Review & Swatches: Smashbox On The Rocks Photo Op Eye Shadow Luxe Palette

Outer Packaging of Smashbox On The Rocks Photo Op Eye Shadow Luxe Palette 

The ULTA-exclusive Smashbox On The Rocks Photo Op Eye Shadow Luxe Palette retails for $42 and contains a limited edition eye shadow collection of 28 party-perfect shades! There are a variety of finishes from mattes to glitters in lush neutrals to dazzling jewel-inspired tones. 

Exterior of Smashbox On The Rocks Photo Op Eye Shadow Luxe Palette

The exterior of the palette has beautiful diamonds which reflect light wonderfully and would make for a delightfully glamorous gift. The palette itself feels a little pillow-esque when you push down on the top and it seems ideal for traveling, even though it is slightly larger than a typical travel palette. 

My only qualm with the Smashbox On The Rocks Luxe Palette is that there is an overlay that has the color names which I'm never a fan of, I would rather that they were printed next to the shade names (though I can see how that can be difficult with the diamond arrangement). The layout of the shadows saves a decent amount of space and you have 28 full sized eye shadows in a medium-sized palette. I love the diamond in the center, I don't know why but it makes me giddy with delight when I open the palette!

Names of Eye Shadows in Smashbox On The Rocks Photo Op Eye Shadow Luxe Palette

The palette seems to be set up from left to right as follows: leftmost there are nudes transitioning to earthtones and greens, in the center region above the diamond there are purples and below there are blue tones, on the rightmost side of the palette there's a mixture of smokey eye bold shades (grays, deep burgundy, dark brown). I appreciate that this isn't a random assortment of shadows because I find that some palettes can be too overwhelming to look at when there is no rhyme or reason to their placement.

Swatches of Nudes/Earthtones (Left side of Smashbox On The Rocks Luxe Palette)

From the left side of the palette, you can see that the shades are neutrals and earth-tones. Most of these shades are buttery, creamy and swatch absolutely perfectly but I found Midas to be weakly pigmented on the secondary swatch and it doesn't transfer well out of the pan. I was very pleasantly surprised with Zoom (mint green with gold shimmer) and Roast (dark brown with sparse gold sparkles). Ambient is a good dupe for Amber Lights from MAC, I own both and there isn't a major difference between them when worn on the lid.

Swatches of Shades around Diamond (Center of Smashbox On The Rocks Luxe Palette)

The shades in the middle of the palette perform fairly similarly, with Purple Mist not being very pigmented at all and easily brushing off the skin while pastel is rather dusty and too similar to my skin tone for me to wear as a unique shadow. Sapphires needs to be built up for maximum intensity which can be great for beginners or those who are afraid to go overboard with a dark shadow. Navy is slightly darker and a little less blue-toned. The standouts are really Lavender, Juniper, Peacock and Lilac, all of which are very smooth, easily blended and quickly reach full opacity.

Swatches of Smokey Shades (Right side of Smashbox On The Rocks Luxe Palette)

On the right side of the palette you can see from the swatches that the shades become darker and more smokey, even featuring some great highlight shades (Snow, Babycakes and Moonlight). The most bold colors are Frambroise, Asteroid, Royal, Smoke and Cabernet, all of which perform as expected. I was a little bit disappointed by Mink and Babycakes because the colors were just too soft and the shadow's pigment lacked a "stickiness" which keeps it adhered to your lid so it's harder to build up. Mostly, the shadows perform beautifully and are better than expected!

Smashbox Photo Op Luxe Palette "Get The Looks" Booklet

Included in this palette is a booklet with 6 looks that you can create from the shades, they are listed underneath and you can use them as a guide for your holiday parties this year! 

If you find that this palette is too big for you there is a smaller, original version of the palette called the Smashbox Photo Op palette. However, I would strongly suggest for you to pick this up, if not for yourself, then at least to gift to the makeup lover in your life!

The quality of the eye shadows is consistent and there is such a wide variety of unique shades that aren't usually found in palettes that pushes this palette to a must-buy!

Happy shopping and Happy Thanksgiving everybody!!!

7 New Holiday Makeup Gift Sets (Tarte, Too Faced, bareMinerals, Smashbox, Clinique)

I wanted to do an update post about makeup items that have already been released for the Holiday Season. I won't be re-mentioning the ones that I have already posted about, so if you're interested in the Too Faced Everything Nice and La Belle Carousel sets as well as the Anastasia Tamanna palette, you can check them out in my previous posts.

The bareMinerals READY Convertible Eyeshadow Palette ($39) is an ingenious little gift. You can purchase this set and pop out the inner top third piece of the compact to take "to go" and the 12 eyeshadows are convertible so you can pop them in and out - thus you can create your ideal eyeshadow trio! This is a really cool idea, I like the color selection, and if the quality is anything like the regular READY eyeshadows, this would make a great gift set for the holidays.

The Smashbox On The Rocks Photo Op Eye Shadow Palette ($39) is another 12 eyeshadow palette, full of glorious shimmery gem-tones, a few highlight shades and some smokier shades. This is a great gift for a shimmer lover or someone who prefers bolder makeup. The pigmentation is smooth, the glitter isn't very chunky and I think this set is very reasonably priced, it is however much smaller in person.

For classic lovers of Clinique, try A Black Honey Affair palette ($36). This palette features 8 mauves, nudes and browns to create everyday looks. These shades were all inspired by the cult classic Black Honey lipstick shade.

Tarte's Brush With Destiny set features 5 bamboo brushes and a beautiful travel case ($44). Each set features the following brushes:

• contourtuinist bambo cream blush & contour brush
• the balancing act bamboo foundation brush
• the buffer airbrush finish bamboo foundation brush
• double-ended bamboo eyeshadow brush
• undercover lover bamboo concealer brush

Too Faced Beauty Wishes & Sweet Kisses set ($34) is an adorable bronze themed gift for the beauty in your life. It features 3 cocoa-infused eyeshadows from the Chocolate Bar Eye shadow palette, a matte Chocolate Soleil bronzer and the Sun Bunny bronzer as well as a deluxe version of La Creme Gloss in Naked Dolly (to be released Spring 2015).

If you're gifting someone who is a huge lover of Tarte Amazonian Clay Blushes, you'll be happy to know there's a deluxe, limited edition set Chic to Cheek ($35) which includes the following colors:

• amour (candy pink)
• classic (soft apricot pink)
• prim (plum nude)
• daydream (rosy pink)

bareMinerals has yet another great value, the Magic Act ($39) set featuring 6 of their Ready eyeshadows, 3 blushes and a luminizer.

• Eye Shadows: Celebrate (yellow cream), Fortune (light pink), Shazam (pink), A-ha (brown champagne), Pumped (bronze brown), Foreshadow (brown truffle)
• Blushes: The Close Call (bronze taupe), The Natural High (gold peach), and The Indecent Proposal (plum)
• Luminizer: The Premiere

Stay tuned for my next post all about the Urban Decay Holiday 2014 new releases!

Product Review: Smashbox Full Exposure Travel Palette

The Smashbox Full Exposure Palette is one I've constantly looked at in Sephora but have never purchased because the packaging wasn't gimmicky enough to draw me in or there was always something else I was coveting more. However, when I learned that Macy's had a travel sized version of the palette featuring 8 shades from the original 14 of the palette, I was thrilled! This was exactly what I wanted - to dabble in the palette and avoid colors I may not be incredibly fond of (such as some of the repeating nudes and grays).

The travel-sized Smashbox Full Exposure palette is so small it fits in the palm of my hand (and I have small hands) and it retails for $22 (Macy's often has discounts, however so I got mine for $15). The full sized palette features 14 colors and retails for $49. The travel palette features 8 shades at .02625oz each versus the 0.035 oz sized shadows of the original palette. The travel palette is sleek, can fit in any purse and seems quite resilient as it is made out of plastic - it even contains a miniature mirror for any on-the-go touch-ups.

Top Row: Chocolate brown with golden pearl, soft gold with gold and silver pearl, light tan with gold and silver pearl, midtone slate with silver pearl

Bottom Row: Matte warm chocolate brown, soft matte midtone tan, creamy matte beige, ashy dark brown

Here are my swatches of the palette. I'm incredibly happy with this travel-sized palette as I don't think I would have splurged on the full size and this really satisfies my craving for this line. I really think this palette is fairly similar to the Lorac Pro Palette but it is a travel friendly version. The shadows are buttery, perform well and are easy to blend... I find that this would be particularly useful for someone who wants an easy look or is new to eyeshadow combinations.

Product Review: Sephora Superstars Limited Edition Gift Set

Hi everybody,


I wanted to bring you all a review about my new favorite purchase and product available on the market right now. It retails for $75 but the value of the products in this set is exactly $296.11 (you can see the calculations below) if purchased separately.

This is a 13 product set, of which 9 products are full sized and the others are very generous deluxe samples. These products are the best sellers of 2013 at Sephora, so you know they've got to be great.

So I took pictures of what all the products look like out of the box and I'll go through the efficacy of each one of them.





The packaging is absolutely delightful, when you pull off the laser-cut top-sheet, the inside box is a beautiful rose gold. As you can tell the produts range from lipstick to nailpolish to hair and perfume, this is a kit that basically gives you everything you need for a daily makeup routine (and even has 2 skincare products included).

The nail polish included in this set is Deborah Lippmann Nail Lacquer-Cleopatra In New York which is an absolute onyx black with gold hexagonal sparkles in various sizes that remind me of New Year's Eve. It is absolutely fantastic and the nail polish looks in real life exactly the way it looks in the advertisement below. This product if bought on its own retails for $19!!

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NARS actually has 2 of their products that made it into the favorites this year, and I was extremely excited because I've only ever owned 1 blush from NARS since they are so expensive I can never really justify purchasing their products! Both of these products are full sized. One is a Blush and Bronzer Duo in "Orgasm" and "Laguna" (their most popular shades) and the other is NARS Sheer Lipstick, Dolce Vita in the most wearable and universal shade "Dolce Vita" which looks great on all skin tones and anytime of day. The Blush duo retails for $41 and the lipstick goes for $26.

This set includes a rollerball of Viktor & Rolf's extremely popular floral scent Flowerbomb . I've always wanted to try this perfume and it was always too expensive, with even the rollerball selling for $29. I'm happy to report that I would purchase the full size, it's smells of oriental flowers (my absolute favorite), roses, freesia's and orchids! This is definitely a luxurious and delightful present to receive in this box.

Another product I was EXTREMELY excited to try out is the Too Faced lash system "Better Than False Lashes". This is actually two products, one is the "Nylon Lash Extension System" which applies nylon fibers to your eyelashes to add volume and length, and the other is the mascara itself which is used to wet your lashes before applying the nylon fiber and then for one final coat to color them black at the end. I'm happy to report that this is, in fact, a miraculous mascara. It makes my lashes look at least 3x fuller and longer than they really are. My lashes actually touch the backs of my eyelids when I wear this! Too Faced Better Than False Lashes Mascara retails for $35 if purchased outside of this set.





The Bumble and Bumble Surf Spray is probably the item I was least excited about so I'm not too upset that this is a travel size rather than a full sized product. 1.7 Fl. Oz are included of this product and this retails for $17.91. This is a good beach spray, if you want to style your hair in beachy waves. It's actually even useful to add volume and distress up your hair a little bit if you want to create a messy bun.

I definitely recommend trying this out in the Superstars collection, I personally would never pay full price for this item because I don't think it's necessarily better than other $8-$12 surf sprays. I was happy that I did get to try it out in the set and I probably never would have if it wasn't included. I also can't think of a different hair product I would be happier to see inside this set, either, so it's still a win-win.

I'm a huge fan of Urban Decay, I own most of their palettes and I can never get enough of their buttery, blendable eyeshadows. Eyeshadows are the one must-have product from Urban Decay, the rest is good too but their eyeshadows are exceptional. The colors "Sin" and "Mushroom" are included in this set, they are a two-in-one eyeshadow. This is limited edition and, as far as I know, only available in this limited edition set. Full sized UD eyeshadows retail for $18 (but these are just in one color). I think it's really great that they give you two universal colors that are for ideal for a perfect neutral look.

Another product I hadn't had the pleasure of trying is Smashbox's Camera Ready BB Cream and it was also included in the set! Now, the only caveat here is that this only comes in the shade "Light" in the set so it will not work for all skin types. However, it is super-blendable, I'm usually a beige or nude tone and it seems a little closer to those shades that a true porcelain or "light". This is the full sized product and retails for a whopping $39. I think it's safe to say that I never would have tried this product out if it wasn't in this set, it costs a pretty penny. However, I really do appreciate it, it's very full coverage and blendable, it really moisturizes your skin as well.

The next two products are both staples in my beauty routine. One is Anastasia Brow Gel, Clear (0.085 oz)  (travel size, $5 value) and the other is stila Stay All Day Waterproof Liquid Eye Liner ($20 value). If you've read this blog before, chances are that you know my absolute favorite daily eyeliner is the felt-tip pen one by Stila, this is a great way to test it out for a fraction of its cost. The brow gel is extremely useful for taming eyebrow hairs. 

Josie Maran Argan 100% Pure Argan Oil 0.5 oz has always been a beauty blogger favorite and is used for hydrating skin, cuticles, and dry hair. The retail value of the travel sized product is $15.20 and will last for months of usage, seeing as the applicator is an eye dropper so you can use this product in a very targeted way.

To finish off the set, last and maybe the best is the Origins GinZing Refreshing Eye Cream 0.5 oz to brighten and depuff (retail value $31). This is a small container that packs a big punch, it's packed to the brim, smooth and supple like whipped souffle batter, and smells of orchids and crushed pearls. I love this stuff, I've been using it nightly and I wake up with soft and rested eyes.