The Balm "Shady Lady Volume2" Palette

This product were sent to me for review purposes - I am neither affiliated with TheBalm, nor paid for these reviews. My reviews are always honest and based on my own experiences and skintype etc - I would always recommend that you read as many reviews as possible on a product prior to making a purchase. 

This little gem was a complete surprise when it arrived a couple of weeks ago.
Packaging wise, this is reminiscent of Benefit - ie strong card (so avaoid water!) and with a heavy pinch of kitch, however, this is more Hawaii-5-0 kitch than 50's plaything... The zebra print compact contains a decent sized (proper) mirror, with bright pink accents on the inside.

So, on the surface this is a very cute looking palette. But fear not - this is definitely NOT a case of style over substance! Beneath its cute exterior, lies a very well thought out selection of colours;

Apologies - as you can probably tell from this shot, I was unable to restrain myself from swatching the colours before I took the photo's. The darker shadows in the palette are also marked as liners (the taupey looking one on the top right has a nice ashy undertone, making it good for brows too. The palette contains a great range of colours, which make it easy to create both neutral and more dramatic looks. 

These shadows have a very soft, blendable texture - no hint of chalkiness, and pigmentation wise they are excellent. and the shimmer and nuances of the colour seen in the pan are easily replicated upon application. These swatches were taken from one swipe across the surface of the shadow;

 The palette arrived with two dinky brushes - a liner and a curved blending brush;

Given that these are travel sized, I was a little bit dubious about this, however they are not bad - comparing them to full sized high end MAC brushes (for example) seems a little redundant, but they do a decent job, and have been added to my travel brush kit...

TheBalm is available at Harvey Nichols (London, Dublin, Birmingham) and online at Cult Beauty and the Shady Lady 2 palette retails at £38.00 ( FYI - that works out at £4.20 per shadow, each of which is approx the size of a MAC shadow!)

The Verdict - Highly recommend this palette, as it is well put together, and will enable you to create a great range of looks. The shadows are very good quality, creamy. blendable and extremely well pigmented.