Category Archives: Highlighter

Wet n Wild Fergie To Reflect Shimmer Palette Swatches & Photos

It seems like some of the most coveted items from Wet n Wild’s new Centerstage Fergie collection are the new To Reflect Shimmer palettes (now available to buy online), which are supposedly MAC MSF dupes. I’ve already reviewed one, Rose Champagne Glow – read my full review here. Today, I have swatches of all three of the shades for you.

These shimmer palettesare very pretty in the pan:

A043 Carnaval in Rio

A044 Rose Golden Goddess

A045 Rose Champagne Glow

And, swatches:

Carnaval in Rio, Rose Golden Goddess, Rose Champagne Glow swatches

Carnaval in Rio, Rose Golden Goddess, Rose Champagne Glow
daylight bulb

Carnaval in Rio, Rose Golden Goddess, Rose Champagne Glow
with flash to show sparkle

Carnaval in Rio is a shimmery bronze that would work best as a bronzer on most skintones. Rose Golden Goddess is an orangey – gold shimmer; this seems like a difficult shade to work with. It might work as a blush on lighter skintones and a highlighter on deeper skintones. Rose Champagne Glow is a shimmer with small flecks of glitter, and is best suited as a highlighter.

Again, for a full review of the To Reflect Shimmer palettes, please click here.

Wet n Wild Fergie Rose Champagne Glow Highlighter Review & Swatches

Wet n Wild Fergie Centerstage Collection To Reflect Shimmer Palette

One of the new Wet n Wild / Fergie Centerstage Collection items is the To Reflect Shimmer Palette, which comes in three shades – Carnaval in Rio, Rose Golden Goddess, and Rose Champagne Glow (which I purchased). [Swatched of all three are in this post.]

Per G. over at Nouveau Cheap, they are blush, bronzer, or highlighter, depending on your skintone, and can be used wet or dry. I swatched it wet, and the area of the highlighter that got wet looks slightly different now, but is still useable – it didn’t seal the product.

Carnaval in Rio, Rose Golden Goddess, Rose Champagne Glow

First, note that this is fairly large product – 11.3g (a MAC blush is 6g, a MAC MSF is 10g). The packaging is fairly compact and very functional, though (unlike most Wet n Wild products), it is not shrinkwrapped – so be careful to ensure that the one you buy hasn’t been tested!).

The veining in this is very lovely – it’s a really pretty product in the pan. From the texture, it appears that it is a pressed product, not a baked product (which makes zero difference to me – I just note it because I’m sure some will compare these to MAC MSFs, which are baked).

The texture of the powder is smooth and blendable, but I wouldn’t describe it as silky. It’s very nice for a drugstore product, but doesn’t quite match up to some of the high end highlighters I have.

Wet n Wild Rose Champagne Glow – with flash
wet, dry, blended

Wet n Wild Rose Champagne Glow
wet, dry, blended – daylight bulb

As you can see, the color of this is a lovely rose gold. These may be multipurpose products, but I think this particular shade is going to be a highlighter on everyone. I’m not sure if you can tell from the swatches, but the highlighter has both shimmer/sheen and very, very small flecks of sparkle. Personally, I prefer to highlight with products that just have the shimmer/sheen and don’t have flecks of sparkle, but that’s just my choice – you might prefer something like this! Still, I love the color of this, so I may end up using it as the world’s largest eyeshadow.

Overall, I think this is worth checking out, especially if you like your highlighters on the more shimmery / sparkly side. If you prefer a more sheeny highlighter, you might want to skip this one.

Shiseido High Beam White Highlighter Review, Swatches, Photos

I probably own too many highlighters already, but that didn’t stop me from purchasing a new one! Shiseido High Beam White highlighter was love at first swatch.

Shiseido High Beam White is packaged exactly like Shiseido’s blushes – in a small, sleek black compact with the best brush that I’ve ever seen as an included extra. I usually dislike compacts that include a brush, because I value the space in my makeup drawers and use my own brushes instead of the enclosed applicators. Thus, I’d rather have a smaller, applicator-less compact. However, this brush is good enough to actually use, which means that I don’t mind it being included – though I would be fine without it, too.

Shiseido blush / highlighter enclosed brush

The highlighter itself looks extremely stark white in the pan, and doesn’t look like it could possible be natural looking when applied. However, it has a soft, smooth, and silky texture, and easily blends out to give a buildable and natural sheen.

This is not a glittery, or even shimmery highlighter – I detect no individual shimmer particles at all. Instead, it has a sheen. It can be used lightly for a natural look, or built up for a dramatic look. The smooth texture makes it easy to use either way.

heavy swatch // blended swatch – with flash

heavy swatch // blended swatch – natural light

High Beam White applied lightly

As I mentioned, I own several highlighters – but, all of my other highlights are neutral-toned or golden – High Beam White is unique in its whiteness. I foresee this one getting a lot of use!

NARS Foreplay Blush Palette Review, Swatches, Photos

When I first saw images of the new NARS Foreplay Blush Palette, a Sephora exclusive, I wasn’t that interested – it contains Orgasm blush, which I’ve never been interested in since I generally prefer matte blushes, and I though the matte pink would be too cool-toned to work well on me. However, while in a Sephora store the other day, I swatched it, and was instantly smitten.

I’d never actually swatched Orgasm blush before, and I liked it more than I though I would – though I was still quite hesitant about the shimmer. However, I loved the other three shades; the matte pink seemed like it would work quite well, the matte coral peach/coral is exactly the type of shade I am drawn to, and the gold highlight shade is quite lovely. So, I bought it, thinking that I could always return if it didn’t work at all for me.

The Foreplay blush palette is packaged in a standard black rubberized NARS compact. Like just about everyone else, I love how sleek the NARS packaging is, but hate how dirty it gets. The Foreplay palette is substantially larger than a normal NARS blush compact, and contains a total of .36 oz of product, while a single NARS blush contains .16 oz; so it’s more than twice as much product for less than twice the cost (single, $28, Foreplay, $49). Of course, each color in the Foreplay palette is smaller than a single NARS blush – but I always prefer to get several smaller-sized colors than one larger color since I don’t finish color products.

Here are the Foreplay palette and a single NARS blush (Amour) side by side, for size comparison purposes:

Size comparison: NARS Foreplay blush palette, NARS single blush compact (Amour)

The textures of all four of the Foreplay blushes were excellent – soft and smooth. The two shimmers are lightly pigmented, and the two mattes are very pigmented. The mattes in particular had a really excellent, even texture that is very impressive. Despite the pigmentation level of the mattes, the texture makes them easy to blend out and get a very natural look. In the swatches below, the natural light photo is a touch overexposed and the flash photo is oversaturated; the actual colors are somewere in the middle.

NARS Foreplay swatches – natural light

NARS Foreplay swatches – flash

And finally, here I am wearing the peach / coral shade on my cheeks, and the gold shade on my cheekbones. I’ve applied the gold shade very heavily, as I find that highlighter usually doesn’t show up well in pictures. I would normally apply less to wear out of the house.

NARS Foreplay – applied

Overall, I’m really pleased with this purchase. I’m sure that the peach / coral shade will become a go-to; I’m actually wearing it right now – and I am pleased to have the variety in my stash from the other shades as well!

Maybelline Dream Lumi Touch Concealer Review, Swatches, Photos

Although I’m really happy with the shimmery/glowy highlighters I own, I recently decided that I would like to add a cream, non-shimmery highligher to my stash. So, I purchased one of the lightest shades of Maybelline’s Dream Lumi Touch highlighting concealer to use a highlighter. I chose the second lightest shade, 320 Ivory, rather than the lightest shade (310 Radiance), because Ivory is more yellow and Radiance is more pink, and I tend to look better in yellow-based shades — though I’m not sure it matters for a highlighter.

I swatched it next to Clinique’s Airbrush Concealer in 04 Neutral Fair, because I wondered how similar they were. They have similar packaging and very similar consistencies. However, the shades I have are quite different; the Clinique is similar to my skintone, while the Maybelline is significantly lighter than it – which makes it a bit difficult to do a meaningful comparison.

Most of my swatch photos ended up overexposed. The first photo is more clear, but overexposed (my skin & the concealers are not actually that pale) – the second is a bit blurry, but the colors are more accurate.

Maybelline Dream Lumi Concealer 320 Ivory, Clinique Airbrush Concealer 04 Neutral Fair
Photo is overexposed

Maybelline Dream Lumi Concealer 320 Ivory, Clinique Airbrush Concealer 04 Neutral Fair

Although click-pen packaging isn’t my favorite, Maybelline’s Dream Lumi click pen is extremely functional – it only took a few clicks (maybe 30 seconds at most) to get the concealer started, and it only takes 1-2 clicks to dispense more product. I haven’t had any trouble with too little or too much product being dispensed.

Because it’s far too light for me, I can’t really evaluate it as a concealer. It does seem to brighten a bit. It has medium coverage for a concealer – more than a foundation, but far less than opaque.

As for use as a highlighter, I really like it! I tried to take before/ after photos using it as a highlighter, but it’s just too subtle to really show up; I find that’s true of most highlighters. Overall, I would definitely recommend both a too-light concealer and this particular one as a highlighter.

Kevyn Aucoin Candlelight Highlighter Review, Swatches, Photos

It’s time for another mini review! Today, I have Kevyn Aucoin The Celestial Powder in Candlelight – my newest highlighter. I heard that this was a very neutral-toned, glowy highlighter with no obvious shimmer particles, so when Beauty.com had their 20% off sale a while ago, I decided to buy it.

I don’t love or hate the packaging; I’d prefer a smaller compact without a brush, but this works too.

The product itself is great – it is, indeed, a very neutral highlight shade that has very fine shimmer, and thus gives a glow without any obvious bits of glitter or shimmer.

Kevyn Aucoin Candlelight – Unblended / Blended

When I initially swatched it, it reminded me of theBalm’s Mary-Lou Manizer (reviewed here), so I swatched them side by side. As it turns out, Mary-Lou is more golden and has a stronger sheen/shimmer, while Candlelight is more neutral toned and more subtle. The difference was more apparent in person than in the below photo – they’re definitely not dupes. Of course, they do look very similar when blended out, and if you’re not a highlighter person, you probably won’t want both of them.

theBalm Mary-Lou Manizer; KA Candlelight

What’s your current go-to highlighter?

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