Hi guys! I hope you’re all having a good International Women’s Day! We should all embrace our beauty, on the inside and on the outside 🙂 So, today I thought I’d balance out the expensive with the inexpensive and bring to you a makeup brand
that I think is SO worth the hype; Makeup Geek!
- Normal Eyeshadows
Starting off with the normal eyeshadow pans that come in a wide range of colours, there is definitely something for you amongst the selection of shadows being offered by Makeup Geek. Of these eyeshadow pans, I have 12 of them, which I will swatch in the pictures below:
- Cocoa Bear: A matte warm reddish-brown, very smooth to apply
- Cosmopolitan: A shimmery pink with gold flecks – dupe for Mac’s Expensive Pink!
- Mocha: A cool-toned matte dark brown, good for the outer corner
- Chickadee: A warm matte orange, good for warming up the crease
- Creme Brulee: A matte mid-tone brown, dupe for Too Faced’s ‘Salted Caramel’ from the original Chocolate Bar palette – perfect transition shade!
- Vanilla Bean: Soft matte cream white, good for highlighting the browbone
- Glamorous: Shimmery bronzey shade with slight reddish undertones when applied on the lid
- Burlesque: Shimmery purple with minor silver flecks in it – very smooth to apply
- Latte: Matte mid-tone brown that leans more towards being cool-toned
- Goddess: Shimmery reddish-brown
- Peach Smoothie: Matte light peach shade, a little light on my medium skin tone, but might be a good transition shade for people with fairer or darker skin tones than me
- Mango Tango: Satin watermelon pink
Overall, these eyeshadows are pretty pigmented, the whole lot of them, and most of them are soft and easy to blend. The shimmer shades, such as ‘Cosmopolitan’ and ‘Glamorous’ are such beauties on the lid and the pigmentation and usability of these eyeshadows make it a dream to apply.
However, the matte eyeshadows can be somewhat hit or miss (but mostly hits!). The shade ‘Mocha’, for example, is a little stiff and can be a little patchy in application. On the flip side, ‘Creme Brulee’ is a beautiful shade. It can kick up a lot of powder upon putting in your brush, but tap off the excess and you have yourself a gorgeous transition shade. A definite must-have (plus it’s also like Salted Caramel from the original Too Faced chocolate bar palette – and wasn’t that the most beautiful transition shade ever!?). Asides from Creme Brulee though, Cocoa Bear is also quite unique, as it is a reddish brown that is gorgeous as a darker crease shade or a shade to use in the outer vee. Now onto the foiled eyeshadows…
- Foiled Eyeshadows
These eyeshadows are where it’s at for me 😉 I honestly cannot get enough of these foiled eyeshadows. These eyeshadows are so metallic, so beautiful, so pigmented.. it hurts. These swatch as beautifully on the arm as they do on the lids, and the pigmentation is stunning. Being foiled eyeshadows, you do have to work with them a little. Without a primer, these will crease as it does have oils infusing the pigments together. But by using Urban Decay’s Primer Potion or Mac’s Paint Pot, these eyeshadows can stay on the lids for a good 8 to 9 hours with no fading or creasing. You don’t need to build this up as much as one or two swipes can do the trick, however, be warned that these do apply better with the fingers or with a synthetic brush. There are 20 shades in the line so far and I’m very tempted to check out a few more of them as these are my favourite metallic shadows that I have tried by far. Of the 20, these are the 6 that I have in my collection:
- Magic Act: A warm champagne gold, that is perfect for highlighting the inner corner or as an all-over lid shade
- Grandstand: A warm pink – one of my absolute favourites!
- Untamed: Probably my favourite of the bunch, Untamed is a warm coppery gold that is temptation in a little pan
- Flamethrower: A reddish-copper metallic shade
- Center Stage: The only foiled eyeshadow I have that is slightly patchy and less pigmented than I expected, Center Stage is a deep blue – but used on top of a black base, this colour really pops out.
- Mesmerized: A metallic purple-grey that is great for a smokey eye
- Pegasus: A turquoise shade that reminds me of reflective oceans and chlorine waters
- Duochrome Eyeshadows
Of the duochrome eyeshadows that came out last year, I only have one of the 12, and it’s “Steampunk”. Steampunk has a black base with brown-copper flecks in it. This particular shadow is alright for me, it doesn’t impress me as much as the foiled ones, but I do want to try out more from this line – (Secret Garden and Karma look gorgeous!) so I’ll reserve my opinions on this line for now.
- Blushes
On a positive note, the blushes are absolutely stunning. They are so good for the price. At AUD $14.40 on Beauty Bay, you get so much product (4.25g!). These blushes are pigmented, so you barely need to tap your brush into it to pick up the product. They’re not too powdery and they are also easy to blend. The blushes do come in natural colours, and there are some slightly deeper ones that can be good for darker skin tones but I do wish that the brand will expand their line in the future to provide more options for more skin tones. However, if you’re light to tan in skin tone, these blushes will look beautiful on you 🙂
- Foundation Stippling Brush
Finally, brushes. Or really, brush. So far, I only have the one foundation stippling brush. The first thing I thought of when I touched this brush was, “This brush is so soft!”And it’s dense enough that I can still use it to pick up powder products, such as my Bare Minerals original powder foundation, which I’ve used to buff the minerals onto my skin. But I’ve also used this brush for a tinted moisturiser and it works just as fine as a stippling brush (which really, is its intended purpose). This brush is dense enough that it helps to achieve maximum coverage, but soft enough that it makes it easy to blend powder and liquid face products. And as far as I’ve used it, the hairs on the brush don’t shed. Would I recommend this brush? Definitely. It’s on par with my beloved Expert Face brush from Realtechniques which I’ve been using for years now, so if that doesn’t tell you something about how good this brush is, I don’t know what will.
WHERE CAN I GET MAKEUP GEEK SHADOWS IN AUSTRALIA?
- You can get Makeup Geek off the Beauty Bay website or the Makeup Geek website, and they both ship to Australia within 2 weeks.
And to finish off this post, I thought I’d insert a look I did using the foiled eyeshadow ‘Untamed’ all over the lid with ‘Flamethrower’ on the outer third part of the lid, ‘Creme Brulee’ as my transition shade, Cocoa Bear and Mocha in the crease, Vanilla Bean as my browbone highlight and finally, Magic Act on the inner corner. Also, I used a slight dusting of Makeup Geek’s ‘Infatuation’ blush on my cheeks.
What products from Makeup Geek do you have and think I should try? Let me know in the comments below! 🙂
Tune in next Tuesday for more posts. Thanks for reading guys!
Much love,
Hawa. xo
From Beauty Within 