Review: Priceline 40% off Haul

Hey guys! One week and counting until I head off to Thailand and Laos for two months - I am seriously excited and have had SO many things to do, and of course have had little time to blog :( which is sad but I am still being very active on my Instagram @jemsbeautyau. During my time away I won't be able to blog much (I think I'll be able to prep at least two, hopefully more) and my Instagram will be looking a little barren as well (although I'll do my best). However bear with me and remember that I'll be heading to MAC and Sephora no doubt before I return ;)

Anyway, now that's all out of the way, today is a review of the products I picked up when Priceline was having their 40% off cosmetics sale, which happens about twice a year. I went into Priceline nice and early on the first day, list in hand, and it was quiet and easy for me to find what I wanted, so all in all it was a very easy trip (it can sometimes being seriously busy and hectic so I'm glad it wasn't this time).

I picked up some things I've been wanting to try out a while, but had not yet taken the plunge.

• Loreal Paris True Match Foundation in C2
• Bourjois Paris Healthy Mix Foundation in 51
• Face of Australia Face Base Primer
• Essence Silky Touch Blush in Autumn Peach
• Australis Fresh and Flawless Pressed Powder in Deep Natural
• Bourjois Paris Healthy Mix Serum Gel in 52
• Essence Sun Club Bronzer for Blondes

Let's start with the foundations -

Bourjois Healty Mix Foundation in 51, Bourjois Healthy Mix Serum Gel in 52, and Loreal Paris True Match Foundation in C2

All three of these are raved about online, and when push came to shove I couldn't pick between the three of them. So I did what any normal person would be - buy all three! (40% off guys!) To be honest, I don't think any of the three colours I got match me perfectly, but I got the lightest shades available and it's coming into summer soooo.... it might be ok.

Here's a comparison swatch to help you out:

Top to bottom: Loreal True Match, Healthy Mix Serum Gel in 52, Healthy Mix Foundation in 51

As you can see, Healthy Mix in 51 is obviously the lightest colour. The Serum also comes in 51 but at this point I was comparing 51 and 52 and they looked so similar that I just got 52 and figured the lighter coverage one in a darker colour would be useful in summer. Looking at the swatches now there is very clearly a difference but it looked negligible in the bottle. Ah well. The True Match is the darkest of the three, but is also the most cool-toned (which I am), as the Healthy Mix runs very, very yellow. However, I'm not too picky (although I probably should be) because I often mix foundations or even out colour using bronzer and concealer etc anyway! The finish of a foundation is much more important to me than an exact colour match.

The True Match has, in my opinion, the best finish. There is something about it that just looks so natural, it seriously melts into your skin and makes it look like there's nothing on your face. If I ever go somewhere where C1 or even N1 is sold I'd probably pick it up because this foundation just makes your skin look amazing. I understand why Lauren Curtis raves about it so much (and she matches one of the colours perfectly so it makes a lot of sense). 

I like the Healthy Mix Serum for days when I want my skin to feel a little lighter and have a more dewy finish. I don't find a massive difference between the finish of this vs the regular foundation, except that the foundation is more matte and slightly heavier coverage. I don't think you need both to be honest. I'd pick depending on level of coverage/skin type, and go from there.

All in all, all three probably are my three favourite foundations I have. I think they are all going to be well used by me and I'm happy to have picked them up!

True Match is $29.95 and can be found here.

The Bourjois Healthy Mix Foundation and Serum Gel Foundation are both $32.00 and can be found here and here, respectively.

Face of Australia Face Base Primer

Face of Australia have three similar primers that I had trouble picking between - this one, one with SPF15 and a HD one. I chose this since it had great reviews online and I was looking to replace my Rimmel Fix and Perfect which I've nearly finished up.

This primer is white (strange to me after the Rimmel one is orange!) and quite runny, and you have to be careful when you squeeze it out because quite a lot comes out. And a little goes a long way! It feels very light on your skin and dries quickly, and smooths out my skin nicely. It feels almost like a moisturiser, but leaves your skin feeling nice and prepped for foundation, not sticky or heavy feeling at all.

It's oil-free, which is good for my oily-skinned gals out there, however I am dry-skinned and it still feels really moisturising on my face. It is water-based, meaning it doesn't have silicones that fill in or 'blur' your skin (that's what their HD foundation is made for), so using a pore-filling primer in those areas such as the T-zone may help moreso than this primer.

I do recommend this primer, however I will continue to use my Fix and Perfect until it runs out and will likely use Porefessional or Primed and Poreless to fill in pores and even out some bumpy areas of my skin underneath a primer like this. I think this would be a good primer for someone looking to try primer out for the first time.

Essence Silky Touch Blush in Autumn Peach

I have a love affair for Essence that cannot be tamed. Pretty much every product I pick up by them I love, and this is no exception.

I have to admit, there's nothing really special about this blush. It comes in a tiny single compact, is matte, and has some swirls on, y'know. No fancy shimmer or colours or nice packaging or anything. But it just does its job perfectly, and that's what makes it such a great product, especially in conjunction with the price - $5.10 at Priceline. For some reason there are only four colours on the website and Autumn Peach isn't one of them, but head into your local to see what they have in stock. They come in a range of nice, basic colours, are nicely pigmented, and just have everything you could want in a blush, for an amazing price.

Autumn Peach is a dark pink with orange tones, almost a deep coral.


Australis Fresh and Flawless Pressed Powder in Deep Natural and Essence Sun Club Bronzer for Blondes

The Australis Fresh and Flawless Pressed Powder is absolutely raved about online so of course I had to see what all the fuss was about. I picked up "Deep Natural", not the lightest colour but I thought the lightest colour looked a bit too yellow for me so I decided to go with this one.

I think it works really well as a setting powder to mattify foundation and give a bit more coverage. I'm not sure how well it would cover on its own but for someone looking for a light coverage powder, this might be a good choice. Unfortunately, this powder only comes in three shades, which are all relatively similar to one another, which is pretty disappointing. If you match one, you're in luck, but if you're even slightly too light or too dark you miss out on this product. It costs $11.95 at Priceline and you can have a looky here.

The Essence Sun Club Bronzer I picked up pretty much solely because of Karissa Pukas - she really loves it and I was in need of a matte bronzer that was lighter than my Chocolate Soleil, so I just went for it. I got the one for blondes because, well, I am blonde, and that's the one Karissa had. Hair colour isn't really the best way to figure out what colour bronzer you should pick up, so just get whatever one you think will match your skintone.

This is a really good bronzer for adding warmth to light skin. I have very pale skin and struggle finding the balance between "well I'm cool toned" and "but I wanna be sun kissed!" and I feel like this helps me look a bit tanner without my skin tone looking weird. It smells like coconuts which kind of reminds me of Le Tan Gradual Tanner, which isn't the worst smell but is pretty darn strong, for those that it might affect. It comes in a massive 15g which I think will last me forever... The packaging is nice and sturdy and clicks closed well. I could only find a link to the shimmer bronzer on the Priceline website here, which says its $6.15 but also has a product picture of the matte bronzer... which is strange. There's no link to the matte bronzer on the website at all. Get your shit together Priceline website, honestly. Anyway, if you get it instore, make sure it's the matte one, not the shimmer one (I also think it was $7 not $6 so that might help).



That's all for my Priceline haul! Did any of you pick these up? What do you think?

Daiso Haul

Hey guys! So a long while ago now, I went to Daiso, a Japanese 100-yen shop (like a $2 shop) that sells everything for $2.80. So... like a $2.80 shop. But that doesn't have the same ring to it.

The basic idea behind Daiso is they sell HEAPS of stuff for super cheap, like a regular bargain store, except everything is Japanese and there are lots of unique things like storage, pretty stationary and MAKEUP that you might not find in other bargain stores!

So of course I went to go buy insanely cheap makeup. I didn't pick up any eyelashes, but I believe they also have very nice false eyelashes if you're interested in that.

But here's what I picked up! Unfortunately because this was ages ago I don't remember the names of everything, but this is more to show you the kinds of products you can pick up:

• Black Floral Compact in Ecru
• Eyeliner Coat
• Ellefar Felt Eyeliner in Black
• Cream Eyeshadow in Rose Gold (I think it had a proper name but I can't remember it)

Here they are opened up:

The first product is the little compact, which I really just bought for the packaging and figured I could replace it with any pan that would fit if I wanted (I'm hoping Makeup Geek blush will!). But what came with it was a powder foundation. The colour actually matches me fairly well, it's lighter than it looks in the pan. The only thing is that it contains glitter which is fairly annoying and I didn't realise at the time due to the lighting. This doesn't get a lot of use, I mostly keep it on my vanity as a pretty accessory. It does have a mirror though and clicks shut nicely, so would definitely be great for any product that you may want to depot into it!

The powder is lighter than it looks in the pan.

 Next is this pretty cream eyeshadow. This is very different from a Maybelline Colour Tattoo or the like, it in fact feels more like a cream-to-powder formula as it is very dry to the touch. So it takes a bit of work to get it onto your eyelid and needs a bit of layering, but the colour is so gorgeous (see below!) and seriously lasts for ages. I wore this to a night out in NZ and slept with it on, and the next morning it hadn't budged. I feel like this would be a great base for other eyeshadows over the top, but still is really, really gorgeous as an all over colour.

This next product is the only one I use nearly every day - their liquid liner. I love liquid liner in pen form, I find it so easy to use and less messy than those in a pot. The nib is quite a bit thicker than others I own - for example Maybelline Master Precise - but I find the formula darker and more opaque, and this hasn't dried out on me, unlike my Master Precise.

I definitely think this is worth the $2.80, and is up to par with my other liquid liners I use equally as often.

My last product, the eyeliner coat, I really only picked up to try out because I've never seen a product like this before. It reminds me of like, really watered down PVA glue that you use for papier mache, just because it's kind of a half-opaque white colour. It doesn't actually feel PVA guys! To be honest, I haven't noticed much of a different putting this over my eyeliner in terms of lasting power, although, to be fair, I've only tried it on liquid liner. I had forgotten I owned this so I might have to dig it out to try again. If you find your liner fading over the day, it might be worth trying this out as a possibly cheap fix.

And there we go, that was my little Daiso haul! Have you ever been there? If so, tell me what I need to pick up! And, as always, thanks for reading guys.

October Favourites

I really hope you guys have started just getting automatically prepared the first week into the month for my monthly favourites, because you and me both know that's been the pattern as of late (oops!) This month has absolutely flown by and included my last classes of my first year of uni and some final planning for my trip to Thailand and Laos in December! Still haven't decided what I'm going to do about the blog and my Instagram in that time, but that's an issue for another post.

Here are my favourites for the month:

• Maybelline Fit Me Foundation in 15 Fair
• Australis Colour Inject Mineral Lipstick in Grunge
• Australis Ready Set Go Finishing Powder
• TheBalm Frat Boy Blush
• Real Techniques Setting Brush

Maybelline Fit Me Foundation in 15 Fair

I picked this concealer up one day when I was just wasting time at Priceline before the Sydney Noodle Markets (did anyone else go? They were amazing!) because I hear it compared so often to my precious NARS Radiant Creamy Concealer but I hate using it because it's so expensive, which is silly but I go pretty heavy on concealer so I wanted one I could use a bit more liberally without worrying about price.

I chose 15 over 10 because it seemed to be lighter and a whole lot less yellow. I actually saw a Fit Me ad in a magazine the other day that confirmed this - apparently the numbers that end in a 5 are for pink undertones and the 0s for yellow undertones. Annoying they don't actually tell anyone that though! It was in tiny little writing in the ad. Frustrating. 

It comes in packaging very similar to the NARS, with a thin clear tube with a black lid and doe foot applicator. I only realised when I got home but I think I got one that had already been opened :( which is AWFUL for someone to do (it wasn't a tester) but I just wiped off the edges and tried not to be too concerned because it would have been more effort than its worth to take it back, and I was kind of annoyed that I didn't notice it myself first.

Left: Fit Me in 15. Right: NARS Radiant Creamy Concealer in Vanilla.

 Anyway. Enough rambling about my troubles at Priceline. I really do love this product, it's nice and creamy and fairly long-lasting. It leaves a bit of a dewy finish and looks really natural on the skin. Today I wore it on its own without any foundation or anything and a couple of hours later I was like "holy hell my skin looks great" then realised I had concealer on but it had seriously just melted so nicely into my skin. As you can see in the above swatch, the Maybelline (on the left) is darker and pinker than my NARS (in Vanilla), but otherwise they have a similar consistency - the NARS is slightly thicker and creamier but it's not a huge difference.

Boy this could practically be its own review. This concealer holds its own very well, and is the best drugstore concealer I've tried thus far. It goes for $14.95 at Priceline.

Australis Colour Inject Mineral Lipstick in Grunge

I'm pretty sure I've already spoken about my love for this formula. Australis have killed it with these Colour Inject lipsticks. The formula is consistent - all of the ones I own are creamy, thick, super-pigmented and long-lasting. This is the first one I've picked up in the new packaging, and I'm not the biggest fan of it, although I do like that the top isn't slanted anymore so they're easier to store.

Grunge is a deep, red-purple vampy colour. It goes on really evenly and I have 0 troubles with patchiness like I do with nearly every other dark purple colour I own. It's really easy to apply and very comfortable on the lips, and there's not much more to say other than I really wish I'd picked it up earlier and not tried to deal with the purple Velourlips or NYX's Transylvania or Ulta3's Plum Velvet... because this is better than all of the above.

From Insty.

Australis Ready Set Go Finishing Powder

Another product I spent way too long wanting but not buying. I was holding out for the Face of Australia loose setting powder, but it was always sold out at my local and I got annoyed with waiting, so decided to go for this instead. I'm really happy with the purchase! It makes your skin feel nice and smooth and makes your foundation last longer. It doesn't give a matte finish, which I was happy about, since I have my Stay Matte that does a good job of that. For super staying power, I wouldn't rely on just this though - it is, technically, a 'finishing' powder, not a setting powder, so you could dust it over your setting powder if you were looking for your foundation to really not budge all day. But for regular days, this is just fine for me.

For some reason it's one of those nails-on-chalkboard feelings for me twisting open the lid (you know the ones that don't really make a sound but make your teeth hurt? no? just me? ok) but that's probably just me being overly sensitive rather than a fault with the packaging. It does have way too much powder coming through the sifter for regular use, but I normally just tip it upside down before opening and then use whatever is in the lid - my brush never goes inside the actual packaging.

If you've been looking for a nice, cheap, translucent powder to set your makeup without mattifying your face, this would definitely be my first recommendation!

TheBalm Frat Boy Blush

Man I love TheBalm's packaging. So gorgeous and just so fun. This is my first TheBalm product, and definitely won't be my last. I absolutely love this blush, It's the perfect corally pink colour, it's nice and matte, decently pigmented (I get scared of blushes that are way too pigmented and just take over your face) and blends easily.

It's technically a shadow as well, but I'm not a huge fan of pink eyeshadow and really can't see myself using this more than maybe once as an eyeshadow. But that's fine, because it works perfectly as a blush I don't need to think of another use for it.

Another addition people might like is it has a little mirror under the lid. As much as I don't travel, I love knowing that things WOULD be good for travelling if I needed to. If you have been reading since way back when, you'd know I went to NZ in July and forgot to bring a mirror, and the little Face of Australia LE Contour Kit I brought was an absolute saviour for having a decent mirror inside. I like to think these little surprises make you love products just that little bit more.

Real Techniques Setting Brush

I think this is the first brush I've ever included in a favourites! This is the Real Techniques Setting Brush that I got as part of the Sam's Picks set, which I bought off iHerb for about $35 about a month ago. I mostly wanted it for the buffing brush, but this was an unexpected favourite that I got out of it!

Comparison of sizes. L to R: Buffing Brush, Setting Brush, Base Shadow Brush.

This brush is like a jumbo version of the base shadow brush (another love of mine) and is so good for setting under the eyes, and any other little spots on your face. Seriously, I don't know what I did before I had this brush. How did I get those little spots on the inner corners of my eyes? And around my nostrils? And between my eyebrows? Who knows. All I know is that this brush exceeds in its purpose, and what more can you ask? It's soft, fluffy, and cheap! I highly recommend grabbing it in your next iHerb order.

And that's all for October! Thanks for reading and let me know if we shared any favourites this month :)

Review: Maybelline Brow Drama

I was super excited to see this product on the shelves here in Australia, simply because I was that close to splurging on Benefit's Gimme Brow, and now there was a cheaper option for me to try out first! Good on ya Maybelline.

Maybelline's Brow Drama is touted as a "sculpting brow mascara" but, y'know, I'm happy to just call it a good ol' brow gel. It comes in a little black tube with the Brow Drama logo (which I think is quite attractive) and a little box underneath to tell you what colour it is - we've only been given medium brown and dark brown as choices here in Australia, although I'm fairly sure they have blonde overseas. Ce la vie, I grabbed medium brown even though my hair is ash blonde.

 I suppose what you would call the 'defining feature' of this product is the funny shaped spoolie they included. It essentially just has a little "ball" at the end of it which is what you use to apply the product - the rest of the spoolie is useless because the bristles are so short there is no way you can manoeuvre them onto your brows. Maybelline say the shape helps to 'comb and shape your brows into a natural curved arch'. Hmm. Interesting.

Overall, I do really like this product. I use it nearly everyday in my brows over my Anastasia DipBrow in Taupe to define my otherwise blonde hairs and keep them in place. The colour is definitely too dark for what I prefer (I'd pounce on the Blonde version!) but because it isn't being used to fill in your brows per se, I don't find it unusable. It's not too warm either - a nice, slightly cool toned brown that I can imagine would match most brunettes or dark blondes.

The funny little spoolie is actually not too bad too use. It does let you be a bit more specific about where you apply the product and it picks up just the right amount (unlike something like Australis' Tint my Brow). The bristles are a bit sparse, but, again, this doesn't seriously hinder the use of this product.

Brow Drama definitely keeps your brows in place and doesn't set them with too much of that 'crunchy' feel that others do, although it doesn't feel completely natural like DipBrow on its own does. It does a good job of coating each hair, looks natural and not clumpy. It lasts the whole day unless you're like me and are constantly touching your eyebrows (seriously, does anyone else do this?) and so for that I'm pretty pleased.

This is what my brows look like with DipBrow to fill and Brow Drama to define:

Not too dark, right? It is surprisingly natural when you finish up.

Brow Drama goes for $12.95 at Priceline and is available in Medium Brown or Dark Brown.

I had some great comments on Instagram, so let me know what you think of this product here as well!

And, as always, thanks for reading!

September Favourites

Let's not even mention what the date is (considering I did that last month...)

Here are my September favourites! A few of these are actually products I've had for a while and never really loved... until now! 

• Anastasia Beverly Hills Dipbrow Pomade in Taupe
• Covergirl Trublend Fixstick in L1-4
• Chi Chi Metallic Eyeshadow Stick in Solid Gold Dancer
• Rimmel London Lasting Finish by Kate Moss Lipstick in 03
• Essence Bloom Me Up! Shimmer Powder

Anastasia Beverly Hills Dipbrow Pomade in Taupe

The one, the only. There's no mistaking Anastasia as a favourite for brows, with good reason. The Dipbrow is creamy, the taupe colour is spot on for light blonde or cool toned hair, and it outlasts anything else I've ever used on my brows. I use this everyday, and it is very, very versatile - you can use it to just fill in tiny spots in your brows, or go all out and pretty much redraw your brow, if you wanted to. The only issue I have with this (which may be user error since I haven't heard any others with the problem) is that the very centre of the product seems to have dried up slightly and is now no longer as creamy as the outside parts. However, I've just been working from the outside and ignoring the issue, hoping it will go away... I'm not sure if this is because I didn't store it lid side down the first week or so, or just bad luck, or I didn't put the lid on properly one day or something, but it is a small error I have found in an otherwise great product.  A favourite for September, and likely for a while to come.

Covergirl TruBlend FixStick in L1-4

Top: blended swatch. Bottom: unblended swatch.

I didn't have high expectations for this concealer, only because I seem to have better luck with liquid concealers rather than cream, but I was pleasantly surprised with this product. The pink undertone makes it perfect for concealing my blue under-eye circles, and because it's in stick form just makes it really quick and easy to use. It's twist up (thank goodness) which is just a godsend after the issues I've had with jumbo pencils (see below...). It's highly pigmented, and blends in well, but seems to disappear easily if you over-blend. From what I've experienced, it has fair staying power, although I struggle noticing staying power of concealer because it gets used in conjunction with foundation (obviously) so if it disappears I always wonder what role the foundation underneath played in that. Nevertheless, if you're looking for an easily portable concealer to chuck in your bag for touch ups or for travelling, and you aren't looking for a heavy duty concealer, Covergirl might have just made your perfect product.

Chichi Metallic Eyeshadow Stick in Solid Gold Dancer

Heavy swatch in natural light.

This is one of the only eyeshadow pencils I own that seems to actually be of a fairly "eyeshadowy" consistency when applied. Very different to, say, Rimmels Scandaleyes Pencils, this Chi Chi pencil is seriously metallic and quite dry to the touch (not sticky). I prefer this, as the lasting power is vastly improved with such a formula. It can be slightly patchy to work with, but the formula can be layered to reduce this issue. It's also a huge bitch to sharpen, but I've found that this varies drastically depending on your jumbo pencil sharpener, since people always seem to complain about NYX Jumbo Pencils and I have no trouble at all sharpening those. Weird. Anyway, I wore this to a festival (Listen Out!) as liner this month and it did not budge! Very, very impressed with this, especially as something I picked up to use once for my formal last year. Definitely a keeper.


Rimmel London Lasting Finish by Kate Moss in 03

Unattractive angle lip swatch.

The only decent full face photo I could get that showed the colour true to life. Oh man I love this lipstick.

A browny-taupe nude with a creamy finish. This is the nude that made me fall in love with nude lipsticks. It lasts well for the price, smells amazing and is super opaque. I prefer this formula over the Matte Kate ones (in the red tube) but I haven't tried it in other colours so there might be some variation. I am absolutely in love with this lipstick though, and it has definitely opened up the world of nude lip colours to me. I've had it for a while but its only been this month that I've realised what a good product it is (does anyone else do that? Forget or not realise how great a product you own is?)

Essence Bloom Me Up! Shimmer Powder

Pretty design imprinted into the powder, but of course I didn't take a photo before I used it...

Attempting to show the colour. It's lighter than this in real life.

Swatch in natural lighting.

I got this, obviously, as part of Essence's recent Bloom Me Up! collection, which was a nice refreshing change from the mostly unattractive look of the other recent trend editions (despite there being some really good products in them). Maybe it's just because I'm really not a fan of Essence's branding in general... Oh well. This is a gorgeous, gorgeous highlight. It is definitely on the shimmery side, but I somehow don't mind as much as I normally would because it looks so natural! I pat this on with my finger (because I hate getting glitter in my face brushes then forgetting about it) on the tops of my cheekbones and set with a setting spray and I really love the effect. It also has pink undertones which is right up my alley. Definitely go check out your local Priceline and see if they have any of these left over, it's definitely worth it for just over $5!

So those are my favourites for September. Let me know what you think!

Review and Swatches: Glamourdolleyes Eyeshadows

Hi guys! Today is a long overdue review of six gorgeous Glamour Doll Eyes eyeshadows that the very lovely Vanessa sent to me to try out. I got to choose six colours I thought looked interesting and she sent them internationally for me! I felt so so lucky to be able to get this opportunity, and I wanted to give a really detailed review based on my experiences with them. So let's go!

Before we get to the shadows, I'll give you some background on Glamour Doll Eyes. It's what most people refer to as an "indie" company, or individual, as they are small and often have prices that rival the drugstore, yet quality that matches the mid-range. Their eyeshadows tend to be loose, very pigmented and often come in sample sizes. They also release lots of collections and are generally very exciting! Glamour Doll Eyes started in 2008 and currently sell eyeshadow, primer, blush, glitter, and even lip products, but the eyeshadow is definitely the biggest range.

Moving on, here is what my six sample jars looked like: 

The colours I chose were:

• Bittersweet
• Mushroom
• Brown Eyed Girl
• Lethal
• Bella Donna
• Aqua Foil

I decided with this review not to give individual reviews of each colour, as I found them to be very, very consistent in quality, so I will instead give a general review of the eyeshadows I received and my overall thoughts at the bottom.

Here are my arm swatches of each colour. I put them over Jordana 12HR Made to Last Eyeshadow Stick in Continuous Almond to get more even swatches and also to compare how they lasted over the day.

From top to bottom, these are in the same order as above:

The above pictures, as with each below, have natural lighting on the left hand side and flash on the right.

Initially, I was most intrigued by Mushroom as I thought the taupe/silver duochrome (where the colours shift in different light) was absolutely gorgeous. However, I soon realised each of my colours had a very unique colour shift or colour undertone that made them stand out from any other eyeshadow colour I've tried before. These are all super shimmery and highly pigmented.

Here are close-ups of each colour and a description, before I move onto the review:


Bittersweet
Deep taupe base with orange/gold duochrome

Mushroom
Deep taupe base with silver duochrome

Brown Eyed Girl
Shimmery brown with hints of purple undertones

Lethal
Deep taupe base with purple duochrome

Bella Donna
Turquoise with subtle purple undertones

Aqua Foil
Turquoise with hint of gold

I gave myself plenty of time for this review as I really wanted to get a feel for what these eyeshadows are like, considering they were my first indie purchase and my first foray into loose shadows. So what do I think?

Firstly, each of the colours I picked are absolutely gorgeous. I know I keep saying that, but it's true. Each could be used as a single wash of colour over the lid and it would look like finished, due to their colour shifts that add real depth. Aqua Foil works really well as an inner eye pop of colour on an otherwise plain eye, and Bittersweet would have its place in any warm neutral eye look.

The sample jars I was given were very generous, with a little shadow going a very long way. I barely needed to dip my brush into the colour to get enough to cover my lid - they don't shy away from pigment over at Glamour Doll Eyes!

I also like the aesthetic of the brand as a whole - it's a breath of fresh air from other well-known brands, and I like putting these jars on display as they all match and look good together.

However, as with most products, these eyeshadows come with some negative aspects.

Firstly, I really had difficulty getting used to having loose eyeshadows. In general, you have to be a lot more careful as they can be easy to spill, and you have to watch the amount you have on your brush before you apply. However, this is obviously an issue with application I have personally, and is no reflection upon the quality of the product. It is just something for others to consider before purchasing, as I know many people mostly work with pressed eyeshadows. There is definitely a learning curve with these shadows.

Moreover, the packaging slightly bothered me as I would have preferred to have the colour name or some sort of reference to the colour on the lid of the jar, as opposed to underneath, simply so when they are all lined up I can easily grab the colour I'm looking for. I know I could always just store them upside down, but then you don't get the pretty brand name, so neither is perfect. Also, Aqua Foil unfortunately stained my Real Technique Base Shadow Brush - after a few washes it seems to be back to normal but it made me quite sad that the tip was all blue instead of white.

A full size of one of these shadows will set you back $6 USD, and you get the choice of with or without a sifter included. A sample baggie is $1.25, and a sample jar like mine is $2.50. This is seriously good value, especially if you want to try out a whole bunch of shades and you barely ever hit pan on anything (I know I don't...). GDE have free shipping on orders over $50 worldwide, and have plenty of Gifts With Purchase that change often, so you always get a little bonus!

On the whole, I'm really glad I have these shadows in my collection. They are unique, bright and fun, and the colours are very wearable. They don't get reached for as much as, say, a pressed palette, simply due to the fact they take a bit more work and aren't fully appropriate for the morning rush, but their quality cannot be overlooked. I will definitely be making a future order with them!

And that's my review for today! Have any of you tried Glamour Doll Eyes? What do you think?
Thanks for reading.