Rimmel London Glam'Eyes HD English Oak Swatches, Photos and Review

I spotted this colourful Union Jack-designed eyeshadows in a drugstore recently and couldn't pass by without buying one. I'm an Anglophile, I have to own a Union Jack eyeshadow palette!

Rimmel Glam'Eyes HD palettes come in eight variations (you can see them all here). I chose English Oak, a blend of warm-toned browns, arguably the most easily wearable palette of the bunch. 

Here's what the Rimmel website has to say about Glam'Eyes HD eyeshadow:

Rimmel introduces Glam'Eyes HD, our first creamy powder eyeshadow with Velvet-HD technology creates colour that looks perfect under any light. Prismatic pigments catch light at multiple angles, reflecting the ideal colour for the light you are in. Unique palettes of 4 shades expertly coordinated to work in sequence, adapting as light changes to give perfectly complementary effect in any light. Crease-proof colour lasts all day.

The Glam'Eyes HD eyeshadow palettes retail for around $6 CDN, depending where you find them. 

Instructions on the bottom of the palette

Each palette comes with basic instruction of how to use the colours in it together and one of those useless little double-ended sponge applicators which always come with drugstore eyeshadow palettes. Always just toss these, they're utterly useless.

The palette has four eyeshadow colours, separated into 13 sections. While it looks really cool, it's pretty impractical as the tiniest section, containing the copper shade at the top and bottom of the palette, is difficult to get a brush (or that sponge tip applicator) into. 

Swatches

The shades in the palette range from a deep brown to a shimmery vanilla. From L to R (descriptions are BeautySquared):

#4 lid colour - warm chocolate. This colour is the least shimmery of the four.

#3 crease colour - shimmery copper. 

#2 outer corner colour - shimmery bronze.

#1 highlighter colour - golden vanilla.

The package instructions says to apply the chocolate shade on the lid, the highlighter shade on the brow, the copper in the crease and the bronze on the outer corner. 

Here's what the recommended application looks likes:

I found the colours all kind of looked the same applied the way the packaging recommended. Either I blended way too well or the shades maybe shouldn't be worn this way. Unless you like spending lots of time putting together an eye look that could have been achieved using one or two colours. 

I love all of the shades individually though, they're all very, very pretty and applied in a way that allows them to stand out a bit more is perfect. 

The shades will work ideally on blue or green eyes since they're all warm brown and copper shades. They'll also work nicely with hazel and brown eyes.

Review:

I was very impressed with how well these applied although getting the shadows onto a brush was difficult due to the packaging. I recommend using a small, stiffer brush or a brush with a tapered tip with these palettes, not a fluffy brush. I found the product crumbled a little when I worked my brush into the palette and the colours powdered into each other a little. Still, the palette isn't expensive and it's easy enough to tidy up when you're finished.

The shadow formula is very creamy, very blendable, and has a great level of pigmentation. The colours are all shimmery, which is to be expected from most drugstore eyeshadows, but the largest shadow, the chocolate shade, has less shimmer. 

Application-wise, they go very smoothly and have a creamy consistency. It didn't take much product to get a good effect and they blended well. The colours in the English Oak palette are very complimentary to each other, making for a very easy way to get a sultry eye look. 

The colours stayed true throughout the day, giving approximately 10 hours of wear without creasing (with Urban Decay's Primer Potion underneath). The shimmer is a bit too intense for workday wear, but would be fantastic for evening and night. I have not tried the more colourful Glam'Eyes palettes but if English Oak is any indication, the colours of the other palettes will go on well and stay true for a long time.

Have you tried any these super-cool looking Rimmel palettes? 

C.

World Cup Flag Nails

I'm a big fan of football (soccer in North America) so this is a very exciting time for me - it's World Cup! For three weeks, the best teams in the world are gathered in South Africa to play it out and determine which country will hold the title of World Cup champions for the next four years. 


Since Canada hasn't qualified for the World Cup since 1986, I cannot cheer for my own country. Insert sad face here. I do tend to cheer for one opponent in each match and as is customary for Canadians, you cheer for your roots, where your parents/grandparents/great-grandparents etc come from. For me that's France, Germany and if they had qualified for 2010, Poland but the team I support the most is England. I was introduced to football and the madness of the World Cup when I spent the summer of 1998 working in a pub in London. I witnessed the exhilaration, joy, frustration and depression of the fans as England limped out of the contest after a Beckham red card left them a man down. I've also been entranced with the culture of England since my early 20s as yes, you can call me an Anglophile. I think somewhere back there in my roots you can find a drop or two of English blood so it beats a little stronger in me that you'd expect!


All of this making little sense to you? Not to worry, I'm getting to the point of this post. I support England so I painted the English flag onto my nails. 

This is an easy and fun way to sport your team colours. England's flag is pretty simple to recreate - a red cross across a white background - St. George's Cross it is called. Australia, South Korea or Brazil's flags would be a touch more complicated but if you really wanted to have it look close to perfect, go to a nail salon and have it done. I simply bought bottles of white and red nail polish and did the England flag myself. Not bad at all for my first time doing anything but painting a single colour on my nails! I used two coats of the white polish and then with a thin bristled paint brush (available at art stores) painted the red cross on top. It was difficult to get straight, even lines especially on my right hand (I'm right-handed) but I got the effect I wanted. 

I didn't have time to take a proper photo so the one above was taken on my cellphone as I walked to the pub where I watched England's first game.

Another photo of my right (messier) hand taken with my friend Joel's iPhone.

I don't like to give up my girliness even though I'm a fan of football and this is one way I get to show my support that's fun and "me". Anyone can try this - do your toes too! - and it works with any flag. If you can't recreate the flag exactly just use the colours. Give it a try if you're a footie fan - now's the time!

C.