Natasha Denona Glam Eyeshadow Palette Swatches
Natasha Denona Glam Eyeshadow Palette ($65.00 for 0.67 oz.) is a new, permanent (as far as I can tell) “cool-toned” palette that has five matte eyeshadows and 10 shimmer eyeshadows. I’d say it is more of a neutral-toned palette with a few shades that were more cooler-toned, but there are shades that I would classify was warm-toned in the palette (particularly the bottom row).
The brand also decided that instead of names, they would label each shade with the “ideal place to apply them.” After the palette was announced, and people with deeper complexions noted that the lightest shade in the palette was labeled transition (and it is the only shade labeled as such), it made it more obvious that the placement is very much referenced for lighter skin tones.
In general, I find that the larger Natasha Denona palettes are actually less overtly framed around lighter skin tones than the majority of mainstream palettes and regularly skips an ultra-light matte beige kind of shade (see palettes like Gold, Bronze, Sunrise, Metropolis). This particular palette is not really any more or less inclusive with respect to the actual shades than plenty of palettes on the marketplace, but it is the framing of the arrangement–which is how it is sold!–as a “how-to” for lighter skin tones. Instead of deeper skin tones writing off a shade or two, which is far more the norm than it needs to be, it’s an overt choice to cater to lighter skin tones with this arrangement, even if that may not have been intentional.
I really urge people who’s natural inclination is to dismiss someone’s concern, especially as this concern was voiced by numerous deeper BIPOC throughout the brand’s posts on social media, to try to listen and understand the context in which these concerns are raised. The industry has historically excluded deeper skin tones, and while progress has been made in getting better shade ranges in foundations and concealers, it’s still a vastly disappointing landscape of color cosmetics that very often include “universal bronzer” or one or two shades of blush.
As a result of a lot of comments from disappointed people, the brand stated that there are “[three] different composition options” so that “you can switch them around and customize your own palette according to your preferences and skin tone,” and they said to “head up to [their] stories and catch them before they are gone!”
It’s nice that the brand showed how to rearrange the palette to work for other skin tones, but there’s nothing included in the actual product packaging that suggests that there are other arrangements… and why do I have to take out 15 eyeshadows to rearrange them? Why do I have to rush to an Instagram story (that’s now MIA!) in order to screen shot how to do it? Why isn’t this promotional material included at point of sale? (There’s no pamphlet or how-to included with the palette–at least not in mine!)
Why wasn’t this information included at launch? Did anyone notice that the pans are not labeled? (FYI, each shade has a number assigned to it as well as the placement name.) So once you take it out of the pre-made arrangement, it can be really hard to know which shade is which? How many questions do I have to ask to make it obvious that I’m not buying what the brand is trying to sell after the fact?
The very point of the palette having the names it does is to be “an easy-to-follow constellation of shades” and be a “mistake-proof palette” that turns you “into an instant pro.” There is nothing easy about taking a screen shot of an Instagram story, receiving your palette, popping out several shades (or more!) to rearrange, and then using it.
I will even argue that I was surprised at the composition of the palette as it did not feel very user-friendly in terms of following. I’m not sure why it was divided into categories like brightening, pop, darkening, and blending… what really distinguishes the “crease” shade from the “smoke” shade other than suitability by skin tone? Why not label the lighter mattes as “blend” shades and the more mid-tone and darker mattes as “crease”? Why are there four different center eye lid shades? How do I know which one to use with what? The first column has two center eye lid shades, while the bottom row has two center eye lid shades and two outer eye lid shades… and nothing for the crease? It just seems like each row should be a clear/complete look!
Truly user-friendly would make it very, very obvious that “these shades go together and here’s how you’d place them,” but this gives the user a lot of room for error — and that’s fine because ignoring the placement names, I see different combinations and can put together several looks, so it is cohesive as a color story (though I’d say overly shimmery, and this is coming from someone who… enjoys shimmers more than mattes).
I think the brand would have served its diverse buyer base by creating multiple five-pan palettes that created go-to neutral palettes by skin tone, e.g. Touch of Glam (lighter, cool-toned), Smoky Glam (darker, cool-toned), Glitz & Glam (lighter, warm-toned), Rich Glam (darker, warm-toned), etc.
Christine’s final paragraph is right on point. Why not make a series of quints that could suit more people more easily? Why are we always inundated with a sea of same-same products that routinely cater to light and warm? It’s not the most “Glam” look when the colours clash with your undertone or miss the mark in terms of the light/dark spectrum. Fortunately, there are singles, empty palettes to build your own colour story, and Sydney Grace.
Personally, I don’t like the quints. Expensive for what you receive. And I think she already has a few “neutral”, “cool” and “warm” quints. In my opinion, she simply should have not changed the names to tutorial ones for a large palette and all would have been fine. There will would have been dark-toned women and warmer-toned lighter women saying that the palette isn’t for them, but at least they couldn’t say it was purposefully created for paler skin tones.
“and Sydney Grace” made me laugh out loud. Their earnestness is admirable.
Just speculating here, but I think the whole “here’s three ways to rearrange the pans to suit your skin tone” concept was an afterthought born out of the pushback from consumers.
There’s nothing that really says it was part of the plan – no diagrams at launch, no mention of arrangements, and there’s nothing included in the box itself (at least, not mine) that says as much. It also defeats the point of being user-friendly, IMO! Nothing user-friendly about having to rearrange the palette!
Even if I am not deep skin tone, (i’m light / light medium( I think that the names are quite misplaced, at least based on my own tastes and experience. Indeed the transition in too light also un my opinion. I don’t really like glittery brown bones, so I’d never use the latest shade in this way. The crease shade it’s more a transition for me. Moreover, having deepset eyes, I prefer to put lighter shimmer in the centre of the lid, than in the inner corner. Finally, why one is supposed to use only shimmer shades into the lid. How’s is wrong with a matte smokey all over the lid? Basically, ND had not make a smart choiche here, every user has it own taste and way to use the shades and a makeup newbie don’t buy such an expensive product. A part from this, the palette seems to be of excellent quality and the colour story seems quite cohesive (except for that gold into the bottom left, it seems to my like a punch into the eye togheter with the other colours) I am not really into this colour story, but I’m realizing that thos is one of the rare palette that I currently cannot dupe in my considerable collection. This makes the palette quite interesting, even if, to be honest the reason why I don’t have something similar in my collection is that I don’t really look good with this tones. I look terrible with silver and most of the gray, and, due to my warm undertone, I feat that most of the taupe shimmer will turn silvery-graysh. So I think that I haven’t to fall into the hype
Are there journalism awards for blogs? If so, this piece is a winner. You hit this just right. That said, I can’t deny that I like these swatches. Looking forward to seeing what dupes I have already.
🙂
It’s a pretty palette for sure – I can see it being a go-to for some people!
So was waiting for this!!! Thanks for the swatches!
As I reread your post, as concerns it not being “user friendly”, clearly the labelling as a tutorial is not arranged as is typical for such naming conventions – with everything in eye space order); however the color combination in quads and linear do work (which is the same thing she’s done before), so again, leaving well enough alone would have been better. (And it sort of looks like she arranged them as she did in the past AND THEN someone got the idea of the tutorial afterwards. Sometimes you pay a price for trying to “innovate” or change up and it’s better to think it out a bit longer. I will say that I hope she learned from this; to have diverse ethnicities on her marketing team or if she does, to perhaps have people advise her who don’t work for her directly. It reminds me of when you sell outside of your country and offend someone due to language and lack of understanding symbols used elsewhere.
Fingers crossed that they’ll reconsider the placement (or perhaps giving them names in the future) and using a lookbook to show “how tos” by skin tone!
Well, I do agree that if you want to go the “how-to” route, as someone suggested quints or rows in order of the eye spaces (zones) would be better. That said, if I worked for her, I would have kept the conventional naming ‘being careful” of each term and left her arrangement as is. My “only” complaint for this palette is that two colors seem VERY similar, but then your swatches make it clearer that they aren’t the same (and I understand that artist, MUA’s like the subtle differences for precision), so I’m hoping that I’ll not have lots of dupes. 😉
Agree with your long rant about this palette. She should have just put names like normal.
Aside from that thank you for saying it’s more neutral than cool-toned. I have noticed that so many of her palettes are warm-toned, which makes them harder for me to wear. I should probably go take a peek in-store before buying.
It’s definitely “cool” for Natasha Denona’s palettes, but genuinely cool-toned? That’s a little more of a stretch, LOL!
I agree 100% with everything you say here. It was probably long in the works before June 2020 and so the post hoc P.R. patch up is just too evident. I feel almost like she should have just owned up to the framing and said that it was too late in the process to change, but they’re earnestly working on being less white-centric in their branding going forward. Or the inclusion of a little info sheet would have been a great move! I loved when I was starting out and Make Up For Ever included info sheets with suggested looks with palettes! Super helpful. And I could out it away when I didn’t need it.
LThat being said, these are totally beautiful colors that I’ve longed for all together in a palette, but I’m not sure I like the uniformity in the texture of the shimmers, and overall this palette might be too gray for what I lean towards at the moment. I like the two pinky shades that she included!
Some of those Dior quints you reviewed recently cover these sorts of colors and have a gorgeous elegant presentation, so it’s something to compare this to! If I did buy this palette, I’d rearrange the shadows and cover over the descriptions in sharpie, because I don’t like the additional visual clutter of the text with placement info. That’s just me — I hate extra visual information and it becomes a chore where I naturally reread it all every time I open it up!
Thanks always for your careful review, accurate photography, and thoughtful commentary!
Agreed – something along the lines of sorry, we’ll do better, and in the meanwhile, here’s how to make the names work for different skin tones! Because they could also change the name for the next round of production, you know?
That sharpie idea is genius bc the names are blatantly marginalizing. You’d think they would be smarter about names after the safari palette.
Sharpie idea is good. I used to do this with white out for Urban Decay palettes when I hated their negative appellations. I think I’d just cover the names here and keep the numbers for future reference. So thanks for sharing that idea!
I agree…I have very fair skin but I can see this being so insensitive and exclusive. It seems quite condescending to tell you where to place the shadows. After all, makeup is about playing and trying different shades and different skin tones would place those shades in different spots. It’s so silly not naming the shades in the pan. It makes it hard for even the youtubers to give tutorials: oh, I’d put this center lid shade here and use this other center lid shade in the inner corners? A lot of the shimmery shades look too similar as well, I feel like there are dupes within the same palette and it’s way too expensive for that.
You raise great points, Christine! Only thing is, as a woman with a very light skintone, I would say eyeshadows catered to my colouring are also missing from the mainstream market. I would say this palette is suitable for a “medium” skintone.. most of these shades are too dark for me (at least for day wear.) I contour my crease with colours that most people would place in the inner corner of the eye or under the brow bone. High end brands like Urban Decay, Pat McGrath, even Natasha Denona… don’t really offer such shades. One of the few brands that does is Zoeva, whose eyeshadows are frequently rejected as “too light.” Another prejudice. I think the cosmetic industry was used to producing makeup for a particular skintone, which is lighter than most but darker than mine. They should change.
I’m the same as you! 99% of mainstream palettes are too dark and warm for me. I thought this palette was going to be the one but unfortunately most shades are too dark or too warm once again…….. Everything is catered to the light/med skin tone with so many gaps in the market for deep skinned and pale skinned makeup lovers!!!!
Completely agree and I’m in the same boat as you. It annoys me when people say most palettes are for pale skin, because no they aren’t, or at least it will show up on your pale skin, yeah it’ll show up and it’ll be muddy and smokey. Palettes are typically for light to tan, leaning more towards the medium beige type skin tone I think. It makes sense as medium foundation shades are the most popular sellers, followed by light shades, to my understanding? Pale and deep aren’t as big of sellers, so as far as sales go it does make sense that they aren’t as catered to. It still sucks. I wish a company would make a palettes based on skin tone. Sort of what Sydney Grace is doing, except even more catered.
The thing is that it’s way easier to sheer out an eyeshadow on fair skin than to build it up enough to be usable on deep skin. I have fair skin as well and if I use the right brushes for a sheer application I can use many shades that would be too dark for me otherwise.
If an eyeshadow is deeper on your skin than you’d like you can also still use it. If it was too light to even show up on your skin like many eyeshadows are for POC that wouldn’t be possible.
That most makeup is catering to light skintones as the default is rooted in racism. Some eyeshadow palettes being too deep for a neutral look on very fair skin is not. You can’t really compare the two in my opinion.
Also I would argue that most eyeshadow palettes on the market do cater to fair to light skintones. I haven’t found an eyeshadow palette that I couldn’t make work on my fair skin.
So glad someone of lighter tone said this! I’m not as I’m considered medium so for the most part everything goes. But, I’m just a little tired when I see palettes the could be for ALL ethnicities and tones available and yet we harp on this subject. This case is different and being in this community helped me to see that I’m wrong not to see that if you indicated that certain colors are “crease” or” transition” and that that can’t be the fact for most other tones then you should also indicate for what tone it is. And thus, the palette is evidently originally organized for a lighter tone, which is what lots of people took issue. If they had taken the time to doing that exercise (of thinking about for what tone the “crease” and “transition” apply that she (or her team) would have seen that there would be issues and thus how to avoid them. I personally didn’t see it, but I now understand better, especially after seeing Chris Luvs Lux review of the palette. She was blunt about the issue yet did the review and achieved a great look; however not using the suggested placements.
I really appreciate you saying that the primary issue is the arrangement/naming, not the shades themselves. I saw a lot of people (and of course, everyone has their own opinion!) basically saying what amounted to “I don’t use the shades” or “well no one said dark skinned people can’t wear cool tones” which in my opinion, isn’t really the point here. Whether is was ND and her team’s intention, they decided on a concept and thought it would be helpful, but their execution and labeling relays a very small part of the skin tone spectrum that they were going to be helpful for.
Across the board, I somewhat think the shade “tones and depth” are more or less spread out the same as Bronze, but if we had named Beach “Transition” then I think there would’ve similar disappointments here. I also don’t feel that her IG Story helped that much? As you noted it isn’t in the palette insert which feels like an afterthought but also the original shade names are confusing enough as it is? I think the repetition of shades like center eye lid, lower eye lid, etc means that even when rearranging it’s not very cohesive. I hope her team takes this feedback for future palettes as overall, this setup seemed unnecessarily confusing and restrictive.
All that said, I really do hope this palette reviews well! I’d rather pick it up during a sale as I want to maximize my use of Bronze before the weather changes, but I think that this was a beautiful curation (and hopefully still a good quality formula!) of shades. I’m curious to see how different Outer Eye Lid (1 and 3) are in your final review! They look quite similar from your swatches.
Some pretty shades here, but looking at it, I’m pretty sure I can dupe all the ones I like.
Again, inclusivity being treated as an afterthought. It’s transparent and companies always seem dimly surprised by the responses.
My knee-jerk reaction to this color story was more favorable than my second take. It’s funny, both this and the Enduring Love palettes from Sydney Grace often seem billed as “cool” by casual observers but I would hazard only some shades in either actually are cool tones—which is not a dig on Enduring Love by the way, a beautiful palette I still covet probably more than any other. It’s just funny how perception works. That’s how a long cycle of super warm palettes can change impressions going forward.
Sometimes it’s like we’ve forgotten what cool-toned colors look like so anything that isn’t true warm is now “cool,” LOL!
You’re right! I’m a painter so I mix colors all day and this is a particular bone of contention for me lol.
All I know is that after watching Alicia @kinkysweat last night and reading your editorial above just added to my own feelings of WTH did ND go and do here. Why the grand departure from using actual shade names? That “transition” shade I will use just like Alicia did; as her browbone shade in at least one look! As she is my nearest “skin twin” on YT, I can fairly reliably tell that, yes, this can work on us darker medium skintones, even tan tones possibly. But honestly, this does feel like a slap in the face with these shade placements instead of real names. I’d have called that transition shade “Bone”. It’s as white as one!
I really like this palette and it’s the first since the Gold that I’ve wanted. I don’t have a dark skin tone, but being uber fair means I suffer from the same issues as deeper skin tones – in that “universal” brow bone, highlight, bronzer, etc shades don’t cater to me either – almost all foundation ranges start too dark, or if they’re light enough then the wrong undertone until many shades too deep. Most eyeshadow palettes (ND included) aren’t complete as I end up having to use my highlight as a brow bone shade anyway. I’m annoyed at the minor inconvenience on my end from cosmetic companies – I can’t imagine the pure frustration at being wholly dismissed by an industry. I like seeing more and more companies step up and make wider ranges and actual women of color owning brands and creating products that cater specifically to them. It looks like ND’s major misstep here was to name the suggestion of each shade according to white girls instead of leaving it be and just using numbers or whatever the hell. Well, white girls of a medium skintone anyway, those sure as shit aren’t brow bone colors for me.
My actual critique of the palette is just that for $65 I won’t use the pinks in the top row, the peachy pink on the bottom is iffy, and Glam C325M looks a little thin/patchy. At least it’s not her $125 price tag.
Could not have said it better!
When I saw that the shade names had been replaced by a tutorial, I immediately thought that this was ND trying to copy Charlotte Tilbury’s user-friendly palettes. I also got the feeling that people were going to be mad about that light transition shade. I also am very light-skinned and prefer cool tones. This palette looks perfect for my coloring. I have some of her other ones (Lila, 10, Bronze) and I can pull most of it off, but I look better in neutral or cool colors. This is a tempting palette for me, but not sure the shimmers are different enough from what I already have in my ND collection to justify buying this, especially that bottom row. I don’t know if it’s worth it. Your swatches will help me decide.
Funny enough, I think ND is a more inclusive brand on the whole compared to CT, but the way CT has some of her palettes, she’ll do brighten, enhance, smoke – which is user-friendly but also more inclusive.
Well said Christine, absolutely spot on, in your comments regarding the very real issues surrounding the inclusiveness of eyeshadow shades and makeup in general.
I have a feeling that ND is going to heartily regret her ridiculous naming system and of, course, the numerical system goes west the moment you move the shades.
I don’ think it’s as cool toned as promoted, but more neutral leaning. I guess it’s because we have seen so many, many really warm toned palettes in the past few years that anything more neutral looks cool to us. I do like it though and think it would suit me.
I think it’s great that the brand wants to provide a better breakdown of how to use the shades, but I think it could be achieved with a look-book or a QR code on the back, too, so it’d be awesome to see a rework of the naming system in future runs of the palette.
I do like the colors in this palette as i have a light to light medium complexion. I does bother me when make-up is not inclusive. As far as name vs whatever was used on this palette, it is not an issue for me bc I can’t read them wo my glasses anyway.
I don’t think we need to over analyze this. It’s eyeshadow and either you like the colors or you don’t. I ordered this platte and am waiting for it to be delivered and I can tell you that I won’t even be looking at the names, who cares about the names anyway and are people really going to take offense to names?
“Who cares about the names” is thoroughly answered above, and as I’ve mentioned, listening to the voices of deeper BIPOC who have spoken about this is readily available – just see the brand’s social media pages. If you don’t care, that’s your prerogative but there’s no need to shut down the conversation and act like nobody else is entitled TO care. We are allowed to care about different things to different levels (or more than one thing at a time).
Temptalia is a community that has and will always be part of doing better and part of that is respecting people’s opinions, not dismissing them – and worse, criticizing them for caring more than you. The part that is hardest for me to understand is at the end of the day, what is being discussed? What is being advocated for? Greater inclusivity. Why is this something not worth discussing? Why shouldn’t we care? Sometimes pushing for change comes in small ways, and when the community rallies together, we absolutely do generate change. I have an audience, and I’ve been in the industry for awhile, so why not try to improve my corner of the world if I have any ability to even further that conversation? So many people use makeup as an escape, yet they can’t escape daily microaggressions that the industry presents so those who are privileged are enable to enjoy it as “just makeup,” but for others, it is a more complex relationship than that.
Raising a concern or pointing out an issue with a brand’s naming, marketing, etc. doesn’t mean you can’t still like the brand, purchase the product, and so on. Nowhere in this post did I say not to purchase from the brand, not to purchase this palette, or anything even close to that. You can be disappointed in something a brand has chosen to do and still enjoy their products, hoping they’ll learn and do better in the future… which is really all I’ve seen people ask for here.
I think it’s great you want to bring change and you should. I on the other hand will just continue to enjoy my so called privilege and makeup as I do now. I’m not concerned with other people’s skin tones and if a brand has 48 shades of something to suit other people. There are lots of brands that cater to darker skin tones and I’m not able to buy those products and I’m not complaining. In this crazy world that we are living in makeup is my happy place and I will not let anybody turn that woke.
You’ve not commented previously, so if this isn’t a subject you want to discuss or deal with, I’m surprised you joined in! Again, I ask that you respect other members here if you are going to join the discussion – there’s a huge difference in saying that you don’t care vs. criticizing others for expressing their own feelings.
You can find our comment policy here: https://www.temptalia.com/policies/
how graceful you are, because the things i want to type right now… actually, i did type, and deleted. the line between going all in on ignorance and respecting decorum is blurry right now. i presume you have the ability to block and delete trolls?
Imagine what I haven’t published ? Sometimes, if the same type of comment (the substance) comes up, I will allow the least rule-breaking version through and respond to it in hopes of educating others.
Well said – 100% agree. “Going all in on ignorance”.
Thank you Christine for using your platform with so much clarity and compassion.
“I don’t think we need to over analyze this.”I totally agree with you .This palette seems to be goodlooking for a lot of skintones anyway. Just have a look at her photos on her website. There are different skintones wearing this palette and it suit them all (dark or light). Ohterwise, I rather agree with Christine and you all, to say that the names are not really user friendly. Charlotte Tilburry is more succesfull with this king of naming.
Mmmmmm yeah, I’m really disappointed in Natasha Denona’s team for going with this naming scheme, and I’m on the fairer end of the spectrum. You really nailed it very eloquently in this post. In terms of the actual shades offered, Sydney Grace’s Enduring Love palette is about what I need in terms of grays, and I’m a little bit nervous that this palette might swiftly make me look like I have a pair of shiners on my face with my complexion. I had the same issue with UD Naked 2 years and years and years ago, when I was just getting started with makeup.
I’m going to hold off on this one, hope the brand responds to the backlash, and see what else is brought to the table for Fall.
Her palettes have always catered to warmer, and definitely every shade of skin. The mistake was not including the different skin variations with the palette.
The palette needs to be labeled with “crease”, “liner”, etc, for ease as the end user customizes.
I am glad that to have a palette from her that leans cooler toned. I appreciate the help with how to put together a cohesive eye look as she designed it. The problems are the missing color stories for all skin tones and a physical pamphlet with purchase. What does it hurt removing it from online as people purchase it, to rearrange it to fit each person perfectly.
If her intention was individualization, then I find that unique and would love to see more of it.
I agree with what you’re saying about the naming convention for this palette, and I totally get what POCs are saying. They’re absolutely right.
I’m sorely tempted by this palette, though. I think it has enough warmth not to go muddy, and although I’m not a huge fan of matte taupes, I don’t mind them as much as I used to. I love shimmery taupes, and this has a great variety of them.
I think many are still purchasing, but they’re disappointed and hoping the brand will do better in the future – that was the gist of what I’ve seen on my end looking through various comments on ND’s Instagram! I know a few are going to wait for a sale/reviews.
This is definitely a “do better” situation, and it wouldn’t kill the brand to change the name (even if it’s only that one) to something like blend in future palette productions!
I was debating this as my first ND purchase – her palettes are always too warm for my complexion – but between the neutral-warm feel (I swear she doesn’t know what actual cool tones are) and the tone deafness of this response its now an easy pass!
Techno question Christine, perhaps previously answered, so sorry, but how long after you put swatches in for a palette does it take to see dupe results for the palette in particular with our vanity?
I pull and enter dupes as the last part of the review process.
I am so undecided when it comes to this palette, and that was before I read the above text (very well put, thanks!).
I think it would suit me, I like most of the colours in the palette, and I think it was a good idea, on paper to name it as they did, of course naming like this doesn’t really work in reality, something someone should have thought of before releasing the palette.
I used to really like the little diagrams some brands included in their palettes, or quints or quads. I think Dior and Chanel used to do it, UD did in the Theodora palette ages ago, to name a few.
So, I like the colourstory, it would suit me, it would be easy to use, I should love it, but I don’t. I’m not exactly sure why, maybe I think it looks boring, or there’s too little variation within the palette, or it’s simply because it looks so dupeable.
I honestly don’t know.
I am very much looking forward to the reviews, though and hope this will be on sale, and then I might pick it up.
I really like when you point out issues like you did here, thank you Christine!
Someone who commented on my Instagram post about the palette mentioned that having monolids made a lot of the placements not work. I definitely think a look-book would have given the brand the room to really provide more detailed insights to buyers while including more vs. less!
Honestly, this reminds me SO much of the ColourPop Going Coconuts palette. And I’m truly soooo tired of brands blatantly ignoring the voices of BIPOC people and then trying to save face at the last second. Money saved.
I’ve been hoping to try Natasha Denona for awhile and this palette is the kind of colour story I love (at the moment, from my collection, if I could only have one eyeshadow palette it’d probably be UD Naked 2). But this thoughtlessness over diversity is really unacceptable. Thank you for the commentary, I hope people hear it. I’ll be passing on this.
I thought I’d be all over this as soon as it released but now, probably not. For starters, it’s not available in store – it’s online only at Sephora. Add to that the highly inflated price (much higher than the price increase in Canada for those Dior quints) and that just makes me angry. If I’m paying that much for something ($87, for Pete’s sake), I want to be able to see it for myself. I heartily agree with Christine’s suggestion of 4 smaller palettes aimed at specific skin colours and tones.
WOW! $87? I wonder if ND ships directly to Canada and if it’s less… or maybe Beautylish / Cult Beauty. Obviously, those are all still online only but maybe less price uptick.
Tell me about it! The Dior quints, which are the same US price, are $72 here – still a painful price but not as much as ND. AND there’s the issue of not being able to see this for myself. The reviews on Sephora’s site are very positive but still, the 2 issues – price and “online only” are enough to make me pass on this (to say nothing of the fact that I’ve probably got dupes for all of these; the whole palette reminds me of Too Faced’s now discontinued – I think – Boudoir 9 pan palette!)
Does it feel like the difference has gotten worse over time? Obviously since I usually spend in USD, I don’t follow the exchange rates, but it just seems worse these days!
Very much so. Even when the Canadian dollar was at par or above the value of the US dollar (yes, there were such times) we still paid more. The standard excuse was “oh, you Canadians require bilingual packaging….” but even with products I purchased in the US, they had the same French labelling/instructions as those I purchased here. A Canadian consumer program called Marketplace did an expose a few years ago about why things are marked up so high and while I didn’t understand the explanation very clearly, what came out of it was that much of the increased charge is artificial and it’s done “simply because they can”.
Such a bummer! Makeup is expensive enough often times, no reason for ridiculous markup that isn’t supported by exchange rates!
You are so right Christine.
From my initial hurrah! a cooler toned palette!, my heightened joy was fading away after a second glance at the palette.
The naming is weird and indeed only suitable for light skin tones (medium at best). A very stupid call from ND and her marketing team, to say the least. Especially in these times, where information is flowing, inclusivity is not that hard to incorporate.
Beside all that, there are too many shimmers, and too many dark shimmers. It’s not Christmas yet, so I’ll still ask Santa a true cool toned palette with and even layout between shimmers and mattes (all mattes would be ok as well!).
Warm palettes are pretty much the baseline these years, I’m ready for a wave with tones I can wear.
I feel like Inner Corner (Shade 3), Center Eye Lid (Shade 13) and Brow Bone (Shade 15) are all kind of in the same vein… really just need one. You could lighten any of those with Inner Corner (Shade 9). Definitely feel like you could use one or two more mid-tone to medium-dark mattes… something else between Blend and Smoke (perhaps rosier or purpler in tone) and then something between Smoke and Lash Line. Center Eye Lid (Shade 11) is tonally quite warm-toned and could also go in lieu of adding in another matte, I think.