Blush Cosmetics Palettes

Hi all!

Firstly I just want to say a big thank you to everybody who's had a read of my blog and shared their opinions! I've received some really good feedback about my previous blogs and I'm getting lots of coverage in countries I've never even heard of so I'm really pleased! I know the title of this blog is really long and will cover a few different products but they're all really cheap & handy products from the same website so I'm going to try and cover them all in one go without over powering your mind!

I've been looking into doing some more makeup courses and being a typical female, my makeup collection was obviously no where near big enough and needed a huge extension if I was going to even consider going professional. So, naturally I went straight to MAC, Smashbox and Inglot's websites to see how much it would cost me to get everything I need to start practicing. After having a minor heart attack at the price of starting out with a full professional makeup kit (around £600/£700!) and eventually talking myself out of applying for a credit card to get myself up and running I started trawling the internet for better offers.

Now, don't get me wrong, these products aren't on a par with MAC or any other top brands of cosmetics but if you're looking to practice doing makeup on others or even if you just love doing your own makeup at home these are a serious must have!

All palettes featured in this blog are £9.99 inc VAT from Blush Cosmetics - P&P applies but they're delivery is so fast and normally comes within 1 or 2 days! They're really well packaged as well and I've never had a damaged product.

Blusher Palette

This is my favourite out of all the palettes because I'm a big fan of PINK cheeks! This is great for

blending different colours and changing your look from day to evening by using a slightly darker blusher for a smoky effect. I use MAC 129 Powder⁄Blush Brush (£26.00 from Selfridges) to apply the Blushers because no matter how cheap the product is, you can always get it to look just as expensive if you use a good brush to apply it! I always apply to the apples of my cheeks and then brush up towards my ears to get an even look on both sides.

This palette is £9.99 inc VAT from Blush Cosmetics which is an absolute bargain! I use them every day and they've barely worn down at all. For saying how cheap they are, they're really highly pigmented and you barely need any on the blush to get quite an obvious colour. I wear the bright pinks on a daily basis and add a touch of the brown colour (bottom right) if I'm going out in the evening. Each circle of blusher works out less than £1 each so I'm sure you'll agree, this is a great buy if you love experimenting with different colours!

Eyeshadow Palettes

There's quite a few different eyeshadow palettes to choose from, all at £9.99 each. I found it too hard to pick between each one so I ended up buying two!

This is the one I bought first - the 88 colour palette and I'm really happy with it! Some of the colours are matte, some are sparkly and some have a creamy texture to them so it's great for creating different looks for day or evening wear. I tend to stick to the left / right hand side of the palette and don't really use the eccentric colours in the middle but again, they're all very highly pigmented and last a really long time. I found I have to apply a base coat on my lids first to get the best wear out of them. I recommend 'Too Faced Shadow Insurance - Primer' or 'Too Faced Shadow Insurance - Candlelight' if you're looking for a sparkly effect - £16.50 each from LookFantastic.com. The palette comes with a mirror attached to the inside of the lid and two double-ended applicators. I found the applicators to be quite stiff and I ended up crushing a few of the circles of eyeshadow by accident! Thankfully they were the bright greens so I can't say I was too upset. But to avoid this, try to invest in a good blending / applicator brush. I use MAC 275 Medium Angled Shading Brush (£19.00 from MAC or Selfridges). The brush is for applying and for blending so that's one less brush you need to pay for!

As I wasn't using any of the brighter colours, I decided my next purchase would be a more neutral palette that I can get plenty of use out of so I went for the 28 colour Neutral Palette, again at £9.99 but the eyeshadows are a lot larger in size to make up for the fact you're not getting as many.

 Here's the Neutral palette that is basically a palette of light - dark brown eyeshadows. Most of these are matte but there are a couple of shimmery ones that look great for a different edge on the smokey eye. The black eyeshadow (bottom right) is very pigmented and quite hard to smudge in if you don't have a good base on your eyelids and a decent brush!

The first two columns of the palette are my favourite and I use these every day for a barely visable colour that just brightens my eyes enough to make me look human in the morning! I apply the white in the corner of my eye using my finger and pull it upwards around the socket and blend it out along my eyebrow for a slight glow and also to make my eyes look wider. The colour above the white is great for an all-over eyelid colour if you just want something really natural looking. It gives a really nice sheen to your lids and blends great with the light brown (two eyeshadows across) in the crease of the eyelid for a delicate shadow. To change this to an evening look, lightly apply a darker brown to the outer edge of the eyelid and blend gently into the middle of the lid and very lightly tap your brush into the black and smudge into the outer edge of the lid crease for a really classy smokey eye look that works with any outfit. (Video blog coming soon!)

Why not give this method a try with some of your favourite eyeshadows and let me know what you think? I'd love to know your opinion!

Lipgloss Palette

Now, I'm not a massive fan of lipgloss because it tends to dry my lips out and I can't stand the sticky texture that you get with most glosses - even the expensive ones! I decided to get this palette for practicing on models in preparation for makeup courses but ended up using it quite a lot over the top of my MAC lipsticks if I'm going out.

The lipglosses are quite pale in colour when you put them on despite how bright they look in the palette which to me is a really good thing because it means they won't overpower your favourite lipstick underneath. Much to my surprise they're not as sticky as lipgloss that comes in a tube and have a texture that I can only describe as being like vaseline. It gives a gentle shine and a neutral look when used alone without feeling like your lips are glued together! The white/silver colour in the top left looks great when dabbed gently over a pale pink lipstick because it makes your lips really shimmery and girly! This palette is also £9.99 and a great buy if you're a lover of lipgloss or just looking to experiment like me!

Contouring / Blush Palette

I have to admit, I've only used this palette once and that was when I was doing my halloween makeup the other day! The white powder applies really smoothly over the top of any foundation or just on bare skin for a spooky look if you're doing scary fancy dress makeup! It's actual purpose, along with the light pink, is to highlight the face around the eyes and t-zone (the centre of your forehead, the bridge of your nose and the indent of your chin) I will elaborate on this at some point when I do a review on my cream highlighter which is much better!

The light and dark brown in the middle of the palette are for use around your temples, underneath your cheekbones and around the jawline and even your nose if you have larger features. I'm not going to elaborate on this just yet because I plan on doing a video blog to show you all exactly how to use them because they can be a useless addition to your makeup bag if you're not sure how to do it properly. A lot of the video blogs I've seen on how to contour and highlight properly are quite vague and don't go into enough detail for different face shapes so I'll try and make it as simple as possible so you're not all confused like I was!

Concealer Palette

Obviously being a snowflake I am extremely limited to what colours I can actually use on myself but I did purchase this for practice on all different skin colours and it's great for that because you can blend them to get the perfect match. The three really light colours in the first column are the corrective concealers for redness and blemished that you apply before putting on your concealor for the ultimate coverage. The palest one is the second circle down in the second column and is still slightly too dark for my skin so I mix it with a little bit of the green corrective concealer and apply underneath my foundation to hide any nasty red marks!

The concealers are all really thick and require a little bit of time before you can apply anything over the top of them otherwise you just wipe them off. If I'm in a rush I just dab a little bit of powder over the top of it to set it before I put on my foundation. If I'm applying concealer over a spot I always use my finger (after I've washed my hands of course!) and I use MAC 195 concealer brush (£17.00 from MAC or Selfridges) for covering the annoying red marks I have on my cheeks! 

So there you have it guys! A few lovely little palettes to add to your collection if you're looking to do it on the cheap! Possibly the most long-winded blog I will ever do but I felt I needed to get them all into one blog so I'm not bombarding posts onto the page - apologies in advance for any sneaky typos that I've missed in proof reading. Video blogs will follow shortly which I will definitely need your opinion on - this is a new thing for me so hopefully you will like them. Again, let me know what you think of the blog and if you've got any of the palettes please do share your opinions with me!

I'm going to start taking requests very soon so if there's any products out there you're looking at buying but aren't quite sure, throw it my way and I'll look into reviewing the most popular requests!

Next blog: No7 Smoky Eyeliner