Themed Palettes: Kailav & Colourpop

I love love concept palettes. Concept palettes seduce me more than Duke of Hasting’s smoldering. So when I came across the Kailav and Colourpop collections, I had to order them.

Colourpop x Avatar and The Last Airbender

So Colourpop launched another collection. I know you’ve heard this joke but they’re truly DJ Khaled at this point. I’m Colourpop fatigued and I can’t tell one collection from another. But the Colourpop x Avatar the Last Airbender (ATLA) collection truly stood out because of its execution. (Sidebar: After the ATLA collection, CP released 2 other collections — Daisy Does It and xtra Celestial… right after! Like a day or two after. Slow down Colourpop! At this point CP is like a desperate boyfriend/girlfriend trying hard to keep their partner interested. And have they stopped uploading swatch parties on YouTube?)

I remember watching Avatar The Last Airbender, the anime, when I was a teenager. I quite liked it but I always ended up watching Card Captors and Fuishi Yugi. Of course, once I became an adult, you couldn’t stop me from watching Kung Fu movies (I know, I know, Kung Fu is Chinese and Anime is Japanese, but I’m talking about my growth from watching non-violent shows to action packed martial arts movies).

My first reaction to the sneak peek of the ATLA collection was: “I like the appa mirror, but I’m not sure about the rest”. Like most fans have pointed out, the collection is not a true representation of the show at all. But I think what ColourPop has caught onto, which many other companies like elf in the past has, is that turning a collab collection into a mainstream collection helps sell products. The Powerpuff girls collection is a good example of this. The colors were a true representation of Powerpuff Girls, but the packaging was awful. It felt like Claire’s makeup. The ATLA palette on the other hand; the packaging is amazing, but the colors are not true to the show. But that makes it wearable. Remember, the people who watched and remember the show are now 30-somethings with a corporate day job.

So I went from “I’m not sure” to “I like the colors in the palette”. I ended up purchasing the mirror, a lip tint and the eye shadow palette. A special shout out to the packaging designer and to whoever put together the collection. The person who designed this collection really spent time on it. The eye shadow palette design is so amazing, that I promptly depotted into another magnetic palette so that I don’t spoil the packaging. Every detail in the packaging from the gold detailing to size & shape is amazing. Now this could be due to Nickelodeon’s oversight. If I remember right, the Wet n Wild x Spongebob collection was a hit too and Spongebob, like ATLA, is a property of Nickelodeon. I hope they don’t go the Disney route and license their trademarks to anybody and everybody. The fallout of Disney’s brand strategy is visible on the shelves of Dollaramas in Toronto.

What I like about ColourPop is the anxiety free delivery. Sure it took forever to get delivered; so long that the collection was sold out by the time I received it.

Appa Mirror

The mirror is a standard pocket size mirror. You can get something similar at Miniso or Daiso, but I have to admit that the design is cute.

If you really, really want it, buy an Appa sticker from etsy and a simple mirror off of amazon and put them together. Trust me, that’s pretty close to what CP has done. Better yet buy an Appa plush.

Price: US$ 12

Lip Tint in Sealed with a Kiss

I had high hopes for this lip tint. I didn’t expect the gloss to last but I was hoping that the tint would last long, but it didn’t. I wore it for 8 hours and the tint started fading at around 4 – 5 hour mark. In comparison, the Peripera Ink Velvet lasts a good 9 – 10 hours for me. The color is pretty, but all in all, I wouldn’t repurchase this formula.

Price: US$ 9

Avatar the Last Airbender palette

The palette itself is small, smaller than I expected. Something about CP’s marketing that always catches me off guard is the size of CP palettes. I have the Sweet Talk and California Love and they’re small too. Something else that caught me off guard was the number of times this palette was restocked. Either Colourpop released the palettes in small batches to create demand or they actually produced more; I can’t tell which is true. This collection was well executed so it could’ve actually been popular. It is the first collection in ages to be sold out twice.

Now the colors in the palette are wearable and I like it because of that. But, they’re not very Brown Girl Friendly; especially for some of us with golden undertones. You need a good primer for the colors to show up true to pan. I had trouble working with blues but I just realized that may be something to do with me and my level of skill. I’ve had the same issue with blues in the Pacifica’s Moonflower Palette and Revlon’s palettes. The blues also had a lot of fallout. Be warned, do your make up after you do the eyes.

Some combinations I used and I’ve enjoyed so far are:

• Ice Shield all over the lid, Moon Spirit in the center and Earth Kingdom in my crease
• Vortex all over my lid, Quick Sand layered over it and Air blast in the corners of my eyes
• Air temple all over my lid and Quick Sand layered over it

As I use the other colors, I’ll update this post.

The shimmers are fall out city. If you’re using shimmers make sure to use a wet brush and a primer or glitter glue for maximum impact. Without a wet brush or primer, the shimmers just looked like random glitter on the eyes.

The mattes were great and easy to use. They lasted longer on my un-primed eyes. The blues, both shimmer and matte had the maximum fallout. The worst shadow was Earth Rumble. It’s supposed to be Khaki-ish Green, but as you blend it turns black-ish grey. This was unfortunate because I had a video call and I couldn’t wear a smokey look to work!

Some of the shades in this palette are unique like the blue shimmer and the white shimmer, although I was able to find some similar shades in my collection already.

Is this palette worth it? Nope. I clearly fell for the packaging and the color scheme.

Price: US$ 22

If you still want a decent Avatar themed makeup collection keep an eye on the Boxlunch website. There weren’t too many reviews of this collection, and from the only review I saw on YouTube, I assume the quality isn’t the best. Their brushes seem cute though. The palette is out of stock but the artwork on it is so beautiful. Caution: I have never purchased from Boxlunch or used their products, so I can’t recommend the site or the collection.

Kailav Beauty (formerly Museé Beauty) Impressionism + Van Gogh Palette Curation

This might sound elitist (a la Frasier) but I love Art, Opera and the Symphony. I don’t remember how I came across the brand Kailav (or Musee) and the Art Nouveau palette but I like that this an Asian-owned brand and that the colors are brown girl friendly. Now, I have a series called Brown Girl Friendly because I recently realized, much later than I should’ve, that what suits White and Black skin sometimes doesn’t suit Brown skin. Us shade in-betweeners with golden undertones are in a twilight zone when it comes foundation and eye-shadow shades.

I chose the Impressionism + Van Gogh Palette Curation over the Art Neuvo palette (which is inspired by Gustav Klimt’s art) because the Impressionism and Van Gogh palettes seem true to the concept. Now I love Gustav Klimt’s the Kiss; something about it reminds me of bitter sweet moments in a significant other’s arms after a long, tiring week. It’s one of my favorite pieces of art. But the problem I have with the Art Nouveau palette is that it does not capture the essence of the painting. For one, there should be more yellows and gold. And second, it could easily have been edited down to a 9 or 12 pan shadow. Instead they created a rainbow palette and slapped a Gustav Klimt on the cover. If I had to redo the palette, the palette would consist of Indigo, mustard yellow, gold, pale yellow beige, grey, black, purple, lavender, red, reddish brown, coral (inspired by the lady’s lips) and green. The palette needs 3 yellows at least! If you look at the painting the first thing that hits you is the warmth of the yellow. The palette does not capture any of this.

The Daydream paint palette on the other hand is very pretty but I don’t create art; so I have no use for an eyeliner palette. I love the concept and if I had any artistic talent, I would’ve definitely grabbed it.

Now onto the Impressionism bundle. Before ordering the palette, I knew I’d be dropping a huge sum on this palette. Indie make up brands’ shipping prices are exorbitant. I paid around CAD 26 in shipping. Surprisingly, I didn’t pay any additional customs or duties; it looks like that was already included in the huge shipping cost.

I ordered the palette on Mar 25 and it took forever to reach Toronto. I know that the shipping is supposedly Carbon Neutral but it travelled through more states in the US than I have!

Van Gogh Palette

I love this palette! I was surprised by the quality. It was, borrowing a few terms from BTS, smooth like butter. This is a carefully edited palette and 9 pans are all you need to capture the essence of this painting. I’ve seen so many shadow palettes where the packaging has a piece of art but the colors don’t represent the painting at all. This is probably the first time I’ve bought make up for the makeup and not the packaging.

It is such a Brown Girl Friendly palette, that I can see myself using the entire palette, even the green and yellows. The shadows lasted me 6 – 8 hours and survived a workout.

If you’re thinking of trying Kailav’s formula, go with this palette. Between the two, this felt cohesive and had better quality.

Now most of the colors in this palette can be easily found in your collection. The only unusual color was Irises and I loved the quality of the shadow. Cottage is the perfect tone of brown for me and Terrace reminded me of a Colourpop shadow called Good Life.

Why would you buy it? The only reasons to buy this palette are if you’re looking for a Brown Girl Friendly palette or if you love art and want a makeup the represents Van Gogh’s art or if you don’t have a huge makeup collection.

Impressionism Palette

I was surprised with this palette. The artwork seems to be a version of Monet’s Water Lilies, which may be why they have taken the liberties that they have with it. For one, it is a rainbow palette with a version of the Water Lilies artwork slapped on the packaging. They do seem to be hinting at Water Lilies because of the names of the shadows. I’m also surprised that they chose this piece of art because it’s a reminder of souls lost to World War I.

(Learn more about this piece of art on Great Art Explained on YouTube)

Not surprisingly, I had an issue with the color story. The palette wasn’t edited and has so many similar colors. This could’ve easily been a 9 – 12 shadow palette instead of a 16 shadow palette. Some shadows weren’t even relevant to theme or the art; shades like Poppies, Scintillate, Haystack, Wisp and Giverny were unnecessary. I know you need to include browns in a palette or the influencers will scream their heads off about the palette not being a “one and done” palette, but it just didn’t make sense including it here.

Quality-wise, I was not so impressed with this palette. The quality wasn’t as good as the Van Gogh and some of the shadows didn’t last as long on me. That being said, it was when I started using this palette that I started realizing how bad ColourPop shadows’ quality is.

I have to mention that I love Scintillate, the duochrome in the palette and it reminds me of an infamous Make up Geek (RIP) shadow in the MUG Manny palette. Besides, it did not last long on my eyes. I had to re-apply the shadow during the day.

All in all, I did not like it as much as the Van Gogh palette in every way: in terms of execution, quality and color selection.

Should you buy it? If you’re looking for a rainbow palette and you’re brown, then yes. Though I didn’t like the palette as much as the Van Gogh palette, I must admit the tones are perfect for my skin tone.

P.s: I hope Kailav creates a palette based on Georges Seurat’s A Sunday Afternoon on the Island of La Grande Jatte. It can be such a beautiful purple, burnt ochre, terracotta and muted red palette.

Featured Image Photo by Alina Grubnyak on Unsplash