Wednesday, May 16, 2012

Urban Decay Book of Shadows IV Review

    Hello Beauty Junkies! As I mentioned in a previous post, I recently made a purchase from Hautelook.com when they had their Urban Decay sale. I'm breaking my review into two parts because the review on just the Book of Shadows IV is a fairly long one by itself. Stay tuned for a review on the rest of the product I purchased!


    The main reason I made this purchase was for the Book of Shadows IV (or BOS IV as I will sometimes refer to it). This palette came out awhile ago and while all the Book of Shadows are awesome, this one just really didn't catch my eye, especially with a $62 price tag. I assume many other UD junkies felt the same way because the last two Books of Shadow, I Heart NY and Alice in Wonderland, sold out rather quickly right off the bat and have never been a sale item. Anyway, when I saw this palette on sale on Hautelook.com for $24 I figured it was a steal. Urban Decay palettes are always worth the money because if you purchased each shadow individually at $18, it would end up costing $288. It also gives you great variety in your look instead of purchasing one or two shadows by themselves and each palette comes with a small bottle of shadow Primer Potion. This palette also came with a full size 24/7 liquid eyeliner, a small tube of Super Curling Mascara and a little speaker with a USB cable. The speaker is to be used with a smart phone. There is a little card included with QRC bar codes you can with your phone and it takes you to several tutorials.

    So far, my satisfaction with this palette has been a little across the board. I would assume all UD shadows are made with the same quality, but when I used Blue Bus (blue shade, top left corner) and Gravity (second row from top, purple second from the left) the color didn't transfer to my lid. Instead of Blue Bus being a periwinkle with a purplish shift like it is in the cake, it looked like a smudgy, dirty mess. Gravity was the same way. Instead of being a soft dark purple, it looked blackish and dirty. I ended up trashing this look and removing these shadows. On a different occasion, I used Bender (green shade, first in second row under Blue Bus) and got the same results. Instead of being a nice green, it looked like a blackish smudge with no real color definition. I have never ran into an Urban Decay eye shadow I didn't like, so this was disappointing to me.
    
     On the other hand, I have used Zephyr (white shade, bottom right hand corner) several times as a highlighter and it is awesome. Its a golden white tone that is great for the corner of eyes and under the brow bone. I also used Bust (bottom left hand corner), Missionary (right of Bust) and Lost (brown tone under black shadow, second row) in a natural look and was pleased with their texture and color payoff. I am very excited to use Crystal (light blue shadow above Zephyr). It is a very pretty light blue with a silvery shift. If anyone recalls the scene in the movie Everafter when Drew Barrymore's character is in the ball gown with the wings, she has a "mask" painted on her face that is bluish, iridescent with shimmer and glitter. This shadow would be perfect for that look. Haha sorry for the tangent, just had to share what this color reminded me of. Another perk to the shadows is this palette is not many are repeats and ten were new shades. If you are a UD fan and you have several palettes like I do, you being to accumulate a few popular repeat shades such as Midnight Cowboy Rides Again, Sin and Bake.  Anyway, while I am not 100% pleased with all the shadows, at $24 it  was still worth the buy.

     Included in this palette was a full sized tube of 24/7 Waterproof Liquid Eyeliner. I have used this several times and have liked it for the most part. The brush is very small, which I like because it makes it easier to maneuver around your eyelashes, especially if they are curled. The formula is pretty black in color, another thing I like, but it tends to get a little shiny. I prefer my liquid eyeliners to dry very dark matte black. I have yet to use it on my bottom lash line and am a bit reluctant because it's more likely to get in my eye that way and sometimes that stuff really burns! What I don't like about this liner is the way it comes off. It peels off in little pieces that got stuck in my eyelashes that weren't easy to get out, even with my heavy duty makeup remover. I'm glad it came with this palette, however I'm not sure I would purchase it at $19 by itself.
    
     Also included with this palette was a small tube of mascara in Urban Decays Super Curl formula. After a few uses, this mascara is okay. It didn't curl my lashes as promised and isn't waterproof so it couldn't even hold a curl from my eye lash curler. It did go on very smooth and I liked the shape of the brush and its bristles. Every lash got clump free coating which is always nice. This formula gets great reviews on the Urban Decay website, however since it's not waterproof it's pretty much a deal breaker for me. You can buy this travel size for $10 if you'd like to give it a try. Stay tuned for a post on my favorite mascaras and eye lash curling tips!
    The small speaker is kind of cool, but it doesn't really give your phone any extra volume. I didn't find the speaker necessary to play the tutorials from my smart phone. The tutorials are useful, especially if you are a beginner and gave some fun, funky looks you can do with this palette. Overall, I feel a booklet of instructions or just the address of the tutorials would have been more effective than the speaker/USB system and the palette probably would have cost less.

     Overall, it was worth the $24 to purchase this palette. However, I would not have purchased this palette at regular price. I feel part of the reason this palette was more expensive (UD BOS are usually around $50-$53) was because they included the USB equipment and the speaker which were completely unneeded. The small primer potion and mascara were nice perks and I was very happy it came with the full size liquid eye liner because I have been wanting to try it for awhile. Not a terrible palette, but it didn't live up to the expectations I hold for Urban Decay. I've been happy with every shadow palette before this and I own seven! You can still purchase this product on UrbanDecay.com for $29.

Stay tuned for my May Birchbox review! 



    


1 comment:

  1. I've always wanted to get volume 4 but its just so expensive. I do love Midnight Rodeo so much though. I like how its not overly glittery. Great review chick x
    Heroine In Heels

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