New L'Oreal HIP Eyeshadow Duos: "Crystal"

Popping up recently in the special displays at the drugstores are new HIP (High Intensity Pigments) Eyeshadow Duos from L'Oreal in a "Crystal" finish. Today I have swatches from three of the five new duos.

I haven't had a chance to try the shadows, but they struck me as subtle, shimmery, and metallic, with the potential for a bright, glimmer effect perfect for a winter evening...perhaps New Year's eve? Or, at this point, another festive midwinter evening celebration.

First, I wondered, what is "Crystal" supposed to mean here? As opposed to the other categories, such as the metallic or bright. According to the L'Oreal site, the powders "contain a high pearl content, leaving the irridescent, crystalline finish that beautifully highlights eyes." So, that's the "Crystal" label, as opposed to calling them "Pearl." The finish promises to be "shimmery" and "pearlescent" and "glimmers like pure crystal."

Second, I noticed a little re-branding going on: "HIP Studio Secrets Professional Crystal Shadow Duos."

Now to the swatches, first the duos from left to right: Romantic, Charming, and Darling.


First up is Romantic, with a silvery color on the left and a pale pink-brown on the right:


The first thing I notice is the texture. Without really pressing my finger down TOO hard, the shadows really flaked up like crazy, especially the silver on the left:

Correspondingly, the shadow did not adhere very well to my arm in coherent swatches:


The middle shadow duo is "Charming" with silver on the left and a purple, almost a blurple, on the right. This duo was the one I was most interested in:

The texture was just as flaky and problematic:


And, the third duo, "Darling", in pale, pearlized beige (left) and brown (right) tones:

The now customary pic of the loose flaky mess left by the swipe of a finger:



Comparison swatches:




The shadows look great in the containers until you swipe them with your fingers. I wonder how one would apply them and make them adhere. Put an extra layer of eye shadow primer?? Coat one's lid lightly with Vaseline?? And the eyeshadow brush as well?? It seems these duos with the pearl-crystal finish were in theory a great concept, but I am not sure, based on swatching these crazy-flaking shadows, how well they will work in practice. Hmm.

Urban Decay 24/7 Super Stash Swatches

I can't remember the last time I used a whole eye pencil. Enter the 24/7 "Super Stash" from Urban Decay!

The creamy smooth 24/7 pencils seem to be very popular, so I was psyched to get this little kit of mini pencils a few weeks ago as part of a little Urban Decay haul from ULTA (I've already reported on the outstanding Urban Decay Show Pony Shadow box). How cool to be able to try a variety of these pencils without committing to the full sizes!

Here's a little more info from the packaging (wow, shiny, I can see the reflection of me taking the photo!!):

The pencils in this smorgasbord range from the very basic and very black ("Zero") to gold ("Eldorado") to brights like purple ("Ransom") and green ("Graffiti"). On the other hand, using tiny, stubby pencils may not be as user friendly as the full size.

Left to right (above in the package and below swatched on my pale-skinned arm): Zero, Oil Slick, Corrupt, Eldorado, Graffiti, Binge, Rockstar, Stash, and Ransom.

Pictures were taken outside in late afternoon sun with some overhead clouds.

Zero (black) draws a thin, sleek fully black line.

Oil Slick NEW (black with silvery sparkle) drew a rather weak line, prompting me to draw back over it. It has some sparkle to it.

Corrupt NEW (dark brown) also drew a weaker line, which made me draw over to get it stronger.

Eldorado NEW is a bright gold with a metallic sheen to it. It went on opaque.

"Graffiti" is emerald green.

"Binge" NEW is a deep, dark blue. Could it be blurple?

"Rockstar" is a rich, deep dark brown.

"Stash" is a dark brownish olive green with iridescence.

"Ransom" is a lovely bright purple. I got the set out of order, as I couldn't get the top off of Ransom when swatching, so it comes last in my version. And, it seems to have broken off, hence the lack of clean line, there.

Below, the lighting best shows the sparkliness of "Oil Slick" as well as the full-on iridescence of of Eldorado (the gold) and Stash (olive, brownish green), as well as somewhat iridescence of Graffiti (bright green).

While I am at it, I've added to this comparison another 24/7 eye pencil "Covet" I got as part of a limited edition duo (duo with what? I'll get to that in a subsequent post!). Corrupt is a metallic dark green which showed up rather bluish green when I was in the outdoor light, qualifying it to go with a glitter eyeliner called "Peacock." Oops, I let the peacock out of the bag so to speak!

Below are the swatches under indoor lamplight, with "Covet" on the right.

Outdoors:

These pencils glide on when doing swatches on my arm. So far, I have used the "Covet" dark green, and I give it two sets of eyelashes up, so to speak! As well as two thumbs. It drew on smoothly in a strong, thin line over glittery, chunky shadow. I look forward to trying these mini pencils next. I love different color combos with shadows.

At $36 for the Super Stash, are these gems worth the money? I would say so (use a coupon or discount!), but I know there are some perfectly good drugstore eye pencils in great colors. Hmm, sounds like a research project!

In the meantime, with ten 24/7 eye pencils to my name, I am still seeing more pencils on the Urban Decay website that I need to have. Yikes! But the next purchase for me will not be more pencils but a sharpener for all the pencils I have!!!

Urban Decay "Show Pony Shadow Box"

When I was at my ULTA store a few weeks ago on the usual nail polish run, I found myself browsing the makeup. I already own an Urban Decay matte eyeshadow as well as the Urban Decay Primer Potion (UDPP), and all the little kits and sets were looking really tempting!! I helped myself to a couple of smaller eyeshadow kits in order to give other shadows a try. The Volume 2 of Urban Decay's "Book of shadows" (containing 16 shadows) didn't seem a good idea until I had tried a few more, and since they don't have a book of shadows in all matte, the little palettes were a way to test the waters with these shimmery ones.

First up is the "Show Pony Shadow Box" of six Urban Decay eye shadows.


What really caught my eye, besides the cute splashy artwork, was the miniature UDPP. How handy to have a travel size as a back-up for my full size primer potion! The colors also looked like good basic colors, with both neutral tones and some pops of color, all in warm tones.


Isn't this the cutest?? The artwork is by Kime Buzzelli.


Voila! Open, the palette reveals a mirror and the 6 shadows, with more decoration like on the outside.


Here are my home swatches, with apologies to the great arm swatchers such as KarlaSugar.



All of these shadows are quite shimmery on the surface. Starting on the top row left to right, "Snatch" is kind of shiny and sparkly and is a peachy, beige-y, coppery color---I seem to have a hard time finding the right words to describe the color. It seems to have some gold flakes in it. Against my finger, the shadow feels smooth but with some texture.


"Mildew" is a gorgeous olive drab green. Is this loden? It shows green in the palette but not a forest or emerald but a more neutral olive-y tone. On my finger it is soft and mossy...is it a moss green?? Swatched on the skin, it does have a shiny finish to it.


"Flash" is a beautiful medium purple that feels fairly smooth in texture on the skin.

"Painkiller" is very soft and smooth and easy to get a lot onto my finger. A very intense aqua blue. And look, it is very close in color to China Glaze Adore!!


"Smog" is a nice neutral light metallic brown color. It is very similar in color to "Toasted," below. Smog seems more of a greenish brown kind of color, though, while Toasted is a pinkish-coppery tone.


All together now!


Blaze and Mildew are at the bottom.

And, the kit wouldn't be complete with an eyeliner pencil, now would it? Here we have the 24/7 eye pencil in "Zero" which is black. Handy dandy!


Let's add the liner at to our eye shadow swatches to see it with the shadows.


The pencil goes on so smoothly. No one wants to be standing in front of the mirror, bearing down on her lids with her eyeliner pencil trying to get it to draw a good line. Pencils always go on pretty smoothly on the hand, while the real test is the eyelid; I do believe that this pencil that it will work nicely on the lid. I can't wait to try it, especially since I generally stick with brown or charcoal colors (with occasional green, blue or other fun colors....actually, I never use black now that I come to think of it).

More close-ups of the swatches with the liner.

Top to bottom: Snatch, Mildew, and Flash.


Top to bottom: Painkiller, Smog, Toasted.


Smog on top; Toasted on bottom.

The logical next step is to try some eye looks with these shadows. Yay, I can't wait! I am very glad I bought this sample kit. They are six great colors, it's great to have a test eye pencil in basic black, and I love having a mini size UDPP to take on the road!!

So far, I give this kit a preliminary Euridice 5 out of 5 YAY! rating, but the real score comes after trying them out for a while.

Finally Got My OCC Lip Tars!!

I discovered Obsessive Compulsive Cosmetics Lip Tars back in August when I was watching a lot of YouTube beauty tutorials, and I've been hoping to get some ever since. Sold in small, clear tubes, lip tars are highly pigmented lip colors designed to be mixed into custom colors. A tiny amount of the product goes on the lips with amazing coverage, so a tube will last a long, long time.

I got the red, blue, green, clear, white, black, plum, and deep burgundy. I'll post more about these later, but here are swatches on my hand (took quite a lot of effort to get all that color off my hand, lol!)


Below are swatches I did as I went along mixing my color combinations trying to get some decent lip colors. The challenge is going to be getting light enough colors. I might have to order a couple more tubes of the white!

I ordered my Lip Tars directly from OCC's website for $12 apiece. I took advantage of a 10% off Black Friday special that was tweeted by www.twitter.com/occmakeup; follow them for more information about the company and other cool specials! OCC is known especially for being not just cruelty-free but also vegan. More on these amazing products and my experiments to come!

Please note: it's obvious from the text of this post that I purchased these items myself, for my own use, and what I'm sharing here is totally my own experience and opinions. But I am stating that anyway in the spirit of the new regulations applying to bloggers who endorse or review commercial products.

Bummed about Prescriptives!

After being in an all-day meeting yesterday, I came home and got the news that Estee Lauder is shutting down the Prescriptives brand.

Yeah.

I just blogged about the Prescriptives fall eyeshadow palettes and gushed about how great Prescriptives is. Deep inside, I think I sensed something like this might happen. It's remained an awesome brand, but I didn't think it was getting the attention it deserved. You can't find it as readily as some other department store brands. It doesn't seem to have the buzz.

I don't know if Estee Lauder is closing Prescriptives because they do not want it to compete with the myriad other brands they have....specifically any that focus on color. The tweets I am seeing focus on their Line Preventer but also other great skincare classics, as well as their signature fragrance, Calyx, which I have worn before. All I know is that I am a blue-red, and without Prescriptives I don't know if I will ever be able to confidently choose a natural, matching foundation ever again. It's a personal blow for me.

I do know that I will be heading to the department stores to try to stock up on foundations. Anyone reading this, help! How long will I be able to store unopened foundation? Will it help to put it in the refrigerator??

I might even pick up some Calyx for old times' sake. Sniff.

Euridice-Beauty: Drugstore Finds and Reviews

Drugstore makeup can be such a pain. Quality can be iffy (ever bought cheap eyeshadow only to have it crumble immediately?). Worse of all is the inability to try it on from testers to see if the colors actually work. Yet, the price is right, not only in the current economy---why wouldn't anyone ever not want to take advantage of reasonably priced makeup? If only one knew what to buy, that is.

One can find reviews of HIP Duos from beauty bloggers and YouTube beauty "gurus." Pictures and tutorials using different products, including drugstore, can be immensely helpful. I am starting an Euridice-Beauty series aimed at sharing the drugstore products that I own or have experience with in order to add to the blogger knowledgebase. I hope that I can save someone from buying items that I found to be disappointing, but recommend the items that I found success with!