Holiday palettes are everywhere currently but I haven’t been showing some less expensive options have I? I feel like I’ve been awfully fancy shmancy lately! During the holiday season so many high end deals come out that I splurge more often. I had the opportunity to review the Studio Gear Cosmetics Holiday Smokey Eye Palette so I thought I’d share my thoughts with you today!
From Studio Gear Cosmetics-
Studio Gear Cosmetics is a prestigous cosmetics brand featuring a full collection of professional makeup brushes, revolutionizing complexion formulas, and a wide selection of color products for the eyes, cheeks, and lips. This is a line created true to the concept that every woman deserves professional, high quality cosmetics at a reasonable price.
The Studio Gear Professional Brush Collection is the core of the line. Made only from the highest quality hairs and hand-tied for unbeatable quality, women around the country are using this collection to enhance their makeup application and express their creativity with precision. Customer loyalty is ensured through a lifetime product guarantee and with over 40 tools, everything from basic to advanced techniques are covered.
The Studio Gear color palette is vibrant and original – the colors are true, pure, and precise. The simplicity and quality in the eye shadows and lipsticks provide staple colors for any look, whether it be timeless or trend. Customers ask for products by name and keep coming back again and again.  

This is my first time trying out Studio Gear line thus the long paragraphs above about the line. I honestly haven’t heard much because I think my ULTA is still getting their line in. You can purchase Studio Gear from the beauty departments of Bloomingdales, Macy’s, Dillard’s, HSN and ULTA & also on their own website. Being stationed out here I really only have access to ULTA so that’s likely why I have some Studio Gear ignorance. Because of some of the price points I saw online I had pretty high expectations, they are about on par with Stila or Smashbox price wise. The Studio Gear Cosmetics Holiday Smokey Eye Palette is currently on sale on the Studio Gear website for $25 but the regular retail price is $40. That’s quite high for 4 eyeshadows & one blush in my opinion so I expect nice packaging, high quality pigmentation, fantastic texture, & a wearable look overall since this comes as a palette. After checking the ULTA website (where I’d naturally shop) they have this palette listed as $10 or free with any $30 Studio Gear purchase. Um. Okay? Whatever, onto the review shall we?

Let me start with the packaging: it doesn’t blow me away. It feels a bit cheap & the sleeve is pretty but once removed there is absolutely nothing about this palette I find “holiday” or even the palette name located anywhere. The palette is made from very thin but quite sturdy cardboard & it closes with an invisible magnetic closure. The front is simply black, grey, & white with their logo & name. The back has a long list of ingredients for each product inside. Zero decoration or anything that would let me know the name of this palette later on or that I bought it around the holidays. Guess the sleeve is supposed to stay on? The one pro on packaging is that although quite thin I find it very sturdy, worth mentioning again in fact.

Inside…we have no mirror. Maybe this is a personal pet peeve but I just dislike wasted space. Sure the look idea is pretty but I would have preferred it on an extras card or even on the back of the palette. Mirrors reign for me. The look idea is also just a sticker, mine is already starting to pull & peel a bit at the edges. Not impressed. The one nice thing about the top of the palette is you can see the shade names I suppose, again, something that could have gone below each eyeshadow or on the back of the palette. The not so nice part about the diagram is that it has the eyeshadows located in the wrong places…not sure if mine is a dud or if they’re all like this. They specify how to get the look using lots of other Studio Gear products, none of which I’ve tried or were included with the palette itself but it is a standard smoky look.

Let’s dive into the actual products shall we? You receive 4 eyeshadows & one blush which is in the center of the palette. All of the products contain shimmer. The blush is Snowy Glow & the eyeshadows are Platinum, Frost, Coal, & Glimmer.

The pigmentation on this palette is pretty poor although the shade Platinum & Snowy Glow blush are absolutely lovely. Snowy Glow is very similar to NARS Orgasm or TheBalm Hot Mama blushes, a beautiful peachy pink with golden shimmer. It is much prettier once swatched than I had anticipated in the pan. Frost (a frosty, shimmery white) is extremely difficult to work with- very flaky, crumbly, & barely any pigmentation. Glimmer is actually pretty in the pan (a very pale gold with hints of champagne) but swatches extremely sheer. This was the most depressing for me because I actually don’t have anything like it & it is lovely in the pan. Coal is kind of a poorly pigmented shade but that isn’t so terrible if you’re just looking to blend or darken. Coal is a chalky medium silvered charcoal with silver shimmer. Platinum is by far the standout in the eyeshadow category- buttery & beautiful metallic silver. I wish the rest of the shades performed this well, it is truly lovely.

Overall I can see where they were going with this palette & if you pick up some other items from Studio Gear at ULTA I think this is a nice freebie. At $10 (or even less after the holidays) I think this palette might find a happy home in someone’s stash for the shade Platinum & the blush in Snowy Glow. Because this didn’t perform for me personally I don’t see myself reaching for it much but I’d still really like to try some more Studio Gear items to check out if this was some kind of fluke. Especially the blushes! If you chose to order from the Studio Gear website you can also use code SGHOLIDAY for 10% off.

What do you think? Have you tried any items from Studio Gear? Anything I need to check out in particular?