Em Cosmetics Beach Life Palette: Poolside Look

I'm really quite enjoying playing around with this Beach Life Palette by Em Cosmetics. There's just a lot of choice, and what with the huge range of reviews from saying "I returned this" to "this is the best palette ever", of course you have to find out yourself what really works in order to get a good impression. I decided to go a bit brighter and more out-there today, and went for the fourth quadrant of the palette that has got a lot of blues and shimmery white.

This quadrant has actually got quite a few impressive shadows. The blues are fantastically pigmented, and the shimmery white highlight is particularly vibrant. The majority are smooth and show a lot of colour in just one swipe, the exception for this, however, is that peachy pink eyeshadow. That one is actually a bit rough in texture, nowhere near as smooth as the others. None of them really kick up that must dust either, not even the white shade which I fare to be the butter-iest, but the dark blue shade (like the dark shade of the third quadrant) does have the slightest bit of fluff to it. Again, a shame because it's so dark and close to the lip products.

The lipgloss is pretty nice, a bit more solid than the lipgloss from the Sunshine Lover look, but it is quite pale, so it doesn't work too well on my pigmented lips and skintone. The lipstick is very, very soft and squishy, I can't imagine this being in an actual bullet form. It's of sheer pigmentation too, but a nice orange tone.

The blush is really nice in this quadrant too, it's very smooth and quite pigmented. No dust either. It has a slight sheen to it, maybe a little more than a satin finish, but really no shimmers in it. It leans more pink than in the pan which I quite like, but it does keep the peachy coral undertone. This is really nice for, I would assume, almost all skintones, even much paler and deeper skintones alike.

left to right, without flash: anti-clockwise starting from the top left corner

With Flash

I used the designated look again for this quadrant called "Poolside". These eyeshadows apply really nicely on the eyes, pretty much on par to the swatches and they blend really well, the peachy pink applies better than the swatch, though. This is really quite the frosty look, because of the combination of the blue and the white in particular, so I suppose this could be a look for a "pool party" I suppose. But it still quite bright. I used the dark blue for a liner as I wanted a more deeper liner look, just to contrast a bit better with all the lighter shades. As much as I love how easy it is to line with the shadow using the angled brush included, the order of instructions perplexes me, in that you line your eyes and then add the shadows. It diffuses the line a bit too much for my liking.

The blush is really quite nice, a bit more sheer on my skintone, but I like going light on the blush. It probably would have worked better with a denser brush, but the eyes were so bright, I was hoping for a more neutral rest of the face. 

I used the lipgloss for this look, it is quite light and sheer even though the designated look says that the lipgloss is more for a 'pop' look, I don't really see it being a 'pop' colour.

Before

After

Close-up of the eyes

While I do like that they give you looks to follow, it does use a bit too many of the colours, I feel, and the order is a bit whack. If you're following the look given, it really almost defeats one of the main ideas of the palette being that it's for the woman on-the-go. There are quite a few steps, and the liner pretty much disappears after applying the other shadows, but it's nice if you apply it on the lower lash line, especially the deep blue. These shades will probably make it into my favourites from the palette, just based on how smooth and pigmented they are. I don't think they are the creamiest I've ever tried, but they can probably gain the "luxury" name these are meant to have. Again, a more out-there look, but if you love blues, these are pretty decent.