Written Reviews

I got this to be a dupe for Marc Jacobs O(vert) gel liner, after comparing them side by side in-store and finding very little difference in colour. Despite the adjective "matte", this pencil has about the same level of sheen (not glitter but not flat, dry looking "matte-ness") as the MJ pencil has and the shades are virtually identical. The Sephora pencil doesn't glide on quite as nicely as the MJ one does, nor is it as long wearing but it is really not bad and for 1/3 the price, I can't complain. I love that this is a twist up pencil and that there's a smudger on the other end.

I'm surprised I haven't written a review for Secret Keeper yet. It's one of Sephora's newer releases (2015/16) and it's so lovely. The site describes it as "light grey" but this shadow is so much more than that...it's a shimmery, satiny taupe grey with undertones of purple (very subtle). It puts me in mind a great deal of TheBalm's Insane Jane which is one of the best eyeshadows ever but not available any longer and it was never available as a single shadow, which is a shame. The quality of Secret Keeper is first rate. It works well with other neutrals - browns or greys - as well as with purple shades like Inglot 434 or 420 or MAC's Grand Galaxy but it's also really useful as a "one and done" shade since the sheen and the versatile undertones mean that it looks different depending on how the light hits various planes of your eyes. And because Sephora has designed their eyeshadows to be easy to depot, this shadow (like the other singles) is very "travel friendly".

I've been wanting to try this concealer for ages but every time I've stopped in at my local Sephora, they've been sold out of the lighter shades I wanted to try. I finally got this in Light Neutral about 2 weeks ago and I love it. This is so much better than Nars Radiant Creamy Concealer which, on me, looks anything BUT radiant or creamy....try dull, dry and cakey! But this beauty from UD is just about perfect....covers well, looks natural, doesn't look dry, doesn't settle into under-eye lines and wears really well. I have a lot of really good concealers but this one has quickly moved into the Top 5 and, possibly, the Top 3!!!

I bought this shortly after getting the LE Glowing Gardens Pink from Dior. I was freaking out about using up the Dior product (even though I've never even hit pan on a highlighter) and got Pearl because, while it looks very different in the pan, applied it looks very similar. This is a lovely and natural looking highlighter on my fair skin and very adaptable. I can take it from subtle to more dramatic for an evening look. It's a really lovely product and of all the Becca powder highlighters, this is the shade that suits me best as Champagne Pop, which was touted as being a cooler toned option, is still too warm for me in its power formulation.

I got a very tiny compact of this (the size of a Nars single eyeshadow) as my VIB Rouge welcome gift for 2016. This is a beautiful shade - sort of a warm raspberry red that I think would be flattering on just about everyone. I am seriously contemplating buying a full size of this, though I doubt I actually need it and I never seem to finish up any makeup products save for skin care and foundations. But this is worth having and not like any other blush I own.

I have 2 of the Buxom build-your-own palettes, so 12 shadows in total and I think of all of them, Style Icon is my favourite. I love the shimmery finish and the very wearable golden taupe/light brown colour. Very easy to wear and great value. I'm just sad that this whole line is being phased out in Canadian Sephora store.

Can I just say how much I LOVE this eyeshadow (especially paired with its palette-sister, Deeper)? I have this in the 15th Anniversary palette but I'm glad UD had the wisdom to make this stunner a permanent shade. It is a lovely golden bronze shade that is warm but doesn't lean at all red. I can't wear red-toned shadows and yet I really love warmer shades like this one, which is so flattering. It is creamy smooth and pigmented and just a dream to use which is another reason I'm glad it is permanent - I can use it freely without worrying about using it up and not being able to replace it. I just wish UD would get with the program and make shadows available in simple pan form so we could easily put them into our own palettes and not have to pay for packaging we don't even want.

When the Dual Intensity shadows first launched, Himalia was one of the shades I really wanted but these are so pricey as singles in Canada and I've yet even to hit pan on any of the shadows I own, so I held back. Then I was able to get this beauty in the Dual Intensity palette. This is a warm, shimmery beige/light bronze shade and I really like it. It seems a lot of people very much dislike the Dual Intensity shadows (while loving MAC's In Extra Dimension shadows which have basically the same finish, it seems to me) but I really like them. I like the fact that when used dry, these are not too heavily pigmented since I like to have a level of control with really shimmery shadows. But used wet, you can tget a full wattage type finish. Himalia is such a pretty colour for all over my lid, with a subtle matte colour in the crease. In the summer months, I love wearing this for an evening out as the shade and the sheen look so right and so "sultry summer nights".

This shadow looks more yellow toned than pink toned on me (more like MAC Dazzlelight than Phloof!, to clarify). It's a lovely, very high sheen shade that is a bit much for me for a browbone highlight but I love it as an allover lid colour with something like MAC Omega or Cork in my crease and it is great as an inner corner brightener. Works well with so many of the shadows in my collection and since getting it, I've been reaching for it a lot.

I liked the look of this as soon as I saw it here, in Christine's review, but at this steep price, I had to check it out in store before making my decision. It's a really lovely combination of shades for summer. I think my favourite is the 4th shade, which applies on me as a cool toned smoky brown. But all 4 shades are lovely. I wore this the other night to a Sephora private event and 2 SAs commented on how much they liked the shadows I was wearing (I was dismayed to have to tell them it was a brand Sephora doesn't carry). The top left shade, which I found initially disappointing as it didn't seem to show up on me, actually works beautifully and the faded, watery green is just gorgeous. While this is a summer 2016 release, this quad will work beautifully in the autumn. I find the Chanel shadow quads are generally "travel friendly" but I make it a point to keep the plastic protective inserts that come with these as an added level of "protection" if I take them travelling.

Probably my favourite shade in the whole Empreinte du Desert quad. This look so different applied than it looks in the pan. Don't get me wrong - it looks darned nice in the pan but more like a coppery golden brown. Applied, though, it looks much darker, cooler and smokier. It is smooth and gorgeous. To my dismay, even with all the brown eyeshadows I have, I've nothing else that is a "dupe" for this beauty, which means I'll have to use it in a rather miserly fashion since these pans are pretty small. I'm so glad I grabbed this quad as soon as it launched at the Chanel counter. It's a great quad but this particular shadow is the real star for me. I've learned to keep the plastic protective "shields" that come with Chanel quads; it offers some protection when travelling with them, thus making them "travel friendly".

The colour pictured above is actually the shade "Anger", not Furious. If you look at both the packaging and the instruction card for this palette, you will see that "Furious" is the black shadow that shares a pan with "Anger" but the instructions clearly state to use this shimmery white shade as a highlighter and the black shade (Furious) to line. It seems that UD put the first run of these palettes together with the split pan placed incorrectly but they eventually did correct it. My palette has the split pan placed as it should be and as the outer box shows it and, more importantly, to be in line with their own instructions for recreating the Mrs. Mia Wallace "look". So, Anger (labelled here as "Furious") is a wonderful shimmery shade that is great for inner corners but I find it a bit too sparkly to use as a browbone highlight except for evening/parties, etc. Pigmentation and texture are SPECTACULAR.

I soooo didn't really need this but I so very much wanted it. I was torn between getting Aura or Hourglass Strobe Powder in Incandescent (that's the shade I love in the Ambient Light trio but the Strobe Powder is VERY different, which is confusing and a bit annoying; how I wish they'd make a full size of the Incandescent Ambient Light powder). Anyway, when I compared the 2 products in store, it was clear that while Aura packs a pretty hefty glow, it is much smoother more wearable than Incandescent, which has lots of "visible to the naked eye" glitter all through it. I am so happy with Aura. The pink tone to it is my best shade and this is similar to the LE Dior Glowing Gardens highlighter I got several months ago and which I use rather like a miser for fear of using it up and not being able to replace it. What is really lovely about Aura is that in addition to being lovely and flattering and all that, it is versatile enough that I can use it for daytime/work as well as using a more deliberate application for other occasions.

I don't actually own this yet. I was leaving Sephora with my purchases and went over to look at the new shadows and swatch a few that interested me, including Roasted Chestnuts and all I can say is WOW and DOUBLE WOW! This is a beautiful matte brown and talk about PIGMENTED....it is REALLY packed with colour and it is really smooth. Had I not been in such a rush, I'd have gone back to get this. The swatch on the back of my hand stayed there til I got home, which was pretty impressive. I am definitely going to grab this shadow the next time I'm at Sephora.

Sephora discontinued one of my favourite pencil liners - the Contour Pencil in the shade Snakeskin Dress. I figured that since they were revamping their eyeshadow line and Snakeskin Dress was always sold out at the store near me, I had better grab it when I could, since it didn\'t seem to bode well for the future of this wonderful eyeshadow. Sephora\'s eyeshadow line contains some real treasures, and this happens to be one of them - a beautiful golden green shade that sort of screams \"autumn\" but works all year round. It\'s a real stunner for brown or hazel eyes. You get a lot of shadow for a little money AND these are wonderfully easy to depot (and then put back again) if you want to.

I've had this shadow since Sephora rolled out their entire new line of eyeshadows back in March of 2014. This was also when they'd throw in an empty 3-pan palette to hold the shadows if you purchased 2 or more. Be On the A List is a nice mid-toned brownish taupe - a great, practical colour to wear every day. It is reasonably pigmented and easy to use. I find this to be an interesting shade to wear because, for some reason, I don't even seem to need any eyeliner with this - just a coat of black mascara and this shadow and my eyes look perfectly "done", which is great for times when I have to get up REALLY early and still look presentable (6 am trips to the airport, for example, which we're facing tomorrow morning to deliver youngest son for his move to NYC for 4 months) so it's timely that I saw this shadow mentioned on the site today and remembered why I like this so much.

Love, love, love this peachy/champagne beauty. It's along the lines of MAC's All That Glitters or Naked Lunch, 2 shadows which I really love and use often. And as much as I have promised myself at least to TRY to stop buying the same sorts of shades that I already have in almost embarrassing abundance, I am very glad I have this as it is excellent - flattering, brightening, smooth and pigmented.

Sephora carries a limited range of the Anastasia single shadows in store; many of the shades are "online only". Since I prefer to see the shadows for myself, compare to those I already have, etc., buying in-store suits me more than ordering online. I got Legend because it was one of the few shades available in-store that I liked and which seemed a bit different from shadows I have in my collection but, to be honest, I wasn't really wowed by it until I got it home. What a great shadow! I've been so pleased with all my Anastasia purchases to date. Legend is a wonderful shade of gleaming golden beige. It can be sheered out for a subtle brightening effect or packed on for a more intense look. Texture is outstanding.

To be perfectly honest, I only really chose this colour to make up the 4th shadow in a quad. The Sephora near me doesn't carry Chocolate Crumble (at least not yet...it is supposed to be an "in store" shade) and I nearly got Chocolate (Titanium) but decided to go for something more matte since the other 3 shadows I bought were shimmery ones. I was torn between Hot Chocolate and Smoke but Smoke won out. It's actually much cooler looking than the photo here would lead one to believe. The 2 qualities that tipped me in favour of this were the smooth, evenly pigmented texture (with no patchiness, which wasn't the case with Hot Chocolate) and the fact that this is cooler. While I will probably purchase Hot Chocolate one of these days, I am really happy to have Smoke as part of my Anastasia quad.

I'm not quite sure how it is that I've overlooked writing a review for this lovely workhorse of a shadow. Like the best of the Infallibles, it wears well, applies so easily and it's so affordable. It surprises me that these are actually BETTER than the Chanel Illusion d'ombres - they are, for the most part, more pigmented, more buildable AND they don't dry out. All of this while costing of a fraction of the Chanel shadows. Bronzed Taupe is just what the name suggests - an easy to wear, almost universally flattering shade of taupe that works beautifully as a lid colour with a matte neutral brown shade (UD Vengeance, for example) in the crease/outer V and it is lovely worn all on its own for a quick and easy eye look.