Build a Quad: "The Tropics"

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Christine |

Build a Quad: “The Tropics”

One of my all-time favorite color pairings is green, teal, and blue. There’s just something so fun and youthful about it–it’s a combination I find myself going back to over and over again. The quad includes MAC Freshwater Eyeshadow (a medium dark blue frost), MAC Shimmermoss Eyeshadow (a shimmery dark teal), MAC Juxt Eyeshadow (a summery yellow-green), and MAC Shroom Eyeshadow (a soft, lightly shimmered highlighter). But… but… if I had my way, I would do away with Shroom and bring in MAC Gorgeous Gold Eyeshadow.

You can always mix it up, too — if you have similar shades, whether they’re limited edition, another brand, or what-have-you, there’s nothing wrong with swapping in a yellow-green substitute for Juxt. You could easily add a brighter pop of green like MAC Sour Lemon Eyeshadow if you so desire. It doesn’t really change the theme of the quad, but you can change it up and make it your own.

A few combinations to try with this…

  • Juxt on the inner half of the lid, Freshwater on the outer half of the lid, Shimmermoss in the crease, Shroom as a highlighter
  • Juxt all over the lid, Shimmermoss on the outer corner and crease, Shroom as a highlighter
  • Shroom all over the lid, Juxt slightly layered over, Freshwater in the crease, and Shroom as a highlighter

A few looks I’ve done that can be replicated with these shades…

Build a Quad is a feature focusing on creating different eyeshadow palettes that are both beautiful and functional using permanent shades of eyeshadow. We invite readers to suggest their own build-a-quads — just leave your ideas in the comments! Don’t forget to name your quad! 🙂

P.S. – It’s great that the response to this feature has been so overwhelmingly encouraging and positive, and I’d really love to hear from you as to how often you’d like to see it pop up per week. (Once, twice, everyday?) I want to try and see what might work best 🙂  Thank you!

See swatches…


Freshwater, Shimmermoss, Juxt, Gorgeous Gold

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62 Comments

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Tina

Twice a week would be perfect I think…for you and for us…so you don’t run out of these ideas and we don’t get too overwhelmed. I love this series! You are awesome!

Vness_12

First and foremost…love the quad. Great colors. I have all but one of those and I think I’m going to have to pick up Freshwater and put this together. Secondly, I took a look at the “Jewel Tone Teals & Blues” look you linked and GGIRRRRRLLLLLLL LoL You ROCKED that look! It is gorgeous and it looked really nice on you. I’m definetely going to give that one a try. Thanks as always for an awsome site C.
🙂

LUCY

OMG Christine this is a genius idea!! i am sometimes confused as to what colors complement each other, but this makes it so much easier:) i say two times a week! yayy

daphne

So, why’d you include Shroom instead of Gorgeous Gold then? 😉 And wow, Shimmermoss doesn’t look nearly that green on me, that’s really interesting! I love this combination too, though. Sometimes I get bold and wear these kinds of colors to work but mostly I have to keep it to the weekends, so I take advantage and wear these colors when I can! I just got Gorgeous Gold so I am going to play around figuring out how I can integrate it in with these colors. I think it’s too much for me for a highlighter.

I think a couple times a week is fine for this one! Daily would be overkill but having it here and there is great to motivate one to think of different combinations and break out of an eyeshadow rut. Can we submit ideas for these too?

Christine
Light Medium, Neutral, slight yellow undertones. Normal-to-Dry skin. »

Hey Daphne!

At the end of the day, it’s exactly for the reason you said — it’s too much for you as a highlighter. It’s something I love, love, love on me, but I recognize most people are like, “Uhh, too much!” (and may even say/think the same about me wearing it, but whatever, I luvs!), so I kind of wanted to present in two ways.

Gorgeous Gold can work on the lid, or you can use it between the crease and the highlighter, to help it fade into the highlight.

And yes, you can submit ideas — the rules are all permanent shades and you must come up with a name 🙂

daphne

Neat! Thanks Christine – I stocked up on empty quads over the summer during the Sumo Sale and I’ve been having a lot of fun playing around making them. I will think about submitting something.

Thanks also for the suggestions with Gorgeous Gold. I think it’s seriously one of MAC’s prettiest and most interesting colors, but because it is pale and different it’s hard to know what to do with it. The transition to the highlight sounds like a great idea.

Christine

Nice! I am more of a 15-pan palette kind of gal. It’s just easier for me to keep track of, but I also have a little bit of a monstrous collection, so I think I’d need like 50 quads.

I also love Gorgeous Gold on the inner lid/tearduct AND on the lower lash line.

OyaOshun

Another wonderful quad idea!
Yellow Greens aren’t so good on my cool toned (NW43-45) complexion. Could you suggest an alternative green for the quad that would suit a cool toned person? Thank you!

Christine
Light Medium, Neutral, slight yellow undertones. Normal-to-Dry skin. »

Thank you, OyaOshun! 🙂

You could try Tilt or Moon’s Reflection — they’re not really green, but they’re very pretty blues that would work in this quad, too. It’s hard to find a green that’s not so yellow! Swimming is the only one I’d recommend, but it may still be a little yellow on you (though it’s kind of a grassy green).

sandra

Looks good Christine! Keep on the good work 😉 Twice a week would be perfect!!
I only have Shroom, the other 3 colors are brandnew for me (and to me a bit bright, LOL). I do have Steamy, so I guess I can use that one with gorgeous gold too (as Steamy is a bit blue-isch/green). Wrote it down on my shoppinglist for tomorrow (MAC: nymphette l/g and Gorgeous Gold e/s and 2 x empty 15 palettes!!)
Oh and is Teal a different name for green/grey colors? (English isn’t my mother tongue, sorry for that).

sandra

Hi Christine,
I did some serious shopping today, bought the 2 x 15 pallete and some eyeshadows: Goldmine (no Gorgeous Gold available), Soft Brown, Expensive Pink, Mysterie & Retrospeck. I think that Mysterie is a great choice for a new quad (with soba maybee and Tempting for a smoky eye?).

glitter princess

I agree I would love to see this post once a week always look forward to reading this and this colour combos are my favourites!

Freshwater reminds me of urban decay’s kiddie pool or from the deluxe range PEACE e/s,

Shimmermoss reminds me of flipside from urban decay,

Juxt reminds me of estee lauders Mint Ice eyeshadow which i love and

Gorgeous Gold reminds me of Lemon Square(40) from the Deluxe Pure Color Eyeshadow Palette.

Anitacska

Such gorgeous colours! I often wear blue, but don’t normally mix it with green, should try it really, looks gorgeous. (Although to be honest I mostly liked the bluer looks: Oceaniac Aqua Blue and Neutral & Blue, but mainly cause I would do those.) Today I’m wearing blue, turquoise and gold from Laura Mericer Mediterrenean See quad and it’s so pretty. 🙂

Christine
Light Medium, Neutral, slight yellow undertones. Normal-to-Dry skin. »

I’m surprised that you don’t pair it with green! It just seems so natural to me, I suppose 🙂

That Laura Mercier quad was so tempting, but I managed to resist when it came out!

Roxanne

I wanna have them ALL. I am going to bookmark these so I can just print them out and head for MAC 🙂
I like that you gave an alternative to Shroom since you’ve used that one in a previous quad (so we can arrange every quad to be different w/o having too many double e/s). I’m not really great with coming up with color combo’s myself (usually wear different shades of the same color or premade quads).
I think it would be great if you did this once or twice a week (more would be too much, I feel) so we can really have something to look fwd to!!

Christine
Light Medium, Neutral, slight yellow undertones. Normal-to-Dry skin. »

Aww! 🙂

Yeah, I’m torn between omitting the highlighter and not. For me, if I was going to store everything in quads, I’d probably just have a highlighter quad rather than work one into each quad. I’m just not sure what you all would like to see in the end. We’ll see how it goes 😉

rashmi

hello christine
very nice quad pls come up with some pinks …. as soon as possible

hey again i need ur help
i asked mac for discontinued product
and they said i can order 6 of them
can u please suggest what all i can order
m thinking of 1 MAC brush 226
and other 5 u suggest anything like lips , eyes or cheeks
can they give me mari sheeno ???

Christine
Light Medium, Neutral, slight yellow undertones. Normal-to-Dry skin. »

Will definitely try to do so!

To be honest, there aren’t too many products I’d probably phone in trying to track down! The 226 is definitely one… you could ask about Mari-sheeno, but I would be very, very surprised if they found it! MAC has so many great permanent shades and is always coming out with new limited shades, I’d just save up for those myself!

amy

I have juxt and shroom. Juxt is my first MAC eyeshadow and I still buy or BTM it once in a while when I used it up. Shroom I have used often as an overall lid shade and brow bone highlighter as well, so that one is getting down to the pan.

Bettina

Christine this is a great idea. I sued somethign from your purple one yesterday and was like oh duh why didn’t I ever think to pair these. I am now about to attempt something from this one and we’ll see what happens LOL

Nicole

What I bright quad! Not really my style, but I will recommend the combination of Shroom and Shimmermoss to a friend.

In my opinion this type of post should appear two or three times a week. Everyday would be boring in the long run.

Brie

I’d be all over this quad if I could wear those tones, but sadly can’t! A beautiful combo though 🙂

I really like this feature and I think it would be great to see it two or three times a week (I think daily would be too much but once a week too little lol).

As an artist, I like to come up with “concept” color combos with my eyeshadows. Whatever I happen to be inspired by that day, so this whole thing really appeals to me. One of my personal faves is one I like to call my Nymph combo:

D’Bohemia
Teal pigment (or alternately, for a non pigment – Shimmermoss)
Humid
Vanilla

I like to put D’Bohemia on the lid, Teal in the crease and corner, Humid to deepen the corner and and Vanilla to hightlight. I think it’s a really unexpected but pretty combo.

Christine
Light Medium, Neutral, slight yellow undertones. Normal-to-Dry skin. »

Thanks, Kimberly! 🙂

It’s not feasible for me to create looks *specifically* for this post (seriously, you’d get it once a month or less if I did that, LOL), but I’ve certainly done looks with various limited edition shades that could no doubt be created with a quad of permanent shades, too — at least to a significant degree 😀 I am just really glad you liked that addition!

Laetitia

Hi Christine! This quad is so pretty. Not sure it would work with my skin tone, so I was wondering what shadestick you would recommend to go underneath to maybe darken it up a bit or help the colors pop more.

As much as I would love a build a quad feature daily, I agree that it might be overkill for some (and for you!). 2-3 time a week?

Christine
Light Medium, Neutral, slight yellow undertones. Normal-to-Dry skin. »

Hey Laetitia,

I’m not even sure what shadesticks are still permanent, since they keep discontinuing them so fast! I wanted to say Lucky Jade, but it looks like that’s gone now… I’d say Beige-ing for a cooler look and Shimmersand for a warmer look.

Zeezee

Very nice if completely wrong for my skin colour 🙂
The only quad I own has business-like neutrals – most of my fun colours are cheerful cheapies. Still, I think you could do worse: Satin Taupe, Copperplate, Shroom & Fig 1. I like the matte/shimmer and neutral/colour juxtaposition.

Bettina

I so wanna name this quad..

1. Dorthy’s Dress-blue
2. Emerald City-the darker green
3. Tin Man-the silver-gray
3. Oz-the lighter green

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