NARS Essential Eye palette

NARS released TWO eye palettes this fall, and unlike the Modern Love palette, I'm totally in love with this one. The Essential Eye palette retails for $55 and is available on the NARS website as well as Neiman Marcus. Unlike NARS's past eye palettes, this one contains a cream eyeshadow and 5 powder ones encased in NARS's regular rubbery packaging.
The shades are as follows:
Unconditional Love- a nice light peachy bronze. Putting this under one of the powder shadows intensifies the color. It's similar to Nepal, which is also in the palette. I've heard that NARS cream shadows crease on a lot of people though, so it may be something you might want to consider if you're tempted by this palette.
Night Star- golden nude with shimmer. This is probably the only shade I liked in the Night Series palette, so I'm kind of glad to have it back since I swapped away the Night Series palette due to its chalkiness.
Galapagos- brown with gold sparkle. I've seen a lot of shades like this summer, but it doesn't make this one any less pretty.
Nepal- peachy bronze nude
Ondine-taupey purple
Thunderball- matte grey based blue

Overall I really like this palette. Yes, 3 of the shades are really similar, but I like all of the shades in the palette and the palette is easily wearable. It's well worth what I paid for it.

NARS Modern Love palette.

Originally a Nordstrom Exclusive, the NARS Modern Love palette retails for $55 and is available on NAR's website now that Nordies has sold out of the palettes. The palette contains 6 shades;

Alhambra--a frosty peachy nude. I'm not entirely sure why this is so popular. I feel like it's pretty dupeable.
Jezebel--a brownish red.
India song--shimmery neutral brown
Tokyo--purple tinged white. This shade's practically white on my skintone
Habanera-- greyed purple. This is the prettiest shade in the palette, but it pulls mostly grey on me and the purlpe doesn't really show through.
Pandora--matte black. As far as matte blacks go, this is one of the more vibrant blacks. I'm not a big fan of black eyeshadow though as I don't really have any use for it since I prefer gel liners

All around, the colors in the palette are pretty indivually, but I can't seem to combine them in a way that makes me happy, so as a palette, I don't really like it. It's probably still worth the price if you like the colors though.

Too Faced Natural Eye Neutral Eye Palette

Ok, so I got forced to work downstairs on a computer at work, except I'm all caught up on my work, so here's some swatches for you guys of the TF Natural Eye palette. This palette comes in a box like palette that coses via magnet and has a little pull out drawer with a dual ended sponge applicator in it and 3 look cards tucked into their own pocket in the lid of the palette (which is a GREAT idea..Tarte should take notes on this because I always lose the look cards that come with their palettes) The palette contains 9 shades, with the "base" shades in the palette being like 3-4x the size as the other colors, which is nice, but I personally would have preferred it if the other colors were a bit bigger.

Heaven- a matte light yellowy beige color. It's a nice, all over color, albeit a bit light for my skintone maybe.

Velvet Revolver- matte taupe

Sexpresso- Matte dark brown, the most boring shade in the palette

Silk Teddy- Shimmery peachy pink with gold shimmer

Push-Up- golden bronze color, metallic finish

Erotica-dark grey taupe

Nude Beach- golden peach with LOTS of glitter.

Honey Pot- Gold

Cocoa Puff- warm brown with gold shimmer

Look cards: I've tried 2/3 of these so far and I kind of like both of them. (I've tried Day and Fashion) I had been extremely wary of this palette until I'd tried it, since A Musing of a Muse's rendition of these looks looked quite frosty, but they were fine when I tried them myself. I think the difference was that she used a much heavier hand than I did when applying.
Day is a nice, matte subtle look, though I feel like it's probably meant for lighter skintones. It still works on mine (about NC30 or so) but it's definitely pushing its limits.

The "Classic" look..is a nice bronzey look that I think is kind of nice for summer. It's definitely very metallic and shimmery, but it's not anywhere near as bad as I was expecting. I wouldn't really have called it a classic neutral eye myself, but oh well. Silk Teddy is your standard peachy champagne wash. Depending on how much you apply, it can be a more or less shimmery shade. Push up, when pressed onto the lid as instructed, was a metallic coppery bronze color, While Eriotica is a deep satiny brown.

Fashion was the look that I was the most wary of, because even just looking at Nude Beach in the palette it looks like frosty hell. However, overall, the look was fine, minus Nude beach, which had a ton of glitter in it, which also means that it had a ton of fallout. This is probably the one shade in the palette that will see little or no use, but being able to use 8 out of 9 in a palette isn't too bad.

Honey pot is a really beautiful gold color, and was apparently just the gold I'd been searching for this summer, so I'm really quite happy with it. Cocoa puff is really pretty as well.

So, I bought this palette expecting to hate it and return it instantly, but it looks like this one's staying in my stash, as I can find very little wrong with it. The packaging is a smidge bulky for what it is (because who really needs the sponge applicator, let alone a pull out drawer for it), but overall the shades in the palette are very nice, and I love the sort of "Makeup for Dummies" feel to look cards. I think it's worth the $30 or so I paid for it.

Tarte Femme Naturale palette

I haven't made a Sephora order in a while, but I decided to last week and I got two things; the Tarte Femme Naturale palette and the Too Faced Natural Eye palette (I'm a huge sucker for neutrals) and I got both of these suckers this week. I generally like Tarte's palettes in theory because they come with handy little look cards for the colors inside the palette. This palette came with 10 shades of eyeshadow, a dual ended eyeliner, and a dual ended brush. The colors inside this palette are quite pretty as well, and comes in a mix of matte and shimmer shades encased in a reuseable magnetic palette.
For the most part, these shades have decent pigmentation (some are on the sheerer side) and blendability, but the two middle shades in both rows had a somewhat grittier texture, which I think shows in my swatches. On the lid, however, they aplly and blend just fine, but it kind of reminds me of some of MAC's grittier pigments. (and yes, I spelled the name of the palette wrong, but was too lazy to change it)

The look card: click for full size

I actually forgot to swatch the eyeliners in this palette..and I'll add them in later,but both colors are smooth and pretty, and the dual ended brush is a really nice brush as well (it's really soft). Overall, I think it's a pretty decent deal for 10 full sized eyeshadows, eyeliners, and a brush. However, I just cant pull off the darker pink, and I kind of felt that it would look better on lighter skintones (I'm currently NC30-35). Additionally, the quality of the shadows in the palette suck in comparison to Tarte's permanent ones (though still decent), so mine's going back.

Dior Fall 2009--Smoky Jazz and Night Butterfly

This year I went absolutely nuts at the Nordies Anniversary Sale. From Dior I picked up a Diorskin Forever Compact and the two palettes that are available for Fall 2009. I didn't pick up the Nordies exclusive palette Purple Jazz. (it was too reddish for my tastes) I'm not usually a huge fan of Dior, but this Fall's collection made me plop down my credit card after maybe 5 minutes at the counter. Both of the palettes for fall are gorgeous and lemming worthy to me. (Though I will admit they aren't must-haves)


Smoky Jazz is a cute little palette with 4 e/s, a brow powder, and a cream eyeliner. It comes with a double ended floam applicator and a double ended brush with an angled brush on one end and a thin smudge brush on the other. At first glance, I feel that this palette doesn't really look very smokey, but trying this on my eyes, I was pleasantly surprised to find that it works very well as a smokey palette. The plastic insert in the palette calls the white shade a "Topcoat" This color is a pretty shimmering white which can be applied to be an opaque, glittering white, or sheered out over the lid to have a nice shimmer. This is a great hightlight color and makes a passable base color as well. The next color over is a shimmery taupey silver. The color next to that is a warmer taupe. The last e/s shade in the palette is a really pretty matte taupey purple grey. I like this color the best probably out of the colors in this palette, but it definitely seems a bit out of place. The taupe color next to the black liner is labeled as a brow powder by the plastic insert. It looks too light to be of any use as a brow powder for ladies with black hair, however, when I gave it a try on a whim while I was playing with the palette, it worked surprisingly well for me. I guess it's good to know that in a pinch I can get away with using this as a brow filler. It also works just fine as an eyeshadow. The cream eyeliner is a basic black eyeliner. It applies just fine, but never fully sets like gel liners do (remains smudgeable). It does last an awfully long time though..it took me 2 days to get this one off my arm. This palette retails for $65. for that price it's a "nice to have" item, but not a must have.


The 2nd palette I picked up was a beautiful quint of purples, Night butterfly, which retails for $56. The texture of this quint differs from Dior's regular quints in the sense that it's not super buttery, however, all of the colors in the quint (except the black maybe) still apply smoothly and blend just fine. It's also much less shimmery than Dior's permanent quints, which I really like. The black color was chalky to the touch, but I'm not sure I'll ever use it since I tend to ignore blacks in palettes) The colors in the quint are a beautiful cool toned purple with blue shimmer, a pinky lilac color, black with silver glitter, a mid toned grey, and a red based plum. Put together, I can create a really nice purple smokey eye with this palette. Out of these two palettes I think I am definitely more drawn to the colors in this palette, although I don't think that the colors in the palette are wholly unique. Because of this, I'd also say that this is nice to have, but definitely not a must have item.

NYX Palettes--Part 1

For those of you who frequent the boards on MUA, you might already know that I am definitely a high end hoor,when it comes to my makeup (It's a good thing this obsession doesn't extend to my clothing and accessories or I'd really be in trouble) However, one of the few drug store or low end brands I'll use is NYX. They're a great affordable brand with products that in my opinion, competes beautifully with every mid end and high end brand out there. If you hang out on the boards, you'd also know that I'm a huge palette hoor. Unluckily (or Luckily, however you like to look at it) for me, NYX recently came out with 20 new palettes (which contain either 5 colors or 10 colors) I missed the big blowout sale NYX had of these when they first released these, and had subsequently decided to pass on them, but when nonpareilboutique had their sale over the 4th of July weekend, I caved and picked the 6 palettes I wanted the most out of the lot, and I was absolutely delighted to receive them in the mail.

The quality of each palette is excellent and all of the colors in these palettes have decent pigmentation and blendability. There are a few colors that are a bit chalky (mostly the black or near black colors..which I hardly ever use so it's perfectly fine), but for the most part I love these palettes and have absolutely no regret in ordering them. I ordered 5 of the 10 color palettes; Mysterious Brown Eyes, Versus, Romance, Smokey Eyes, and Champagne and Caviar, and one of the 5 color palettes; I Dream of Barbados.

Mysterious Brown eyes is NYX's palette designed to complement, you guessed it, brown eyes. It is a mostly neutral colored palettes with a couple of purples and a green in it. Out of the 6 palettes I ordered, this is the only one I've tried on my face so far (I just started working for real and the 8.5 hour day plus 2 hour total commute has left me too wiped to play, and it takes too much effort in the morning to drag myself out of bed in the morning to leave myself time to properly apply eye makeup) Most of the colors in this palette are quite smooth, but the lilac color on the top right does feel a bit chalky. However, with a MAC 139, this color applies rather pigmented and blends just fine with the other colors in the palette.
Versus is a great little palette with neutrals and purples. It's not as buttery as most NYX singles are, but I wouldn't say it was chalky either. The shadows in here are drier in texture than many of my NYX singles, but there is asolutely no problem pulling color off of it. I'm not really sure what brand I could compare the texture to, but I'd say it's similar to some NARS's creamier shadows, but not as dry as other NARS shadows. (Does this make ANY sense?)

After I swateched the Versus palette, I thankfully decided to give up trying to swatch all 10 shades in a palette at once on my arm.

Romance is a nice warm, somewhat neutrally palette. The texture of this palette is absolutely wonderful, and I'd probably go as far to say that it is the most buttery palette in the lot of 10 color palettes I ordered. The second Row in particular is very buttery and pigmented.


The Smokey Eyes palette is probably the sexiest smokey eye palette I've seen around. It gives a nice variety of colors to use for a classic smokey eye, which is nice, because I think that 4 color smokey eye palettes, while nice, get a little boring. This palette gives you a nice chance to play with several shades of colors to create both a warm and cool toned smokey eye. The quality of this one is generally excellent, but the first color from the left on the bottom row is chalky (It's the black color though, so who cares really). IT'd apply just fine as a liner though I think.


Probably the sexiest palette to look at is Champagne and Caviar. Champagne and Caviar is a great palette of neutral colors. Additionally, the colors in this palette are not super shimmery, so this palette is perfect for work. The texture leaves me with nothing to complain about either.


Last, but not least, is I Dream of Barbados. This is a really nice cool toned palette with purples, greys, and a pink. This is a really cute palette that actually seems to resemble Dior's Fall quint; Night Butterfly. It does have a few differences though, which I will discuss later when I post swatches of what I got from Dior's Fall collection. The texture of this palette is even better than the 10 color palettes and I think that the quality of the shadows in this palette match the quality of NYX's really nice single shadows perfectly. Each of the shadows in this palette are about 1" in diameter and are the same size as MAC shadows, so if you chose, you coud depot these colors and place them in a MAC palette (Which seems a bit pointless to me, but some people like that)

Anyways, for those of you wondering why the title of this entry was "Part 1", I actually intend to order the rest of the NYX palettes and swatch every last one of them for you guys, so please look forward to that. Additionally, I'd like to say that I'm not quite done posting all my Stila stuff (or Bobbi Brown for that matter) , so look forward to that. If I don't update my blog for a while, there's still a decent chance that I may still be swatching. For those who want to browse some of the swatched I may have but have not posted on here, you can go ahead and check out the photos of the MUA user 'stashswatch'. That's the username I'll be using to share my swatches on the boards. Additionally, I haul in a rather OCD manner. If you see any of my haul posts (usually under my main handle 'eternalstarangel' aka ESA) and decide that you'd like to see something swatched, feel free and shoot me a message. Thanks for stopping in and have a nice day!

Brush Cleansers--Parian Spirit, Smashbox, MAC

For the last 6 months, I've generally been really lazy about cleaning my brushes. Thankfully, many brands make brush cleansers that are great for light cleanings in between times that you finally get around to deep cleaning your brushes (which unfortunately for me has been a few months now...don't get grossed out though, I have a LOT of brushes so I've been on a rotation...) The three I've tried so far are Smashbox's, MAC's and Japonesque's Parian Spirit cleaners.

I'll start this post off with Japonesque's Parian Spirit Cleanser. This cleanser comes in 3 sizes, a 2 oz. bottle with a sprayer, an 8 oz size, and a huge 16 oz size. I was lucky enough to get a decent sized sample of this stuff from a friend of mine who picked this up from IMATS while she was there. (Thank you!) This cleanser is probably the quickest and easiest to use; you simply pour a little bit out into a small container, dip your brush in, and swirl it in there slightly and pigments literally just fall out of your brush. It's pretty interesting to watch. It has a lemony scent to it (Lemon Pledge anyone?) After that, just squish it a bit with a paper towel and it's good for use again. Out of the 3 cleansers I'll be talking about today, this is also the only brush cleanser I've tried that REALLY pulls all that gross gunk out of your lip brushes...and does so rather quickly at that (I think it took me less than a minute to clean 3 lip brushes) I like this one very much for that. However, overall, this cleanser is my least favorite out of the 3 because it seems to contain oil, which I don't think is something I like. This does make it so that scratchy brushes like the maxine mop are much much softer, but I think I'll skip on this for using regularly on anything except my lip brushes.

Next up is Smashbox. Smashbox is the first brush cleanser I ever bought, back in the day, when Smashbox was pretty much the only cosmetic line I used. (I was a die hard Smashbox fan back in high school and my early college years) Smashbox's Brush Cleaner comes in a 4 oz spay bottle and retails for $15. To use this product, you spray the brush cleanser on a paper towel and then sweep your brush over the moistened towel to remove pigment. It's a nice cleanser for removing pigment from your brushes as well as sanitizing your brushes, but I feel that MAC's brush cleanser does the same exact thing for way less money.

MAC's brush cleanser comes in a 7.9 oz bottle with one of those push top dispensers (like BBW lotion bottles) and retails for $11. One bottle lasts me a very, very long time (i think the last one lasted me about 10 months or so) I use this one in the same way that I use the Smashbox one, I spray/pour a bit of this stuff on a paper towel, run my brush over the dampened area, and then squeeze my brush slightly with a dry paper towel. My brishes are ready for use again within a few minutes. I'm generally quite happy with this cleanser, and out of the three I'm posting about today, this one is my favorite. It makes my life much easier since I can go just a little bit longer without having to deep clean my brushes. I think it's generally better to use on smaller brushes like eye brushes, but it can pull color out of cheek brushes as well, generally, I prefer to subject my face brushes to deep cleaning instead of using brush cleanser.

For deep cleaning my brushes, I like to run the tips of my brushes under warm water, then work in a mixture of antibacterial soap, baby shampoo/conditioner, and warm water, or just a mix of warm water and antibacterial soap. I then rinse out my brushes, squeeae out excess water, with a paper towl, and lay them flat to dry.