Colourpop Forever Freshman Collection Review and Swatches

Hey Everyone!

Colourpop released their Fall 2015 collection recently which includes two sets - Forever Freshman and Back To Cool! Initially I wanted to pick up both but the lippie stix's in Back To Cool collection didn't really grab my attention plus I already had quite a few similar shades but on the other hand the Forever Freshman collection had some really unique shades which were missing in my collection so obviously I had to get it!

Colourpop Forever Freshman collection retails for 30$ and contains 6 full size Super Shock eyeshadows of 0.07 oz each. All the shades in this collection are new to the colourpop eyeshadow line and currently are available only in this set but I am hoping colourpop will sell these individually in future as they have done in the past with some collections.

As with the fall just around the corner the shades in this collection are absolutely perfect for the season! The set comes in thick cardboard box packaging wherein the eyeshadows are securely placed within the round slots. I must say I am very impressed with the packaging as the box is quite sturdy and the round slots are exactly the size of the eyeshadow pots which helps the eyeshadows to stay in tightly! I had to apply force to remove the eyeshadows from the cardboard slots! 

The shades are absolutely gorgeous! Colourpop has done it again! As with all their eyeshadows these are no different and have excellent pigmentation! All the swatches below are done with one single swipe so you can definitely see how amazing the pigmentation is! The set contains mix of warm and cool tones. The shades in this set are -

Crimper- Soft gold with multi-dimensional gold glitter in a Metallic finish
Koosh- Icy silver taupe in an Ultra-Metallic finish
90210- Greyed out taupe softly sprinkled with pink and gold glitter in a Satin Luxe finish
Melrose- True rust in a Matte finish
As If- Mid-tone cool taupe in a Matte finish
Baby T- Deep blackened blue in Matte finish

All the shades have amazing pigmentation, the only shade which lacks a bit pigmentation is As If but its definitely buildable and even on my NC42 skin tone it does show up beautifully! The best part about colourpop eyeshadows is the staying power! I have worn these with and without primer and they stay on my eyes for 8-10 hours until I remove them with a makeup remover! And this is true with all colourpop eyeshadows not only the ones in this set. The shades stay true to their intensity even after 8 hours which is freaking awesome! If you have never tried Colourpop eyeshadows I highly suggest you give them a try! With 5$ each these are one of the best drugstore eyeshadows out in the market if not best! Highly recommended!

Rating:- A

Price:- 30$ 

Availability:- Colourpop.com

Colourpop Baby T

Colourpop Crimper

Colourpop Koosh

Colourpop As If

Colourpop 90210

Colourpop Melrose

Colourpop Forever Freshman Collection Swatches

Hourglass Ambient Lighting Edit Palette Review, Swatches and Comparison - Holiday 2015

Hey Everyone!

Its only mid September and Holiday 2015 Makeup Bonanza has already begun! I have to say I have been waiting for the holiday season to begun eagerly! Almost every brand comes out with their versions of the holiday sets and palettes and you definitely get some very good deals around this time of the year! The very first palette to hit the market this year was the Hourglass Ambient Lighting Edit Palette. I do own the original Hourglass Ambient Lighting palette and love it a lot so when I saw that Hourglass was releasing another ambient lighting palette with blushes and bronzers I was super excited as I don't own any of the hourglass blushes or bronzers and this palette seemed awesome way to try them!

Description:-

A limited-edition wardrobe of powders, blushes, a bronzer, and the debut of the new Ambient® Strobe Lighting Powder—an illuminating powder designed to create the perfect highlight. This palette includes a Strobe Lighting Powder in Iridescent Strobe Light, two Lighting Powders in Dim Light and Diffused Light, two Lighting Blushes in Luminous Flush and Mood Exposure, and a Lighting Bronzer in Luminous Bronze Light. These products use Photoluminescent Technology, the optically transparent particles alter the appearance of the skin by manipulating and refracting favorable light. The result is skin that looks smooth, even, and enhanced—not masked. The soft-focus technology helps to minimize the look of wrinkles and imperfections, neutralize discoloration, and emulate the appearance of young, healthy skin. 

Packaging is absolutely gorgeous! Hourglass definitely does a fantastic job with their packaging. Its reflective metallic old gold which is so classy and elegant in my opinion. The only downfall would be that it does attract dirt and can get messy very easily. 

The palette comes with 3 Hourglass Ambient Lighting powders - Dim Light, Diffused Light and a new limited edition exclusive to this palette strobing powder Iridescent Strobe Light. The blushes in the palette are Mood Exposure and Luminous Flush with Luminous Bronze Light bronzer. The quality of the powders present in this palette is as good as their original ambient lighting palette and their singles. The powders are buttery soft with great pigmentation. The blush shades chosen in this palette will work across all skin tones in my opinion. The bronzer is tad bit too light for my skin tone but if you have light to medium skin tone the bronzer will look gorgeous!

Now coming to the most important part PRICE! The palette retails for whopping 80$ and approx 84$ with taxes. When I received the palette I was shocked to see the size of the palette! Its almost as small as my hands and I have tiny hands! Of course I was not expecting to get full size products but I thought the individual pan size would be same as the ones in original ambient lighting palette but to my shock the pans in hourglass ambient lighting edit palette are much smaller than original ambient lighting palette! Below is the comparison picture side by side of both the palettes and you can see how small the pan sizes are as compared to the original palette!

For me personally I am in two minds, for the price I definitely expected more quantity plus not all shades work for me! I already own Dim Light as its present in the original ambient lighting palette. The new Iridescent Strobe Light is shimmery pale pink highlight with tiny chunks of glitter..not a fan! Diffused Light I love for highlighting under the eyes..it works great! I do love both the blushes especially Mood Exposure as it was already in my wishlist, though I would have loved Radiant Magenta or Diffused Heat but ah well Luminous Flush is also gorgeous. Finally the bronzer in Luminous Bronze Light is way too light for my skintone to work as a bronzer, it give more of a glow and works great as a topper over the matte bronzers.

The only reason I may decide to keep the palette would be because of how travel friendly it is! You get your highlight, under eye setting powder/highlight, blushes and technically a bronzer into one! Plus buying any two full size products would practically cost more than this palette! But even so I am still debating on whether or not to keep this palette..I guess time will only tell!

If you have never tried any of the Hourglass products , this palette is a great way to try the ambient lighting formula but if you already have the original lighting palette and singles of blushes/bronzer I'd say you don't need this palette.

Rating:- B+

Price:- 80$

Available exclusively at Sephora and Hourglass

I hope the review and comparison was helpful, until next time take care and stay beautiful!

Kat Von D Metal Crush Eyeshadows Thrasher and Iggy Swatches, Review

Hey Everyone!

Kat Von D recently launched her line of Metal Crush eyeshadow's and I hauled a couple of them to try out but after trying these out I am definitely going to pick up a few more - Thunderstruck, Black No 1, Raw Power and Electric Warrior have already caught my attention!

Description:-

Bring a shock of metallic color to eyes. Kat Von D’s proprietary formula features Color-Soaked Concentrate™, the result of a technique in which pigment-saturated powders undergo a unique tumbling process that softens and smooths each particle until shadow is creamy and lustrous—leaving behind the highest possible levels of pigment and pearl in this ultra long-wear shadow. With a polished metal finish and 11 striking shades, Metal Crush Eyeshadow glides smoothly across the lids, saturating them with beautiful metallic pigment. 

Packaging is stunning as all of Kat Von D products! I love the logo on the cap, the font definitely makes it eccentric and edgy! The shades I picked up are Thrasher - a gorgeous metallic gold and Iggy - a pearlescent mermaid green! Both the shades are gorgeous and I don't have anything like them in my collection! Kat Von D is known for her long lasting highly pigmented products and these eyeshadows are no different. The eyeshadows are highly pigmented with smooth texture. They don't feel dry or flaky whatsoever. I have worn them with and without primer for testing purpose and both the times I got around 7-8 hours of wear without any creasing but then again I don't have oily eyelids.

The formula is consistent across both the shades and you get what you see! The pigmentation is intense with absolutely no fallouts which is amazing! Sometimes metallic shadows are hard blend due to the oils present in them which make them appear so metallic and foiled but I had absolutely no problem blending these out...infact they blend effortlessly! They also don't feel extra creamy like some of the makeupgeek's foiled eyeshadows (where the pigment gets stuck together) but at the same time the pigmentation is as intense as a foiled shadow! These are very much comparable to the Makeup Forever Artist Shadows..both wrt to price and quality! If you love metallic eyeshadows as much as I do definitely give these a try! I highly recommend these and can't wait to get my hands on more!

Rating:- A

Price:- 21$ each for 2.8gms

Available at exclusively at Sephora and QVC

Kat Von D Metal Crush Eyeshadow Iggy

Kat Von D Metal Crush Eyeshadow in Thrasher

Kat Von D Thrasher and Iggy

Kat Von D Thrasher and Iggy Swatches

Kat Von D Metal Crush Eyeshadows in Thrasher and Iggy 

I hope the review and swatches were helpful, please feel free to leave your comments and suggestions below. Until next time take care and stay beautiful!

Morphe 35O Palette Review and Swatches

Hey Everyone!

If you are active on social media you would know that this palette has taken over the entire makeup world with a storm! The new Morphe 35O Palette contains all warm toned eyeshadows you can thank of! If you love oranges, browns, coppers, bronze, yellow, gold etc than you need this palette in your life! The palette has been constantly sold out on the Morphe Brushes website but the good part is that its a permanent item and according to the morphe IG it will be restocked by the end of Sept. So hang in there!

MAC Vamplify Collection Lipgloss Hyper-Fabulous and How Chic Is That Review, Swatches and Comparison with Dupes

Hey Everyone!

MAC just released their new MAC Vamplify Collection of lip glosses and I picked a couple of shades to try on and I must say I am pleasantly surprised! As you all know I am  not a big lip gloss person but I love these! Why? Keep on reading...

What does MAC Cosmetics say: Be seduced by our most dramatic lipgloss yet, M·A·C Vamplify. Infused with a new colour-boosting technology, the formula is loaded with high-powered pigments in 17 shades, including three online-exclusives. One swipe loads lips with attitude, as a combination of lush natural oils polish with moisturizing colour. The glossy colour wears comfortably for hours, for a look that comes on strong and doesn’t let go. Also, dare you to resist the near-everlasting power of Pro Longwear Lip Pencil, now in 12 new shades.

Out of the 12 shades I picked up a couple which I know I will get a lot of use out Hyper-Fabulous which is gorgeous mauvey brown nude and How Chic Is That? which is stunning purple! You know I love my purples so I had to get it!

MAC Vamplify lip glosses come in standard MAC lip gloss packaging but these are taller than the usual lip glosses which MAC sells. There are 12 shades ranging from nudes/corals/pinks/reds/plums so there is a shade for everyone! 

The formula is what sold me on these! It goes on smooth with opaque pigmentation and are completely non sticky! They feel hybrid between the liquid lipstick and lip glosses. They have the shine and comfort of wearing lip gloss but pigmentation and staying power of a liquid lipstick! Amazinggggg! I know a lot of people love the standard sweet vanilla fragrance but I am not a fan of it and guess what these lip glosses dont have that sweet vanilla scent to them!

I have been wearing them non stop for the past week since I got them and I must say I love these and planning to pick a couple more shades from the range. The staying power is very impressive as even after having a full blown meal I can still see the colour on my lips! Plus it does leave behind a very healthy stain on the lips..I say healthy because it does not dry out your lips and is easily removed using any makeup remover. 

Overall I'd highly recommend MAC Vamplify Collection lip glosses they are totally worth every penny! If you love intensely pigmented non sticky long wearing lips with shine these are for you!

Rating: A+

Price: 20$

MAC Vamplify Lipgloss How Chic Is That? on my NC40-42 skin tone

MAC Vamplify Lipgloss Hyper-Fabulous on my NC 40-42 skin tone

Digging in my collection I found a dupe for MAC Vamplify How Chic Is That and its non other than Kat Von D Susperia liquid lipstick! They are dead on dupe for each other apart from the formulas. Of course Kat Von D Susperia is a matte liquid lipstick and MAC How Chic Is That is the exact same shade but in a lip gloss formula. As you can see below both have intense and opaque pigmentation.

MAC Vamplify Collection is now available online and in stores at MAC, Macys, Nordstrom, Bloomingdales and Belk
I hope the review and swatches were helpful, until next time take care and stay beautiful!