MUA The Artiste Collection Palette – Fab or Drab?

When MUA Cosmetics announced they’d launched their new Fur Effect Nails, we couldn’t resist jumping straight online that afternoon and getting our order in (review coming soon). As is often the case with MUA, when our package arrived, there was a little extra present. This time it was the Artiste Collection.

Being addicted to their Undressed Palette, which is one of our daily staples, we’ve been meaning to try some more of their shadow palettes for a while. The Artiste Collection is slightly different, as it also contains two blushers, a bronzer and a highlighting shade as well as the six eyeshadows.

Firstly, we have to say thanks to the little elves that work in the MUA warehouse! The palette was wrapped in so much bubble wrap, the postman could have thrown it at the front door and it still wouldn’t have broken! The palette is a little bigger than MUA’s standard shadow palettes due to the extra products, and it comes with a sponge applicator. Not something we use, but some people do find they get a good finish from them.

Once we actually managed to wrestle it from the bubble wrap, we were instantly struck by how pretty the palette is. The six eyeshadows are all in bright, colourful shades with a marbling effect throughout each one. The shades looked very wearable with a good range of neutral tones to complement the brighter ones.

As you can see from the swatches, even when dry, all the shadows are well pigmented with lots of shimmer.

For a more dramatic look, when we swatched them wet, the shades really pop! Perfect if you wanted to glam up your look for the evening.

The blushers come in two shades of dusky pink, which would suit almost all skintones. You could follow the top tip from Karla Powell, MUA’s resident makeup artist, who recommends always using two shades of blusher to define the cheeks. (Read our interview with her here).

The bronzer is matt without shimmer, so would be great to use alongside the highlighter as a contouring shade. You can read how to Conquer Contouring here.

In regards to ingredients, the palette does contain a lot of talcs and parabens, but considering the quality of the product and the fact that the Artiste Collection is usually only £6, we are incredibly impressed.

Definitely FAB in our opinion! You can purchase the Artiste Collection online from the MUAStore or in Superdrug.

Shine Your Light

We love Temple Spa for their luxurious skincare but we’d not tried their cosmetics range before. We thought the gorgeous Shine Your Light set would be a good place to start, containing two nail treats and two cream eyeshadows in complementary colours, we thought they’d be perfect for the Christmas party season. As with all the Temple Spa sets, it comes presented in a lovely gift box, so it would make a great Christmas present, but we’re not giving it away!

Browns are a great colour for autumn/winter, so we thought we’d start with the Terra twighlight nail treat.

As you can see, three coats give a sumptuous, shimmering colour, and it lasted well for 4/5 days without chipping.

Ice/frost colours are also particularly apt for the cold weather we’re having at the moment, so the Azzuro silver/blue nail treat is great for adding some on trend sparkle. 

We like it with one coat alone, it gives a lovely pearlescent shimmer, which would make a great alternative for when you normally quickly pop on a coat of clear varnish.

With two coats the colour really comes into its own, and would be ideal for Christmas parties!

The two eyeshadows come in very similar shades to the nail treats; Imbrunire and Oceano. They’re cream shadows with sponge applicators and we love them! The colours are beautiful, and the cream formula is easy to apply and very easy to blend. It’s not quite a cream to powder formula, as it doesn’t dry to a matt, powdery finish, but once set they stay put for hours and there is no creasing. We used Oceano in the inner corners of the eye, with the darker Imbrunire in a V shape on the outer corners of the lid – gorgeous! 

Shine Your Light is available from Temple Spa for £25 and your can buy online here, or through one of their Spa to Go consultants at a Temple Spa skin class. 

Limited Edition PPQ A/W12 Palette for Fashionista…what will you fill yours with?

Sometimes when we’re wandering around in our lunch hour, something bright, shiny and irresistible will catch our eye. Here at thebeautyobsession, we’re a bit like Magpies when it comes to pretty, shiny things – which is unfortunate as they’re usually expensive!

Luckily for us, our Friday trip to Superdrug ended with us purchasing something gorgeous, for a ridiculously good price! Don’t we all love things like that? The new Limited Edition A/W 12 Palette by PPQ for Fashionista is an absolute gem. The Palette itself is gorgeous, and looks far more expensive than it is and the bonus is, you can choose a total of four blushers and/or eyeshadows to fill it with, for the bargain price of £10.

For those that aren’t familiar with Fashionista, they’re a new brand by Style Icon London who retail in Superdrug. As well as a range of products you’d expect from any cosmetics line; foundation, mascara, concealer etc etc… they also have a range of over 49 eyeshadows and 12 blushers that you can buy individually or purchase with a custom palette.

As the PPQ palette is so gorgeous, we decided it would only be right to fill it with what we thought were some of their most gorgeous eyeshadow shades.

We’ve chosen 3 shadows from their Double Take Baked Eyeshadow range, and you can see the shades we picked above. We also decided to be a little bit sensible and buy a new blush, but we wish we’d been a bit more adventurous and gone for something other than a traditional mono shade now we’ve had a chance to try them out.

So although they look gorgeous, we all know that it’s all about how they look out of the palette and on your face that counts, and thebeautyobsession doesn’t overlook quality for appearance.

We’re very pleased to say that all four shades we tried lived up to expectations. We have swatched them wet and dry for you to see the impact.

Wet Swatches

Dry Swatches

There is very little fallout from any of the colours and they blend very well. We think that they add a nice touch of shimmer for brightening up a daytime look. Even more excitingly, if they’re used with a wet brush, they’ll give you an evening look that will really help you stand out from the crowd!!

Overall we are really impressed with this palette and the shades that we chose, and we can’t wait to try more Fashionista products to see if they’re all up to the same standards.

Have you tried this brand? What did you think? If not, do you think you’ll give them a try now you’ve read our review? Let us know!

You can find out more about Fashionista and subscribe to their newsletter here. You can purchase them from the Superdrug site here.