Eyeshadow palette

Excuse the broken piece in the above palette – when it arrived, it was smashed and sadly, I couldn’t salvage it. *insert sad emoji face* However, a broken corner certainly didn’t stop me from testing these newly released Cover Shot eyeshadow palettes from Smashbox. There were a handful of various ones released with this collection, but I naturally went for the ones with the most neutral and wearable tones. Most of the palettes were shimmer shades with a matte thrown in here and there, though as you can see from the below swatches they are a subtle shimmer.

Out of all three, I found myself reaching for Ablaze the most simply because the color pay-off for that particular palette is much richer than the other two. The Metallic eye palette has many of the pale shades that I prefer to wear, but I did have to reapply a few times to build up the color. The Golden Hour Eye palette had a good selection of subtle lid colors, with the deeper shades being perfect as a liner or intense crease. They are quite compact and small so it makes them easier to tote or bring when traveling. I don’t have too many Smashbox shadows (in fact, I don’t think I have any) so I was definitely impressed by the quality and color payoff of each.

 

 

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I’m sure we all need another eyeshadow palette, right?! Ok, maybe we don’t need one but we always want one. While new ones get released every.single.day – I really think both of these rather large newly released palettes are worth adding to a collection. The new Urban Decay Ultimate Naked Basics Palette which is all matte and stunning, and the new Lorac Mega Pro Palette 3 which contains every shade of eyeshadow you could need to create beautiful (but more neutral based) looks.

1. Urban Decay Naked Ultimate Basics Palette – I have the original Urban Decay Naked Basics Matte palette and have been using it for years. The texture is perfect, the colors are perfect – I love how it gives me such a clean and polished look. The new Ultimate palette has a row of gorgeous rosy/beige/tan neutrals and a row of rich earth tones plus a deep graphite and inky black. There is some fallout when using this palette as I find with all of my Urban Decay Naked palettes but the colors blend so beautifully on the eyes and give the most pristine matte finish to the eye that I find it worth the slight powder drop.

2. Lorac Mega Pro Palette 3 – If there every was a palette that contained every color I could ever want – I think it is this one. 2 rows of matte, 2 rows of shimmer and all somewhat neutral shades. There is no electric blues or vibrant kelly greens for me to have to avoid – all of these shades are ones that I could use to create an everyday look or even a great polished evening eye without being too over the top. The texture is as I would expect with a Lorac palette – buttery, buttery, buttery. The colors blend smooth, evenly and look stunning on the lids. There is minimal fallout but with certain dark colors I recommend doing your concealer after your eyeshadow so you can clean up if anything drops while applying. The colors are rich and I think this would be a gorgeous palette for almost any skin tone. It’s not the easiest palette to travel with but if you already bring multiple palettes with you for every trip (yup, I know that struggle), this could solve that problem. There is not a single color that is missing from this palette that I would need to supplement with another. Another hit from Lorac – though I am a bit biased and think this is the best mega pro palette yet.

*pr samples included