Review – Hard Candy Top Ten Trendsetters in Raining Men and Birthday Suit

Photo heavy post (so something new and different for me).

Now that I’ve had a bit of time to play around with these palettes, I have thoughts!

Just to recap from my original haul post, here are some stats:

Hard Candy came out with five new ten pan palettes
Each palette retails for $6.00
Sold exclusively at Walmart
Hard Candy does say that they are cruelty free which we can all applaud right?
Each shade has 1.3g/.04oz of product (13g/.4oz total in each palette)

Raining Men

I just swirled each finger in product a couple of times. Well, three times to be precise.

(Every swatch is a single pass with my finger)

Shade 1: Glitter shade - only the glitter transfers on the eye. Shade 2: I'm going to go with metallic on this. This shade does require some building up on actual application to get this kind of intensity. Shade 3: Glitter and again, this translates as pure glitter on the eye. Shade 4: I would call this a shimmer shade. This also requires a bit of build up on the eye and reads as more blue than charcoal once applied. — Shade 1: Glitter shade – only the glitter transfers on the eye.
Shade 2: I’m going to go with metallic on this. This shade does require some building up on actual application to get this kind of intensity.
Shade 3: Glitter and again, this translates as pure glitter on the eye.
Shade 4: I would call this a shimmer shade. This also requires a bit of build up on the eye and reads as more blue than charcoal once applied.

Shade 5 - Shimmer shade with pretty good pigmentation and application. Shade 6 - Shimmer, again, good application and pigmentation. Shade 7 - Shimmer...there is a theme here with the shimmer shades. Shade 8 - Glitter that guess what? Just translates as glitter on the eye. — Shade 5 – Shimmer shade with pretty good pigmentation and application.
Shade 6 – Shimmer, again, good application and pigmentation.
Shade 7 – Shimmer…there is a theme here with the shimmer shades.
Shade 8 – Glitter that, guess what? Just translates as glitter on the eye.

Shade 9 - A shimmer shade with decent pigmentation but this is more similar to the charcoal/blue shade in that it requires a little work to get a full opacity application. Shade 10 - Shimmer with great pigmentation and application. — Shade 9 – A shimmer shade with decent pigmentation but this is more similar to the charcoal/blue shade in that it requires a little work to get a full opacity application.
Shade 10 – Shimmer with great pigmentation and application.

I’m just going to say it, I love this palette. With the exception of the lighter glitter shades, every color has good if not fantastic pigmentation. Everything blends easily, I didn’t have any problems with creasing and not even the slightest hint of fading. The gold, red, brown and light green shades in particular rivaled some of the high end eye shadows in the staying power department. The glitter shades are a bit of a bust but they’re not horrible, just…glittery. The only complaint I have about this palette is that I get fallout throughout the day. Luckily, it’s only with the lighter shades (gold shade is the worst culprit but the light green did it too) so you do end up with some shimmer on your cheeks. For the price though, I say you need this in your life. These are gorgeous colors.

Birthday Suit

Same three swirl situation happening here.

I'm going to point out here that within the first four shades there are two shades that are my skin shade just with slightly different undertones. — I’m going to point out here that within the first four shades there are two shades that are my skin shade just with slightly different undertones.

Shade 1 - A yellow toned cream Shade 2 - An almost mid-toned warm grey Shade 3 - A warm deep brown (this swatches badly but does build up a little better in actual application. It still applies a little patchy but it's workable) Shade 4 - A pale pink — Shade 1 – A yellow toned cream
Shade 2 – An almost mid-toned warm grey
Shade 3 – A warm deep brown (this swatches badly but does build up a little better in actual application. It still applies a little patchy but it’s workable)
Shade 4 – A pale pink

hc_bs_5_8 — Shade 1 – A yellow toned cream
Shade 2 – An almost mid-toned warm grey
Shade 3 – A warm deep brown (this swatches badly but does build up a little better in actual application. It still applies a little patchy but it’s workable)
Shade 4 – A pale pink

Shade 5 - A light cool grey that does not transfer well onto the eye. This actually just reads as my skin tone but cooler Shade 6 - A medium/light warm brown that works well as a transition shade Shade 7 - A peach skin tone shade Shade 8 - A light/almost medium grey — Shade 5 – A light cool grey that does not transfer well onto the eye. This actually just reads as my skin tone but cooler
Shade 6 – A medium/light warm brown that works well as a transition shade
Shade 7 – A peach skin tone shade
Shade 8 – A light/almost medium grey

Shade 7 - A navy blue. This can be built up and is quite nice but not a "wow" color, it's a tad patchy and chalky, but again, you can work with it. Shade 8 - A cream shade — Shade 7 – A navy blue. This can be built up and is quite nice but not a “wow” color, it’s a tad patchy and chalky, but again, you can work with it.
Shade 8 – A cream shade

I’m much less enthusiastic about this palette. Most of the shadows are a little bit chalky and kick up a fair amount of powder once you set your brush in the pan. The intensity of the shades is lacking. All of the would be mid-depth shades apply a lot lighter than they appear in the pan and can’t be built up (the exception being the warm brown shade #6, which applied as you would expect it to looking at it). There are four light, highlight type shades with a possible 5th if you count that light lavender grey shade, although I wouldn’t use that as a brow bone highlight, it’s still in that same color depth. The two deep shades are nice but they aren’t amazing. Overall, I think that this palette is OK but not good. It’s a bit hard to get a complete look from just this palette on it’s own.

However, I thought that Birthday Suit paired really well with Raining Men. Raining Men lacks any highlight, base, transition shades and Birthday Suit is chalk full of them (see what I did there?).

So, to sum up, I highly recommend Raining Men. If you don’t have any matte light shades in your collection already, I would say snag Birthday Suit because it plays nicely with Raining Men but really…you could probably skip it and not be missing much.

You thought we were done here didn’t you? HA!

Here are some pictures of the shadows in action so you can see how they translate on the eye.

The dark green and light green basically blended themselves here. Any poor blending you see is my fault not the shadow's fault. But that's likely always the case. — The dark green and light green basically blended themselves here. Any poor blending you see is my fault not the shadow’s fault. But that’s likely always the case.

This look was very...meh. There was a lot of building up of color to get the intensity that I wanted which culminated in a lot of muddiness. Yay. — This look was very…meh. There was a lot of building up of color to get the intensity that I wanted which culminated in a lot of muddiness. Yay.

This was absolutely my favorite combination of colors from the Raining Men palette. But I'm a sucker for red and gold. — This was absolutely my favorite combination of colors from the Raining Men palette. But I’m a sucker for red and gold.

This is a good example of the opacity that you can expect from that dark brown in the Birthday Suit palette. I did do some other looks with this palette alone but they were all very "no make up make up" looks. — This is a good example of the opacity that you can expect from that dark brown in the Birthday Suit palette.
I did do some other looks with this palette alone but they were all very “no make up make up” looks.

3 thoughts on “Review – Hard Candy Top Ten Trendsetters in Raining Men and Birthday Suit”

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jessica says:

March 23, 2015 at 8:33 pm

i love the creamy style of the raining men palette, but i can’t wear the maroon-purple or the copper-red. i got such an allergic reaction that my lids itched and my right lid almost swelled shut. they’re great colors and i hate that they give me that reaction, but the other colors are great as well so i’m not too down about it. i got my palette at walmart for 6$ which is a great deal to me.

1. cellardoor2014 says:
  
  April 10, 2015 at 2:58 pm
  
  Yikes! Allergic reactions are always so much fun Have you had reactions to other red or purple pigments in the past or was this the first time that happened? I do agree that these are a fantastic value in general though.