I wandered into Five Below this morning to see what was new in the makeup aisle and at first it looked like the same stuff that's been there for a while. But then I started pushing things aside and looking toward the back of the shelves and there was a bunch of brand new stuff just hiding back there (I posted the other things I found on my Instagram page today in case you're curious).
The Profusion Studio Highlight palette ($4) was the first thing I pulled out and I was like...what!? You guys know I love my highlighters and while it's easy to find highlight/contour palettes, a full highlighter palette is more of a rare thing, especially at the drugstore!
Profusion can definitely be hit or miss but I decided to try this based on my fantastic experience with their Blush Boutique kit earlier this week (see that post here). I couldn't wait to get this home and play with it a little bit, so here are my first impressions...
This kit is generously sized and the pans are perfect for getting a brush into them. Here it is next to L'oreal La Palette Nude for reference. If you know how large the La Palette Nudes are, you can appreciate this comparison, even though one is eyeshadow and one is highlighter. I mainly wanted to show the overall size compared to something you're probably familiar with.
It comes with a protective plastic sheet over it that's taped down on both sides to prevent tampering. I really appreciated this because a lot of times when I go into Five Below, everything is broken or has been swatched already. Unfortunately, the names of the shades are on the plastic sheet so unless you want to keep it, you won't have the shade names available to you.
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There's a really nice range of shades in this palette, so no matter what your skin tone, you'll find at least one (if not more) in here that suits you. On my pale skin, I can use the first two in the top row (White Pearl and Pale Gold) and the first two in the bottom row (Golden Pearl and Golden Nude). The bronzy shades are too dark for me to use as highlighters (and too shimmery to use as bronzers) but they do make great eyeshadows!
Here are the swatches and I have to say, this is definitely another winner from Profusion! These shades are soft, pigmented and absolutely beautiful. The only shade I had a little trouble with was Pale Gold...it felt a little bit gritty compared to the others. I'm guessing it may have a little bit of a chunkier shimmer in it, but it's still beautiful nonetheless.One that really stood out to me was White Pearl because it has this gorgeous blue-purple shift that's hard to see in photos but it looks amazing in person. The Golden shades are beautiful as well. I still can't believe that this entire palette was under $5...it's just amazing.
I haven't seen any other reviews on this palette except for a brief first impression on YouTube (the video is here...skip to 11:34 to see this palette). The YouTuber, Alexisjayda said that she got hers at Ross for $5.99, so if you live near a Ross store and not a Five Below, you still may be able to get this (although it's $2 more at Ross). Unfortunately, I can't find any online retailers that have it... even Profusion's website doesn't have it, which stinks.
So remember...if you go to Five Below and you don't see this right away, start digging into the shelves a little bit because it might be behind some other things like it was at my local store.
So what do you think of this palette? Have you seen it anywhere yet?