Do you like building your own palettes?
I do! It can be overwhelming at first, but when you finally zero in on the types of shades you like, it can be amazing when it comes together.
— Christine
Explore Temptalia
We're here to help you make better beauty purchases that you'll enjoy and love! We recommend signing up to take advantage of personalized features like tracking products you own, viewing dupes that you already have, and more!
Here are some useful resources for you:
Compare Any Two
Curious how two shades compare to each other? Type in the shades below to get instant side-by-side swatches!
38 Comments
Comments that do not adhere to our comment policy may be removed. Discussion and debate are highly encouraged but we expect community members to participate respectfully. Please keep discussion on-topic, and if you have general feedback, a product review request, an off-topic question, or need technical support, please contact us!
Please help us streamline the comments' section and be more efficient: double-check the post above for more basic information like pricing, availability, and so on to make sure your question wasn't answered already. Comments alerting us to typos or small errors in the post are appreciated (!) but will typically be removed after errors are fixed (unless a response is needed).
We appreciate enthusiasm for new releases but ask readers to please hold questions regarding if/when a review will be posted as we can't commit to or guarantee product reviews. We don't want to set expectations and then disappoint readers as even products that are swatched don't always end up being reviewed due to time constraints and changes in priorities! Thank you for understanding!
Comments on this post are closed.
We try to approve comments within 24 hours (and reply to them within 72 hours) but can sometimes get behind and appreciate your patience! 🙂 If you have general feedback, product review requests, off-topic questions, or need technical support, please contact us directly. Thank you for your patience!
In theory! In reality, I usually get confused and overwhelmed. Working on it though!
Yes, absolutely! Because I get to pick all the shades and their respective finishes out myself, there won’t be any uselessly unflattering or ones that I look at as ‘meh’. I picked out and bought many MAC and CP single pan only/s’s and made quite a few quads (perhaps too many!), 6-pan Buxom Palette, too. It’s actually a very fun and satisfying way to build ones stash, I found!
Yes!
I have a whole bunch of Colourpop, ABH and Sydney Grace pans in magnetic palettes and I periodically pull them all out and re-arrange them. I just got my SG Xmas in July goodies, so I am going to re-sort them over the weekend.
Heh, I just did this earlier this week!
I love it. I greatly prefer it to buying pre selected palettes because I’m very picky, and I think I have a good eye for colour and enjoy playing with colour stories and making them work for a limited choice of shades and my skintone.
I’d love it if companies offered build-your-own palettes at a discount to buying singles.
Theoretically, but when I actually try to do it myself I can’t narrow anything down.
Sometimes. It can be frustrating when the shades I really want are constantly sold out. I don’t make my own palettes very often, but I really like the (mostly) matte brights palette I put together from Coastal Scents, as it filled in gaps in my collection when it was hard to find matte autumnal brights. I also love my SugarPill Pro Palette because it has most of my favorite SP shades in it.
When I wear powdered shadow definitely. Larger palettes overwhelm me and contain too many colors I’ll never use. I have a medium palette of singles and a small metal palette that fits about 6 singles so I build a mini palette from my larger collection based on season/mood/purpose. (travel, etc)
I mostly buy singles now. With pre-made palettes it’s rare that I love every color, but with singles I can make my own color story. I’ve been really enjoying Sydney Grace, Coloured Raine, Strobe Cosmetics, Sugapill and Inglot’s singles. I just made a pastel palette with those & I’m working on a swampy green one now.
Send them to me! The pastel and the green…. idk why, as of yesterday, I get 2 comment boxes, and brilliantly chose the wrong one. The correct one, I think, is below the ID info, which it never was before, and above the subscription checkbox. Time to try other devices.
Sounds like fun and an easy way to think outside the box.
Yes! I have 41 “standard size” eyeshadow singles (from MAC, MUG, ABH, ColourPop, and Sydney Grace) and I love rearranging them to be creative or to mimic new palettes that I admire. I keep most of them in a large MUFE tin palette but I also have some in a small nine-pan z-palette. Right now the z-palette is arranged to be an imitation of the ColourPop Oh Honey palette – basically I stuck all my yellow, orange, and gold shadows in it and honestly it’s cute af, no need to spend any more money.
I do, but not often. I selected some shades that I liked and didn’t find in the pre-made palettes, or that are included in some palettes which are not worth buying just for those particular eyeshadows.
I didn’t a few years ago but then I redid all of my shadow collection and now have quite a few singles. And yes, I enjoy organizing the palettes. For example, I have a quad of UD neutrals and a 6-pack of UD shimmers. I’ve got a 5-pack of SG mattes that I use just for dealing with my deep set eyes too. I just got a bunch of new SG ones that I’m testing out now. For the new ones, I think I’ll be making a small one of just purples and another of outer-V and crease shades, at least. I use a tape label printer so each palette is easily identifiable.
I made a warm gold, peach, yellow, orange and red palette and a cool blue, green, lavender and purple eye shadow palette. Using JD Glow, MUE, Coloured Raine and ABH eye shadow singles. It was fun making them. I love the colors I picked . I get happy using and looking at my personal palettes.
Yes, I absolutely love it. I also love doing my makeup on the run or preparing custom palette colors for vacations. I depot almost all my palettes these days. I like how it helps me to be less seduced by packaging and hype and more focused on color, quantity, and quality. Saves room , too. Sometimes I’m thrilled to see a brand release a palette that I have already made myself.
Yes and no. I guess I’m a bit like Kuavsui – I really like the “idea” but in the end, I keep buying the same types of colours over and over again so I end up with palettes filled with several variations of something like Sumptuous Olive, Smog, Ritzy, Satin Taupe and Dazzlelight! A pre-made palette forces me to try a few different shades that are out of my general sphere of repetitive buying!
By the sound of it we also prefer the same type of colours and finishes! 😀
I am the same Mariella, I know if I buy any SG singles they will be of pretty much the same shades as what I have already in abundance…as much as I love the finishes on them.
Yes, I do. It’s fun.
I mostly use MAC as it’s a brand that I don’t have to pay tax for as opposed to all the US brands not available in EU stores.
Right now my MAC palettes are a bit boring, but easy to use, there’s one for neutrals, one for colourful, one for grey and green and one with a few browns. The greens should be in the colourful one, but that one is full 🙂
I also have one small UD, and two mixed ones, Sydney Green, MUG, and some others.
What I find tricky is the different magnetics, it was a long time since I last re-arranged my singles, but the MACs didtn stick to MUFEs palette or if it was the other way around. Anyone else had that problem?
Yes, MAC uses the reverse of everyone else with their magnets so they only stick in MAC brand palettes. I bought magnetic tape that I stuck to the bottom of my MAC singles to get them to stick to my MUFE palette. Obviously it makes them stand up a little higher in the palette than my shadows from everyone else but it’s a minor issue. Before I did this I had them separate in a drawer and they didn’t get used all that often as a result, so practicality definitely outweighs aesthetics here.
I did the same after depotting my MAC singles. I find that I rarely use singles. Palettes are so practical.
Thank you for explaining about the reverse magnetic MAC uses.
I’ve only made one little 4-pan Urban Decay palette, and I had such a hard time deciding which shades to use. I’ve thought about using the Color Stories feature to design a virtual palette, but that hasn’t worked out. Instead, like to use that feature to save makeup looks I’ve created. I guess I prefer to leave palette-making to the professionals!
Someday I’d love to depot all of my MAC singles into one big palette, though that would be for convenience, not artistry. I’d love any suggestions on where to get an empty palette for my MAC shades…maybe that would motivate me to actually do it.
Hi Seraphine, I depoted all my single mac eyeshadow a long time ago. Back then, I used a MAC pro palette (4-pans then 15-pans). Now I put every eyeshadow I own in an Adept palette (that I review on my blog). I love it way more than my old Z-Palette. Mac eyeshadow pans won’t magnetise so I had to use the metal pieces that originally came in my Z-palette
Thanks, Karine. I looked up the Adept palette, but it’s much too big for my use. I only have about 16 MAC singles (I mostly buy pre-made palettes) and don’t plan on buying more. 16 might not sound like a lot, but they take up a lot of much needed space. So now I’m thinking I’d be better off with two of the 9-pan palettes. Do you think those work well enough?
ShopMissA has a palette that will hold 28 singles for $6. If you keep an eye out, occasionally they also have $1 shipping, so you can get a palette that will hold them all for $7.
Thank you, Kirsten. I’m going to look into that one.
I do! I have four custom-built palettes at present: two eyeshadow palettes, one shimmer topper/highlighter palette, and a blush palette.
My shadows average $6 apiece and there are none that don’t flatter me, so I feel like it’s a good investment over buying ready-made palettes.
In theory, yes, it sounds like fun. But in application, I fail because I choose different variations of the same color over and over and over. I’ve created more monochromatic palettes than ColourPop! When I branch out, I get overwhelmed and then give up. Pre-made palettes are the best bet for me.
I do! I find it’s harder to find a good empty palette I like, though!
Have you looked at the Book of Shadows palettes on Etsy?
Yes. Started with ‘extension’ palettes that echoed the colors in an existing palette, Zoeva En Taupe. (And yes, that Chanel blush would be pretty perfect with those.). Did another couple of extensions or monochromes. The latest iteration is Adept palettes (Amazon, amongst others) that is by brand. So far, it’s SG, CP, and Viseart. The big project will be another Adept for depotted UD. How do you spell chore? Adepts are double sided, with strong magnets on the outsides, and a lucite divider that flips to cover the side you are not using. Travel palettes or MUA schlep it palettes, they are not; far too heavy and substantial. But they hold a metric ton and are so sturdy that they could become heirlooms. One model does have a mirror, I think. To tell the truth, if I open all three, I impress myself, lol. And the # of choices you have in front of you is astounding.
I much prefer to chose my own shades. I only pic what I want and I do not end up with unwanted shades. I have a small collection so everything fits in one huge palette.
In theory — most of my shadows don’t lend themselves to use in palettes (my stash is overwhelmingly loose powder shadows, and most of my palettes would be very difficult to depot without wrecking the shadows). I do mentally create my own palettes from my stash, but I can rarely do it literally, except with the few pressed shadows I’ve purchased in pans or managed to free from their original palettes.
I do. After years of playing with makeup, I’ve gotten a good sense of what kinds of shades/finishes I like, so I know which singles to pick out from the seemingly hundreds of choices. Pre-made palettes were much more useful when I was an eyeshadow beginner though
I do, but I find that I use them less, don’t no why.
I do, but my issue with them is that you usually can’t swatch them before buying, so I’ve ended up with colors that I won’t wear. (I currently need to destash 4 ABH and 4 Sydney Grace that I don’t care for, and go through my MUG, Mac and Inglot singles for dupes and things I won’t wear.) But I definitely have a collector’s mentality and this satisfies a bit of the urge. I just have to be careful not to get carried away.
I have never tried it because up until recently I was only interested in palettes, but now I am more confident about the shades I like, I could do it. Also some of the brands that I would buy singles from (like SG) do ship internationally – I think at reasonable rates. Colour Pop is another brand that comes to mind too.