Hey beauty lovers!

My apologies for this week's delayed post, but I ordered this palette super early Monday morning and wanted to review and swatch it for you guys in this week's post! It arrived Tuesday afternoon, which was expected as all of my Sephora packages usually arrive within 1 to 2 business days - I know, I probably should have given a heads up that this post was going to be late for the people who actually care, but it's here now and I couldn't be more excited. So, without further ado, here it is:

The brand spankin' new Anastasia Beverly Hills Modern Renaissance eyeshadow palette was just recently made available for purchase on www.sephora.ca for C$55.00. These palettes are, to my knowledge, not yet available in Sephora Canada retail locations and I am unsure whether they will be releasing it in stores.



The Modern Renaissance palette has 14 shades, 3 shimmer and 11 matte, and a double-ended eyeshadow brush (BONUS: It also has a decent sized mirror!). After swatching, I thought that each of the shadows were super pigmented and creamy. The most pigmented shadows were, as expected, the deep reds and oranges. I did find that the lightest matte shade, Tempera, was just the slightest bit chalky, but nothing that bothered me too much. In terms of wear, I have worn these shadows both with and without a primer underneath and both times my eyeshadow didn't budge, smear, crease, or look muddy at the end of the day. I always apply any shimmer shades with a flat shader brush dampened with MAC Fix+ to intensify the color and reduce fall-out, which definitely worked on the two shimmer shades in this palette. With the shadows I have used on my eyes, so far, all of them applied smoothly with great colour pay-off. You really only need a light hand when using this palette. The shades were quite easy to blend out and I found that it was very easy to correct any mistakes by going over an area again with the desired colour (be careful if you do decide to layer shades, as it can begin to look muddy - mixing the reds and browns can also create a bruised eye look!). The double-ended eyeshadow brush included in the palette was, unfortunately, nothing to rave about. I loved the duo fibre dome brush - it was great for placing and blending out shadows in the crease and was super soft, but I found that the blending brush didn't blend out my shadows as well as some of the other blending brushes I own, shed fairly quickly, and was quite prickly for an ABH quality brush - not soft at all. The idea of double-ended brushes for anything other than travelling is also a no-no for me, as they are quite difficult to store without damaging at least one end of the brush.

I would imagine that many people would purchase this palette solely for the red shades in here alone; however, this is a very Autumn-inspired palette with a good mix of "bruise" shades. A few concerns and warnings for anyone who does decide to purchase this palette is to be very weary of the placement of the red shades on your eyes and the colour combinations you decide to use. Placing a red shade on your lower lashline can make you look very washed out and sometimes ill looking. If you do decide to add a pop of colour to your eye look this way, make sure to smoke it out with a neutral to warm mid-tone brown shade. Also, be careful which shades you decide to use in combination with each other, as any eye look achieved using the reds in this palette can begin to look like a "bruised"- or "black"-eye when all the colours have been blended together. With that said, I think that if you're careful with the pigmentation and colour combinations, the looks that can be created with this palette can absolutely be stunning and bring an unexpected pop of colour to your make-up look.

Overall, I'm super impressed with the quality of this palette and would 100% recommend it to my girls/guys who are on the hunt for some stunning red and orange-toned shadows. The palette in its entirety was very highly pigmented, smooth, and easy to work with, and I enjoyed using at least one end of the double-ended brush. The eyeshadows stayed put all day without smudging and didn't crease even when I decided against using a primer.

I really want to use the more vibrant red shades in this palette, but I find myself wanting to wait until Fall to bust those out. Let me know if you have any ideas as to how I can incorporate those shades into a Summer look and leave me any links to tutorials that you loved using this palette, I could use the inspiration!

Xo,
Marian