Lancôme 29, Saint Honoré: Blondette Fatale Eye and Brow Palette

As part of the 29, Saint Honoré collection, Lancôme have produced a beautiful neutrals palette. A mix of taupes and browns with different finishes, this is truly an eyeshadow palette to fall in love with. Well, it certainly is if you're as taupe obsessed as me! The shades are not overly warm and are suitable for producing either a smoky look or a contoured, defined eye look. In true Aaron de Mey fashion, the matte shades in the palette can also be used as brow powders. I remember when I met Aaron last year that he expressed a love of multi-purpose makeup. He also recommends using the colours wet for a more intense look. Though I find the colours to be nicely pigmented dry too.

On to the colours. There is a stunning frosted, light pinky taupe, a frosted bronze, a satin finish taupe and matte, cool dark brown. All of the colours have good pigmentation and feel very smooth in texture. The satin finish taupe is the perfect crease colour for a defined eye. I'm also in love with the dark brown eyeshadow as it is pigmented, not red based and there's not a hint of chalkiness. It reminds me a little of RBR Blackpepper Jay. I've used it successfully as both a liner shade and to add depth to the crease. The light frosted taupe is beautiful. I'm sometimes wary of shimmer on my (more mature) eyes but this is well done and I feel confident wearing it with the non-shimmery shades. I have used the bronze-y shade least but this also makes a nice lid colour. There are pictures of the colours applied in my most recent FOTD post here.

 

I have included some pictures comparing Blondette Fatale to a few of my other neutrals palette for reference. The ArtDeco eyeshadow look quite similar to the lighter Blondette Fatale colours. 

 

If you're a big fan of neutrals or you don't own any neutrals and you're looking for a good palette, I think this would be a good investment. I think for me this is a near perfect selection of colours. The only thing I think it's lacking is a matte highlighter but that would make in a quint not a quad and I really have plenty enough already! Blondette Fatale costs £33 and is available at Lancôme counters now.

Disclosure: PR Sample

L'Wren Scott Collection for Lancôme

I had the great pleasure to meet Aaron de Mey yesterday, Global Make up Director for Lancôme. He was in town to promote the current collection, a collaboration with L'Wren Scott which I believe is already on counter.

There were only six of us there so it was a tremendous privilege and we had the opportunity to probe Aaron for make up tips and tricks. I love Aaron's approach to make up, he's not a fan of foundation and prefers to use concealer to maintain the natural contours and highlights of the face. I love make up which enhances natural features rather than creating a mask, so I really appreciate this ethos. I sense that Aaron likes to play with make up; using a lip balm to create an eye gloss or highlight the face, a clear mascara to tame the brows or using a lipstick as a blusher. He also introduced me to a few  products from Lancôme's range that I hadn't come across: Teint Miracle concealer, La Touche Pro concealer and Eclat Miracle. The Eclat Miracle (or Liquid Mirror) uses the same light reflecting particles that are in the Teint Miracle foundation and it is the most beautiful highlighter, it's such a refined pearl glow. Being a concealer obsessive, I'm really keen to give La Touche Pro a test drive, it has a lovely texture and coverage. I'd love to see if these products could take me back to my no foundation days of the summer. Anyway, I digress..

I was really interested to hear how Aaron enjoys working with L'Wren on make up looks for her shows. He describes her as one of very few of friends that actually wears make up and that she loves to have a new and unique item especially for her collections. One of the gems of this collaboration, the steel grey nail polish (Le Gris), was developed for L'Wren's collection last year. It was a perfect match for a dress that formed part of the collection. It is a stunning colour, I can easily see this being a best seller.

The eyeshadow quad that L'Wren designed for the collection begs a smoky eye. It would have been rude not to ask Aaron's favourite way to achieve it. Aaron described his love for the more edgy looks as well as the more sophisiticated.  His basis for all good smoky looks is to start with a favourite eye pencil and layer. He likes to use a balm to turn the shadow or pencil in to a gloss to create a less structured, more "fashion" look.  He also explained that it pays to do the eye make up first rather than after foundation, to allow for clean up afterwards. He described how to use concealer to blend the edges and to apply as a triangle underneath the eye as this is an area prone to natural darkness.

We all received an eyeshadow quad signed by Aaron and of course being a diligent beauty blogger, today I had a go at putting some of his inspiring tips in to practice. Post to come of course, along with swatches of the palette. For now I shall leave you with a picture of Aaron and myself. Do please excuse the fact that I look like a chipmunk with Dame Edna's glasses on. It's definitely not my finest hour! Even the gorgeous Ruth had a slight wardrobe malfunction during this photo session, so I will console myself with the fact that it happens to even the best of them.