Entries for Monday May 21
TKB Trading’s Athena
- Vendor: TKB Trading
- Availability: part of the regular line
- Color Range: medium brown shimmer
- Staying Power: 3 out of 4
- Cost/Amount: USD$14 for one ounce
- Would you purchase again: yes
- Similar shades:
The shimmer is definitely muted, on dry application; and is even a bit softer on wet application than it appears in the pot. Compared to Aladdin’s Lamp, which displays a warm red-silver-gold shimmer even applied dry, this color’s performance is almost sedate. It’s nice, though, to have a straight mica that acts a little bit more like a traditional eyeshadow-with-pigment-and-base. (And this is marketed as a mica, with some titanium dioxide but not much. It needs a base of some kind to adhere to your skin, even with wet or damp application.) I haven’t tried using this to contour, though with its slightly deeper brown base I’d imagine it would look fairly attractive on the inner vee, or the outer lid. It might not work quite so well in the crease, unless you were looking specifically for a softer brown that wasn’t “au naturel” shadowing. Just…remember the base. This does appear to have a bit of a base, but it is mica, so migration and fading are a distinct possibility if you just apply it the same way you apply regular shadows.
Lost in Makeupland’s Them Bones
- Vendor: Lost in Makeupland
- Availability: from the webstore; part of the Alice's Chains collection
- Color Range: pale faded yellow sheen
- Staying Power: 3 out of 4 stars
- Cost/Amount: USD$5.99 for 1.2 grams
- Would you purchase again: yes
- Similar shades:
The shades from the Alice’s Chains collection didn’t really appeal to me much. I’m not quite sure why - perhaps because they were mostly warmer shades, when I tend to prefer neutral and favor cool shades? Alice’s Chains contained a bright orange, a medium-bright yellow-green, a warm fuchsia, and this shade. This is a very soft, faded yellow with minimal shimmer. It isn’t quite what I often define as a “sheen”, which means that the color is semisheer; but it’s not got much of a shimmer nor a satin or plush finish, either. I could see using this as a blending shade, especially to soften the line between neutral and gold-toned shades; but it’s just a bit too pigmented and lacking in shimmer to make a good highlighter for me. Golden-toned or -undertoned skin types may be able to use this as a softer brow highlighter, or browbone color.