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It’s the first makeup review of 2020! WOO! Excitement!

In my 2020 Blog Resolutions Post (see it here) I talked about how I want to be more regular and consistent with makeup reviews. I’ve picked up a ton of new products lately, eyeshadow palettes especially, and I definitely need to start reviewing! Makeup is my other love besides nail polish, so I want to incorporate it even more into the blog. As always, nail polish will be #1, but I’m just expanding the blog out to include even more topics that excite and interest me!

Now let’s look at this palette, shall we? Over Black Friday, I made a large Colourpop haul of mainly a ton of their eyeshadow palettes I’ve been wanting. They’re all so affordable and I just love all of the color schemes. Safe to say Colourpop fully has me, and they can just take my money.

And along with that large Black Friday, I still wasn’t satisfied. Colourpop had also recently released a trio of Ulta exclusive palettes, that all were themed as part of their larger butterfly collection. Two of these 3 caught my eye, and I couldn’t stop thinking about them so I grabbed them after my brother gave me an Ulta gift card for my birthday. (It was also 5x points that day, so I almost had to, right?) I ended up passing on the 3rd palette that was included in that release (see I DO pass on some of them, okay). It was more orange-toned and featured a lot of shades that I already owned, so I just wasn’t in love with it.

As mentioned, these are 2 new palettes that were released together, but I’ll still be reviewing them separately and giving full reviews. I’ll compare them together in the 2nd post as well, so if you’re just looking for 1 you can base it on your color preferences.

So let’s begin with the 1st of the two! It’s called ‘Gimme Butterflies’ and it’s the lighter and more coral-toned of the 2, in the light pink packaging. These palettes are currently Ulta exclusives, though I’m sure they’ll be brought onto the Colourpop website sometime soon – like they did with the Love Bird 9-pans. They’re no longer showing on the Ulta website, but I did pick mine up in stores, so I’m sure there are still displays. They retailed for $18 each.

The packaging, as mentioned above, continues their butterfly theming that we saw started with the Flutter By collection. It’s the standard cardboard packaging, and does not have a mirror (I never use a palette mirror when getting ready, so this never bothers me).

It does have glitter detailing all around that I absolutely love. Colourpop always has the cutest packaging. It’s pretty fine, and doesn’t feel super textured. It’s set down well and won’t leave glitter fallout wherever it’s stored.

And here’s the palette inside! As you can see it’s one of their traditional 12 pan palettes. It features 6 mattes (Woke, Making Moves, Fair Play, Glider, Labyrinth, Skipper); 3 shimmers (Ur a Catch, Over It, Winged); 1 matte with glitter (Bloomin’); and 2 pressed glitters (Get Lost and Overpacked).

And here are the swatches! As you can see it leans to a more warm, berry-toned neutral, with some bright pops of pink and that gorgeous bright pink-red matte.

You can see the first glitter ‘Get Lost’ has a shimmery gold-peach shifting base with larger gold pieces, and large iridescent hexagons.

‘Overpacked’ is a dense, smaller glitter with tones of pink, blue and gold to it.

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For this one, I only have one eye look here, but you can see the tone of color you can get from this palette. (Another thing moving forward in 2020 is writing down and checking off eye looks I’ve done especially with larger palettes, this is all mainly talking to myself.

This is using ‘Making Moves’ in the crease, ‘Glider’ in the outer third of the crease, ‘Bloomin’ to deepen the outer corner, ‘Over It’ on the inner lid, ‘Ur a Catch’ on the browbone and ‘Get Lost’ glitter patted onto the inner corner.

(Also ugh, I wish I had natural daylight all the time. I would love to take photos with it always, but it’s winter and I don’t always get that precious sunlight! Hopefully this year I can figure out more consistent lighting for the times I don’t have sunlight)

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Alright, now into the review!

Up first, let’s talk about the elephant in the room: the pressed glitters. Of course, they are labeled with the little star and “not for use in the immediate eye area’ on the back of the palette (there are a couple of other shades labeled with that as well because of the brighter pigments in them can stain the eye area a little). As far as I know, technically no glitter can be labeled as “eye safe” and this is always a warning that Colourpop will put on their glitters. I know a lot of people don’t like them and won’t use them, and in the end it’s deciding at your own risk. Glitters can get into your eye and irritate them, and if you have especially sensitive eyes, it can be something to skip. I personally choose to wear them, but of course I would never force my decision onto anyone else!

Alright, mandatory disclaimer over! I am in the minority and have been enjoying the Colourpop pressed glitters so much. They’re a great way to add extra sparkle to any look.

‘Overpacked’ is a smaller and more dense glitter. There’s no base color to this one, so I did prefer to tap it over another shade. It applied easily with my finger and distributed nicely. And once on the eyes, it stayed well, even over a powder shadow. Colourpop’s glitters have something to them where they stick even without a glitter primer and I love that about them, as it makes it easy to just tap onto any look. I noticed a few pieces drop down during application, but that’s to be expected with glitters. And throughout the day, there was just a touch of glitter fallout under my eyes, but because of the smaller sized pieces, it’s not very noticeable at all and wasn’t crazy. I didn’t have any issues with it flaking off into my eyes and irritating them, and again the smaller size definitely helps that.

The other glitter, ‘Get Lost’ has more of a shimmery golden base with bigger gold glitters and larger iridescent hexagons. It does feel more emollient than ‘Overpacked’ and tends to “squish” around more in the pan. It’s got a creamier feeling than ‘Overpacked’ which has a more “sandy” texture. Because of this squishier texture, I did find it was a little harder to pick up with a brush, so I did like using my finger to press it on more. The larger hexagons can be harder to pick up as well, and can place a little more scattered than the rest of the glitter. It does have more of a base to it, so it will add shimmer to any shade underneath – I loved using it as an inner corner look. I didn’t notice any sort of glitter fallout from the base, but the larger hexagons are more likely to flake and fall off throughout the day. They are ones that I could see potentially irritating the eye if it was to fall in so keep that in mind. Overall, it felt like a cross of their super shocks and a pressed glitter. Not my all-time favorite as it was a little harder to pick up, and I didn’t love the larger hexagons, but I did enjoy using it in the inner corner, and it could be so fun tapped onto the face and cheeks for a festival look.

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Now onto the shimmers. As mentioned above, there are 3 shimmer shades. ‘Ur A Catch’ is a light champagne gold; ‘Over It’ is a peachy base with a gold shift; and ‘Winged’, a warm-toned pink shimmer.

I found all 3 of these shimmers were definitely a touch more “dry” and almost crumbly than some of the other Colourpop shimmers. They still picked up easily with both a brush and finger and applied well to the eyelid. But I did prefer to pack and almost “buff” them into the eyelid and inner corner more to get a more smooth looking base. I also preferred to just press them onto the lid with a finger to build up the color and shimmer.

I noticed a touch of shimmer fallout as I applied just because again of the more dry formula. I think these would benefit from being applied to a sticky base, as more of that shimmer would come through and stick to the lid. I’ve got a noticeable dent already in ‘Ur a Catch’ just from use of testing these, so that one is definitely the most crumbly. They also faded a little throughout the day, and I noticed super fine glitters underneath my eye throughout a full day of wear.

I do think these are nice overall but I would say not my favorite shimmer formula from Colourpop. I know they have more foiled and shiny shimmers out there that just pop on the lids, and are more creamy and smooth than how these shimmers feel. I have nothing against more satin shades, but even their normal satin finish shades are smoother than these. They’re fully usable, and I’ve enjoyed the looks I’ve made with them – I’m just being a little more harsh on them as I personally prefer Colourpop’s other shimmer formulas.

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And now onto the mattes! I think the mattes are the true stars of this palette. They’re so pigmented and easy to blend, and add bright pops of color for any eye look. The lighter shades start out more sheer and build up easily, and are great for transitions or blending out the edges of the brighter colors.

‘Glider’ can definitely be more intimidating, as it’s very pigmented right off the bat and can take a touch more blending just because of the bright color. It can be tapped off and built up more slowly if you’re a little more new to color. But it builds up nicely on itself into the full bright color you see in the pan. I can definitely see myself continuing to pull in that shade for bright pops of color.

I did count ‘Bloomin’ as a matte shade. It has glitters in it, but once applied onto the eyes, the glitter drops out and it performs as a matte. I didn’t notice any glitter fallout or any on my eyes when I used this shade. If you pick it up with a flat shader brush and pressed it onto the lid, you might notice more of the glitters. But overall it’s a lovely deep matte shade that you can use to add depth to any eye looks.

There was a touch of powder kickup in the pan – especially on the brighter and darker shades – but it wasn’t a lot and I didn’t notice any sort of fallout with application. I really have no complaints about the formula of any of these mattes, as they all performed so well on the eyes and were just easy to work with. If I had to make one small complaint, it would be that the two more purple-toned shades, ‘Fair Play’ and ‘Skipper’, were very similar once blended out on the eyes, so I do think one of them could have been a little more different.

I did notice a touch of pink staining on my eyelid after wearing the brighter shades, especially ‘Glider’ throughout a whole day – which is why these shades are marked with a star and marked not for use in the immediate eye area. It was gone by the next morning and was never something that was noticeable under other shades.

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And that’s the review! Overall, this was a nice palette and a nice addition to my Colourpop stash. I don’t regret buying this at all, and am glad to add it to my collection. The mattes were absolutely stunning and so blendable and pigmented. The shimmers were still nice, though just a touch more dry and crumbly than others. I enjoyed this palette a lot – but I know with the color story and the pressed glitters, it’ll come down to your own personal preference whether you’ll truly love and enjoy it. I’m just here to give you an honest feel for the formula, you’re the one who makes the last decision in the end!

Stay tuned for the 2nd review of this palette’s companion, ‘Butter Me Up’, coming shortly! That review will also include both palettes swatched next to each other so you can get the full idea and story!

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Upcoming Reviews
Nails: Holo Taco Launch Collection • Lights Lacquer Polished Gems • Revlon Holochrome Polishes • OPI Mexico City Spring 2019

Makeup: Revolution Pro All That Glistens • Colourpop Butter Me Up • Colourpop Smoke Show • Milani Gilded Noir

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