Sleek i-Lust Hidden Gems Palette - First impressions and swatches

(Firstly let me apologise for the quality of the photos. My laptop is broken so I'm going between phone and small tablet, it's not fun but you gotta do what you gotta do.)

I didn't go into Superdrug today planning on buying make-up, all I wanted was some facial wipes and maybe a white eyeliner (which I didn't end up buying). However the facial wipes are opposite the make-up, go figure on that one, and when I saw this I had to have it. It's so pretty.

After doing a bit if research online, I found out this palette was only released today, and is part of the limited edition Rockstars collection by Sleek. I was a bit surprised about it only just being released as the display was almost completely wiped of stock. I know their eyeshadow palettes are great quality and the liquid lipsticks are good (full review of them here), but I didn't think they had a big enough following to pick a display clean in a couple of hours. 

So full details. The palette is £7.49 and you get six 1g eyeshadows. The palette is long and skinny, rather than the short rectangle design Sleek usually use. The pans are also larger and square rather than the small round ones in the i-Divine palettes. Although these square ones look bigger they are actually smaller, their regular palettes retail for £8.99 and contain twelve 1.1g pans. 

Sorry about the bad lighting in this photo.

So here's a shot of the inside of the palette. Its cute but nothing special. None of the cute geometric design from the front makes its way inside which is a shame, but the I prefer square to round pans and the colour selection looks good.

Colours L-R. Emerald City, Amethyst Sky, Amber City, Sapphire Blues, Ruby Tuesday, Diamond Dust

How do they swatch? Very well. Sleek's eyeshadows are some of my favourites and I find their sparkly metallic ones far better than the mattes so I expected them to be good.  So pretty. The silver and gold shades are a bit chunky and flakes but still blendable and have a very high colour pay off.

Here's a more close-up image of the swatches. I did another single fingers worth of eyeshadow over Emerald City, Amethyst Sky and Sapphire Blues to make the colour more intense. Emerald City is an almost duo-chrome green and brown shade.  Amethyst Sky is a metallic purple, but it has a lot of very fine multicoloured glitter in it that doesn't really show in the photos. Ruby Tuesday is my favourite though. I love a metallic red, as I might have told you, multiple times now.

Diamond Dust vs Urban Decays Frenzy

Diamond Dust on the left and Frenzy from the Electric palette on the right.

L-R, Diamond Dust brush swatch, Diamond Dust finger swatch, Frenzy finger swatch

This was more a test I did to satisfy my own curiosity than anything else. The Urban Decay Electric palette has an amazing silver in it, so I thought I'd compare them. 

Diamond Dust is a bit more chunky and has a darker, more gunmetal undertone and Frenzy is a very fine and smooth pigment with a very white silver colour. If you're looking for a crazy silver colour both are great. 

Overall final thoughts...

This palette is great quality and value. Its not something that you can build complete eye looks out of, but if you have a great collection of nudes and crease colours and just need something for a pop of colour, then this is your palette. 

XOXO Scruffy

Enquiry? Message me ascruffyduck@gmail.com 

Other Sleek reviews...

Sleek Matte Me Lipstick Reviews

Sleek Smoke & Mirrors Gift Set

Review and Lips Swatches: Sleek Matte Me Ultra Smooth Matte Lip Cream - Cruelty Free

When I thought about writing this post I was like, "Sleek, there's a brand I don't own a lot of stuff by". Then I thought about it and realised I own enough that I could probably give a fairly decent assessment of the brand (these lipsticks, a Primer, 2 Eyeshadow Palettes, a Cheek and Eye Palette and the Solstice Highlighter palette that's super famous).

Top to Bottom: Petal, Shabby Chic and Velvet Slipper

I'm always a little hesitant when it comes to square tubes, as if the caps don't line back up right it just bugs me. These have been designed to only do one complete turn so if you put the Sleek logo to the front and then put it on it ends up right where it should be. Its so satisfying.

Other than that, the packaging is very nice. I feel like the Primark ones might have based their packaging on these (full review of the Primark Liquid Lipsticks here). Its really sturdy and unlike the Primark ones the plastic is thick and heavy enough to stop it feeling cheap.

Top to Bottom: Petal, Shabby Chic and Velvet Slipper.

So I own three of these. Petal and Shabby Chic which I have had for a very long time, and Velvet Slipper, which I got more recently. In the top picture of the tubes Petal and Shabby Chic look very similar however once you have them out and swatch them you can how different they are. Petal is a very pale pinky colour and Shabby Chic is more of a grey-tone mauve colour.

Lip Swatches

Petal

Petal is a gorgeous soft pink. This ones doe-foot applicator is different to the others. Its longer and skinnier which makes the colour harder to apply. Also as this formula is the lightest and the thinnest out of the three it needs two coats. The doe-foot being weird makes it harder to apply and it can look a  little streaky. Once its on it lasts a really long time though so its worth the extra effort.

Shabby-Chic

If I had to compile a list of my five all time favourite lipsticks, Shabby-Chic would feature in there somewhere. This one has a regular doe-foot and probably the best formula out of all three. It only needs one coat and the grey-mauve colour is surprisingly wearable. If I had to recommend any of these shades it would be this one.

Velvet Slippers   

So Velvet Slipper looks like a soft reddy-purple in the tube but once I put it on and built it up, so it wasn't patchy, it turns out super dark. As you can see from the arm swatch, one coat leaves it super patchy.  Once its built up it does feel a little thick and chunky, but no worse than one coat of some LA Splash shades I own. 

I decided to wear test this shade as it as the most noticeable, so any changes or rubbing would be more apparent than the others.

Look at my shiny, shiny nose...

So here's an update photo four hours, two cups of tea, some biscuits and a plate of pasta later. As you can see there is some wear and tear around the inside of my lips, but considering I ate a whole plate of pasta and cheese sauce, I'm really impressed. That level of sauce and oil would strip a Kat Von D or an LA Splash clean off my face. These are under half the price of both those brands so for it to have broken down this little is amazing.

So, to summarise, I think these lipstick are really good value and although the formula and applicator vary from colour to colour they all still perform really well. If I had to recommend one it would be Shabby Chic which I think is the best overall. I'd be interested to try more of them, however I have so many matte lipsticks, I'd probably just try them a couple of times then they're sit at the back of my lipstick drawer.

xoxo Scruffy