My friend Liora recently turned me on to Anastasia Beverly Hills’ eye shadow palettes, so I picked up the World Traveler palette (the subject of this review) and the Artist Palette. Now here’s the thing: the stores got rid of the Artist Palette to make room for the World Traveler palette. However, I can’t find the World Traveler palette on the Sephora or Ulta websites. Oh, Sephora has it highlighted on the Anastasia brand page, but if you click on it they say they don’t have that item. So… I guess I should have reviewed the Artist Palette?
The World Traveler palette is aptly named, because its compact size and 12 versatile colors make it ideal to take with you on a trip. Mainly neutrals, with a few pops of color, it has a mix of finishes, some good crease and highlight colors, and a basic matte black should you want to do a more sultry look. It has a mirror in the lid and comes with a decent double-ended brush.
Pretty colors!
This palette trends pretty warm, but even though I have a cool skin tone I still found the colors were pretty good on me. In fact, I did a look on Wednesday with Bellini, Morocco, Spoiled and Soft Peach (shown below) and I got compliments on how much greener my eyes looked. I’m also surprised that Intense Gaze looks good on me, as I am not usually a pink person.
Peachy eye look.
The shadows have a wonderful velvety texture and apply pretty well, although I find the colors are not as intense as I tend to go for. I’m not sure how much I would use this one for performance makeup. Definitely not on the big stage, but maybe for a restaurant or day time outdoor show. I do think that colors like Spoiled and Pink Champagne would be good to work in to a stage look, but I would probably reach to other palettes (like the Chocolate Bar or Monarch) to complete the look.
The great thing about this palette is that it is only $30, which is a really fair price for this quality of shadow. This would be a really good way to add some neutrals to your collection! However, if you can’t find the World Traveler palette, the Artist Palette is the same size and price and has a mix of colors and neutrals, so maybe pick that one up? The clear lesson here is I nice to review palettes faster!
I’m so excited about this palette, I just had to do an unboxing video and talk about it right away instead of waiting to use it and give it the belly dance sweat test. Since the lighting and focus in the video are less than ideal (note to self, your bedroom is apparently not a good place to film), please enjoy these supplementary photos!
Mi Vida Loca!
24 glorious colors!
Swatches
The all-important green swatches.
Mismatched eyes.
Click on any image to view full-size.
Additional notes: These colors are intense enough that I noticed a little staining on my eyelid when I removed my makeup! And yes, I checked and the palette is $59. Mi Vida Loca palette is currently available online, but is not yet in stock in Tucson Sephora locations.
This review will mainly cover Buxom’s relatively new Customizable Palette. I haven’t been able to thoroughly test the eye shadows under dancing conditions yet, so that review will be in another couple of weeks.
The Palette.
This new modular system gives you a nice, relatively compact palette with a mirror, a brush, and a slide-out drawer that you can fill with up to 6 colors chosen from the current range of 40. I was interested both because of how sleek the palette looked and the fact that they had a few colors that would fill some holes in my collection, so I picked it up. You can get the palette and six colors for $40, which is a good deal since the shadows are $12 each!
A single shadow.
The shadows themselves come in a little box, with a plastic insert that holds the pan. You pop them out and slot them into the palette, although if you don’t have a palette or have too many colors, you could either keep them in the box (which would be a little inconvenient), or put them in a Z-Palette. Alternatively, you can get a single compact for only $2, which isn’t bad if you decide you only want one or two colors from the collection.
Sliding drawer in action.
The sliding drawer system makes it pretty easy to swap colors in and out, but it’s also much more compact than the build-your-own systems from Urban Decay and Make Up For Ever. I could easily put this li’l palette into my purse, for instance. And I think 6 colors is a good number… It gives you the chance to bring, for instance, two vibrant colors, two neutrals, and a good highlight and crease color. That could keep you set for an entire 10 day vacation if you chose wisely! I also like the fact that there’s a mirror filling the entire lid. I often find myself doing makeup in odd places so having a built-in mirror comes in handy. There’s a double-ended brush, too. It’s not amazing, but I was able to apply the shadow with it and get good color payoff, so again, if you’re on the go, it might come in handy.
Pretty, pretty colors.
As I said before, I’ll do a full review of the shadows themselves after I’ve had time to wear them to dance. My initial impression is that they have a smooth texture and intense pigmentation. However, despite the fact that the formula claims to be “primer infused”, I still recommend a primer. This isn’t the first time I’ve seen this claim, and every time it seems to result in shadows that go on better than old formulas, but they’re still prone to creasing and wearing off! I find that I really need to put down a coat of Primer Potion no matter what eye shadow I wear, to provide a good base and ensure that my color lasts through a sweaty Tucson day or a long night of performing.
This review is going to be a little quicker than usual because hey hey it’s my birthday and I’ve got dinner plans to jet off to! But if you were wondering what a fancy belly dancer buys herself for her birthday, the answer is that she buys herself a fancy eye shadow palette. Seriously, I resisted the NARSissist Dual Intensity palette for a while because it’s not cheap, but then Sephora had that sale, and I had a birthday coming up, and I had just picked up some new freelance work, so I splurged. Was it worth it?
Look at the pretty!
Well, I haven’t had much chance to try it out yet, partially because I was so hesitant to mess up the pretty design pressed into the pans. But yesterday I took it out and gave it a whirl! These are really beautiful shimmery metallic colors, but they’re somehow understated and elegant. It’s a very mature palette, good for your classiest gigs. So of course I wore it to go out to dinner in a t-shirt to Pita Jungle, because it was a normal Thursday night.
I love that the palette is split evenly down the middle between dark shades and light/bright shades. You can combine a few colors to create a look, or use just one color as a special pop with some more standard eye shadows. It leans towards neutral without being boring. Honestly, I think this palette is really ideal for a belly dancer, especially if you do a lot of night club gigs or really upscale parties, because it’s so elegant. I wouldn’t necessarily break these colors out for a fun outdoor gig, except that I might use the lighter ones as an inner corner highlight, because when applied damp they create a really shiny effect that makes my eyes look all big and pretty.
Way too glam for my bathroom.
I created a look using Subra (the plummy shade), Europa (the brighter pink) and Andromeda (the pale pink). These are not the colors I usually lean towards, but I need to start using them more because they look really good with my green eyes!
A few notes about the packaging and stuff: It comes in a nice sturdy-feeling matte black plastic case with a mirrored front and a mirror inside. There’s no color labels on the inside, they’re printed on the back instead. It comes with a brush that can be used to apply the shadows wet or dry. I’m not sure yet how much I like the brush in terms of the size and shape, but it seems to be decent quality and it has lots of bristles to pick up plenty of color. I think I’ll need to do some experimenting to see what type of brush I feel works best with this formula, and I have a feeling it might depend on whether I want a dry or wet application and wear I’m applying it. For instance, I found that my Makeup Geek tiny pencil brush was perfect for a damp application on the inner corners of my eye, because it picked up a good amount of product but gave me very fine control. I could probably use the same brush for applying these colors like a liner.
So should you invest in this palette? If you’re serious about makeup, or you’re a pro or semi-pro dancer who does a lot of elegant gigs (or has a Gothic sense of style), you might want to invest in it. If you just want to try out the formula, you may be better off picking up just a single pan of the dual-intensity formula in the color you think you’re most likely to wear a lot (keeping in mind that the lovely chocolate brown Ursa Major is currently exclusive to the palette). If you do decide to get it, I definitely suggest waiting for a sale, or a double-points weekend, since it is such a big-ticket item. That said, Sephora’s website does say it’s “Limited Edition”, so if you’re really in love with it, maybe you shouldn’t wait. Only you can decide!
Ok, try not to hate me too much, because apparently this thing is sold out all over the place, but I scored the Sephora + Pantone Universe Color of the Year Facets of Marsala palette, hereafter referred to as “Marsala Palette” because dang that is a lot of words. If you’d like to see me unboxing it and giving my initial thoughts and trying some of the colors, as well as seeing my corgis and one of my cats, you can watch this incredibly poorly filmed YouTube video I made on Monday.
Anyway, I lucked out and when the brand-new Sephora opened at the mall near me, they had two Marsala palettes in stock so I decided hey, why not give it a try. I usually don’t buy Sephora’s palettes because their eye shadow is usually disappointing, but I felt like giving this one a try because the colors in it were so unusual and really varied.
Look at all those colors!
In addition to having Marsala in four finishes, there’s some warm browns, cool browns, terra cotta colors, greens, silver, gold, and even blue and burgundy. Over all it leans towards warm tones, and these aren’t colors I would normally wear, but I found myself really liking them the more I experimented with them. You already know this if you watched the above-linked video, but I challenged myself to really test this palette out by wearing only eye shadows from the Marsala Palette for 5 days in a row. It looks like I managed to try over half of the 24 colors this week, including the Marsala Glitter and Marsala Matte.
Marsala and brown with peach lips.
Monday’s look wore well, although after about 4 hours I noticed I had a lot of fallout from the glitter shade. I liked how the marsala, brown and gold created a kind of desert sunset look.
Bronzey!
Tuesday’s look was built around Toasted Nut, which is really warm. I would not normally think of doing such a bronze eye unless I was maybe doing something steampunky, but I really liked this! I wore this for probably around 6 hours before removing it and it held up well, even when I got a little sweaty from sotes in ballet class. Wednesday’s look was built around the olivey green shades Dusty Olive and Kelp, but I did it right before dance class and didn’t have time to photograph it. I got REALLY sweaty for an hour in DJ Dance Cardio and then did an hour of troupe practice. I had a little color loss in the center spot of my lid where I always lose color first, but my makeup still looked surprisingly good for how much I sweated.
Duo-Chrome!
Thursday’s look was a really quick and simple one using Castor Gray. Despite the name, this color is a green-brownish duochrome very similar to Kat Von D’s “On the Road.” I really like it!
And then I went overboard!
I knew I needed to do one more look today before I wrote this post, and it happened to be one of those boring rainy days where you know you’re not going out again so you decide to play with your makeup. In addition to doing this ridiculously over the top look based around Marsala Matte, I also played a bit with contouring, tried a new lipstick, and put on my NARS Seduction blush, which is so dark but also really good with Marsala, in case you were wondering.
Over all, I’m pretty happy with this palette. I mean, I bought it with the idea that it would probably end up being crummy and I would return it. But ever color I used had good color pay-off and staying power. They do seem to not blend quite as well as I would like, and like I said, the Marsala Glitter shed all over my lower eye area. But given my past experiences with Sephora eye shadows, this was a vast improvement. My only complaints are that I wish there was maybe one or two more colors that would make good highlights (I kept wishing for a simple matte or satin ivory, which I do have in other palettes but I was ONLY using eye shadow from this palette this week to see how versatile it is), and the packaging…
Ooooh, shiny!
The see-through box it comes in is really cool, and the rosy gold lid is gorgeous, but this shiny metallic stuff really shows finger prints and water spots like nobody’s business. The back is plain white with a diagram of all the colors. Because there are no labels on the inside, you have to keep flipping it over to figure out what color you’re using. The colors are also listed on the sleeve, but they’re shown as swatches with the Pantone color number and then a list of the names. Neither of these options is especially quick and easy to refer to if you’re trying to do some sort of video or tutorial and tell people which color to use.
And to be perfectly honest, the inside just looks CHEAP. The mirror on the inner lid is great. Otherwise, the tiny square pans are set into a really flimsy white plastic liner, and the pans don’t line up perfectly with the edges. It looks more like a drugstore palette than a high-end palette, and since it was around $40, that seems ridiculous to me. Also, because the pans are small and close together, it’s easy to get a little cross-contamination of colors going on.
Packaging complaints aside, I don’t think there’s really anything on the market that comes close to this particular mix of colors. As I mentioned in my video, there’s a lot to work with here if you’re doing a 90s grunge revival look, plus you’ve of course got the color of the year, and some neutrals, and GREEN. Because the palette is pretty compact for the amount of colors it contains, I’m pretty sure it will be coming with me when I go to Portland in March.
This palette is currently not listed on Sephora’s website and is sold out in many stores, so you’re going to have to really hunt if you want one of your own. Good luck!
I’ve reached a point where I’m tired of buying big palettes because they have one or two colors I love and don’t have, mixed in with colors similar to or exactly like ones I already have, and colors I’ll never wear. But individual eye shadows can take up a lot of space, and often have more product than I’ll ever use (I’ve yet to hit pan on even my favorite color in my first palette). With that in mind, I decided it was time to start rounding out my color selection by purchasing individual pans from Makeup Geek and putting them into a Z Palette for easy storage. For my initial order I picked out five colors… three shades of green (of course!), a cool matte grey, and a medium silver. I also bought myself a large Z Palette in the rose gold chevron pattern, and a pigment in Kryptonite. I’ll talk about the palette in this review, but you’ll have to wait to learn about the pigment.
As you can see, the individual colors arrive in really cute little envelopes. I tested and it seems pretty easy to take the shadows in and out, so I saved a couple of the packages in case I want to just take a color or two with me on a trip.
My palette so far.
The large Z Palette that I purchased can hold 27 Makeup Geek eye shadows, so it looks pretty empty with my five colors so far. It has a magnetic base so the little pans just stick right to it. It also comes with some sticky-backed metal blanks that you can attach to any other stray makeup pans you might have. I like the pretty rose gold and white pattern, and the big plastic window in the top makes it easy to see what colors I have in here, which would definitely come in handy if I had more than one palette going.
COLORS!So anyway, as you may have noticed I sort of love green, so I was excited to get my hands on some shades that weren’t really represented in my collection of palettes.
Seamist is a beautiful shimmery aquatic green. Perfect for summer, or for a mermaidy costume! This is the only one I haven’t had a chance to wear yet, but I can’t wait to find an excuse for it.
Dirty Martini is a matte olive green. I LOVE drab olive greens and already have some shimmery ones, so I had to have a matte to go with. I needed to layer this one on to get the intensity that I wanted, but once it was on, it was so gorgeous!
Envy is a dark metallic green. I find that when I applied it, it was more of a black with green undertones. I think I need to try applying it wet to bring out more of the metallic shimmer. The pigmentation is good so it’s definitely worth experimenting with.
Stealth is a matte grey. I thought this was a really unusual color and might be fun to play with. Like Dirty Martini, it has to really be built up to get any impact. This is the only one I wasn’t really impressed with.
Mercury is a pretty silver. I have various silvers in palettes, but they’re either a warm silver, or have bad glitter fallout, or otherwise just leave me wanting. This one is a little sheer, so it makes a nice highlight. Like Envy, I might try applying it wet to see if I get a bolder look. Applied dry, it is very shimmery, just very pale.
Obligatory hand swatch, no primer.
I wore Dirty Martini, Envy and a touch of Mercury to troupe practice this week. Applied over primer and sealed with makeup setting spray, it still looked perfect after an hour of dancing.
Greeeeeen.
And I used Stealth and Mercury last month when I was testing Fem Bot makeup ideas.
Goth Bot mk 3.0.
I’ll definitely pick up more of these shadows to keep filling out my collection.
Look, it was inevitable that I would buy the Monarch Eyeshadow Palette from Kat Von D. I tried to resist, since I had just recently purchased the Chocolate Bar, but c’mon. There’s a color in there called Entomology. The only way this palette could have been more obviously marketed towards me is if it had been a green beetle themed palette (which Sephora did have a few years ago, but sadly Sephora’s palettes are full of the worst eye shadow ever).
The colors are rather pretty even if there aren’t any greens.
And while it might seem odd for someone who loves crazy colors to buy two neutral palettes back to back, Chocolate Bar and Monarch actually play very well together. No seriously, Liora and I did extensive hand-swatching in the store before I made my purchase decision and found that there was very little color duplication and many colors that looked great together. To prove it, I used both palettes to create my Tribal Fest performance look.
Gosh I love those color names.
This palette is also good for day time looks, though. On Wednesday I was going out for lunch so I decided to do my face in a nice neutral palette with a POP of metallic turquoise eyeliner, because why not? I used Tiny Death, Killing Jar and Summer Fly together.
This made for a very nice, subtle look that held up pretty well for about 8-9 hours, until I went to hip hop class and troupe practice and got all sweaty, at which point I had some color loss.
The palette itself is made out of nice, sturdy cardboard. It’s attractive, well-constructed and has a strong magnet closure. The mirror is a generous size. It’s probably a little big to fit in most travel pouches, but not so big that it would be unreasonable to throw it into your bag. With just this one palette you could have your day and night time looks. I really like Wrath for performance makeup as it’s a really intense copper and it looks great with my red hair, so other ginger dancers should really give it a look.
But really, I’m serious, I’m not buying any more palettes after this!
If you follow my Facebook fan page, you know that my reaction to the release of the Too Faced Chocolate Bar was less than enthusiastic. I thought it was silly and gimmicky and it made me think of the chocolate-scented nail polish I had as a teenager, which smelled like fake chocolate. My general thought was that this seemed like the sort of thing I would expect from a cheap drug store brand marketed towards teens and tweens, not a prestige cosmetics brand. But I figured I’d go smell it at Sephora to see if it really did smell like chocolate. And I did, and it did, but I still didn’t feel a strong desire to buy it. There was a really pretty opal-y pink/white highlight color that I liked but otherwise I was like “meh, mostly neutrals, whatever” and decided it was Not. For. Me.
But then I was shopping with my Official Sephora Buddy Liora (seriously, it’s ridiculous how often we go to Sephora together), and the awesome saleslady there started swatching it for us and I saw how intense the colors were and how beautiful they were for neutrals, and I changed my thinking. I waited for a sale and I snatched that chocolate palette right up! Then it sat around for a while waiting for me to play with it because it seemed like every time I did my makeup I was too rushed to break out a new palette and take pictures and experiment. Until my makeup play session last week.
Yummy-smelling colors.
I’ve now used this palette three times. The first time was playing with my faerie makeup look, and I just sat around the house for an hour so I didn’t really get to judge how well it held-up, but I was impressed with the color intensity, ease of application, and chocolate scent. The second time, however, was the night Fire & Gold Belly Dance did two sets at Pima County Fair and it was raining and I had to ride a little golf cart in the rain. Approximately 6 hours of wear, two belly dance sets, rain, and by the time I got home it still looked PERFECT. I was really impressed. So I wore it again last night for Open Stage, where I wore it for several hours and did a lot of dancing and got a little sweaty and again, it still looked great.
Obligatory hand swatch, applied dry on bare skin.
This is also a pretty versatile palette. Yesterday, Liora and I were both sporting looks made with the Chocolate Bar. Hers was a sophisticated matte earthy look, mine was a shimmering burgundy look that nicely complimented my red troupe costume but also worked with the green skirt I changed into. Hers was day-time appropriate, mine was evening glamour. As such, this is an ideal palette to take with you on a trip where you need to go from professional business during the day to smokin’ hot dancing at night.
Or wear it when you want to transform into a magical faerie.
The Chocolate Bar comes packaged in a tin that’s shaped to look like, well, a chocolate bar. It has a magnetic clasp that is not very strong so if you are going to travel with it, you should probably put a rubber band around it just to be on the safe side. Over all, it seems to be a really nice product and I’m happy that I overcame my initial apathy towards it.
![IMG_1465[1]](/wp-content/uploads/2014/11/IMG_14651-e1415310714767.jpg)
![IMG_0992[1]](/wp-content/uploads/2014/06/IMG_09921-e1402683264853-768x1024.jpg)
This made for a very nice, subtle look that held up pretty well for about 8-9 hours, until I went to hip hop class and troupe practice and got all sweaty, at which point I had some color loss.
