Before we jump into the actual review I just want to say how thrilled I am that it’s finally cooling down outside! It’s such a relief to see the end of Summer and the perpetual state of melting. Woo hoo!

I’m calling this a first impressions post but I have some fairly strong ideas about this palette so it will likely sound very much like a review. I’ve only had this palette for about a week and I generally like to give a product more time than that before I do a full review. However, this is limited edition and I thought I’d try that whole “get something posted while it’s still relevant” thing. It feels weird right? Don’t worry, it probably won’t happen again.

Front packaging.

back packaging.

Interior

product with natural lighting.

product with flash

product with bonus photo bomb by Gray Cat.

Packaging

Pretty standard cardboard packaging with a slightly grippy texture. It does get dirty easily although I never really care about that personally. The palette does include a nice sized mirror.

Swatches

Matte shades with flash

Matte shades in natural light

Matte shades in direct sunlight

The top two rows in the palette are all mattes (although Sugar Cookie has an almost satin finish).

Shimmer rows with flash

Shimmer rows with natural light

Shimmer rows in direct sunlight

The bottom two rows are all shimmer/metallic/glitter shades.

Shadow texture

When swatching these shades they feel identical to the original LORAC Pro Palette. They swatch well with finger swatches and give all indications that the formula will perform the same as the original Pro Palette. When applying to the eyes there is a BIG difference. Many of the matte shades are chalky and the shimmer shades require a sticky base in order to adhere to the eye. I particularly have a hard time applying shimmer shades over the matte shades. They don’t play well together. None of those issues are anything that I would expect from this brand.

Sample Eye Looks

It’s basically Halloween ya’ll. That’s my story and I’m sticking to it.

I forgot to write down which shadows I used in this look but that main lid shade is either Misty Mauve or Lotus. I think it says something that I actually can’t tell which one is which. They both look very similar on the eye.

This is also either Misty Mauve or Lotus. I’m really not sure. But basically the same look no? You can see that a darker color was added in the corner on this look but it still comes out looking like the first look.

On the face: Revlon Colorstay Whipped foundation in Medium Beige, Urban Decay Color Corrector in Peach, L’Oreal Magic Lumi highlighter, Notoriously Morbid blush in Tempestuous, Notoriously Morbid Highlight in I Though I’d Seen A Ghost, Becca Bronzer. Lips are Burt’s Bee’s Juniper Water.

To blend and highlight the inner corner – Cotton. Transition – Mocha. Lid – Copper Pearl. Lower Lashline – Butterscotch + Mocha. Liner – Raven. Waterline – Urban Decay Zero. Mascara – Lancome Grandiose.

I look super annoyed here. And I am. This was the third or fourth look I had tried out this morning and eventually I had to go somewhere so I had to do a look that was easy and fool proof. Enter the standard golden 5 minute look. I do actually like how this look turned out.

Face: Revlon Colorstay Whipped in Medium Beige. Setting powder – MUFE Ultra HD Microfinishing Pressed Powder. Blush – Milani Luminoso. Highlight – From the Sleek Holiday palette in the bottom right hand corner. Lips: Jordana Sweet Cream Matte in Zombie Queen

Brown Bone/blending – Cool Taupe. Transition – Mocha. Crease – Spice. Inner/Outer corners – Dk. Chocolate. Center lid – Denim + Steel Wool. Dots – Rimmel Soft Khol in Pure White + Peacock + Unicorn. Center waterline – Revlon Photoready Kajal in Matte Lemon. Inner/outer waterline – Rimmel Scandaleyes in Black. Mascara – Lancome Grandiose.

I love halo eyes but I have such a tendency to make them waaaayyyy too dark. I actually like this look but it’s not something I would be horribly comfortable wearing around.

You can see here how Denim in the center lid looks hella patchy. That’s after layers and layers of packing the color on the lid. I then tried to apply a little Steel Wool over Denim to add some glitter and not even a tiny trace of the product transferred to my eye. It DID however all fall out everywhere else.

Face: Revlon Colorstay Whipped in Medium Beige. Setting powder – MUFE Ultra HD Microfinishing Pressed Powder. Blush – Milani Luminoso. Highlight – From the Sleek Holiday palette in the bottom right hand corner.

WITH NO PRIMER. Blending – Butterscotch. Crease – Mahogany + Silver Fox. Lid – Fairytale. Lower lashline – Shadow. Inner corner – Pink Peony + Sugar Pill Ghosted and Lumi. Tightline/waterline – Urban Decay Zero. Blending the lower lashline – Butterscotch and Mahogany.

This is after I added Darling Girl Glitter Glue and re-applied Fairytale (and finished the rest of the look…obviously)

Fairytale is the chunkiest glittery shade in the palette but it looks so pretty in the pan! However; with no primer this shade is almost nothing. It’s pretty but it’s a very soft pretty. And the fallout. I need a damn shelter! I did half the eye look and then added glitter glue and the difference was insane.

Face: Revlon Colorstay Whipped in Medium Beige. Setting powder – MUFE Ultra HD Microfinishing Pressed Powder. Blush – Milani Luminoso. Highlight – From the Sleek Holiday palette in the bottom right hand corner.

WITHOUT PRIMER. Blending – Butterscotch. Transition – Denim. V – Shadow. Lid – Honey.

Glitter glue made Honey a totally different shadow…but damn dude. What the heck?

When I tried a look with the lovely shade Honey and NOTHING STUCK TO MY EYE, I thought I’d try the glitter glue trick again. But since Honey wouldn’t stick to the matte shade Shadow, I couldn’t even blend it at all. Total fail.

Face: Revlon Colorstay Whipped in Medium Beige. Setting powder – MUFE Ultra HD Microfinishing Pressed Powder. Blush – Milani Luminoso. Highlight – From the Sleek Holiday palette in the bottom right hand corner. Lips – Rimmel Naughty Nude.

Base/blending – Cool Taupe. Transition – Butterscotch. Crease – Mocha. Outer 1/2 of lid – Lagoon. Inner 1/2 of lid – Sugar Cookie. Lower lashline – Butterscotch and Mocha. Inner Corner – Foam. Brow bone – Cotton. Mascara – Lancome Grandiose.

I think this is a pretty look. But what is that outer corner color? If you didn’t already read the caption and know the answer just take a wild guess. It’s Lagoon. The vampy turquoise/teal/green shade. And it just looks like an off black. A no color in particular color.

Face: Revlon Colorstay Whipped in Medium Beige. Setting powder – MUFE Ultra HD Microfinishing Pressed Powder. Blush – Milani Luminoso. Highlight – From the Sleek Holiday palette in the bottom right hand corner. Lips – Rimmel Naughty Nude

WITH URBAN DECAY ANTI-AGING PRIMER POTION. Blending – Pink Peony. Transition – Oat. Lid – Lt. Sage. Outer V – Moss. Inner corner – Unicorn

Same look but with no primer.

Ok here’s another mess. Even with primer this one is a bit of a mess. Lt. Sage doesn’t really stick to the eye. You can see patchiness all over the place. And Moss won’t stick to Lt. Sage. Without primer Moss doesn’t even adhere to the eye at all. And with primer you get some pretty color but as soon as you start blending Moss into Lt. Sage then Sage actually lifts away from anywhere the brush touches.

Face: Revlon Colorstay Whipped in Medium Beige. Lips – My Pretty Zombie The Vapors

Blending/brow bone – Cool Taupe. Crease – Flamingo. V – Vamp. Lid – Unicorn. Blending lower lash line – Flamingo. Lower Lash Line – Moss. Liner – Peacock. Inner Corner – Foam. Waterline – Urban Decay Deep End. Mascara – Lancome Grandiose.

One of the prettiest shades in this palette is Unicorn so I definitely wanted to try it all over the lid. And guess what? It is apparently only magical in the inner corner. It looks like any other highlight/silvery shade when over the whole eyelid. Also, you can barely see Moss on the lower lash line here.

Das my fuckit face.

Nothing on my face because I have given up.

Blending – Butterscotch. Crease – Cedar. Lid – Plum. Liner – Lagoon. Waterline/tightline – Urban Decay Zero

So this one isn’t horrible. But there’s not a lot going on either. It’s a pretty neutral look that I slapped on in 2 minutes because I was tired of this game.

Rambling Thoughts

So. You can probably guess my views on this palette. I bought this for two reasons: 1. I wanted a palette that had some cool toned shadows. I now own 80 billion warm toned eyeshadows and almost no cool toned eyeshadow so I wanted something different to change things up. I’m a little tired of the warm smoky eye/sunset eye/IT’S FALL eye and this palette looked different and a little inspiring. 2. EmilyNoel83 RAVED about this so it seemed a safe bet. But. Yeah, I’m just going to say it, this palette kind of sucks. I’ll keep using it and I’m sure that with primer and maybe some other shadows mixed in I can make it work. I do NOT think that a palette should require the use of primer. Back in my day there was no such thing as primer, we used sponges to apply our eyeshadow, there was no real blending and there was no primer and we walked to school barefoot in the snow. Uphill. Both ways. If I can get a $2.00 eyeshadow from Walmart to work with no primer then a $59.00 eyeshadow sure as hell should work without a primer.

Pros

There are some pretty shades in here. I love that LORAC splits all palettes equally between matte and shimmer. The transition type shades do blend beautifully in the crease. I don’t notice any fading throughout the day and I had no issues with creasing.

Cons

All of the shades look really similar on the eye.  Many of the shades turn into an undefinable grayish brownish not really a real color. The shades don’t play well together, some shades won’t blend together at all. The shadows aren’t actually very pigmented but still remain difficult to blend without getting a muddy look.

Overall this is a dud for me. Clearly. If you’re really drawn to these shades or want to test this out for yourself you can currently find this on the Ulta website as of October 29, 2017. It retails for $59.00 but I actually purchased it on sale a week or so ago for $44.25 so it may go on sale again. It is limited edition.

I would love to know your thoughts on this palette if you have it. There are not that many reviews out yet on it but they all seem to be fairly positive. I’m really bummed about this palette because the original Pro Palette is my all time favorite (in fact, if you don’t have it yet you should re-think your life choices). I think it’s perfection! I was really hoping this would be in the same category but alas, not so much.

Edited to add: even though this palette was a let down I’m still really drawn to it. I keep looking at it and feeling like I want to try all the looks with all the colors. I think that also says something about the composition of the palette.

Tidbits:

• I found what I think is a Grizzled Mantid today!
• 
• I’ve been binge reading the entire Inspector Gamache series by Louise Penny and I adore it. It’s a perfect blend of murder mystery and charming small town shenanigans. Definitely check it out if you haven’t already!