One Week, One Palette: Kat Von D Monarch

For the sixth week of my one week, one palette project, I went with the oldest palette in my collection: Kat Von D Monarch. 

At one point, this was one of my favorite palettes, and I think it's because it was different than all my other ones. At the time when this first launched, there weren't many palettes with orange shadows, especially combined with silver and taupes, so this was really a unique palette for a while. 

I was really looking forward to this week in the project because Monarch is easily the least-used palette in my collection. And I never understood why I wasn't reaching for it. I would look at the colors and know that they were pretty and know I could get great look from them. But I had only used it once in at least a year, probably longer. So I was excited to have the opportunity to use it exclusively for one week. 

Top, from left: Entomology, Telepathy, and Tiny Death

Bottom, from left: Wrath, Papilio, Summerfly, Killing Jar, Delaney, Vanish, Disintegration, Shadow Box, and Deadhead

I used every shade in the palette last week and brought in one additional shadow. The biggest "flaw" in Monarch for me personally is that Vanish is the only transition shade available. And it is much cooler than what I like to use. I typically like a peach transition shade, so for a few looks last week I also used bareMinerals Velvet Pecan:

As usual, I used Make Up For Ever Pearl on my inner corner every day. 

Below are five looks I did last week:

Look 1:

Summerfly on the lid, Vanish and bareMinerals Velvet Pecan blended into the crease, Wrath padded onto the outer corner, and Entomology on the brow bone. 

Look 2:

Disintegration on the lid, Telepathy padded on top of Disintegration, bareMinerals Velvet Pecan and Wrath blended into the crease, Shadow Box padded onto the outer corner, and Entomology on the brow bone. 

Look 3:

Killing Jar on the lid, Vanish and Wrath blended into the crease, Shadow Box padded onto the outer corner, and Tiny Death on the brow bone.

Look 4:

Delaney on the lid, Telepathy padded on top of Delaney on the center of the lid, Vanish in the crease, Deadhead padded onto the outer corner and into the crease, and Tiny Death on the brow bone.

Look 5:

Wrath on the lid, bareMinerals Velvet Pecan blended into the crease, Papilio blended to deepen the crease, Deadhead padded onto the outer corner and blended into the crease, and Tiny Death on the brow bone. 

In the weeks since I've first started this project, I've tried to do at least six looks with each palette. I had a sixth look planned of using Papilio on the lid with Telepathy padded on top of it, but I cut this project off one day early. I imagine the look would have been similar to look 2. 

I cut the project off a day early because I wasn't enjoying the palette and because I was just sad in general. Putting dark, depressing colors onto my eyes wasn't helping my mood, and putting on my eyeshadow felt more like a chore than enjoyable. 

The election results hit me hard as a woman, an American, and a human being. I have never before felt the terrified, unsettling, and helpless ache that has resided in me since Tuesday evening. Look 4 (which I did on Wednesday) and look 5 eventually ended up in a dark, crusty blurred mess from me crying. I had black, silver, and orange streaks down my cheeks. And because of this project, I think I'll always think of this week when I look at the Monarch palette. 

Other than my emotional hardship with the palette, I felt on the whole that it was just too dark for me. I like the first four shades on the bottom row, but the rest look so dark and cool-toned for me that it was hard to draw inspiration or get really excited about using them. 

Wrath and Telepathy are my favorite shadows in the palette, and they have been since I first purchased it. I love wearing Wrath all over the lid, and love what it does when blended through the crease. Telepathy is gorgeous on its own, but it's also one of those transforming shadows that changes the look of whatever is underneath it. I love Telepathy applied over the shimmery dark browns and think it gives both colors a really beautiful brass or antiqued bronze look. 

Summerfly was once a favorite of mine, but man, the glitter fallout on it is bad. Really, really bad. No matter what I did, I had glitter all over my face for the rest of the day. For the life of me I can't figure out why brands allow that to happen. No one likes the look of glitter fallout, even people who love glitter on their eyes and face. 

Killing Jar left me wanting a little more. The color just felt too subtle to me and was very close to my natural skin tone. I would have appreciated if the shade was more pink or golden or something. Tiny Death makes no sense to me. It's a matte off-white color that is infused with glitter particles that largely don't translate onto the skin. Why even put the glitter in there? I liked the color of it better than Entomology for a brow bone shade on me, but was always annoyed to find the stray piece of glitter by my eyebrow. 

I had never touched Deadhead before this project and was surprised that I used it two days in a row. It's true that black can really nicely smoke out a look, but it's just not a look that I typically like on myself. Paring Deadhead with Wrath looked pretty, but I felt strongly that I had "Halloween eyes."

While I think all the looks I came up with were pretty and flattering on me, I didn't have any favorite looks of the week, which I think is pretty telling. 

When I told my friend about my struggle using the palette last week, she said at least I found something to declutter. And that's where I've struggled with this. Since Monarch is discontinued, it gives me some pause, especially since I love Wrath and Telepathy so much. I have two orange shades in my Shade and Light Eye and Viseart Neutral Matte palettes that would likely replicate the effect of Wrath. Telepathy, however, is truly unique to my collection, and I like how it transforms the other shadows. Because of this, at first I didn't think I would be decluttering. 

But now that a few more days have passed since I stopped using Monarch, I think I am going to declutter it. I didn't use it for the majority of a year, so Telepathy can't be that special or important of a shadow for me. The color selection is too dark and somewhat cool-toned and doesn't inspire me, and frankly, it's going to remind me for a long while of this shitty, shitty week where I thought I was going to feel on top of the world as a woman instead of sickened. 

Despite the sad events of the week and not enjoying using my palette, I didn't feel the urge to buy new makeup, and that's a small victory for me. Even though I didn't love using Monarch the way I have loved pretty much every other palette in this project, I still felt that there were so many possibilities with it, and that really made me feel the full scope of my palette collection. In the end, I'm glad I gave Monarch a full chance rather than just using it once in a while for one of the looks I liked. I'm glad I was able to see using it five days in a row that it just wasn't a palette I enjoyed using. That's just as valuable of an experience for me as discovering how much I love a palette when using it consistently.