I was at Five Below last week and spotted some 16 Color eyeshadow palettes from L.A. Colors that I hadn't seen there before, and they were only $4 (you can find it at drugstore.com here for $3.99). They had a few different ones but this one caught my eye because it has some beautiful nude shades but also some greens and a navy blue. It's called Sweet and there are two other versions...one with bright shades called Haute and a smoky one called Smokin. Let's take a look!
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| LA Colors 16 Color Eyeshadow Palette in Sweet |
I'm usually skeptical of drugstore eyeshadow palettes...I'm rarely impressed by the ones from "bigger" drugstore brands like Maybelline, Revlon or Cover Girl. But lately it seems like the indie brands have taken over, as I've found that products from City Color, L.A Girl, and Profusion actually surpass the quality of the products found in the drugstore...and they're usually cheaper! The problem is, they can be harder to find so I hope that more drugstores start picking up these brands and carrying their full lines!
This palette is so pretty to look at, between the white packaging, beautiful shade selection, and the zig-zag design in each pan. These are almost all shimmery shades, with the exception of one or two mattes, and the shimmer varies from subtle to pretty heavy depending on the shade.
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| L.A. Colors 16 Color Eyeshadow Palette in Sweet |
The pigmentation of these shades is fantastic...all of these swatches are on bare skin (no primer) and were swiped just once after going back and forth in the pan a couple of times with my finger.
This first row of colors is harder to see, not because the shades aren't pigmented, but because they're almost all light shades and they blend in against my pale skin. I had no pigmentation issues with any of the shades in this row, and they all felt super soft and buttery. The more shimmer each shade had, the softer and more pigmented it was, but they also had more fallout.
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| Top Row |
The second row has mostly darker shades with the exception of the gold and white glittery shades (that white one on the end has a blue/violet shift...it's so pretty in person). In this row, there were two shades that felt a bit more dry, chalky and crumbly than the rest of the palette...the matte olive green shade (5th one from the left) which just wasn't as dark as it looks in the pan, and the navy blue shade, which looks dark in my swatch, but I had to swipe a few times to get it to show up. The first swipe was very light and streaky so I just kept going (this shade is the only one that required more than one swipe). Still, it can be built up easily, so that's a good thing.
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| Bottom Row |
Overall, this palette is absolutely amazing quality for the price, and the fact that there were only 2 duds out of 16 shades is really good. This could be the least expensive eyeshadow palette I own, but it's definitely earned a place in the collection of ones I'll use often.
You can find L.A. Colors at Five Below, Dollar General, Target and Kmart to name a few (for a full list of locations, click here).
If there are no stores near you that carry L.A. Colors, you can pick up this palette at drugstore.com for only $3.99.