and along my jaw line.

It even seems to match incredibly cool-toned looks, which is a huge blessing.

Final Thoughts

Aside from that ridiculous sponge thing in the bottom of the compact, the Physicians Formula Butter Bronzer is absolutely wonderful through and through. Worth noting though: the scent of the bronzer is pretty potent and you can actually smell it through the compact. So give it a sniff in stores to see if it’s something that will bother you. I personally love the scent, but it will linger on your brushes (not through a good cleansing though!).

The colour is pale and soft, not overtly warm, but warm enough to make it look like you’re sunkissed. This does skew towards us paler folks, so I think if you’re medium-deep, this won’t work for you. (I also anticipate this not working for me when I’ve got some summer colour on my face.) I’ve been reaching for this bronzer practically every single day and I’ve almost already worn away the pattern. It’s been a long time since I’ve fallen for a bronzer so hard!

The Physicians Formula Butter Bronzer is available at various Canadian drugstores, but it can also be purchased online for Americans at Ulta.com for $14.99 USD.