Sally Hansen’s Troublemaker (500)

Now discontinued, but I'm glad I grabbed a bottle of this before it disappeared. It isn't my favorite standalone manicure color (I reach for cooler purples more quickly than warm purples), but the formula's fairly good, and I can use it for some interesting nail-art and colorblocking.

CND’s Vinylux Lost Labyrinth (191)

This color almost looks like a slight duochrome - somewhat similar to Color Club’s Sky High, but with a lighter blue base. I get full opacity with two coats, and it lasts a week with CND’s Vinylux top coat. This is a great spring color and it’s...

Beauty from the Earth’s Demeter

Not new-leaf green, it's too saturated for that. If you're not good friends with saturated, clear jeweltone colors you'll have problems wearing this one. If, on the other hand, you haven't met a jeweltone eyeshadow you didn't love, you DEFINITELY need to pick this one up.

TKB Trading’s Softs collection

A dozen colorants made up of “pigment over bismuth oxychloride substrate” according to TKB’s website. They’re effectively a satin finish, and they are “ready to wear” meaning you can use them as color cosmetics straight out of the bag; but you still might want to use either a...

BareMinerals’ Velvet Escape kit

When BE debuted its “velvet” and “satin” eyecolors, I was more impressed with the satins. I still kind of am…but BE appears to have tweaked the formula a bit more, to develop better-pigmented matte eyeshadows. This is good. Now if only there was a wider range of colors in...

CND’s Vinylux Flora and Fauna collection

Five…no, not brighter colors, not precisely pastels, but…almost like muted pastel-brights. (Weird description, but I cannot seem to settle on how best to describe this palette.) I grabbed six of these polishes the instant they went on sale! The colors are very much my preference: not pastels, some...

Concrete Minerals’ West Coast

BareMinerals’ Splendor

Shows more red when foiled, shows more brown when applied dry…and shows as buff-pinkish-purple in the pot. (This color seriously can't make up its mind. Or it's versatile as hell, take your pick.) I like eyeshadows that are this versatile! It can be problematic building a daily look if...

Concrete Minerals’ Bandit

I thought this was going to be a bit more neutral than it turned out to be. Closer to a neutral-ish red than a brown, but…that works well for me. The shadow itself is a little powdery, so I definitely need to use this over a primer and use...

BareMinerals’ Bouquet kit

Not the most thrilling assemblage of colors, but a nice change…in that there’s no brown One yellow, one orange, one pink (which works as a blush or an eye color.) Petunia is, in my opinion, the weakest performer in this kit; but it works fairly well with the...