Review: theBalm Meet Matt(e) Nude Palette

Thursday, July 17, 2014

Ah, this palette. I've had my eye on theBalm's Meet Matt(e) Nude Palette for ages. It was one of those items that I would see on sale and promise myself to get next time, over and over again. I finally ordered a few weeks back and I'm pretty thrilled with it.

Nine matte shades in neutralish shades. There's a trio of rich browns, a few cool purpley grey shades and pastels. The packaging is the pretty standard matte cardboard that graces many mid-range palettes.

Left to right: Johnson, Garcia, Malloy, Rosen, Wood, Singh, Abdul, Lombardi and Hung. Swatched over bare skin, if you can believe it.

Really phenomenal pigmentation and a finely milled texture. These mattes really are superb. There isn't a single shade that is patchy or hard to blend. This palette is almost a home run.

Almost.

The thing is that while the shadows are of excellent quality, I find the colors a bit tricky. I'm just not able to do very many cohesive look from this one palette. I feel like I need a nude shadow perhaps, or a near black shade to near the lash line (plus I like to mix up my eye shadow finishes). So while this is a great palette, it wouldn't be an all inclusive palette to bring on a trip. However, you couldn't find a better palette to use at home to provide you with a great range of crease, transitional and matte highlight shades. Just use other shadows to supplement.

Here I've used Lombardi on the inner corner, Malloy on the brow bone and Wood to deepen the crease and the lower lash line. The green on the lid is Laura Mercier Sherazade and Catrice Don't Touch My Mosserati! Orange on the outer V is Bettina Fire Opal.

I've already shown you guys this look before but I wanted to point out specifically where I used theBalm Meet Matt(e) Nude. Malloy is under the brow again, I have deepened the outer V with Abdul and Hung.

I'm really happy that I -finally- talked myself into this palette. It's just incredibly useful to have.

theBalm Meet Matt(e) Nude Palette is regularly $42. However it goes on sale ALL the time on HauteLook (here's my affiliate link), usually 50% off. At sale price, I can't think of a single other all matte palette that would be comparable in quality.

Have you ever encountered an item that you had to talk yourself into over a long period of time, but you were very pleased with yourself when you finally did buy it?

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