A good eyeshadow palette will have a couple of combos that I see instantly, eyeshadow that’s pretty easy to use with little fallout, good pigmentation, and decent longevity. A great eyeshadow palette is when every eyeshadow is fantastic in quality, and there are lots of ways I can see myself using the palette.
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A palette that I’d consider great would have a mix of satins and mattes in a palette with no more than 9 neutral/taupe shades from light to dark that work well together to create daytime, natural, and evening looks. The formula would be smooth, well-pigmented, and easy-to-blend with minimal fall-out, if any. No glitter or sparkles.
It has to be totally cohesive and contain base, crease, some deep shades that are buttery, easily blendable and the shimmers are smooth and not chunky…Also no weird unusable colors that don’t seem to mesh with the others in the pallette. Very few of my pallettes have everything where I don’t have to carry extra singles or two different pallettes to accomplish my look..but some like ND Glam and I need a nude come pretty close….
A good eyeshadow palette has nice quality shadows and enough variety to get a few looks out of. I may need me to bring in other shadows, such as brow bone and inner corner shades, but most of the palette should be useable for me .
A great palette has wonderful quality, enough variety to get lots of looks, has travel-friendly packaging, and doesn’t require me to bring in singles or another palette to make it work for me. It should have a good mix of tones (not too many really dark shades for me), and finishes.
A great one – one where I can wear EVERY shade, where the quality is great and one that isn’t too big and bulky but that works totally 100% as a “stand alone” that I could take away for vacation without having to add anything else (the ABH “Mario” palette would have been just such a palette if only it had a light coloured, somewhat shimmery or satin-y shade for a highlight/inner corner brightener). I only took the original Naked palette with me to Japan and it was okay but not outstanding (the biggest issue, as always for me, is the poor lighting in hotel bathrooms and my short-sightedness which all combine to make applying my makeup really difficult). We stayed in one place that had a fabulous floor to ceiling mirror with bright lighting all around it (it folded up and was hidden in its own wooden screen, very Japanese style) – I could actually get right up close, nose to the mirror close, to see what I was doing but that was only one place….everywhere else, ugh! And this has been my experience over the years almost everywhere. I need to get myself a good travel-safe magnifying mirror!
A good eyeshadow palette has a great formula and a nice usable color story.
A great eyeshadow palette for me can only be one that it’s customizable; anything’s pre-made can’t be great in my books.
For me, good is one that I think would help round out my collection but not be an every day kind of reach. I would probably buy a good palette with a discount. A great eyeshadow palette is going to be a frequent reach and bring something new to my collection.
TG you’re describing your own!
Christine, I honestly don’t think that any one of us could have worded and described it better than you just did above.
These are exactly my own thoughts, along with just one more: that it is one that is inclusive for all of at least most skin color depths. It’s fine if it goes more towards cool toned or warm toned folks, but it should be something that ALL depths of either groups (or just tastes?) can easily utilize!
My definition of what makes a good and a great palette have changed fairly recently, as I have mentioned before. A good palette would be four or five, at the most 6 shades with a good variety of tones and shades with a color story that is cohesive and good quality. If I had to pull an additional four pan palette to have the right transition color or a pale enough shade for the inner corner highlight, that would be okay as I would still be getting away with a smaller footprint and would not have a lot of shades that I would never use. A great palette for me would be the same but without having to pull in another palette. It would have a really wonderful formula across all the finishes and would be in a colorway that I would use all the shades. Ideally I would like two matte shades and two shimmers with a light and darker shade in each of the finishes. The other important thing for me is I don’t want to deal with fallout all day long. It has to be a formula that stays put for the better part of 7 or 8 hours. I almost always use some form of primer so I could make most things work but a bunch of fallout and glitter all over my face is just a deal breaker for me.
I really like the mini Dior palettes because you get 4-6 shades in the size of a much smaller palette and since I rarely hit pan on any shadow, it is okay with me that they are small. I also like the sort of medium sized Chanel palettes like the 4,6, and 9 shade palettes that they have put out, for the same reason.
Sorry, forgot to mention one thing, if there is a palette that has one of the shades that doubles as a blush or a highlighter then that is even better. I have a few Chanel and Dior palettes where that exact combination occurs and it is great for travel.
Well, we have seen the good, the bad and the ugly eyeshadow palettes reviewed here and all of us, who follow this blog, are avid makeup wearers and we rely on you Christine to help us discern what is a good palette vs a great one in terms of quality.
To me, a good palette is one that has, perhaps, half the shades in the colours I would use and the finishes I like and is probably a B in ratings.
A great palette, by contrast, is one where 85-95% of the shade colours are the ones I would actually use – lots of shimmer and satin shades, very few or no mattes and be of excellent quality – an A or A+ rating.
Examples of excellent eyeshadow palettes, for me, include: ABH’s Sultry, ND’s Glam, PMG’s Decadence, SG x Temptalia’s On the Horizons Light, Naked 1, Pixi Beauty’s Reflex Light, CT The Rebel, Dior’s Bonne Etoile and Maybelline’s Burgundy Bar. Honourable Mentions go to Lorac’s Noir, Fairytale Forest and Soilel.
A great eyeshadow palette for me has between 4-20 shades and has three parts:
– The color story sparks joy;
– You can get at least two different complete eye look from the palette without outside eyeshadows; and
– The eyeshadows work in a range of different conditions – it’s not difficult to “make them work.”
Good eyeshadow palettes tend to have two of those three things.
A good palette has shadows that aren’t the best/need extra work but I still use because I really like the color story and finished looks.
A great palette has a color story I love, an equal number or more of mattes to metallics, pigmented but buildable and blendable mattes in shades that go from light to deep and smooth glitter-free, high shine metallics in light and bright shades.
I don’t particularly mind using fingertips or sponge applicators to apply metallics but if I can get the same opaque foiled effect with a dry brush, a palette goes from great to amazing!