A 10-pack of eyeshadows to mix up your fall looks
By Lauren Kelly, Editor-in-Chief
Even though both nude and matte eyeshadows are very popular, it can be hard to find a cheap palette that’s fully matte. My favourite palette is Urban Decay’s Naked Basics, and I use it nearly every day. However, it only comes with six colours—five mattes, and one shimmer highlight—and the palette rings in at $36. When you also need to be paying tuition and buying textbooks, this can be a hard price to swallow. Another issue I had with it was versatility. It’s great for daytime looks, but it only has two darker shades, which isn’t ideal for fall and winter.
My hunt for the perfect matte nude palette led me to e.l.f.’s Mad for Matte Eyeshadow Palette. It has 10 colours in both warm and cool tones, some similar to those in Naked Basics 1 and 2; plus, it has two matte highlight shades, a beige and a champagne. Although I like having a lighter highlight, these colours can also be used as an all-over base, so they’re a bit more versatile. Missing is a matte black, instead replaced by a deep, cool grey. The other colours include some basic neutrals, a red-brown, a soft pink, and a medium grey.
Applied dry, the colours are pretty middling when it comes to pigmentation. According to the packaging, e.l.f. recommends users to wet their brush to achieve dramatic looks. When I tested this method, it greatly increased the pigmentation, and the shadows went on very smoothly with my Icing brushes.
When it comes to portability, the packaging is very sleek. Although it holds 10 shades, there is very little space left wasted inside the palette. There is a mirror in the lid, but no extra space put in for a brush, which I prefer. This means that the palette will take up very little room in your purse or backpack, so it’s easy to bring with you when you need it.
There are three other palettes in this collection; Everyday Smoky, Need it Nude, and Party Ready. Each of these has plenty of shimmer—especially Party Ready, which is full of bright, glittery colours. If you’re interested in neutral looks, but don’t like the matte look, Need It Nude is perfect for you. It contains a few gold-toned shades and a few rose-toned ones, making it a bit of a mix between Urban Decay Naked 1 and 3. Everyday Smoky is also fairly neutral, but has darker, cooler shades, similar to Naked 2. Although Party Ready may sound too crazy, it contains nudes similar to the other palettes, as well as a bright pink and three blues of varying shades.
No matter which palette you go with—or if you go with more than one—you’ll spend much less on this than you would on the mid-range alternatives, since each palette is only about $12.
