As Christmas is nearing, many stores are starting to stock a lot of gift sets. Models Prefer brings out such sets every year, which are sold at
Priceline in Australia. I chose two of the eyeshadow palettes, although there are also nail polish and lip gloss sets, and an eyebrow makeup palette, and more. Most of these seem to be priced at $10, including the two I purchased - Shadows Party Glam and Brown Smokey.
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| Cardboard Packaging |
Models Prefer Brown Smoky Eye palette is one of several "2 in 1" type palettes that remind me of some of the Two Faced eyeshadow palettes. This one includes a mini brown eyeliner pencil and 6 shadows, which are designed so that you can create two specific looks. There are some other "2 in 1" type palettes that include Blue Smoky and Classic Smoky.
The outer cardboard box has a flap you can open in the store with instructions for the two looks, as well as, for some unknown reason, a Photoshopped eye showing the supposed final look repeated three time with the three steps, rather than a picture of each step. I don't think this is a huge issue, just a bit odd. The instructed looks are not really the same as the picture, and I feel the "Warm Smoky" look is less smoky and more of a cut crease, but I do really like the colours, and you could easily create a smoky look with those same three colours.
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| Inside the palette |
The instructions are also shown on the inside of the palette below the relevant eyeshadow, with the names listed above the eye shadows, which are also numbered. The first look is the three eye shadows on the left, and the second are the three on the right. It's nice, sturdy and convenient, with a large mirror, and as such I chose it as a palette to take with me on holiday. The two looks are simple and neutral, so should be able to go with any lipstick, outfit or occasion. Plus warm eye shadows are good for bringing out blue or green eyes.
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| Indoor natural light |
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| Outdoor natural light |
The dark line on the left is the eyeliner, which seems to be fairly okay for a pencil eyeliner. It applies fairly easily and is pigmented. The eye shadows are backwards, and so are from left to right, look 2 (Warm Smoky look) step 3, step 2 then step 1, and then look 1 (Natural look) step 3, 2 and then 1. Step 1 in the natural look is quite hard to see because its very close in shade to my skin tone - so for me it's a great base shade for blending. As you can see, the shadows are nice and pigmented and are swatched on my arm over Face of Australia Eye Primer in Matte. They apply and blend well enough too - probably not as good as Naked by Urban Decay, but well enough for the price ($10 for 6 eye shadows and one eye pencil, if all are considered the same value, that makes them $1.43 each approximately).
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| Back of palette |
This is the back of the palette, the front is plain black with "Models Prefer" written in the centre. For some reason the cardboard packing calls the palette "Brown Smoky" but the back of the actual palette has it labelled as "Warm Smoky".
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| Cardboard Packaging |
The case for this palette,
Shadows: Party Glam, looks a bit like the Urban Decay Naked series. It's a set of 12 eye shadows and a double ended eye shadow brush. The names of the shadows are written underneath each one, and there is a convenient mirror on the inner side of the lid. Other Models Prefer palettes in the Shadows series are Shadows Nude and Shadows Day to Night.
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| Inside the palette |
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| Indoors natural light |
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| Indoor natural light |
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| Outdoors |
The colours are again in backwards order in comparison to the palette. It contains two blue shades (Royalty and Midnight), two purple shades (Suspect, and Mysterious), two green/turquoise shades (Foxy, and Envy), two browns (Tease, and High Heels), two greys (Busted, and Blackout), a silver (Disco Ball) and a pink shade (Princess). Disco Ball, the silver eyeshadow, is quite pale. Disco Ball and Princess are both very shimmery. The other shadows are more of a moderate shimmer. The shadows are quite pigmented and blend easily.
The brush is quite good, one end is a standard brush for applying eye shadow, while the other end is a large blending bush. The blending brush is very soft but possibly too large for use on the eye.
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| Back of Palette |
