When I first saw the preview for the new things that were launching in autumn, this was the thing I was most excited about. I've been craving a nice chocolate palette for a while and have both I <3 Makeup Naked Chocolate and Too Faced Chocolate Palette on my wishlist, but never got round to buying them. I'm a fan of these Catrice palettes and including this one, I currently have four, however, as absolutely gorgeous as the shades in this palette are, in terms of quality this disappointed me. It's of course not a total fail, but it's not what I'm used to when it comes to Catrice.
I love the selection of shades - it's a half-half mix of matte and shimmery colours and it contains all the colours you need, from a matte skin tone base to a deep shade for outer corners. Surprisingly for Catrice, this time it's the matte shades that lack in pigmentation and quality, especially the third shade just isn't what I'm used to when it comes Catrice's eyeshadows.
First shade is a shimmery light champagne gold that I tend to use as an inner corner highlighter, but it looks lovely on the lid as well. This is one of the better performing ones as it's nicely pigmented. Second shade is a matte yellow-beige skin tone colour that serves as a base colour. It's more on the chalky side, but since it's a light base colour, this doesn't matter so much. But the next colour is very disappointing. It's dry, chalky and very difficult to build up as well as make it look even and blend. Otherwise the shade colour is lovely - a matte, medium brown, but how this passed the tests to be included in this palette, eludes me. Shade four is a shimmery version of the previous medium brown shade and it's much, much better in terms of quality. Fifth shade is a gorgeous coppery-bronze shade that was just made to make blue eyes pop. It's the most buttery shade in the palette and it reminds me of some shimmery shades in the Makeup Revolution palettes. It still needs a lot of building up the colour, but I love the final effect. The last shade is a warm deep brown with a matte finish and it's the best matte colour in the palette, however, it still leaves something to be desired. For one I wish it were darker because now it doesn't add enough depth to the outer corners.
These perform better with a primer, but still several layers are needed for a decent look. The eyeshadow that you see on my look is that coppery one, even though I used all shades in the palette. the outer corners just can't be deepened enough with that last shade, so it all looks more like one eyeshadow. Staying power on the other hand, isn't' bad and these also don't crease on me.
I expected so much more. Compared to other such palettes from Catrice, this just is not the same quality. I absolutely love the colours, so I'm gutted that the pigmentation isn't the best and I'm planning on getting a similar palette from a different brand. Absolute Matte is still my number one recommendation, closely followed by Absolute Nude. Absolute Rose lacks variety, but it's a lovely palette nonetheless.
I got my palette in Tuš Drogerija for 5.29 €
Have a great day!