So it seems I have been posting quite a bit of NARS lately.. but you know what? There’s more!!!
Behold the magnificent NARS Kauai Duo. A metallic antique gold and a medium shimmery purple.
From the two quads that released this Spring, this one was my top pick, as I can honestly say I have no eyeshadows in my collection which can be considered as exact dupes. Although China Seas is beautiful in it’s own right, I never see myself reaching for a blue of that tone for everyday makeup. However, since purple is my favourite for accenting my deep brown eyes, getting this was a no brainer.
So pigmentation wise both shades pack some serious colour, and the gold more so. It’s pigmented to the point where it felt like cream! And never before have I ever encountered such an amazing texture, not even the Hourglass eyeshadow duos (which I would describe as silky rather than creamy when compared to this) 🙂
While photographing the swatches I only had to do one firm pass to get this to show up in full opacity, but for courtesy’s sake I decided to do two.
On to the purple… This too was highly pigmented and I find that it’s a great liner shade if you don’t see yourself using the duo for a complete eye look on a day to day basis. Personally i’d get more use out of them as singles, the gold for a nice wash of colour for a night out and the purple as an accent colour to jazz up a neutral beige eye look for the day time.
So without wasting more time here are the swatches…. please note that these were taken in natural light.
If you asked me, is it worth rushing out and buying? I’d say yes, only if you see yourself using these type of shades. But as far as quality goes, this one can’t be beat and is a must have if you are a makeup lover like myself 🙂
Other info-
These eyeshadows lasted well over 8 hours on me with no creasing and I found them very blendable and easy to work with.
Available at Sephora (U.S) which is where I purchased mine.
With my recent Spring kick came an insatiable thirst for pastel eyeshadows. I did end up with a few Dior pastel quads and palettes, however I still wanted a Spring palette that I could call entirely mine; colours selected by me, in shades and finishes that flatter ME!
So while I was picking up a bottle of their famed Cleansing oil (review to be up soon) the gorgeous eyeshadow bar at Shu Uemura caught my eye and the first thought that crossed my mind was SPRING PALETTE! Hahaha
Love how my mind works right? 😛
What I love about the Shu Uemura eyeshadows is that they have such a large variety of colours ranging from the lightest pastels to the most shocking neon orange you could ever find! Basically Shu Uemura is all about colour, bold, unapologetic colour.
The hardest part is usually deciding which 4 colours would come home with you.
So here’s a little guide to help you with purchasing Shu Uemura eyeshadows-
They come in 7 different finishes,
P- Pearl
G- Glitter
ME- Metallic
IR- Iridescent
M- Matte
Silk smooth
Cream
I picked two pearl shades, one metallic and one glitter.
P121- A soft peach, which was a shimmery pearl finish. Silky and blended so easily.
P 140 – A pastel pink, yet another pearl shadow. This was a cool pink.
ME 433- A soft pastel shimmery green. It was the first colour I picked. This colour compliments olive skin tones so well, and if you are of that colouring, I highly recommend getting this one! From the three coloured shades, this one felt the smoothest. I love to pair this with orange or peach for a fresh Spring look.
G W-SV 909- A sparkling silvery white. This was one of the smoothest glitter eyeshadows I had ever encountered; One swipe pulled in a lot of product and it went on buttery smooth! I highly recommend this shade as well.
P.S- For those of you who are lusting over the Tom Ford glitters, but can’t justify the price tag, these are a good alternative!
Here they are, swatched.
The good thing about these is that you can never be unsatisfied with your palette, as they are all hand picked by you!
Product info-
Each single eyeshadow contains 1.4g of product and retails at SGD 22. I purchased mine at Tangs beauty boutique.
P.S- The cases are available separately and they come in a choice of monos, duos and quads. The quad palette also could accommodate blushes. So if any of those catch your eye, you could go for a blush and two eyeshadows as opposed to just 4 eyeshadows.
And here it is! The limited edition NARSissist eyeshadow palette. 15 gorgeous eyeshadows housed in one palette.
Pictured below is a guide to all the swatches and reviews, named for your convenience 😉
L & R (Left and Right) are colours that appear in existing duo eyeshadows. The others are all existing singles except Bad Behaviour which was an LE.
( All about Eve(L), Madrague (R), Fez, Bali, Coconut grove)
*P.S- Click on the images to view full size 🙂
Row 1
All about Eve (L) – A shimmery warm beige with a slight pink tinge. This had medium colour pay off, and went on somewhat sheer.
Madrague (R) – A light brown with a slightly warm undertone, this matched my medium skin and disappears once blended in. I feel on fairer skin tones this would show up very well.
Fez – A high shimmer coppery bronze. This had excellent colour payoff. The best performer in this palette!
Bali– A neutral dark brown. Although this was not dry to the touch and was finely milled, it applied quite patchy with less than impressive pigmentation. This was the dud in the palette, which was a shame as it would have been a great colour for crease work in a neutral matte eye look.
Coconut grove – A deep, dark, warm matte brown. It was finely milled and pigmented, and the colour pay off was average, although I should note it was a bit disappointing compared to the Coconut grove single eyeshadow, which had incredible colour payoff and is one of my all time favourite NARS colours.
(Madrague (L), Nepal, Ashes to Ashes, Brousse (R), Mekong)
Row 2
Madrague (L) – A matte cream shade with a light yellow undertone. This was very soft to the touch and finely milled. The colour pay off was very good and would make a lovely highlighter for the brow bone or a good base shade.
Nepal– A warm shimmery rose. This had good colour payoff, soft and blendable. One of my favourites!
Ashes to ashes – A neutral taupe shade with a shimmer finish. This went on a bit sheer due to its harder, firm texture, but I found that the colour was easily buildable.
Brousse (R) – A deep dusty aubergine shade which was gorgeous. I did find some difficulty picking up the colour as it was a dryer, stiffer texture. Although, this too was buildable to full opacity.
Mekong – A deep dark matte brown with bronze shimmer. This was well pigmented with very good colour payoff but was slightly on the dryer side. A gorgeous shade nonetheless.
(Bellisima (L), Lhasa, Bad Behaviour, Dogon (R), Pandora (R))
Row 3
Bellisima (L) – A shimmery yellow ivory shade with gold flecks. I found this a little powdery and applied sheer.
Lhasa – A dusty shimmery lavender shade. One of my favourites in this palette as I owned nothing like it! This too was on the harder side, and went on sheer but was easily buildable to medium opacity. And looked gorgeous once applied!
Bad Behaviour – A LE colour released with the Guy Bourdin collection. This is a warm pewter shade. The colour payoff was good. And was pretty much opaque once applied.
Dogon (R) – A deep Navy with very fine shimmers, although upon application it looked almost matte. This felt soft to the touch but the colour payoff was not too great.
Pandora (R) – A deep matte black. This had decent colour payoff, although blends into a very sheer shade which required a lot of building to get full coverage.
Final thoughts
I found the colours in this palette very workable, I personally see myself reaching for this regularly if not every day.
All but three had good and buildable coverage, namely Bali, Dogon and Pandora.
And my favourites were Fez, Nepal, Lhasa, Bad behavior and Mekong.
Overall around 9 out of the 15 were very good shades (blending easily and buildable to a higher opacity with no powderiness). It’s value for money, considering In Singapore a duo retails somewhere around $45 I believe.
For those who prefer very highly pigmented eye shadow with intense colour pay off, this palette might be a bit disappointing. However for a majority of makeup users this would make a perfect travel companion or a great addition to your everyday makeup bag as it’s a nice compact size housing a total of 15 eye shadows!
Also if you are already a collector of NARS eyeshadows and own quite a number of these shades, obviously there’s no point in purchase since none of the colours are new. However if they are your favourites, this would be a great way to own the same colours (for travel purposes) as a portable version at a very economical price.
In conclusion, I see this palette selling out fast, as all NARS palettes. So if you are interested, act fast 🙂
Special thanks to Julyen at the NARS counter at Tangs for providing me with valuable info while putting together this post for you and also a thank you to NARS for generously sending me a palette for review.
P.S- To see this palette in action, drop by my IG page, there’s a dramatic eye look that I post yesterday after my NARS makeover 🙂
I know my blog is slowly turning into a blog dedicated exclusively to Dior makeup, but once you find something you love, you start to obsess over it right? RIGHT? 😛 (Don’t stop till you get enough they say!)
Anyway, so this time around it’s something from an older collection, Rose Porcelaine 834, which I purchased at Neiman Marcus recently.
At first glance I loved that there’s a healthy combo of cool and neutral pinks in this palette. Perfect for Spring!
However swatches proved otherwise!
The quint consisted of,
A cool medium toned almost cotton candy pink – swatches very sparkly and the colour gets lost in the midst of all the shimmer
A cool soft yellow/cream shade – excellent for highlighting the inner corner of the eyes, it went on smooth.
A light beige/ pink shade – The pink in it disappeared on my tanned skin, looked more of a frosty white, but the texture was silky smooth
A warm light baby pink shade – This was not as frosty as the others and would look lovely on fair skin. A great everyday shade for a light wash of colour over the entire lid.
A medium mauve brown – not as silky when I swatched it, but I liked that the shimmer content in this was to a minimum!
Overall I feel this palette would be perfect for those who prefer their eye shadow sheer and not too pronounced. The intense shimmer content in some of the shades prevents the shadow from taking a true to pan colour on the lids, however for anyone below a NC 25, this should look ok for a fresh Spring makeup look. The quality was good, and I usually don’t experience much fall out with Dior shadows, most fall out only occur during application and nothing during the day.
I found the best combination for medium skin is the top right shadow combined with the two below. However, I’d like to end on the note that this is a quint best suited for the lightest of the light skin tones, and personally I wouldn’t recommend it as there were too many light shades and they all looked pretty similar, not value for money in my book
I purchased mine from Neiman Marcus
You could also purchase this online from Sephora
Thank you for stopping by, hope you have a wonderful weekend!
I received my palette as a birthday gift from my friend Val a couple of months back, and of course she fished around to see what I had my eye on from the Tilbury collection, and I am happy to say I was ‘consulted’ before she purchased this for me and therefore it was exactly what I wanted! 😛
I like many, was so intrigued to try Tilbury products as I heard she was one of the core consultants who put together those fabulous quads by Tom Ford. Needless to say expectations were sky high when these hit the market and everyone wanted a piece of Tilbury to add to their makeup collections!
My review was based on it’s individual performance as well as a comparison to Tom Ford palettes.. hope you enjoy.
Charlotte Tilbury Glamour Muse
The packaging is a sleek mahogany, and has a strong retro look with it’s rose gold accents, I love how it doesn’t retain fingerprints and is pretty easy to keep clean. It’s not as weighty and large as the Tom Ford palettes, although I love this size as this is ‘just right’ and perfect for traveling with.
Charlotte Tilbury Glamour muse eyeshadow shades
The eyeshadow palette consists of four beautiful shades (no matte shades, just varying degrees of satin and shimmer),
a. A pale pearlescent warm pink which felt silky and very smooth to the touch, however it didn’t swatch as pigmented as I expected. And looks more ivory than pink on me as I am of a medium complexion. (In the swatches you can clearly see that it goes on sheerer compared to the other two shades)
b. A Rosy/taupey shade, which was the best performing from this palette, it had a significantly higher shimmer content and was buttery smooth. I LOVE this shade! (Though it looks pretty basic in the pan, it swatches very differently)
c. A warm grey satin shade, a little less buttery and creamy compared to the other two mentioned, and was just alright.
d. A glitter amethyst purply shade, which i’d like to call ‘the dud’ . This eyeshadow performed so poorly I was surprised and let down, It actually sucked on a monumental level! And while trying this out, I had to pack on the shadow so much, my eyelid hurt from all the tapping! Ultimately I think the best way to apply this is with your fingers cos a brush does a lousy job.
The glitter somehow gets lost in application and looks nothing like the pan, and there was a notable amount of fallout which led to a slightly lower score as far as the overall palette went. Another thing to mention is that, this was the colour that took this palette from boring to fresh, so when that shade doesn’t perform I feel this palette looses it’s appeal.
Here are the swatches for your viewing pleasure! All taken outdoors in natural light.
* Note that the purple had to be built up significantly to get it to look presentable in this pic
Overall I’d give this palette an 7/10 simply because the colours worked well together and blended easily as they were so silky smooth compared to the dryer texture of the Tom Ford satin shades (I swatched a few in comparison just for kicks n giggles).
What I disliked was as I mentioned before, the less than impressive glitter shade being SUCH a dud, and compared to the glitter shadows that Tom Ford makes, this was lacking pigmentation as well as glitter, the whole purpose of this shadow might I add.
But purple shade aside, it’s a great palette to own if you just want it for the neutrals and you can do a great day look with this quad. I see myself reaching for this just for the rosy/taupe shade.
The eyeshadows wore pretty well on me and didn’t crease (I used it over my By Terry Hyaluronic primer btw). And lasted well over 8 hours, which is great.
Other info-
Net wt. 5.2g
Available at Selfridges.
Hope you enjoyed this post and please suggest in the comments below what products or brands you’d like featured, i’d try my best to review them for you if I have them in my stash.
Bubbly Michelle 
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