Christmas Gift Idea #3: The Color Institute's Ultimate Color Portfolio

This review is of a product that I recently mentioned in a post about the new holiday products at Shopper's Drug Mart. This Ultimate Color Portfolio by The Color Institute is available at Shopper's Drug Mart for $14.99. It comes with 80 eyeshadows and 70 lip colours. This caught my eye because the eyeshadows looked really shimmery and I figured they would be similar to the quality of Wet N Wild's eyeshadows, which are very soft and pigmented. I thought this because Wet N Wild and The Color Institute are both owned by Markwins International.

The palette is divided into 9 sections. The top row starts with dark shimmery eyeshadows on the left. The top middle are some neutral lip colours and the top right are light shimmery eyeshadows. The left middle are bright and reddish lip colours, the middle has some brushes and applicators and the right middle has neutral and pink/purple lip colours. The bottom left contains some earthy coloured matte and satin finish eyeshadows, the bottom middle has some darker neutral and bright pink lip colours and the bottom left has some pastel matte and satin finish eyeshadows, along with a few black and white ones.

The quality of the eyeshadows is better than you'd expect from a palette like this and at this price. The top left and right sections of eyeshadows are the best, while the bottom left and right sections of eyeshadows are hit and miss. For the most part, the matte finish ones are terrible. They aren't pigmented and don't transfer well onto a brush or onto the skin. The satin finish ones are all right and are better when used over a primer.

Close-up of section 1 (top left eyeshadows)

The above photos are swatches of all of the colours in the top left section of the palette. They are swatched alone and without the aid of a primer. All of the eyeshadows in the top left section are pigmented and soft! However, there is a small bit of fall out.

Close-up of the top middle section of lip colours (swatches of some colours towards the end of this post)

Close-up of the top right section of the palette.

The above photos are swatches of the eyeshadows in the top right section of the palette. They are soft and pigmented as well, also with a small bit of fall out.

Close up of the left middle section of lip colours. Swatches towards the end of this post.

Close-up of the right middle section of lip colours. Swatches towards the end of this post.

Close-up of the bottom left section of eyeshadows. 

Swatches of some of the colours from the bottom left section. These aren't as pigmented at the ones in the top two sections, but they would be decent over a primer. Some colours weren't worth swatching at the pigmentation is horrible.

Close-up of the bottom left eyeshadow section.

Swatches of the bottom left eyeshadow section. The two black colours are quite good, but you can tell that the purple, blue and grey colours were difficult to swatch. For the most part, the matte colours aren't very pigmented at all.

Close-up of the bottom middle lip colour section.

Swatches of some of the lip colours. 

I chose not to swatch all of the lip colours because a lot of them are very close in colour and they would look the exact same on camera. The pigmentation of the dark colours are good, but are still not as dark as they appear in the palette. The light colours are better in pigmentation as they apply closer to the colour that they appear to be.

I'm not a big fan of the lip colours because they are a bit sticky and don't have a very good taste. They basically taste like cheap lip gloss. 

I think this would be a good palette to give a teenager who is just starting to get into makeup. The quality of the eyeshadows (particularly the ones in the top two sections) is very good for the price. The palette is worth it just for those 40 eyeshadows. The other eyeshadows aren't as good, though there are a few that are worth trying out.

For $14.99, I think this palette is worth it, just for the eyeshadows alone, and if you can get past the taste of the lip colours, then it's an even better deal.

The quality of makeup sets from this brand has certainly improved over the years. I remember when sets used to have eyeshadows that were incredibly difficult to use. Overall, I'd say that this is a good starter palette for teenagers or for anyone who is just starting to get into makeup.

Summary:

Product: The Color Institute's Ultimate Color Portfolio 

Price: $14.99 (Shopper's Drug Mart Canada)

Grade: B-

Read about more gift ideas here:

Top 10 Gift Ideas for Teenage Girls

Top 10 Gift Ideas for Women

Where to Purchase Affordable Makeup

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Wet n Wild ColorIcon Baked Eyeshadows in Canada?

Kind of!

Wet n Wild typically doesn't sell a lot of their Limited Edition products in Canada, but I recently spotted a baked eyeshadow set at Shopper's Drug Mart that contains baked eyeshadows in the same packaging as the new Wet n Wild ones.

They were in a Color Institute set called "Get Baked!" and the entire set costs $24.99.

The small palettes at the top of the set look really similar to the new Wet n Wild ones. 

The set also comes with an eyeshadow base, 4 cream eyeshadows, 4 liquid liners, 4 shimmer sticks, 4 eyebrow pencils, a sharpener, 4 sponge tip applicators and a small brush. All for $24.99!

You can see that there are four palettes in this set, one in blue/white/black/silver, pink/taupe/silver, green/gold/brown and purple/bronze/brown.

Though the combinations of colours in the Color Institute palettes aren't the exact same as the Wet n Wild ones, there are many similarities. For example, Wet n Wild's blue palette has two marble shades and a peacock blue, while the Color Institute has one marble colour and a dark navy. All the other colours are the same. 

The other sets have a few colours that are different as well, but what I find interesting is that the Color Institute has another palette in the collection (the green one).

I found out that the Color Institute is part of the Marwins International company, which is the same company that owns Wet n Wild. This would explain why the packaging is the exact same (clear plastic lid) and why the colours are so similar.

If you live outside of the U.S. and have access to products from the Color Institute, keep an eye out for this set!

It ends up being cheaper than buying the Wet n Wild ones because they are $4.99 (in the U.S.) each, so all three would be about $15, but for $24, you can get four palettes plus all the other items in the set!

*I plan on going to the U.S. in a week or so, and if I can find the Wet n Wild palettes, I'll do a comparison review to see if these Color Institute palettes are the exact same in quality or not. Stay tuned!

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The Color Institute: Make-up Studio Palette (Great Gift/Starter Palette!)

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I was in Shopper's Drug Mart the other day and I noticed they had some of their holiday gift sets out on display. I picked up this palette from The Color Institute at Shopper's for $14.99. I have also seen this sold at Kohl's in the U.S. for around the same price.

This palette includes:

• 6 cream/glitter 'highlights'
• 24 eyeshadows
• 12 lip glosses
• 2 blushes (each blush separated into 4 different colours)
• 2 bronzers (each bronzer separated into 4 different colours)
• 2 highlight colours
• 1 mascara
• 6 small applicators

It comes in a box which has a flap that you can lift up to see exactly what you are getting inside.

After taking it out of the box, you can see that the palette is much smaller than the box. I was expecting it to be a bit larger, but once the tiers are expanded, it is good size.

The 'eye highlights' (glitter/cream eyeshadows) can be seen from the top of the palette on the left and right hand sides.

 After opening the lid, you can see that it comes with a mirror, eyeshadows on the side and the mascara in the middle.

Here is what it looks like when it is fully expanded.

After swatching everything in the palette, I was most impressed with the bronzers. They are a great combination of shimmer and matte, but my only problem is that the bronzer is a bit too small and my larger brushes have a hard time of picking up the product. I am extremely careful as well because the lip glosses are right beside it and I don't want my brush to get into it.

Here are some swatches of everything inside this palette.

Pictured above are swatches of the eyeshadows. I chose to swatch some of my favourite colours. They don't have names, but the colours on the right hand side of the palette are more matte than the shimmery ones on the left hand side of the palette. There is some fall out, but it isn't as much as I had expected. Overall, I was pleased with these eyeshadows, but not blown away.

These are swatches of the 'eye highlights' which are basically glitter/cream eyeshadows. They have glitter on top, so when you first use them, they will be full of glitter. After that, you are left with a cream eyeshadow. I swatched from right to left, so I started with the gold colour which swatched very nicely and didn't have a lot of glitter (mostly it has very fine glitter in it). Then I went onto the red which had almost no shimmer either and is definitely the most pigmented of them all (and my favourite). Then I swatched the green, and you can see that I swatched it twice. The green swatch on the right was the first one and it picked up a lot of the glitter on top. The green one on the left is a swatch after most of the glitter was gone. You can see that the actual product under the glitter looks less pigmented. This is the same of the other colours.I was most disappointed with the blue colour because the cream underneath is very weakly pigmented.

These are swatches of the bronzers. I wanted to swatch each colour separately because I have a hard time using a brush (and getting all the colours at once). I think I will end up using each colour as an eyeshadow. I love the quality of these bronzers as eyeshadows because they are pigmented and seem to blend nicely. The first four swatches on the left are from the right side of the palette and vice versa.

The first two swatches are of the shimmer/highlight powders, and they are all right. I think that if you were to use them over some sort of base that they would look a lot better. The other two swatches are of the blushes and I think they are a bit too intense for me, but using them sparingly could give just the right amount of colour.

These swatches are of some of the lip glosses. I swatched all of the more intense colours because the lighter ones didn't show up on my skin when I swatched them. These lip glosses are creamy and not too greasy. I love the pigmentation of these.

Those are my first impressions of all the products inside this palette. I haven't had a chance to use it enough to give a decent review, but I hope the swatches were helpful.

As of right now, I don't think I would recommend this palette if you're someone who already has a lot of makeup. There isn't really a stand out product that I thought would make this palette worthwhile.

However, I think this is a great gift to give someone who wants to get into makeup, or is coming into that age.

I remember getting makeup sets when I was younger and the quality of most of them was horrible. I was thankful for the gift of course, and at the time I really loved using them, but looking back, the quality wasn't that great.

This palette has some good quality makeup in it though, and I think it would be a great starter palette.

My major problem with it though (and many other combination palettes) is that they put the lip glosses and other cream-based products right beside the powder ones. Powdery products tend to have some fallout and if you're travelling with these palettes, the powder will get into the cream products. This can ruin your lip glosses and other cream products, either by changing their texture or their colour.

My suggestion would be that they should put these creamy products on another tier of the palette, or in a small drawer. An example of this would be NYX's Nude on Nude Palette (click to view). The eyeshadows are on the top level and the lip glosses come out of the bottom and are located in their own separate drawer.

Overall, I would recommend this as a starter palette. It's a great price for some good quality makeup!

Summary:


Product: The Color Institute's Make-up Studio Palette
Price: $14.99 (Shopper's Drug Mart, Kohl's)
Grade: B-

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