Hi guys! Finally another update! I got this Shu Uemura order in the mail about a month ago and I’ve been meaning to blog about it but I just could not for the life of me get a good picture of me wearing the stuff from this palette LOL. Everytime I tried it’d be bad FOTD weather… today was pretty bad FOTD weather too but I just decided to suck it up because otherwise I’d never get anything posted!

So here’s my order. The big cleansing oil, the mini rose depsea water and the mini gloss were GWP for orders over $65 while the little cleansing oil was my deluxe sample. I have to say, I’m all around a bit peeved at Shu Uemura, because the week after I ordered they had the shu uemura x aya takano GWP pouch offer which I REALLY wanted and thought we weren’t going to get in the US!! T_T;

Shu Uemura x Aya Takano Bowwow! Magic Queen Palette + GWP

Now it seems like I’m gonna have to eBay for it or something. I have to admit the GWP I got was pretty nice. The gloss is pretty much clear with small silver sparkles and it smells and feels nice. I love the mini rose depsea water and while I don’t use the cleansing oil I know someone who loves it. :D Then I got my order and I was even more annoyed at Shu Uemura. My whole order was thrown in a box with two sheets of tissue paper (not even wrapped) and I could hear everything bumping around when I picked it up. Happily nothing got broken but the backside of the palette’s box got pretty beat up. I was especially annoyed because I collect limited edition packaging. I guess I should just be happy that the front side of the box with the illustration wasn’t damaged. ;_;

Shu Uemura x Aya Takano Holiday ’10 Bowwow! Magic Queen palette box

I’m not going to lie – my purchase was definitely fueled by my love for the packaging. I really adore Shu Uemura’s Holiday collaborations and I think I’m going to be collecting at least one piece a year for a very long time. Though I really loved the art this year, I wasn’t terribly impressed with the most of the pieces. (I dunno, I’m not really a lipstain/potted gloss person and I don’t use gel/cream blush.) I bought the Bowwow! Magic Queen palette because the colors looked more wearable, even though I thought the illustrations for the Reindeer Kiss palette looked cuter, but I’m actually surprised at how much I like the Bowwow! Magic Queen! The illustration on the box is really nice in person and I LOVE the image on the compact. Super cute! ♥

Bowwow! Magic Queen palette	Back of palette

I’m also really happy to report that Bowwow! Magic Queen is a beautiful palette of wearable colors! I didn’t get either palette from last year (even though I really desperately wanted the Planet Cat compact) since I just couldn’t see myself wearing those colors (individually or together). Bowwow! Magic Queen is much more conservative in terms of color choices, but they’re gorgeous and great for the holidays. The compact is mirrored, and it comes with a double sided sponge-tip applicator and a double-ended brush with a side for liner and the other side looks like a regular-sized eye blending brush but I assume it’s meant for the blush.

Inside the palette

Here are swatches. The blush is a matte, neutral light pink with tiny gold sparkles. It’s light, and on the sheer side, but it has that beautiful lit-from-within quality I love about Shu Uemura blushes. I personally feel it’s a little bit heavy on the gold sparkles for everyday, but it’s also lovely as a highlighter on top of other blushes. (Then again, the sparkles are REALLY small, and hard to pick out individually unless you’re looking for them, and the barista on campus told me my cheeks looked beautifully glowy the last time I wore it alone.) The three eyeshadows are all metallic, gold, taupe and bronze (the palette calls them B1, B2 and B3). They’re all highly pigmented and creamy. I swatched all the powder shades with my finger on bare skin and the swatches don’t do these colors justice. They’re much prettier when applied with a brush. While you can wear the eyeshadow colors together, I’ve found that they’re actually really excellent as accent colors. I’ve been using them to compliment the Bobbi Brown Day-to-Night Warm Eye palette a lot recently. Last, there are two cream shadow/liner colors, a pearly pale gold and a matte forest green. I haven’t actually tried these yet because I’ve heard terrible things about their staying power, but the gold is really pretty and looks like it’d be a beautiful cream highlighter.

Swatches (L-R): Blush B6, Eyeshadows: gold B1, taupe B2, bronze B3, Liners: gold B5, green B4.

And here’s my FOTD. I apologize for being washed out – it’s been cloudy a lot recently and so I just decided to go with this picture since it’s supposed to rain the next three days lol. I’m wearing the gold and bronze eyeshadows from the palette along with the blush. As you can see, the blush is actually really cute! For the eyes, I’m wearing Bobbi Brown Velvet Bronze all over the lid with Espresso in the outer corner. Then, I put B3 in the center of my lid and blended B1 into it from the inner corner. I also used B1 as my tearduct highlight and I lined the bottom outer corner of my eyes with BB Velvet Bronze. On my lips I’m wearing a thin layer of Shu Uemura Pink Venus, from last year’s holiday collection. I think it’s a pretty, casual holiday look. =)

Face: Shu Uemura Face Architect 964 + 754, MUFE Full Coverage Concealer 6, Murad Acne Treatment Concealer Medium; Cheeks: Shu Uemura Bowwow! Magic Queen B6; Eyes: Shu Uemura Bowwow! Magic Queen B1 & B3, Bobbi Brown Velvet Bronze & Espresso, HIP Gold Charge, UD 24/7 Bourbon; Lips: Shu Uemura Pink Venus;

I’ve also really liked wearing the B2 shade in the center of my lid over taupe eyeshadows like BB Burnt Sugar, and I wear B3 over BB Velvet Bronze without the gold for bronzier looks too (great with bronze/peach blush and Shu Jupiter Brown).

All-in-all I really love this palette and I’m really happy I decided to buy it. The only things that annoy me are how easily the compact holds fingerprints (but this is very common) and getting powder into the cream products, but it’s only really an issue for the gold cream to get blush in it, and if I pull my blush brush the other direction or pat, it’s not too bad. =)

What did you guys think of the Shu Uemura x Aya Takano collection? Who put out your favorite Holiday collection this year? And what was your favorite holiday collection of all time? (I think my favorite collection of all time still has to be Shu’s collab with Tsumori Chisato for Holiday ’09. :D)