Weekly Looks: MAC, Natasha Denona, Juvia's Place, Colourpop, Kat Von D, and more

I hit a snag this week in terms of makeup. I've been feeling a lack of inspiration for a while now, but I really felt it this week. I think I was still able to come up with some cool looks that I really enjoyed, but I'm certainly feeling "pressure" to come up with a new look every single day. And, frankly, that has become a little exhausting. On days where I feel inspired to play, it's so fun to come up with something new. But other days, like the majority of this week, I just haven't been in the mood, and looking at my makeup collection felt like looking at a full closet and feeling like there was nothing to wear.

I'm also prepping for a major life change that will happen next week, so that is likely the reason for the lack of inspiration. Nonetheless, I feel like I maybe want to start my "one week, one palette" project again. I can't promise that will happen, but I think it might be a good place for me to start and get my bearings again.

With that said, this week, I mainly pulled from my single shadows and custom or duped palettes.

Here are five looks I did this week.

Look 1: MAC Satin Taupe

Lid: MAC Satin Taupe

Transition: MAC Quarry

Crease: Ardency Inn Violet

Inner corner: Kat Von D Saphyre

Brow bone: Wet N Wild Brûlée

Lower lash line: Juvia's Place Dalia

Look 2: Natasha Denona Industrial and Nina's Orchid 

Lid: Natasha Denona Industrial 

Transition: Makeup Geek Cupcake 

Crease: Natasha Denona Nina's Orchid 

Inner Corner: Makeup Geek Phantom 

Brown Bone: Wet N Wild Brûlée

Lower lash line: Natasha Denona Nina's Orchid

Look 3: Juvia's Place Zola

Lid: Juvia's Place Zola

Transition: Kat Von D pink

Crease: Colourpop Silver Lining

Inner Corner: Kat Von D Saphyre

Brown Bone: Wet N Wild Brûlée

Lower lash line: Makeup Geek Caitlin Rose

Look 4: Colourpop Come and Get It

Lid: Colourpop Come and Get It

Transition: Inglot 361 matte

Crease: Inglot 392 matte

Outer corner: Coloured Raine Ladyship 

Inner Corner: Coloured Raine Crown

Brow bone: Too Faced Satin Sheets

Lower lash line: Ardency Inn Orchid

Look 5: Kat Von D Saint and Sinner

Lid: Worship

Transition: Sacred Heart

Crease: Rosary

Outer corner: Exorcism

Inner corner: Absolution

Brow bone: Baptism

Lower lash line: Worship

Look 1: MAC Satin Taupe

I recently added Satin Taupe and Quarry to this palette, and I have to say that I was really disappointed with how they looked. I don't know if I was just having an off day, but the colors looked really muddy to me. And I don't mean that they muddied together, I mean they looked dirty. I tried to spruce this look up with some purple and vibrant blue, but it felt like a loss all the way around. 

Look 2: Natasha Denona Industrial and Nina's Orchid

This look came out of my duped/reimagined Modern Renaissance palette, and I really enjoyed it. I think these taupe silver shades pair so nicely with a purple in the crease, and I really loved how this look turned out overall.

Look 3: Juvia's Place Zola

This was definitely my favorite look of the week, and I love how beautifully Zola pairs with pinks and purples. I was again reminded how much I love Colourpop Silver Lining, and I am always shocked that many people think it's terrible. (Even Temptalia gave it an F rating!) I don't typically buy into the "maybe I just got a bad batch" excuse that many people give when a product performs poorly, but I genuinely feel like I have a better pan of this shadow than most. This was a really fun look for me and is an easy way, I feel, to wear color without feeling like you are overdoing it.

Look 4: Colourpop Come and Get It

One of the reasons I want to do a one week, one palette project soon is because I want to use this palette for an entire week and just get all the sunset looks out of my system. (Who are we kidding, I would need to do at least a one month, one palette project for that.) I love this palette, but I know that it is also a very pink/purple/berry/orange palette. And maybe I'm not all that creative, but there are only so many looks I can do with a palette like this that aren't going to look totally similar. Luckily, I love the look of pinks and purples in the crease, so that doesn't bother me, but I don't know how interesting it would make these weekly posts. Either way, I loved this look.

Look 5: Kat Von D Saint and Sinner

(This palette was given to me as a gift.)

On an almost daily basis, I reach for this palette thinking that I want to use it and then I put it away because I can't think of a new look to do with it. I haven't wanted to make the obvious neutral looks with it, and most days I'm just not feeling a lime green on the lid with orange in the crease. I believe I've done a version of this look before, but it was one that I liked and wanted to revisit. I like how this look turned out, but I think I would have liked it more if the colors were swapped and there was pink on the lid with purple in the crease. I wear a version of a look like that all the time, so I guess that makes sense. I do like this palette overall, but I continually find it difficult to spark inspiration.

What I'm Not Buying: Kat Von D Saint and Sinner Palette

It's that time again—holiday products are out in full swing, which means the reviews, hype, and hysteria are coming right along with them. And I thought I would start off this year's holiday anti-hauls by talking about the product that most piqued my interest: Kat Von D Saint and Sinner palette. 

I won't be buying. 

Now, before I get into this post, I would like to address the fact that things have been a little quiet on the blog lately. I had some big life events happen and also gained a lot of seriously needed perspective. And, I've been on a much needed vacation to several gorgeous European cities. But I'm back, and ready to get to work to reduce some of the holiday hype. 

So, the Saint and Sinner palette. I don't really have any makeup "regrets" in terms of not buying something—my makeup regrets come from buying things I didn't need. But I will say that for the last two years, I have chosen not to buy the Kat Von D holiday palettes, and some time later thought, "Hmm, I may have liked owning that." And I will just be completely transparent. Some of that for me is in the spectacle of the packaging. I didn't buy Mi Vida Loca Remix because at the time I did not wear color, but the color wheel aspect remains beautiful to me (though the practicality of it is nonexistent). However, the colors can be found elsewhere, so I have never thought that was a true loss. And last year, I loved the cover art of the Metal Matte palette and also loved how enormous it was. But, as I wrote in my anti-haul post, I did not need that palette. 

But, even though I made the right decision two years in a row to not buy the Kat Von D holiday palettes, I still had a moment or two where I thought if those palettes were available, I would buy them. And because of that, I told myself I would consider buying what was available this year. 

But I've gotta say—this palette is definitely not one for me. 

The most interesting thing about this palette, in my opinion, is the packaging: 

As always, Kat Von D products win the packaging award in terms of originality, but I have to admit that a cathedral window is not something I personally am interested in. I can certainly appreciate the artistry behind it, but it is not for me. I also appreciate that the doors open:

And that the colors are arranged to looked like a stained-glass window. 

But, in my opinion, that's where the arrangement of these shadows stops making sense. 

I don't like the way this palette is arranged, it doesn't feel cohesive to me, and it doesn't spark interest or inspiration in me. But more than that, when I first saw this palette, I thought it looked so similar to two previous Kat Von D holiday palettes.

Star Studded:

And Spellbound:

And the biggest complaint I heard about both of these palettes was that the color schemes just didn't inspire people, and as a result, they were never used. And I can see the same thing happening with Saint and Sinner. 

I've seen Saint and Sinner talked about many times, and I've even seen people rearrange the colors in Photoshop so that the palette looks more cohesive and workable. And what's so interesting to me is that a lot of people decided to buy this palette after seeing the Photoshopped images. And to me, that just seems like people trying to find any reason to buy a new, hyped item. That is not to say that you can't find inspiration in rearranging colors and looking at colors in a new light—that is something that has been immensely helpful for me and is an exercise I find really valuable. But I think that works best when you apply that to what you already own instead of applying that to a new product you are trying to convince yourself is worth buying. 

When I looked at the swatches, I was even less impressed:

The top swatches have at least three white and three silver shades, and the rest of the colors are pretty basic and exist somewhere in my collection already. And the bottom swatches look like my NYX Fire palette:

As well as Colourpop Yes, Please!:

And again, there seems to be quite a bit of repetition in the bottom swatches. There are two red/orange shades and two yellow shades, and when you look at the two swatch photos together, there are two black shades as well as a deep purple that may come off similar to black on the eye, and four taupe/brown shades. Now, I'll be the first to say that the swatches look much more repetitive than the colors actually look in the palette, which tells me that these swatches (like almost all swatches provided by a brand) are unreliable. 

While the exact color scheme of this palette doesn't really remind me of anything other than the two older Kat Von D holiday palettes, I see a general similarity in the NYX Olive You palette:

As well as the NYX Earth palette:

The Saint and Sinner palette costs $62, which makes sense given that the palette contains 24 shadows. I will argue, however, that the palette does not contain 24 unique shades as I feel there is a lot of overlap. For me personally, this palette is not at all worth that cost. Now, there are things about this palette that I do appreciate, such as the always impressive packaging. I also feel like Kat Von D makes their holiday offerings for the makeup lover rather than the average consumer, who I feel most holiday palettes are geared toward. 

But $62 is also a lot of money to spend on some packaging, and I do feel that is the main reason people will be drawn to this palette and want to buy it. I'm willing to bet that most people have the majority of these colors in their collection already, and for the colors you might not have (like three different silvers) it might be because you don't wear those shades. If you're drawn to the warmer swatches, I would look into the Yes, Please! or Fire palettes. And if you're drawn to the earth tones, I would look into the two palettes from NYX or some singles to complement the colors you already have in your collection. 

I get that the makeup industry is so incredibly saturated right now that it is essentially impossible for a brand to come out with something that is unique, innovative, and somewhat trendy. But at the same time, I find this color scheme to be so erratic that it really turns me off. Added to that, half the palette doesn't read "saint" to me, nor "sinner," so I really don't get the theme as it relates to the actual product and not packaging. The colors just look like they were assembled at random, and part of me wonders if that was done in part to trick people into thinking they didn't already have these colors in their collections. Because, like I've said many times before, there is a lot of effort that goes into curating palettes to make it look like the colors are unique when they are not. 

But the main issue I find with Saint and Sinner is that there 24 shadows and only a handful of looks that I personally can see myself wearing. And of those looks, there are a whopping zero that I can't create with items I already have in my collection. So, this will have to be another Kat Von D holiday palette that I pass on. And I'm okay with that. I don't need to add another palette to my collection, especially one with giant, impractical packaging. I don't find the color scheme inspiring, cohesive, or unique, and it really feels like Kat Von D is just recycling old holiday palette shades. I don't need this, so I won't be buying.