I've been dying to try the Holiday 2014 ELF Cheeky Glow Contour Palette but was unable to find them in stock anywhere but at a local beauty supply retailer and they just happened to have BOGO on all holiday items, BONUS (so of course I just picked up 2 of these just in case I needed a backup, haha). It was such an amazing deal, for $5 you get this large-ish contour palette consisting of a highligher, blush and bronzer - and if that wasn't enough they even throw in an angled blush brush!
So of course, now I have it here for you for review.... for science!
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| ELF Cheeky Glow Contour Palette and Brush for Holiday 2014 |
The quantity of each product seems to be comparable to the full-sized blush singles from ELF, so it's quite a decent size. The packaging is sleek and simple and quite frankly, I love the clear window that lets me see the products inside (I have enough dark or opaque compacts to open as it is so it's nice to see the color of the powders clearly).
The bristles of the brush hair are a little too rough for my taste and they seem somewhat scratchy on the delicate skin of the face. I don't know about you guys but my skin is like paper so I can get red and irritated very quickly! I really would have bought this product without the brush, but I guess if you don't have that many brushes, this is a nice add-on bonus.
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| Close-up of ELF Cheeky Glow Contour Palette for Holiday 2014 |
Here's a close-up of the products, you can see that the bronzer is a matte, fairly light-toned shade (I don't think this would work well for darker skinned ladies, and I'm even skeptical about it working on medium gals). The blush is a shimmery peach - I know the finish is not everyone's cup of tea but I like it when my face looks like a happy disco ball! The highlighter is a pinkish hued satin finish with finely milled shimmer particles.
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| Swatches of ELF Cheeky Glow Contour Palette for Holiday 2014 |
My photo above of the swatches came out very true to color and I think it's safe to assume that if you were to swatch these on your fingers, you would see the same results. Unfortunately, ELF did not come out with variations of this Contour Palette, which would have been very nice - so I really don't think this particular iteration is suitable for much more than fair to olive skin tones.
I also want to point out that if you do not like your bronzer to lean orange even slightly, this set won't be for you. I happen to be very fair skinned (MAC NC15) and this trio just happened to work well but even for me the bronzer was a tad orange, especially paired with the tangerine-peach blush.
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| ELF Cheeky Glow Contour Palette for Holiday 2014 Applied to Face |
The highlighter was noticeable but not too bright or overbearing so this is something I could see myself wearing on a regular basis but I might pair it up with another bronzer. As I mentioned before, I like the blush, it is almost a dupe for NARS Orgasm.
Don't mind my watery eyes in the photo, I was experiencing some allergies but still wanted to take a snapshot to show you what the product looked like on.
I hope ELF continues to make these more than just on a Limited Edition basis because the quality was definitely there but the shade selection could be expanded. I would love to see a taupe-leaning bronzer and a pink/red-based blush for a more natural flush.
Have you tried out this palette? What do you think?
